The Collected Short Stories of Louis L'Amour, Volume Four Read Online Free Page B

they skirted an irrigation ditch. Beside Tohkta the old yak hunter moved, silent as a
djinn.
Tohkta, who had stalked wild sheep upon the highest peaks, was hard put to keep pace with the old man.
    Outside the nearby
Ya-men,
which was the government house, stood vehicles that smelled of greasy smoke and petrol. Tohkta had seen them before, in Khotan. There were soldiers there also, reflected light gleaming from their gun barrels. They were fine rifles that filled Tohkta’s mind with envy.
    “The old wolf was right,” Tola Beg breathed in his ear, “the town stinks of danger.”
    The town was different, very different. The fires in the foundry were out and the alley of the bazaar was dirty and neglected. Everywhere there were horses and trucks and soldiers and supplies. Even in the violent days after the murder of the old governor, when the fighting between the Nationalists and the Moslem generals was at its worst, there hadn’t been this many armed men in Kargalik.
    “The forces of history are at work here,” Tola Beg mumbled. “And that is something to avoid.” They moved on through the darkness and then drew up.
    Tohkta crouched in the shadows, listening. Before him was the wall of the compound of Kushla’s father. Soon he would see her. His heart pounded with excitement.
    Creeping like wild dogs to a sheepfold, they came into the yard. Here, too, they heard the language of the Han Chinese, and one voice that made Tohkta’s hair prickle on his scalp…a voice with the harsh tone of command. Neither of them spoke Mandarin, for Sinkiang is a land of many tongues, Chinese the least of them, but both knew its sound.
    The house of Yakub, yet filled with Han soldiers. Tola Beg tugged at his arm. They must steal away while they had the chance.
    But where then was Yakub? And where was Kushla?
    “We must go. They have taken it for their own use,” Tola Beg whispered in his ear.
    Tohkta moved back into the darkness, his thoughts racing over possible alternatives. Then it came to him, and he knew where they would be if they were alive and still in Kargalik.
             
    I T WAS AN ANCIENT Buddhist temple, fallen to ruins, rebuilt, and ruined again. Sometimes Yakub had used it for a storehouse, and Kushla loved the ancient trees around it. There was shelter there, and a good spring nearby. They made their way through the dark town and approached with caution.
    “Look!” Tola Beg caught his arm. “The spotted horse…it is the old one the girl loved. At least they left her that.”
    Why not? The horse was almost as old as Kushla herself, who would be eighteen this year.
    Leaving Tola Beg, he moved swiftly, glancing each way, then listening. Like a wraith, Tohkta slipped past the yak hide that hung over the door.
    In the vague light from the charcoal brazier he saw her, and on the instant he entered she looked up. She stood swiftly, poised like a young deer, ready for flight. And then she looked into his eyes and came into his arms without shame.
    Yakub got to his feet. He was in rags. The one room of the temple that still possessed a roof held only a few sacks and some bedding. Yakub had been a proud and wealthy man, but was so no longer.
    “Go, Tohkta! Go, quickly! If you are found here—!”
    From his shirt, Tohkta drew the sack of gold. “The marriage price,” he said. “I claim my bride.”
    How lovely she was! Her dark eyes glowed, her figure under the thin garments was so lithe and eager. The years he had waited had brought her to womanhood, and to a loveliness he could scarcely believe. He tried to say all this.
    “If you think I am beautiful after all that has happened, then our parents have chosen well,” she said.
    “Please go!” Yakub seized his elbow. “For the sake of my daughter, take her and go. The gold also. If they find it they will take it, anyway.”
    “What has happened here?”
    “The Red soldiers, the ones that we heard of but who never came, they have come at last. They take