Murder on the Silk Road Read Online Free PDF Page B

City in Beijing, viewed the treasures of the Shanghai Museum of Art, and, most recently, visited Xian’s fabulous terra-cotta army: thousands of life-sized clay warriors, each with its own individual characteristics. The warriors had been buried with an ancient emperor to protect his tomb. But all of this was a preliminary to the highlight of the tour, the Caves of the Thousand Buddhas, which were reached via a forty-three-hour train ride that followed the route of the ancient Silk Road. By now, Charlotte had learned a little about Dunhuang: at the juncture of the two major caravan routes—one leading west to the Middle East, the other south across the high passes of the Himalayas to India—it had been a center of Buddhist worship for over a thousand years. The Caves of the Thousand Buddhas was a complex of nearly five hundred caves that had been carved out of a sandstone cliff face, many of them commissioned by traders and dedicated to the success of their expeditions. Each was a treasure trove of Buddhist art, containing richly detailed statues of the Buddha and other religious figures and elaborate wall- and ceiling-paintings. Although the sites they had seen so far had gone far to quench Charlotte’s thirst for the exotic, she was looking forward to visiting Dunhuang, which was considered one of the world’s least-known wonders.
    After a farewell lunch, their guide escorted them to Xian’s modern railroad station. They would be taking the Shanghai Express, one of five trains that left each day from Xian for China’s remote West. It was Charlotte’s introduction to train travel in China, and, from the moment she entered their four-berth compartment, she was captivated. Their compartment in soft-sleeper—the equivalent of first class in a classless society—was charming. From the fold-down table with its starched white tablecloth to the lace curtains at the window and the miniature reading lamp with the silk shade, it was the epitome of cozy, genteel travel. There was even a vase of flowers on the windowsill. They were plastic chrysanthemums, but it was the attempt that mattered.
    Charlotte had noticed that the Chinese, despite their poverty, always made this effort to make things beautiful: the incense burning in the ladies room, the old woman in the market who arranged her leeks in the shape of a fan, the plastic flowers in the little vase.
    “I love it,” she said as they entered. “It’s like traveling in the nineteenth century must have been.”
    “It’s exactly like traveling in the nineteenth century must have been,” said Marsha as she stowed her hand baggage away on the upper berth. “China is the only country in the world that is still making steam locomotives. Modern antiques, fresh off the assembly line.”
    After getting them settled in, their guide moved down the corridor to do the same for Victor, who, due to an error on the part of the travel service, had been assigned to a compartment in another car. Charlotte and Marsha had already said goodbye to the guide at the station and given him a generous tip. Until they arrived in Dunhuang, they and Victor were on their own.
    “Well, here we are,” said Marsha with a wide smile as she flopped herself down on the lower berth opposite Charlotte.
    A tall, raw-boned, fresh-faced beauty, Marsha looked more like a downhill skier than the Sinologist she was. But appearances could be deceiving: her passion was for the kind of ancient Chinese poetry that extolled the pleasures of drinking tea, growing flowers, or gazing at the moon.
    “Yes,” said Charlotte. “Here we are.”
    The trip had come about so fast that being here still seemed unreal to her. It seemed as if she hadn’t had a second to call her own since that bright Maine morning on which Kitty had thrown the Chinese coins down on her kitchen table. She was looking forward to the long train ride; it would give her a chance to catch her breath. Leaning her head against the crocheted