76

Kampa Dzong, Tsang Province, Tibet

April 25, 1939

5:00 p.m.

At the imposing gates of the Kampa Dzong fortress, Macfarlane gladly let Zazar, Colonel Atkinson’s official travel documents held upside down in his big hand, do the talking. Entry was quickly permitted through the immense stone walls into a courtyard full of people. Tibetan noblemen, monks, paupers, soldiers, even small children were all standing in a circle, looking in on a cleared space writhing with colorful motion, a halo of dust hovering above.

The young lieutenant presumed they must be watching a fight, but as he pushed nearer, he saw that it was actually a dance. Curtained in brightly embroidered yet tattered ceremonial robes that draped from their arms and legs, every participant wore a tarnished copper mask beneath a headdress of horn, feathers, and long plaits of matted, woven yak hair. The bear, the yak, the fish, the wolf, the horse, and the pig strutted and spun violently around a smaller yet wilder dancer thrashing desperately in their middle. Holding out silk-swathed arms, flapping them like wings, it pecked back with its sharply hooked metal beak and clawed at them with long, hooked, wooden claws.

“Tibetan devil dance, sir. The spirits are being summoned to kill a hawk demon,” the Gurkha sergeant whispered into Macfarlane’s ear as he watched. Even through his fatigue, it was an amazing sight to witness, as if the long trek to get to that forsaken place had distorted the barriers of time and deposited them into the Middle Ages.

The British officer looked around at the spellbound crowd, only slightly less strange than the dancers at its center. He noticed a small urchin, wedged between the legs of the spectators on the opposite side of the square, staring at the scene. Transfixed with a look of total horror, the boy was holding a small animal in the front of his filthy jacket. Macfarlane thought the grey, fluffy bundle was a baby rabbit or a cat, but then he saw that it too had a sharp, hooked beak and black shiny dots for eyes. It was a hawk, a kestrel or peregrine, still very young, downy and round, only recently taken from the nest. Sensing he was being watched, the boy broke his gaze from the gyrating hawk dancer to look straight at Macfarlane. Slipping back between the legs around him, he vanished.

Goaded by vibrating blasts from long horns arranged on the battlements, the dance gathered in intensity, the hawk dancer beginning to fail, dwindling before the other triumphant dancers until it spiraled into the dusty ground. One final earsplitting cacophony announced its symbolic death, and the other dancers, victorious over the hawk god, mimed hacking it into invisible pieces with which each creature fled back into the castle.

The symbolic sky burial over, the crowd dispersed quickly, and guards became attentive in leading the patrol inside to meet the dzong pen, the governor of the region. Four fur-capped soldiers, looking to Macfarlane as if they were part of Genghis Khan’s Mongol army, accompanied them through wide but dark corridors until they came to a big hall.

At the far end, a large chair stood alone like some rudimentary throne and a small man, dressed in a high-collared, woven, crimson silk jacket that caught the glow of the butter lamps, was seated upon it. He was listening without reply to the competing comments of a group of advisers sitting cross-legged before him on an immense yet threadbare carpet. His eyes were tight shut, his face screwed up in intense concentration.

One of the soldiers approached the nearest adviser who, in turn, rose to approach the dzong pen and whisper in his ear. The overlord immediately opened his eyes; ratlike, they fixed on the British officer.

The small man immediately stood up from his high-backed chair and summoned a waiting servant who stepped forward to bring him a wide-brimmed fedora. The dzong pen slowly lowered the hat onto his head with both hands on the brim. It was far too big for him. Relinquishing his throne, he stepped through the still-seated councillors to meet Macfarlane.

He stopped silently before him as if struck by some deep thought. “Ingleish prezent,” he said as he took the fedora off and offered it to Macfarlane. Uncertain, the lieutenant took it, flipping it over to see the white hatter’s label within. There was an address for Savile Row; beneath, in black ink, the previous owner had written, “Gen. C. G. Bruce.” Macfarlane was familiar with the name. General Bruce was a legend in the Gurkha Rifles. He must have gifted it to the dzong pen on the way to one of his attempts on Mount Everest some years earlier, for which he was equally famed.

Handing the fedora back, Macfarlane said, “A worthy hat,” but the dzong pen, his knowledge of English already exhausted, instead turned his attention to Zazar. He greeted him warmly. Zazar, in return, handed him their travel papers, the dzong pen studying them with feigned comprehension as he questioned his countryman. Zazar’s answers were long and convoluted. Macfarlane had no trust in the rapid stream of conversation until, unable to stand it it any longer, he told the Gurkha sergeant to stop Zazar from speaking and translate what had been said. With an insubordinate look at the officer for interrupting him, Zazar responded angrily to the sergeant, who relayed the content to Macfarlane.

“Zazar says the Sherpa Ang Noru was here. He caused a great fight in the town in which three men died. The Sherpa was sentenced to lose his cutting hand as penalty for starting the fighting and then death for the death he caused. The night before he was to be punished, he summoned a hawk god to the castle. The hawk spirit stank of a thousand hells and regurgitated its young onto the prison guards before switching them into the Sherpa’s cell by magic. The Sherpa then escaped by changing into a bird demon and flying with the hawk god off the high cliff. Every day since, the dzong pen has ordered a devil dance before sunset to slay the hawk spirit.”

“A highly unbelievable story, Sergeant. Is there any mention of the German in this fairy tale?”

“No, sir.”

“Sergeant, can Zazar ask the dzong pen if we can stay here before we continue our journey?”

“He has done so already, sir, although you will have to give him some gifts in return. Zazar also says that the dzong pen believes that the magic of the devil dancers is now growing so strong that the Sherpa will soon be found.”

“Let’s hope so, for all our sakes, Sergeant.”