It was a skittish, self-conscious audience that waited at the benches outside the gate of the 404th People’s Construction Brigade. Colonel Tan and Amah Jiejie had been inside for nearly an hour, and Shan had watched anxiously as the ever-surly deputy warden ran across the compound into the offices when they arrived. Jig Bartram nervously looked at her watch.
Yara glanced back and forth from the guards to the hills above, as if thinking of bolting. Shan stood beside her and rested a calming hand on her shoulder. The afternoon before, she had arrived in his office to deliver an official form. “It’s for replacement of a lost registration card,” she had awkwardly announced. “I know the circumstances are a bit ambiguous, but I was a teacher once and with a new card I can be one again. There’s an opening right here in Yangkar. Maybe someone who is savvy about the ways of government could fill in the gaps,” she had suggested to Shan. The card meant she was acknowledging Chinese citizenship, but with a card she could visit Ko and not be fearful of sending letters. With a card her son could be enrolled in her school.
Shan had accepted the form with a smile. “You are exactly the kind of teacher Yangkar needs,” he said.
Lhamo and Nyima were watching the prison barracks. Shan had tried to discourage them from coming, but they had insisted, saying that they understood no one knew for certain who the man was, but whomever he was he deserved help from those of Yangkar.
Jinhua, his bag packed, watched by his car before starting the long drive home. The young officer was going back to fight corruption in Beijing, with a protective charm now inside his shirt. Shan had tried to talk him out of returning, suggesting there might be a place for him in Tibet, but Jinhua had insisted he had a duty to his dead partner. He had taken Shan’s hand and gripped it hard. “Someday you might need a friend in low places in Beijing,” he had said with a self-mocking smile.
As Shan watched the office door, Trinle warily approached with still another question about the paper Shan had translated for them. It had been one of Amah Jiejie’s most resourceful creations. The money Lau had deposited in Tan’s name had been transferred, over Tan’s signature, to a newly formed charity using Amah Jiejie’s address in Lhadrung. A quarter of the money, the note signed by Tan said, would be used to repair and improve Yangkar, and the rest would be used to restore the chortens and construct a modest complex of buildings on the Plain of Ghosts, to launch a new medical college under the leadership of Dorchen.
When the time was right, during the quiet days of winter, Lokesh and other secret representatives of the exiled government would come and take away the ancient books in the ice cave. Those under the streets of Yangkar would become the library of the new college.
Yara suddenly stood as a whistle blew and prisoners began to stream out of the barracks into the exercise yard. Emaciated monks and lamas began shuffling along a rutted track, their fingers working at makeshift malas. A figure broke out of the line and hurried to the inner fence, where a guard barked at him. Ko dutifully stepped back a few feet, then raised his hand. They could not exchange words, for this was not an official visitation day. Yara raised her own in reply, then pressed her hands together, her thumbs extended back, the next two fingers folded down, the next pointing forward. It was called the mudra of the Precious Horse. Ko smiled as he recognized it, then folded his own hands, making the mudra called Lady of the Diamond Laughter. He had been practicing. They smiled at each other for several heartbeats, then Ko pointed toward the administration building.
Colonel Tan was marching to his limousine, answering the salutes of the guards he passed. Amah Jiejie emerged from the building, supporting an aged man in ill-fitting civilian clothes. At the bottom of the stairs he shrugged off her help and straightened, then proceeded at a slow, limping gait. The tall man had a determined, somehow graceful air about him despite his weakness and advanced age. The stubble of hair on his balding head was all gray. His cheap denim clothes hung on him as if arranged over sticks. But his eyes, though betraying the fear of every newly released prisoner, burned with a deep intelligence. His lean, weathered face turned toward the men in the exercise yard, who quieted and stared as they realized what was happening. Few of the old ones ever walked out of the camp.
The officer of the guard snapped a command and the high gates creaked open. The old man hesitated, looking at the guards as if for permission. He was leaving the only world he had known for over fifty years. The nearest guard nodded, and he slowly limped through the gate, gazing warily at the small group on the bench.
A low shuddering cry escaped Lhamo’s throat. She collapsed onto the bench, weeping. Nyima took a halting step forward, tears streaming down her face. “Kolsang!” she cried and took another step, repeating the name. Jig suddenly gripped Shan’s arm. “He has my mother’s eyes!” she whispered, her voice gone hoarse. Her uncle had returned to the living.