Kingdom of the Golden Dragon Read Online Free PDF Page A

his master’s vagueness made him crazy.
    “This is a problem that has developed during the last two generations, because Grr-ympr remembers when the Yetis were as tall as she is. At this rate, they probably will disappear in a few years,” said the prince.
    “Possibly,” the lama replied for the hundredth time; he was thinking about something else. He added, “Grr-ympr also could remember when they had moved to this valley. That may mean that there is something harmful here, something that is destroying the Yetis.”
    “That must be it! Can we save them, master?”
    “Perhaps . . .”
    The monk closed his eyes and prayed for a few minutes, asking for inspiration to resolve theproblem and for humility to understand that the result was not in his hands. He would do the best he could, but he could not control life or death.
    At the end of his short meditation, Tensing washed his hands, then went to one of the corrals. There he picked out a female chegno and milked it. He filled his bowl with warm, foaming milk, and carried it back to the infants. He wet a rag in the milk and placed it to the lips of one of the babies. At first the child did not react, but after a few seconds the smell of the milk stirred it; its lips opened, and it began weakly to suck the rag. The lama gestured to the mothers that they should imitate him.
    It was a long and tedious process to teach the Yetis to milk the chegnos and to feed the babies drop by drop. The Yetis had a minimal capacity for reasoning, but they were able to learn by repetition. The master and the disciple spent the whole day on the project, and they saw the results that same night when three of the babies cried for the first time. The next day all five were crying, asking for milk, and soon they opened their eyes and were able to move.
    Dil Bahadur felt as proud as if the solution had been his idea, but Tensing didn’t stop there. He had to find an explanation. He studied everything the Yetis put in their mouths without coming upon the cause of their distress. Then he and his disciple themselves began to suffer stomach pains and vomit bile, although they had eaten only their usual tsampa . They hadn’t tried the chegno meat the Yetis offered them, because they were vegetarians.
    “What have we eaten that is different, Dil Bahadur—the one thing?” the master asked as he prepared a medicinal tea for their digestion.
    “Nothing, master,” the youth replied, pale as death.
    “It has to be something,” Tensing insisted.
    “All we have eaten is our tsampa , not a bite of anything else . . .” the prince murmured.
    Tensing passed the bowl with the tea to Dil Bahadur, who, doubled over with pain, put it to his lips. But he stopped short before he swallowed, spitting the liquid into the snow.
    “The water, master! It’s the hot water!”
    Normally they boiled water or snow to prepare their tsampa and their tea, but in the valley they had been using the boiling water from one of the many thermal springs bubbling from the ground.
    “That’s what is poisoning the Yetis, master,” the prince insisted.
    They had seen them use the lavender-colored water from the thermal spring to make the soup of mushrooms, herbs, and purple flowers that served as the basis of their diet. Grr-ympr, however, had lost her appetite over the years, and every two or three days she ate only a little raw meat; when she was thirsty she stuffed handfuls of snow into her mouth. The thermal water—which obviously contained toxic minerals—was what they themselves had used to brew their tea. For the next few hours they avoided it completely, and the discomfort that had been tormenting them ended. To be certain that they had found the source of the problem, the next day Dil Bahadur brewed tea with the suspected water and drank it. He was soon vomiting, but happy to have proved his theory.
    Practicing great patience, the lama and his disciple informed Grr-ympr that the lavender-colored water must be