Christopher Golde
Chapter forty two
The Journey Part one
‘The Boy’
“His eyes were like a flame of fire
and on his head were many crowns.
He had a name written that no-one knew except himself.”
John: Revelation 19.12 New Testament
Date: 21st January 2000 Location: Middle China
Jason opened his eyes slowly and the brightness punished him immediately. He attempted to roll over but the pain prevented him.
‘My God,’ his mind screamed ‘What happened to me… and where am I?’
It was at that moment it all started to come back to him. The ambush, the fighting, the fleeing, and the bullet that got him, and then, vaguely he remembered the face of an old man.
He slowly opened his eyes fully and as his pupils adjusted to the daylight, his surroundings gradually came into focus. He moved his head slowly. He could see cane baskets all about him and the whole room seemed to sway and bump. He could hear a grinding noise and occasionally people talking in Chinese, this time Cantonese. Although his side burned like fire each time he tried to move, he pushed himself past the pain barrier and rolled onto his back. A cane basket fell across him and he pushed it aside. Even that hurt.
Gritting his teeth, he pulled himself upright to a sitting position and looked at his left arm, then his side. Both were stained bright red from what he assumed, was his own blood. He looked towards the light and could see that it flooded in through an open door at the end of the room. All about him, tied to the walls, were cane baskets and boxes of all shapes and sizes.
The room suddenly lurched to one side and he heard a loud bang from beneath, then it all stopped suddenly. The room remained on an angle, the baskets hanging from roof and walls were the only things that still moved, swaying back and forth in unison. He heard someone curse in Chinese and within seconds a head popped into the doorway. Jason stared into the light and focused on the head that had appeared. It was then that he realized that behind the head was open-air and a roadway. The head was that of an old Chinese man with a long beard.
“Ahh, you are awake,” he spoke in Cantonese.
“Where am I,” returned Jason, also in Cantonese?
“Ooh, you speak Chinese,” said the old man surprised.
“You are in the back of my wagon of course.”
Jason thought for a minute and gradually he remembered an old man helping him into a wagon when he was being hunted down by the ambushers.
“Oh yeah,” he said, in English to himself. He looked at the head of the old man and then began trying to move towards the entrance to the wagon. The pain in his side was fierce but slowly he wriggled forward until his legs hung over the edge and his head could lean out into the daylight. Around him, he could see a flat land and roadway that stretched out behind them disappearing into the distance. Spaced irregularly along the road where small dwellings, some of dark grey brick, others made from sheets of wood and tin. Some had fences, others did not.
A car went past in the opposite direction honking its horn.
“So where are we,” Jason asked the old man?
“You are on the road near Yinchuan,” said the old man with a smile.
“I remember you helped me to escape,” continued Jason, “thank you.”
The old man just smiled a toothless grin that helped Jason to forget about his pain for one moment. Jason inched forward to lower himself to the ground and groaned with the pain.
“I think you had better stay there,” said the old man, “I had a look at your injuries and although they won’t kill you, you need treatment. I am taking you to a friend of mine that lives near the city, he is a doctor.” Jason looked at him and sighed.
“Then why did you stop?”
“We are in a ditch I am afraid and my ox is having a little trouble pulling us out, perhaps it is your extra weight.”
“Ox,” Jason said, with a quizzical expression?
He forced his body forward and half fell down to the ground, one leg collapsing but the other managing to hold him up.
“Yeowch,” he screamed softly.
He stood at the back of the wagon for a moment while he recovered from the pain, then limped around the edge of the carriage. All over the wagon were hanging all manner of cane, baskets, furnishings, ornaments. Jason saw the hole the wheel was sitting in, and then he saw the ox with its large ‘U’ shaped horns.
“Okay I’m out, let’s see if he can pull it out now,” Jason said, wincing as he spoke. Nausea was overcoming him and he had an urgent desire to lie down but forced himself to remain upright. The old man went around to the front of the oxen with a long, very flexible whip in his hand. He yelled a Chinese swear word at the ox, pulled at a ring hanging from its nostrils, and simultaneously flicked it on the rear with the end of the whip. The Oxen grunted and went to step forward, the wheel at first rolling towards the lip of the ditch, but then falling backwards and preventing the beast from completing its step.
Again the old man yelled and flicked the rear of the animal, this time the effort seemed more concerted and as the wheel came to the top of the ditch it paused momentarily, before inching forward and completing the cycle and rolling clear. The whole wagon now lurched forward and the oxen completed its step and continued on.
The old man ran to the side and yelled to Jason to jump on as he mounted a step and climbed over some dangling cane to get to the top of the wagon. Jason, who was still holding on to the wagon, staggered towards the back edge and hoisted himself back through the entrance. He collapsed in through the rear door, again screaming with agony at the movement of his wounds.
Inside the carriage, he fell onto cane baskets, his feet still protruding from the back door. As the cane beneath took his weight the pain completely consumed him and he lost consciousness, remaining where he fell.
The two boys sat looking out over the water; the sky was clear overhead but a sea mist made the line between water and sky almost indistinguishable in the still glare of the morning sun. They were perched on a small tussock of grass off to one side of a narrow path etched into a sheer three hundred-foot drop, the rocks below plunging into a seething white sea. From where they were they could see a dozen giant monoliths of stone standing two to three hundred feet above the water, each appearing to loom out of the ocean spray as if approaching the shore in a silent march to eternity.
As they sat looking out over these ghostly white guardians of the southern Australian coastline they took it in turns to cast small stones out over the edge watching them disappear from view long before they would reach the water.
“Happy birthday,” remarked one of the boys to the other.
“Thanks,” was the short reply!
“How old are you?”
“Ten; how about you?”
“I was twelve last October.”
The boy cast a stone from his hand over the edge as he replied. It plummeted into oblivion, no sound, just the rumble of the surf as giant waves ended long journeys by smashing relentlessly into the sandstone rocks hundreds of feet below. The ten-year-old boy flicked a blonde lock of hair back over his head from his brow with his left hand and cast a small stone over the edge with his right hand simultaneously. His light green eyes stared at the spectacular natural phenomena that sprawled before them. He loved the ocean; he felt a natural sense of belonging when he was anywhere near it.
“Isn’t it fantastic,” he said, with true rapture.
The shorter red-haired boy threw another stone
“Yeah, I guess.”
“Whadya mean I guess, it’s fantastic, I wish I could be down there in the water.”
His eyes sparkled as he looked down.
“In the water,” the red-haired boy retorted in horror, “you’re crazy, you’d be eaten by sharks and ripped to pieces by them waves. You wouldn’t last two minutes in there.”
The taller boy with blonde hair stood up and turned to walk along the cliff
“I don’t care, “he said, as he cast one more stone, “I’m not scared, anyhow, I’m protected from all those things!”
The older boy also stood following him
“Whadaya mean protected? Sometimes you talk real crazy, ya know!”
“It’s not crazy, we all live as long as we’re supposed to; that’s all!”
The older boy looked up into his face
“Then whadaya mean ‘you’re protected then?”
The tall boy turned back to the ocean, his profile ringed in a halo of gold created by the rising morning sun.
“My faith protects me and tells me what to do, doesn’t yours?”
The older boy looked away from his taller friend, the glare of the sun too much for his eyes.
“Ya know, sometimes Jason you’re spooky. You’re a good guy and all but you’re just spooky. The guys you hang out with at school an all, they’re all weird!”
The boy with golden hair and green eyes turned back to the smaller boy
“I didn’t expect you to understand and anyway the guys I hang out with are all right, they just have some problems.”
“They’re all losers,” the other boy exclaimed, almost in disgust!
“Why, because one had a hole in his heart, one has cancer and the other guy comes from a crappy family, is that why they’re all losers?”
The tall boy turned and kept walking along the track. The smaller boy called after him.
“You could hang out with all the cool kids, they always ask you and you don’t!”
“They don’t need me,” the tall boy answered, without looking back!
“Need you! Who do you think you are, king of the beggars?”
The tall boy kept walking
“Maybe.”
“See I told ya, you’re crazy!”
Both boys headed off along the coastal track, the sea below continued its timeless endeavour to devour the giant sandstone cliffs, as a haze from the ocean spray settled over the mystical coast.
As the old man yelled at his weary oxen, the wagon laden with wicker pulled up in front of an old thatch-roofed house in a small village outside the larger city of Yinchuan. Slowly, the old man dismounted from his perch at the front of the cart, then tied the wagon to a fence post at the front of the house. He walked reverently to the front door, announcing his arrival with a shout and a knock simultaneously. Soon, there were several people at the wagon rear and they lifted Jason down and took him into the house. Once in the house, a well-dressed gentleman directed them to put the stranger in the room that had a long table at its centre.
The room was basic but was typical of surgeries in provincial China. The table was made of timber but was polished clean with a single white sheet covering it. The room had two sinks and glass cabinets at head height circumnavigated most of the room brim-full with jars and containers. A bench stretched the full length of one side of the room, with cupboards underneath, and there were two chairs padded with black cushions and covered in bedsheets in an attempt to hide their vintage. Along the top of the bench were a number of surgical instruments some in holders, others just arranged neatly in order of size. An old rice cooker sat in one corner and by its content, it was obvious that this was the improvised sterilization unit.
Jason lay stretched out on the white sheet, his clothes bloodied and torn. All the people left the surgery, except for the well-dressed man and a girl dressed in white. For an hour they removed Jason’s ragged clothes, washed and disinfected his skin. They patched his minor injuries and the doctor cut open the bullet wound and cleaned and dressed the hole. After they had finished, the doctor carefully bandaged him then his assistant wrapped him in a clean white gown. The doctor opened the door and called for assistance. The people returned, carrying his still limp body carefully into a bedroom near the surgery and lay him on a creaky metal bed before they all left. The young assistant covered him with a single blanket and stood for a moment staring at his pallid features. He breathed gently and she put her tiny hand to his brow and shifted his blonde hair to the side, before gently wiping the perspiration from his forehead.
Two more days passed before Jason opened his eyes and when he did, the whole saga came flooding back to him. He looked around the room, but since the room was so bare, he had no clue as to where he might be. When he attempted to move his side felt like it was a dead weight pulling him inside out, so he just lay back, closed his eyes and decided to wait for someone to come.
In what seemed like minutes, but could have been hours, he heard a soft female voice in Cantonese.
“You look much better today.”
When he opened his eyes at the comment, the small beautiful face of the girl looked completely surprised.
‘She must not have known I was awake,’ he thought, smiling.
“Where am I,” he said to her softly?
She hesitated a moment then stepped closer.
“You are in the care of Dr Xiang,” she answered softly, as if not sure she should, “you are in his recovering room.”
“How long have I been here?”
“It has been two days since when Mr. Sheng brought you here,” she replied, “you were very unwell, and we thought you might die. But then we found out who you are and then we knew you would recover.”
This last comment did not make much sense to Jason, but after a brief quizzical look, he just let it go.
“What is your name,” asked Jason?
“I am Manwah, “replied the girl, with a flush of shyness.
“Well Manwah, can you help me to get up?”
“I don’t know whether you should,” she began to say, but Jason was already on one elbow and she stopped talking and put her support under his arm.
He was like a giant to her, but he was impressed just how strong she was. Once he was standing the pain seemed to ease considerably. He pulled the white gown around him.
“Well Manwah, let's meet the family,” said Jason, his spirits returning.
Over the next three days, he met many people including the good doctor and indeed all of Manwah’s family. He was astonished by how they all seemed to honour his presence. Nothing was ever too much for them to do for him and the old man Sheng, just stood in the background and smiled.
After another three days Jason was almost back to normal and the people of the village, which was more like a small city, had supplied him with all the clothes and supplies he needed. Sheng came to him the morning of the fifth day, while he sat in the garden with Manwah, sipping tea and eating small sweet buns for breakfast.
“Jason, we will leave today,” said Sheng with a smile and glance at the look of disappointment on Manwah’s face.
“Yes, I agree,” replied Jason, “it is so beautiful here but I must get back.”
Sheng looked at him without blinking a firm insistence in his voice.
“Jason, we cannot return yet, I have to take you somewhere first.”
Jason just smiled at the old man’s seriousness.
“Okay, is it far, because I really should be getting back, they will be worried about me.”
“I am afraid it is very far,” said the old man, “perhaps it will take us a week of travel, but it is essential. It is your destiny.”
Jason thought for a moment. He knew the old man was deadly serious and being in the provinces of China, was like a dream come true for him. Something in what Sheng was proposing felt right. He decided he would go.
“Okay, I will go with you,” said Jason, “but at least first, I must call my friend who will be extremely worried about me by now.”
“Good,” said the old man, relieved of Jason’s decision, “there will be a phone we can use not far from here on our way.”
That morning they packed and left on Sheng’s old ox-drawn wagon. There were at least fifty people there to see them off, most happy and joyous, all except for small, beautiful Manwah. She wrapped her arms around Jason and wept, begging him to return. Jason looked at her beautiful face and softly pecked her on the lips.
“Thank you Manwah,” he said, softly in her ear “I will never forget you.”
With that Jason jumped up on the wagon with Sheng, who was already waiting, long whip poised. The Oxen grunted as it moved, lurching forward and starting them on their long journey towards the distant mountains. Jason looked back at the waving, cheering crowd but could only see Manwah, with her small delicate hands to her lips and tears in her eyes, standing motionless as the crowd moved forward and consumed her completely. Jason turned back to face the road.
“Well Sheng,” said Jason with a smile, “where are you taking me?”
Sheng did not take his eyes off the road.
“You are going to the ‘Temple of Light’, he replied with an air of theatrics. “Tibet!”
“Tibet,” said Jason almost choking on it?
Jason looked ahead and in the far, far distance he could see mountains with snow-capped peaks. He just shuddered and pulled his coat about him.
They stopped shortly afterwards at the small store that sold all manner of home requirement, and Sheng arranged for him to use the phone. Fortunately, Pietta answered the phone and was overwhelmed with relief, bursting into tears, when she heard Jason’s voice.
“I’m okay, I’m okay,” he said, trying to calm her down.
“Look Pietta, I don’t have long on this phone, so listen.” She stopped sobbing and replied soberly.
“Okay, I’m alright, go ahead.”
“Good,” he replied, but then added, “I miss you.”
“I’ve been so worried,” she began, a torrent of words flooding from the earpiece. He had to cut in.
“Pietta, I have to go on a trip for a few days before I return.”
“What,” she said surprised?
“I will be out of reach for at least a week but I will be alright, okay.”
“But…” she started.
“I will call you soon as I get back,” he continued, not wanting to answer too many questions now. Not that he could anyway.
“Go to Hong Kong and stay at my apartment. I will come straight there when I get back. Everything is there you need, business and otherwise.”
“Okay,” she said, becoming more composed
“Just be careful Jason.”
“I will don’t worry, it’s just something I have to do, oh and tell the police I am okay and just got lost when I was hit over the head. I will call them too when I return. Tell them it was an urgent business I had to attend to.”
He stopped for a second. He could hear her breathing on the other end, not sure what to say.
“Take care of yourself,” he said, “I’ll see you soon okay? “
”Okay,” she said, holding back. “Jason.”
“What darling?”
There was a pause.
“Doesn’t matter, just take care.”
“Will do,” he said, smiling to himself, “gotta go now, see you in a week,” bye…bye.”
“Bye”
“Bye.”
At that, he hung up, said thank you to the store owner then went outside to where Sheng was waiting.
For more days and nights, they travelled almost nonstop. Sometimes Jason would take the reins while Sheng slept in the back. Sometimes they would stop in a village for food. The people always greeted them with warmth and enthusiasm. Jason even detected a sense that they were expected in some way and that he was treated with some sort of reverence.
The highways dwindled to potholed roadways, then to gravel and eventually to what seemed like tracks. The traffic in both directions was consistent, they were the slowest. The terrain had for the most been flat land in between mountain ranges, with rice fields as far as you could see in both directions, broken occasionally by cornfields that sometimes blocked out the sun.
The cities they passed soon became towns, then villages, but there were always people, thousands of people, walking, driving, sitting, and working. Country people, clean, well-kept and happy.
On the fourth day, they changed direction for the first time and now the dirt road they were on cut between rolling grass hills heading towards the mountains. With this, the temperature dropped dramatically and Jason put on the thick woollen coats that the town people had provided.
At the end of the seventh day, they passed a small boom gate with what looked like an abandoned guard post. Sheng briefly commented that they were now in Tibet. Jason had spent some of the travelling time talking to Sheng about the countryside and the towns they passed through. One time, Jason asked him why he had helped and why he was now taking him to this temple.
“A long time ago,” Sheng answered him, “when I was a very young man, almost a boy, I had a dream. I saw in it your face and I took you on a wagon to these mountains. I saw the temple and the name, but I was not allowed to enter. You turned into a dragon and flew into the temple and I saw a golden Buddha that blessed me for eternity. After the dream, I woke up and a strange dark figure stood at the end of my bed. He said to me that one day this dream would come true and I must follow my destiny. As I grew up, I led a simple but happy life. I knew I was blessed and people treated me with respect, this made me a very wealthy man. One day a friend asked me did I know where was ‘The Temp of Light.’ My interest alerted, he told me where it was and then I found out how to get there. Then many years later, I came across you injured and in need of help. I knew that this was my destiny and I knew I had been paid in advance. So here I am now repaying my debt to Buddha and fulfilling my destiny.”
That was all Sheng said about it and that was the last Jason asked about it. Both men were content to allow their destinies to merge, for whatever reason it was meant to be.
At the beginning of the eighth day, the track was winding through mountains and the roadway was lined with snow. During that day the sun continued to shine, but the Oxe was doing it hard as much of the road would often be covered with snow.
About midday, they came to the first sign they had seen since the day before. It was an ancient-looking piece of wood nailed and strapped to what looked like an old tree trunk. The sign had a Buddha etched into one end, and it was written in a language Jason did not understand.
“It says ‘Temple of Emah’,” said the old man Sheng, “which is Tibetan for ‘The Temple of Light’. It does not say how far but says to take the next road to the left. It also says those without authority not to proceed.”
About a mile past the sign the wagon halted. Where they had stopped, the rocky roadway was at its widest, so Sheng pulled the wagon off to the side, onto a flat surface covered in snow.
“We will stop here to eat,” said Sheng, dismounting and pulling his supplies from inside the wagon. After they had dined on sticky rice wrapped in vine leaves and cold salted pork, the old man poured Jason a hot tea.
“We will sleep here tonight,” said Sheng, “the first thing in the morning, I will turn back and you will continue up that pathway to the Temple.”
Jason looked at him surprised.
“You’re not coming with me?”
“Remember my boy, the dream, I have no authority to go to the Temple, and I am only to deliver you here.”
Jason looked at him and could tell he wasn’t going to change his mind, and then he looked at where the pathway left the roadway leading into the mountains.
“Don’t worry,” said Sheng, reassuringly “you will be okay, it is your destiny.”
“And how will I return,” asked Jason glumly?
“The Monks in the Temple will take care of that, I am sure.”
No more was said of the plan and the old man went about caring for his beast and preparing for the night. Jason slept restlessly that night. Many things seemed to haunt his dreams, images of Pietta, the faces of his mother and father, other strange people he had never seen before, but seemed to know him, and even briefly, a beast with many heads that taunted and threatened a dark-haired girl he did not recognise but felt a strange attraction too.
When he woke, it was still dark and the old man lying next to him in the wagon snored loudly.
‘No wonder I dreamt of beasts,’ he thought, ‘with snoring like that.’
He quietly as possible, alighted from the wagon and looked to the sky. A full moon sat above them in the heavens, covered intermittently by small dark clouds with silver linings. About him, the snow seemed to glow and the few trees he could see, seemed to take on the shapes of misshapen souls wandering about lost in the dark. The oxen stood still next to the wagon, steam billowing forth at each breath. The whole scene reminded him of his teenage years, sneaking about in the old cemetery where he used to hide his treasures. That seemed so long ago. It had almost been as long ago, as the last time he had seen ‘The Darkness’. So long, in fact, he often wondered these days if it had not just been his vivid imagination that had created the mystical creature. But then, he remembered everything else in his life, the dreams, the amazing coincidences, and the unbelievable opportunities. It had been an incredible journey that had brought him to this day, and it had all been as ‘The Darkness’ had said it would be.
As he walked about, looking at the hauntingly beautiful surrounds, he could see daylight beginning to radiate from the mountain peaks that surrounded them, guarding the entrance to heaven and most likely, the spiritual haven of the temple.
Behind him, he heard a noise and looked over his shoulder to see Sheng climbing out of the trailer. He grunted and groaned, as he fought to dispel the sleep from his mind. Jason smiled and walked back to their campsite.
“Just in time to make me breakfast before I leave,” joked Jason.
“Make it yourself, I’m not your mother,” grumbled the old man.
Jason laughed and pulled out their supplies.
After breakfast and a hot cup of tea, they packed up and Jason helped Sheng to turn the wagon around to face back down the mountain track. Jason rolled together with a pack with spare clothes, some blankets and a small amount of food. After strapping it to his back, he turned to the old man.
“Well, I guess it’s time for me to leave,” said Jason.
He took the old man’s hands then pulled him to his chest and wrapped his other arm around, patting him gently on the back.
“Take care old man and live out your life in peace and happiness, knowing you have paid out your debt fully.
When Jason pulled back, he thought he noticed a small tear in the old man’s eye, but Sheng quickly wiped it away with his hand, looking sheepishly at the ground. Jason turned to walk away when the old man stopped him gently touching his arm.
“I have never had any children,” he said, mumbling a little, “but I will always think of you as my son. May Buddha travel with you and care for you, as I know you have a destiny that will be fraught with danger.”
Jason smiled
“Thank you, Sheng, and thank you for saving my life back there. I will never forget you either. And thank you for scaring the pants off me know,” he added jokingly, with a smile.
Jason then turned and walked the track. He did not look back. He would never forget Sheng and he knew somehow, he would never see the old man again, but he knew it was easier not to look back.
For hour upon hour, he walked the small track as it wound its way through the snow. Fewer and fewer trees shaded its path, and as the track became steeper, the edges of the mountain he skirted became higher and higher. Eventually, after hours of walking, he came about the side of a particularly high rock face and then suddenly there before him, was a view of hundreds of mountain peaks covered in snow as far as the eye could see. The track now turned into ancient stairs cut into the rock face of the cliff and worn dangerously thin by the weather of an eternity.
He stopped and looked up to see a sheer cliff face that somehow, someone, had cut a narrow staircase into. The stairs disappeared off around the edge of the cliff face and not very far from where they departed his range of sight, he could see white fluffy snow clouds swirling towards him. Now, he had some appreciation of just how high he was. It was then that he noticed that even breathing was difficult.
‘I think I will rest before I begin this climb,’ he thought, as he looked up and anticipated the degree of difficulty the stairway posed.