‘No!’ Jamie grabbed at his arm, but it was too late.
At first it seemed Chiru must plummet down that awesome drop, but by some miracle his feet found enough purchase in the scree to support him. He slid swiftly down the river of stones in a cloud of thick dust, his body almost perpendicular to the cliff face. The soles of his designer sports shoes surfed the scree and controlled his speed and an inbred sense of balance kept him upright. Jamie watched him, waiting for the inevitable moment when the Tibetan stumbled and the controlled descent turned first into a tumbling rush before hurtling him into the abyss. But the moment never came. Chiru had lived and breathed these mountains for the seventeen years of his existence. The cliff paths and the scree slopes were his highways and he was as much in charge of his destiny as any civil servant walking down Whitehall. He glided to a halt as he reached the ledge and looked back towards Jamie and waved for him to follow.
For a moment, Jamie felt utterly abandoned. He realized Chiru hadn’t deliberately left them; the Tibetan was a hill man, brought up in the harshest environment on the planet and taught from birth to be utterly independent. The show was designed to give them the confidence to follow him. But Jamie looked at that thin river of stones and experienced stark, paralysing terror. Would he have the courage to take that final step even if he didn’t have Sarah to look after? And with her? No, it was impossible. The only thing they could do was turn back. He had already made the decision when he heard the rattle of machine gun fire echoing through the passageway. The Chinese would be here in moments.
No time to consider the consequences. Sarah was leaning against the side wall of the cleft only barely conscious and with her eyes closed. Jamie pulled her on to the ledge beside him and led her cautiously to the top of the scree slide. When they reached it, he dropped down to sit with his legs over the lip of the void and somehow manoeuvred her on to his lap. He placed the rifle by his right side and wrapped his left arm across her chest. She mumbled quietly and tried to turn her head towards him and in his terror he cursed her to stay still. The sound of gunfire grew more intense.
‘Trust me,’ he whispered in her ear. He closed his eyes and with a final plea to the God he only consulted in the direst of emergency he allowed himself to slip off the edge.
That first second when gravity took control was probably the most terrifying of his life. It seemed certain their combined mass must throw them out into the emptiness and carry them away to the rocks half a mile below. Instead, he found the scree scoring his back and his feet automatically seeking purchase among the stones. He slid toes first with his head forced back and he could feel the knife-edged rock ripping at his scalp. Sarah’s weight forced his body into the scree, compounding the agony and slowing them still further. It was comforting that they weren’t repeating Chiru’s headlong rush, but Jamie knew that if they slowed too much it would be just as fatal. If they stopped, they would never get going again. He pushed with his arm to maintain their momentum. Strangely, after that first adrenalin surge of fear, he never felt in any danger until Chiru’s hands lifted him to his feet and he had to open his eyes again.
Sarah sat groggily among the loose stones at his feet. ‘That was fun. Can we do it again?’
He resisted the urge to throw her off the edge and exchanged a nerve-shattered grin with Chiru.
They were still grinning at each other when the solid thud of an explosion shook the earth beneath their feet and Jamie looked up to see dust and smoke vomit out of the passage where they’d emerged.
XLVIII
TENZIN PASSED THE body of the slain Chinese commando and his sharp eyes caught the fissure that Chiru had missed on the first pass. He coughed sharply as another knife thrust of pain speared his chest and drove blood into his mouth. Every minute increased his exhaustion and dulled his senses. He realized that his wounds and the effect of the explosion were combining to sap his energy and blunt the power of his mind. Somewhere inside him the blood was pooling. When the amount of blood that escaped into his body was outweighed by the amount in his veins, he knew he would lapse into unconsciousness. He studied the crack in the grey wall and checked the first few yards of the narrow rock channel. He could hold them from inside, but only for a few minutes at most, probably less. There was a better way.
He began to climb the sheer outer slope, his hands and feet unerringly finding the tiny scuffs and crevices another man might miss. His blood stained the rocks and they would see it, but that could not be helped. Perhaps it even suited his purposes.
When he reached the point where the surface sloped away towards the crack in the rock, he crabbed his way towards the massive pile of stones and scree that loomed above the fissure like a giant cairn. Carefully, he placed the contents of his pockets among the stones at the base of the pyramid before settling down in its lee where he had a view down into the cleft. He tucked the stock of the assault rifle below his right shoulder and waited.