A Cowboy in Tibet by Mike Burns (romantic books to read .TXT) đ
- Author: Mike Burns
Book online «A Cowboy in Tibet by Mike Burns (romantic books to read .TXT) đ». Author Mike Burns
In the little town of Colives, Oklahoma, in the fading light of a mid-summer day, the red ball of the sun slowly sunk behind the flat horizon, with the twelve-storied Colives Hotelâs black rectangle standing beside it like a piece from a broken frame. The frameâs gone, and the pictureâs escaped, thought Chad Elphick. I heard of stranger things in my time, though!
The twin grandsons in his lap reclaimed his attention. Chad III had helped ease the boots off his feet, straddle-wise, while Grandpa Chad had helped him along by pushing his backside with the other foot. Grady Elphick, the other twin, had relieved Chad of his cowboy hat earlier, but now he plunked it back down on the old, bald head.
The old man sat on his wicker chair under the roof of the spherical gazebo, and stared out at the horizon. Aside from its fading sun and the abandoned motel, it was also marked by windmills and powerline towers jutting up like straw stubble against the darkening blue. He was gathering his wits. He knew what was coming when Grady put his hat back on him. That meant they were shifting gears into story-telling mode.
Thereâs worse ways to spend retirement, the old farrier told himself.
âGrandpa, can you tell us an old cowboy story?â Chad III had plucked up the gumption to ask the question tonight. Usually it was Grady that asked. Grady looked suitably miffed that Chad III had beat him to the punch this time.
âWell, Iâll tell you, son, I mean grandsonâŠof mine,â the old man began at random. âMy grandpa had somethinâ happen to him once. He was a farrier, too, like me and my pa, yâ know.
âAnyways, he was in San Francisco, lookinâ for work, âcause heâd just lost his job at a ranch up north. Somethinâ about the owner thought he was tryinâ to be too friendly with the ownerâs wife, or somethinâ like that.
âSo, he runs into this fella in a Okie bar along the Barbary Coast part of Frisco, and this fella asks him what he does for a livinâ. Grandpa, he tosses back a whiskey, like, anâ he tells him âWell, I shoe horses and such-like. I got my rig close by.â
âHe was careful not to say too much about his rig or where it was, as thereâd be plenty of people that werenât above stealinâ a wagon loaded down with the tools of the farrierâs trade in them days--the forge, the flue, the bellows, the tongs, anvil, spikes, nails, horseshoes, molds, dies, ingots of steelâŠâ
âThe fella looks all thunder-struck, and says, all excited-like, âWell, we been lookinâ for a farrier. Howâd you like a steady job for the next three, four, maybe five years, anâ at twenty dollars week?!â
âWell, grandpa thinks about it, and says, âSounds real interestinâ. Whatâs the job?â
âThis guys says to him, âGot a offer from a Chinee fella, anâ heâs gotta lotta money, anâ says he already bought him a shipment of other stuff, stuff heâs keepinâ secret, and gonna ship it to China, and from there up to his customer in Tibet.â The Chinee fella was beinâ middle-man for the fella in Tibet. â
âOh yeah,â said Chad III. âI heardâa Tibet. Itâs the place in China that people wanna help get free. I seen it on bumper stickers on someâa them cars by the university.â
âYeahâŠI guess.â The old man paused, having momentarily lost the thread. âYou were sayinâ the guy in the Okie bar offered him a job in Tibet, anâ sayinâ he had a shipmentâa stuff for Tibet.â This was Grady prompting.
âRight,â said Elphick. âSo, yeah, my great-great-grandpa takes him up on his offer.
âThey set sail from Frisco on a big clipper ship, and got to Hong Kong in China, right before the monsoon season. The weather beinâ bad, they had to wait there three months. âCourse, there was lots to kill time with. Gamblin,â the women of Hong KongâŠâ
The boysâ mother, sitting on a wicker chair of her own, intervened for the first time. âGrandpa, letâs keep it G-rated. Little earsâŠâ He couldnât see her in the dark circle under the gazebo, but he knew the expression sheâd have on her face right now. âRight!â he said quickly.
âAnyway, they killed time till the monsoon was over. Then they busted their humps gettingâ across China and to the foothills of the Himalayas--you know, the tallest mountains on earth--before the next monsoon came, the followinâ year. They went by horse, by camel, by carriage, by rickshaw, by palanquin, them and their whole baggage train of stuff they shipped across the ocean, âcludinâ Grandpa Elphickâs farrier rig--and they got to the foothills and settled in for another monsoon season.
âThis time, they were stuck in a little village, with nothinâ to do but hang out with the locals--all ten of âem. All they did was gamble, drink butter tea, smoke opium--donât ever do that, boys!--and try to cheat travelers outta their money--when they wasnât robbinâ em. They kinda stayed on good behavior with the large, well-group oâ travelers in their midst, but they still bore watchinâ.
âBut there was another traveler with âem, a Tibetan monk name âa Blessed Lightning. Come to find out, he was goinâ to the same place they were goin,â a place called Ganden. He thought they were goinâ there for the same reason he was goinâ there--to pay religious homage to a monk that was called the Ocean of Wisdom, and who was more or less the ruler of Tibet.
âFact was, they were goinâ there to capture the Ocean of Wisdom, anâ take him to India with âem, and hold him for a ransom in gold--the ransom to be paid to âem when they was in India, anâ ready to take a ship out of there, and back to Hong Kong, and then another one back to Frisco. This was what great-great grandpa Elphick had found out from the Chinee middleman durinâ the trip across China. The monk didnât have no idea what they were up to.
âCome springtime, they were crossinâ the Himalayas. Durinâ a terrible snow-and-rain storm, a big bolt of lightning struck the spire of a temple way up on a hill as they were travelinâ in the valley almost directly below. The statue on topâa that spire was sheared clean off the spire, and tumbled down to the valley floor below, landinâ right in their path. Grandpa Elphick, the middleman, and Blessed Lightning the monk was all at the head of the column, and the narrow little trail was only about seven feet weed. The statue landed there and blocked their way. They took a good look at it--they didnât have a choice!
âThe monk, Blessed Lightning, he turned all terrible-pale, and started tremblinâ from head to felt-booted foot. They asked him what was wrong--had he been hit by fallinâ debris that missed them?
â âNo,â he said. âYou men are in terrible danger. The statue--look at it! Her hand is stretched out--and pointing at you!â I was true. The statue was of a woman, wearinâ only swirlinâ skirts and big golden chains around her neck with large, gold-sculpted pendants, and gold circlets on arms and wrists and ankles. A massive, tiered gold crown sat on her head, on top of streaming black REAL hair. Her body was in a position of dancinâ wildly, poised on one foot with the other in the air, one arm pointed above her head--and the other pointed right at the Chinaman from where she lay on the ground now. Anâ this is what had the Tibetan monk so scared and excited now.
âHe was looking from the Chinee middleman to the statue and back again. âThis statue wasnât that way when it was on the spire of the temple. It changed as it fell. The lightning bolt was no accident. A goddess--Palden Lhamo--is warning you away. SHE caused the lightning. SHE changed her statueâs shape. SHE caused it to point to you, because she knows you have evil aims in mind. SHE wants you to leave Tibet, and never return!â â
âThe Chinaman, who had acted friendly all durinâ the trip, now suddenly acted all hateful anâ haughty-like. He said âYou superstitious Tibetan simpletons are all alike! Donât be ridiculous! It was a bolt of lightning, and nothing more. Letâs push this thing out of the way, and be on our way.â The monk looked horrified, then got all self-righteous and said, âI have passed by this temple dozens of times in my life. I KNOW what the statue looked like when it was on the spire. It was the goddess, but she was seated in the lotus position, not stretched out like a swimmer with a pointing hand outthrust! It changed shape, I tell you! It is an omen!â
âNow Grandpa Elphick spoke up, and said, âHeâs lyin.â That couldnaâ happened. Heâs probably tryinâ to slow us down for some kind of ambush. I had a Cree holy man try to pull the same stunt on me in Oklahoma once. Look around!â Everâbody in the column looked around. The Chinaman, he had one of the Chinee porters open up a parcel on a yakâs back, and pulled out somethinâ. What do yâ think it was?â Chad Elphick paused for the first time, and invited a little audience participation here.
Chad III paused, and mused aloud, âI dunno. Ropes, to help pull the statue out of the road, maybe?â
âNot quite,â Grandpa Elphick responded. âIt was a whole parcelâa Colt .45 six-shooters. Anâ a boxâa ammo, enough bullets to fill all six chambers for each pistol! That took a few minutes, âcause none of these Chinamen had handled a six-shooter before. They coulda been ambushed while they were fumblinâ around, droppinâ bullets off the side and jumpinâ everâtime one went âbangâ on the rocks below. But, finally, they had âem all loaded, and ready for the ambushers!
âThen the Chinee middle-man said, âWeâre safe for now. Letâs throw this fool monk and this statue off the path and go on!â
âHe started forward to do it, and several of the Chinee porters came forward to help. Grandpa Elphick held back for some reason, feelinâ uneasy about the whole thing, somehow. I think he was still thinkinâ about the Cree holy man, and the bad things that had happened to the people that killed HIM---but thatâs a different story.
âAnyway, he hung back, anâ the others, they done it, throwinâ the statue and the monk off the narrow path, anâ the man anâ the statue bounced down the side of the mountain, end over end, the monkâs cries ceasinâ after the first collision with a boulder, the
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