“When I crossed the border from your land into this one, I asked some herdsmen where the great teachers lived, and they answered, 'At Samye,' so I made my way here. I knocked at the gatehouse of the Samye lamasery, and some men in red robes took me in and gave me food and tea, they heated buckets of water with which I bathed myself, and they supplied me with warm clothes and boots, for my own were in tatters and falling off me. Then they asked what I wanted — I was a curious sight to them — and I replied, 'I wish to live a thousand years.' They looked at each other, and then one of them asked, 'In this body?' And when I said 'yes,' they shook their heads and clucked their tongues. They said they could not help in the fulfillment of my vain, misguided wish, and that after a good night's rest I must be on my way. As I was leaving the next morning, one of them, Fosco, a painter of poems, whispered to me that I might get what I was looking for from the Bandaloop doctors. He said I could find these personages in the foothills caves back down toward India. So I thanked him and off I went.”
“But you didn't find them, these Bandaloopers?”
“Oh, yes, I found them, all right, although it was not easy. They had no fine stone buildings, as they have here at Samye, but lived in a honeycomb of caverns, far off the main path.”
“But you found them?”
“Yes. Or, rather, they found me. I was resting in a ravine one day, thinking, 'Oh, how I wish I had something to eat,' when suddenly I was pelted with ears of corn. Hard. Very hard. Made my nose bleed and my ears ring. I drew my knife and looked up at the cliff whence the corn had come, and there were three hairy men dressed almost as motley as I, laughing at me. I shook my blade at them, and they yelled, 'Well, you said you were hungry.'”
“Praise Shiva. How did they hear your thought?”
“I intended to find that out. After I roasted and ate the corn, I sniffed out their trail and tracked them to a hillside riddled with caves. 'You must be the Bandaloop doctors,' I said when several of them approached. 'You must be Alobar,' one of them replied. 'How did you learn my name?' I asked. 'How did you learn ours?' he shot back. 'A Samye holy man told me,' I said. At that, they all had a hearty laugh.”
“They strike me as rude.”
“Rude? Yes, they were plenty of that. But, you see, a long time ago, far off in the west where I come from, I met two rude characters, one a shaman, one a god, and though each treated me disagreeably in the beginning, one gave me special courage, the other special fear, both of which I required for this journey that I am on. Those who possess wisdom cannot just ladle it out to every wantwit and jackanapes who comes along and asks for it. A person must be prepared to receive wisdom, or else it will do him more harm than good. Moreover, a lout thrashing about in the clear waters of wisdom will dirty those waters for everyone else. So, a man seeking knowledge must be first tested to determine if he is worthy. From what I have gathered, rudeness on the part of the master is the first phase of the test.”
“You mean, if you allow the master to be uncivil, to treat you any old way he likes, and to insult your dignity, then he may deem you fit to hear his view of things?”
“Quite the contrary. You must defend you integrity, assuming you have integrity to defend. But you must defend it nobly, not by imitating his own low behavior. If you are gentle where he is rough, if you are polite where he is uncouth, then he will recognize you as potentially worthy. If he does not, then he is not a master, after all, and you may feel free to kick his ass.”
“Interesting. Is that how it went with the Bandaloop doctors?”
Alobar shook his head. “No,” he said. He took another long look at Chomolungma and the runners-up in the world's tallest mountain competition. The sun was starting to sink, and the peaks were pinned with colored clouds, like ribbons designating where each had placed in the contest. It was fairly easy to spot the winner, and numbers two and three. Miss Congeniality was a bit more difficult to identify. “No, that is not the way it went with the Bandaloop doctors. They were alternately hospitable and antagonistic. They would pour me milk to drink, then drop a turd in the cup. They would flatter me, then spit in my face. They would ignore me, then as I made to leave, they'd implore me to stay. It was damnably confusing. And there was no question of kicking ass. They invited me to strike them, but they were so quick I could not lay a hand on them. Their movements were imperceptible, yet they were always a fraction of an inch to the left or right of wherever I aimed my blow. Not one of them touched me, but I beat my own self bloody missing them and falling down.”
“You were humiliated.”
“My lady, that is an understatement. In my own land I had a reputation as a warrior.”
“Did you leave then?”
“I was too winded to even crawl away on my knees. They gave me some oil for my scrapes and scratches and invited me into the caves. What do you think it was like in them? Sharp rocks, cold water dripping from the ceilings, bats screeching by in the darkness? Oh, no, those caves were covered with beautiful carpets and tapestries, thick and warm and opulent. Every nook and cranny glowed with butter lamps, and in little saucers powders were burning that caused the air to smell like orange groves and gardens.”
“Incense!” exclaimed Kudra.
“Whatever. And there were women inside preparing spiced lamb and heating wine. Everyone drank wine until their eyes were red. They also smoked pipes of ground-up leaves from the hemp plant—”
“I know the plant. We made rope from it. Smoked it, you say?”
“Yes, and it seemed to make them dreamy. They would stare into the fire, laughing for no apparent reason. They offered me a pipe, they offered me wine and meat, they even offered me a woman, or two women if I chose. Of course, I refused. I thought it was a trick, a test of my purity. I fell asleep alone, splitting with desire, only to be awakened in the middle of the night by a bucket of icy water emptied upon my head. Well, then I got out, let me assure you. I was angry and confused — and scared. Because, Kudra, no hand held the bucket that dumped that water on me, the bucket was suspended in midair, just tipping itself on me of its own accord.”
“Alobar, you were confused, all right. Or else dreaming. Or. .” She lowered her eyelids, lids that resembled purses sewn from the skins of thick, dark grapes. “Or you are telling me a fable.”
“It is all true, I swear it.”
“Then I suppose I must believe you. Tell me, did they permit you to leave freely?”
“One of the company — there were perhaps a dozen of them in all, not counting the women — followed me outside to inquire about my intentions. I told him I thought I would return to the Samye lamasery. 'Good,' he said. 'You will learn much there. Then you can come back to us.' Well, that heated me up, to be sure. 'There are not enough demons in this world or the next to drag me back to this accursed place,' I yelled. I swore that I would never return. He laughed and reached into my clothes and pulled an egg from where no egg had been. He cracked the egg on the ground, and a huge dog bounded out of it — it looked exactly like Mik, my own dog from my own city that I had not seen in the span of eight Feasts of Feasts. It licked my feet in a familiar way, and then it ran into a cave and disappeared. .”