et of paperwork for international shipment of bodies. You’ll spend a week filling out papers, and you won’t have me to help if I am behind bars.”
Jin winced.
“Then,” Shan said, “you’ll spend the rest of the season dealing with all those who complain about how bad it is for business to suddenly have policemen flooding the Westerners’ climbing camps.”
The constable worked his tongue in his cheek. “Better than chasing this damned nag up and down the mountains.”
The mule gave Shan another impatient nudge. It seemed to be remembering, as Shan did, that they still had miles to go before turning the body over to villagers from Tumkot, where Tenzin’s kin waited for his body. “Then you won’t do it,” Shan said with a tinge of shame, “because if you hold me up any longer I will not return to work on time and in this county the man I work for is the senior Tibetan member of the Party.”
The constable sagged. He extracted a crumpled pack of cigarettes, lit one as he settled onto a flat rock then studied Shan with a suspicious air. “There’s a name for people like you on the other side of the ranges,” he observed as he exhaled a column of smoke. “Untouchables. Disposers of the dead and other garbage. The lowest caste of a low society. You’re Chinese. You’re educated. Why do you let them do this to you?”
“I prefer to think of it as a sacred trust.” Shan extracted two apples from a pouch on the mule’s harness, offered one to the horse, the other to his mule. As he did so he studied the equipment hanging from Jin’s saddle, noting for the first time the heavy ammunition belt tied around rain gear at the back of the saddle, beside the portable radio Jin usually left switched off in the field. “What particu
Jin winced.
“Then,” Shan said, “you’ll spend the rest of the season dealing with all those who complain about how bad it is for business to suddenly have policemen flooding the Westerners’ climbing camps.”
The constable worked his tongue in his cheek. “Better than chasing this damned nag up and down the mountains.”
The mule gave Shan another impatient nudge. It seemed to be remembering, as Shan did, that they still had miles to go before turning the body over to villagers from Tumkot, where Tenzin’s kin waited for his body. “Then you won’t do it,” Shan said with a tinge of shame, “because if you hold me up any longer I will not return to work on time and in this county the man I work for is the senior Tibetan member of the Party.”
The constable sagged. He extracted a crumpled pack of cigarettes, lit one as he settled onto a flat rock then studied Shan with a suspicious air. “There’s a name for people like you on the other side of the ranges,” he observed as he exhaled a column of smoke. “Untouchables. Disposers of the dead and other garbage. The lowest caste of a low society. You’re Chinese. You’re educated. Why do you let them do this to you?”
“I prefer to think of it as a sacred trust.” Shan extracted two apples from a pouch on the mule’s harness, offered one to the horse, the other to his mule. As he did so he studied the equipment hanging from Jin’s saddle, noting for the first time the heavy ammunition belt tied around rain gear at the back of the saddle, beside the portable radio Jin usually left switched off in the field. “What particu
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