Gardella 10

10     We stood there dumbfounded while the Dragon Lady ran to greet the new arrival.  Behind him were a dozen others, all riding on camels.  The leader dismounted & spoke to the Dragon Lady in a language that wasn't English.  He looked excited & so did she.   Then the Dragon Lady was pointing to us & the two of them were walking toward us as we stood in the doorway of the hut.  The stranger might have been in his middle thirties.  He was not tall--perhaps five feet eight or nine inches--but broadly built weighing maybe 180.  He wore skins like the Mongols & as he came closer I could see that he had dark brown hair & that his face was rugged but pleasant.  He smiled often as he talked to the Dragon Lady.   They headed for the hut & he said, "Well, mates, how goes it?"  His accent was not American; he sounded a little like Scotty but not quite.  Next, Scotty was saying, "Glory be!  Audy!  It's been years!"  & the two of them were embracing while the Dragon Lady & Gunny & I stared in bewilderment.  Scotty invited the other to sit down & share our meal & then he said, "Lads, I want you to meet Audy who's an old friend from Australia."  We soon learned that he had been in China since World War II.   "I was a coast watcher during the war," Audy explained.  "First in Burma & then in China with two Australian mates.  Our job was to keep an eye out for Japanese ships.  Both my mates were killed by the Japs & after the war I decided to stay.  I feel the same as Scotty does about China.  Wouldn't go back home in a million years."   When Scotty asked what he'd been up to, he said, "I've just come from the Gobi, taking care of some business."  Inquisitive as always, I asked, "What's the Gobi?"  "A desert," Scotty explained, "between Russia & Mongolia."   "I tell you, Scotty," Audy went on, "on my way back we heard alot about some group been giving the Commies a hard time.  They're in one bloody awful mood down on the plains, especially Manchuria.  Don't know what these blokes have done but the Commies are sore about it."   Scotty grinned at him & then we were all laughing.  "It was you blokes was it?  Been having yourselves some fun?"  The laughter went on for awhile before Scotty remembered his manners & introduced Gunny & me by name.   "Pleased to meet you," Audy said.  "You chaps American, eh?"  We both hesitated.  Then Gunny said "Yup," & I chimed in, "That's right."  Audy laughed.  "I fought with you chaps during the war; I'd know a Yank a mile away in the dark."   "Used to see alot of Audy during the war," Scotty reminisced.  "But afterwards he went north into Mongolia & I lost him."  "I've been up in Mandal," Audy told him, "then down to Sain Shanda & across the mountain to here.  Wanted to see my friends out there."   I couldn't resist saying, "They're sure some friends."  "What do you mean?" Audy asked.   "If you'd been here yesterday, you'd know," Scotty told him.  "It's rather a long story.  For now I'll just say that we have here with us a young khan."  & he pointed to me.  To keep Scotty from going into the embarrassing details I said, "Oh, it's just a nickname the Dragon Lady gave me."   Audy now looked more confused than ever.  "& who may I ask is the Dragon Lady?"  "Sheis."  I gestured toward her.  "Well, that's a new one on me."  "Rick--Khan, that is--gave her the name," Scotty said.  "& that's another story we shan't go into now."   Audy turned to the Dragon Lady & spoke to her in what I suppose was Chinese.  She answered in English, "From now on I am Dragon Lady, that is my name.  &" she added, pointing to me, "his name is Khan!"   "We're all learning new things," Scotty said.  "Until we got here I never knew the Dragon Lady had a sister."  With a cool look she said, "There are many things about me that you do not know.  But there is no time now to tell you everything.  Now we shall watch the Mongol sport."   Gunny was up & heading for the door.  "I've still got a little of that wine in my system," he said.  "I could use some air."  He stepped out but after a second or two he stepped back in.  "My God, they've got wolves out there!" he yelled.   The others seemed mildly amused.  going to the entrance I stuck my head out & saw, sure enough, half a dozen of the snarling animals.  Wondering what they thought was funny about that I said, "Have a look for yourselves!"  "The Mongols keep them as pets, Rick," Scotty told me.  "Wolves?  As pets?"  "Aye, lad, they're tame, they're friendly."   "Bullshit!" Gunny said.  & when I reached out intending to pet one of them, he made a lunge for my hand.  "Friendly, huh?"  But the Dragon Lady said, still looking amused, "Come, I shall take you with me."   Following her out I found there were now no les than a dozen of them most of them bigger than German shepherds jumping all around us.  The Dragon Lady who was carrying some of our leftover food walked calmly up to them, with me still as close behind her as I could manage, while they jumped at her & took the morsels from her hand.  The air outside was cool but I was sweating.  Looking back at the hut I saw that Audy, Scotty & Gunny were all staying put.  The Dragon Lady dropped to her knees & the pets began licking her hands & face.  She said, looking up, "Khan, sit next to me."   Nervous as I was I found to my surprise that the wolves really were friendly.  After they'd licked my hands & I'd begun petting them, out of the corner of my eye I spooted Gunny moving very slowly in our direction.  Several of the wolves turned & snarled at him, but the Dragon Lady spoke to them & they were quiet.  She called to Gunny, "You come here, sit with us."  Soon he was part of the playful group.   When Audy & Scotty finally sauntered over, I Had had all the play I wanted.  We strolled about the camp & saw some of the camel riders who'd come in with Audy.  In answer to my questions he told me he was the only Australian in central China--"from Inner Mongolia to the Gobi to the Russian border," as he put it.  "Just as I'm the only Scotsman in Manchuria," Scotty said.  "Do you have your own territories or something?" I asked.   "It's just where we'd rather be, off by ourselves," Audy said.  "Aye," Scotty agreed.  "But we're close even though we're many miles apart.  & we help each other whenever we can."  "Does the Dragon Lady have a territory too?" I asked.  "She's all over China," Scotty responded.  "She travels from one end of the country to the other to help people she cares about & because it is safer for her that way."   "She cares about her country but she would like to see it without Communists," Audy added.  "Do you think that will ever happen?" I asked.  "Nothing seems to go back to the way it was before."   "The Communists won't last long," Audy said.  "If they last a hundred years, that is not long as the Confucians see it.  What the Chinese have more of than any other people in the world is patience."  "Would you say the Dragon Lady has patience?" I asked.  "Yes, lad," Scotty told me.  "A very great deal of patience."   "I wish I knew more about her--where she came from, & about her family.  Do you know?"  Audy looked at Scotty who seemed to hesitate.  Then he said, "We can't tell you everything at once, lad.  We've got to keep you interested."  Before I could press him further the Mongol lieutenant appeared & he & Audy gripped arms in friendship.  When they sat down & began talking in what I suppose was a Mongolian language, I wandered off, found Kim & was soon showing her & several other children how to shoot baskets, using some makeshift substitutes.  In the middle of this the Dragon Lady came by & led me to where the camels were tied, many of them resting on the ground.  In a minute she was showing me how to ride one.   Like the horses, the camels had simple bridles of rope.  I took hold of the rope in my left hand & threw a leg between the humps.  As soon as I was mounted the camel got to its feet as though I had given it a signal.  The Dragon Lady untied another animal & mounted it gracefully.  "You hold on," she said.  Then she gave my camel a swat & we were off, loping along at an easy gait.  Its huge stride & deep up-&-down movement made it very different from riding a horse & of course I was much higher off the ground.  It glided through the camp & up a slight rise just outside it at such a clip now that I didn't suppose any living creature could overtake me--until I caught a glimpse of the Dragon Lady coming up behind me.  By then we were a good distance from the camp, & the Dragon Lady turned her mount, calling out that she would race me back.  All along the way I had a feeling that she was going just fast enough to keep up with me.   As we dismounted I could see  a crowd gathering in an open field on the other side of the camp.  There were shouts & as we approached it appeared that an archery contest had begun.  Six bowmen were lined up & shooting at targets that seemed hardly visible; they must have been at least two hundred yards away.  The Dragon Lady told me that the targets were skin bags filled with water & that in fact they were about the size of a human head.  But the archers seemed to be popping those bags with almost every shot.  What astonished me even more was seeing the archers move back another seventy-five or a hundred yards & begin shooting all over again.  Though they didn't have quite the same accuracy from that distance, they still hit more often than not.   While I watched, the Mongol lieutenant came up & motioned for me to go with him.  When I nodded in agreement he lifted a thick arm & laid it over my shoulder.  I could hear Gunny laughing as we walked off together.   We came to the archers who stopped shooting when they saw us.  One of them handed his bow to the lieutenant who then gave it to me along with an arrow.  Though I had never fired an arrow before, there was nothing for me to do but fit the arrow to the string & do my best to pull it.  The lieutenant from behind put his hands over mine & helped me draw.  The arrow went off at a crazy angle & he brought another.  This time I managed by myself to draw the bow a couple of inches before I let go.  The arrow made a gentle arc & fell with a plop a few yards in front of me.  I said, laughing before anyone else could, "I guess I'm better with a machine gun."   "More is needed than the strength of the body for this," the Dragon Lady told me.  "The strength of the mind is also needed.  You must concentrate. "  After a few more shots with no improvement I handed the bow back to the lieutenant & grasped him by the arms as a way of thanking him.  Then with smiles all round I walked back to join Gunny & the others & we followed the Dragon Lady to a field where riding events were to take place.  I was surprised to see that the horses being led out were hardly bigger than ponies.  The Dragon Lady, reading my thoughts, said, "Small but very strong."   Hearing hoofbeats I turned & saw a new group of ponies being ridden at top speed by children--some of them no more than six or seven years old.  The Dragon Lady told us that they had learned to ride almost as soon as they learned to walk.   After the horse races came camel racing.  Then there were wrestling matches & finally Scotty came to tell us that we were invited to a hunt as honored guests; the Mongols would do the actual hunting.  We were scattered among twelve small parties, some going after antelope, others after deer or bear.  After an hour's ride I waited along with Nancy absolutely motionless for what seemed an endless time until a huge brown shape ambled over the rocks in our direction.  We were downwind, so he was nearly upon us when the hunters all at once drew their bows, & the arrows went zinging like bees out of a hive.  The bear which must have stood five feet tall dropped in his tracks.  In moments a litter had been made & the dead bear was being carried back to camp.   While we waited to make a meal of the game that had been killed, Audy described his adventures in China--how he'd come here as a coast watcher, how his two buddies had died, how he & Scotty had been involved in a savage battle along thirty miles of the Great Wall.  When the food arrived I ate as much as I could hold, stoking up for the days when there wouldn't be any kind of feast.  Afterward the chief stood up & led our group into his hut.  There while we all sat in a circle the chief began to speak with Scotty translating.   He told us that all along the Khinghan Mountains his people's herds were dying & some of their horses.  They didn't know the reason but they believed underground explosions were somehow to blame.  The people who had set off the explosions had their headquarters at the same base we had gone to such pains to avoid.  The Mongols were now so angry, Scotty told us, that they had decided to go to war against the people at the base.  "With bows & arrows?"  I wasn't being facetious.   Scotty smiled & shook his head.  "Bows & arrows are a part of their tradition, for games & for hunting.  But they use more modern weapons too."  Then I asked whether they had any experience in attacking from an open plain, & the Dragon Lady said bluntly, "No; but still they will do it."  Scotty said quietly, "I think we owe them something, lads.  I think we ought to help them."  Without hesitation Gunny & I agreed.   The Dragon Lady got to her feet & addressed the chief.  He smiled as she spoke, looked us over, then spoke to her again.  Turning to us the Dragon Lady said, "We go tonight & we must go quickly.  We must attack & then move south at once."  "All of us?"   "Oh yes," she answered.  "The entire village will be moved deeper into the mountains, for once we attack the Communists will be looking for us."  The people of the village were nomads, she explained.  "They move all the time.  Ten or eleven times a year they move on again to where the hunting & the grazing are best.  Their home is not one place, it is everywhere."   Soon the lieutenant & his two men entered & the Dragon Lady began laying out a battle plan, while Scotty translated.  We would be using horses to approach & to escape afterward.  The base, between Chihfeng & the mountains, had its center in one main building; a mile from it was a tunnel leading to the underground testing area.  We were to concentrate our attack on the central building.   The Dragon Lady told us that she wanted to take half of our force, but that the chief would not permit this.  He said it was his job, that his people would do it.  "So there will be just twenty-five of us--the seven who are right here & eighteen others.  With his men that will be about one hundred."  I said that was alot of people.   "It will be a big job to do," she replied.  "It will not be as easy as the other base.  We had better see to our weapons."  We got our machine guns & bandoliers & headed back to the chief's hut where the lieutenant & his two friends were already cleaning their weapons.  These were Russian-made, of the same kind as the ones we carried.   The Dragon Lady now went into more detail about the attack.  We'd go in from the west, the near side of the camp; as always she made a sketch in the dirt to show what she meant.  "We shall attack from the northwest & the southwest & close them in.  A third group in the center will stay back to cover our withdrawal.  The Communists will think that we intend to withdraw in the same direction from which we entered but they will be mistaken."   To attack the main building, she went on, she & Audy would go with the chief in the northwest group; Scotty, Gunny, Charlie, Nancy & I would go with the southwest one.  She said, looking at me, "You must keep Charlie close for he knows this area very well."  I nodded.  I had no intention of letting Charlie get far away.   We all walked outside to where the others were mounting up--a motley crew in ragtag uniforms.  In addition to their automatic weapons I saw that several of them were carrying bows & arrows.  Of the two groups the Dragon Lady's moved out ahead of ours, with the backup people in the rear.  Riding two abreast we had soon left the light of the campfires behind us & found ourselves in total darkness.  A now-familiar chill ran through me at the thought of what lay ahead, of how far I was from home.  It was a long time before I could shake off the mood.  We came to a stop & Scotty rode forward to learn what was happening.  He came back to tell us that this was where the groups were to divide.  We started forward agin with Charlie leading us off to the right while the Dragon Lady's people veered off to the left.  The icy feeling went through me again as we separated.   After about half an hour Charlie raised his hand to signal a stop.  I watched while he talked with several of the Mongols.  Then they dismounted & raced off into the darkness carrying guns, bows & quivers of arrows.  We dismounted too, tied the horses off to one side & sat down in a circle.  A chill seemed to have settled into the air as though my own mood had become a permanent condition.  But this wasn't my imagination, by now the night had grown very cold.   "Those who went ahead will open the way for us," Charlie said.  "We wait for a time, then we go."  He reached into his jacket & pulled out an hourglass.  "When all the sand is on the bottom," he told us, "it will be time."  "Suppose the scouts aren't back by then?" I asked.  "We go anyway."  Charlie did not sound cheerful when he said that.   But before long the scouts were back with their quivers almost empty of arrows.  "The way is clear," Charlie said to us.  He looked at his timer.  We had only a little while longer, perhaps only a few minutes.  "They killed the guards?" I asked Charlie.  "Yes."  "Suppose the bodies are found before we go in?"   Charlie did not answer.  Either he wasn't worried or he was being very cool in the face of danger.  In a couple of minutes he mounted his horse, the rest of us followed suit & we were off, proceeding down the trail at a walk.  When we got to the bottom we fanned out onto the open plain.  I took the machine gun off my shoulder, removed one of the clips from the bandolier around my waist & snapped it into the gun which I cocked & rested on my lap, marveling at how small it was.  All the same I was very nervous & so was everyone else.   A war cry sounded & we galloped out onto the plain.  I wondered that any horse could keep its footing out there where at first I couldn't see anything at all.  Then lights began to appear, more & more of them, until I could make out buildings & people darting between them.  Gunfire sounded at a distance off to the left; that I assumed was the Dragon Lady's group attacking.  I lifted my weapon, positioned it & began firing almost the instant I leaped from my horse.  Taking cover as best I could whenever I had to change clips, I headed toward the buildings.   Once again surprise was on our side.  I heard a few explosions off to the left & concluded that the other group must be going for the buildings.  About forty yards off I saw two of the Mongols go down while a group of Communists charged toward them.  I sprinted that way too with Gunny about five strides ahead of me, firing & screaming at the Mongols, "Stay down!  Stay down!"--even though they couldn't understand what he was saying.   Then a grenade blast knocked the charging Communists off their feet.  It knocked Gunny down as well; he'd fallen within ten yards of the Mongols.  I could see, as I hit the dirt beside Gunny, that they were still alive & I prayed that he would be too.  I spoke to him & for a moment there was no sign of life.  Then he said, "Can I open my eyes now?  Did you get 'em?"  Old fox that he was he'd decided his best shot at staying alive, alone & out in the open, was to play dead.  Now he yelled, "They can't kill us!  We're not human!"  To me he said, "I just needed the rest."   Already people were running all over the place again, roused by the explosion, while we lay beside the wounded Mongols firing at the buildings.  Then to our left we saw some of the Dragon Lady's group racing toward them.  I concluded that they must be going to set explosive charges & stopped firing in that direction.  Bodies lay everywhere & some of them were our people.   Charlie came running up with four Mongols who carried off the wounded men.  No more Communist troops were visible though there was some firing from buildings where they'd taken cover.  I saw some of our people running & then I heard Charlie shouting, "We go!  Quick!  To horses!"   Sprinting to where a couple of the Mongols were already gathering the mounts & trying all the while to stay low, I saw that a number of the horses had been hit & were sprawled out whinnying with pain & terror.  This meant that most of us had to ride double.  We were a fair distance away from the buildings when the explosion came rocking the ground under us.  That would have been the main building, I knew.  But I didn't look back as we headed for the shelter of the mountains & the Mongol camp.  Besides the advantage of surprise & the Dragon Lady's military genius, up to now we had also been just plain lucky.  We couldn't afford to gamble on more of the same.   The Dragon Lady's group had been close to us for a long time, but it was not until some time after we linked up & were deep into the mountains again that we could afford to stop.  The Dragon Lady dismounted & walked up to me smiling.  She said, "It is done."  "We got the building you wanted?"  "Yes, now we can go back to the camp."   In another couple of minutes we mounted again & after maybe half an hour we were at the camp.  I was not prepared for what we saw.  With the chief growling out orders everyone was busy getting ready to move on--even the small children had jobs to do.  What had been a village of a few hundred people now became a mounted party of the same number, riding along the trail at a slow gallop with patrols out in every direction.  The next time we stopped the chief walked over & began to speak.  With the Dragon Lady interpreting we learned that we had lost forty people in the attack plus about a dozen more wounded, only one of them seriously.  The chief was thanking us for our help.  He knew we Americans would now be trying to get out of China & to assist us he was sending thirty or forty men with us on the trip south.   We thanked him but it was hardly possible to say how grateful we were.  The Dragon Lady told us what we already knew--that we had to depart as soon as possible.  & before we could reach the sea we had to cross the Great Wall which Scotty told me was about 150 miles away.  "Will they have planes out looking for us again?" I wondered.   "They will not be able to find us in these mountains," the Dragon Lady answered.  & by this time I was ready to believe anything she told me--that she knew everything & could do anything.   We started out with Audy loping alongside me on his camel, which he said he would be leaving with the Mongols until he came back for it.  "What do you mean?  Back from where?"  "I mean from the sea, mate," he replied  "where you & Gunny will be safe."  I turned to him in amazement.  "Are you really going all that way with us?"  "Why of course!"  He sounded amazed at my supposing it could be any other way.   We stopped after about an hour to rest & water the horses.  While we were walking them along the trail again Gunny came alongside me.  I told him how strange it felt to be in a place where you didn't see any other Americans.  "Do you suppose we're the only ones in China?  Or do you think they dropped alot of other parties for missions like ours?"   "I wouldn't be surprised," was his answer.  "What the hell, it wouldn't cost them much.  Drop a few of us in all over China; if we succeed, fine; if we don't..."  In the gray light of early morning I could just make out the hand he ran across his throat.   A few minutes later we got the signal to mount & ride again.  The sun would be coming up soon & I could see an occasional tree & a few patches of grass--a relief from the rocky canyons we'd traveled in so much of the time.  I rode along thinking of how these Mongols, people from a world so different, were now my friends--& how a month ago the odds on my ever having met Nancy who now rode alongside me would have been one in a million.  Now she was someone I'd miss when I was out of China--if I ever got out!   A strange bellowing broke into my thoughts & I looked up to see half a dozen riders approaching.  Scotty, when I asked about them, told me they were scouts--the ones the Dragon Lady had sent ahead to the Great Wall.  He went on to explain that it was essential for us to cross the wall by dawn on a certain day which was a holiday when there would be alot of people congregating there for festivities.   The Dragon Lady rode up now & told us that the scouts after crossing the wall had been into Peking which was nearby.  Before we crossed it, she added, the Mongols were to leave us.  "Then," she said, "we shall split into two groups.  My group will go into Peking & the other will go around it.  Then we shall meet on the south side of the city.  We shall be not far from the water then.  & we shall go on the water to Weihai & there we shall try to find a boat that will take you & Gunny out of China."  I asked why her group was going into Peking.   "There is someone I wish to see."  From the sound of her voice & the look in her eyes as she said it I knew there was no use asking anything more.   Now the Dragon Lady told Scotty that one of the men who had ridden with us wanted to talk with him.  A young man came up & bowed to Scotty who bowed in return.  After the two of them had sat talking for awhile Scotty came over to tell Gunny & me what he had learned.   "That lad operated a radio transmitter.  He was one of three who were trying to help us get away from the tunnel, back there in Manchuria.  One radio operator turned out to be a traitor & all three of those stations were destroyed.  Most of the men in them were killed.  He is one of the few who escaped."  Scotty went on, looking still more somber, "He says that before they were attacked he had tried to establish radio contact with a station operated by Americans to tell them about you.  He is certain they were able to receive his signal because he could hear them sending.  But they wouldn't answer or even acknowledge his message."  Gunny said, "Those rotten sons of bitches, they're throwin' us to the wolves!"   "But Gunny," I said, "suppose they didn't believe the message.  Maybe the guy's wrong & they didn't even get the message.  That's possible isn't it, Scotty?"  "Aye, it's possible, it surely is."  But he didn't sound very sure.   All the same I kept telling myself it was possible.  Otherwise I'd have to believe they didn't want to rescue us & maybe wouldn't even let us rescue ourselves.