The Cloud Maker

Chapter 59

Jack Milton was discussing Phd potential with an undergraduate in his study when there was a knock at his door. It opened a fraction to reveal the left side of Luca’s face.

‘Jesus, Luca!’ he said, jumping up from behind his desk. ‘We’ll continue this later,’ he muttered to the student, waving him up from the armchair and out of the room.

As Luca stepped hesitantly into the office, Jack took him by the shoulders. As soon as he touched him, he could feel just how much weight Luca had lost. His grey eyes looked paler than normal and were ringed with fatigue. Despite his clean clothes, Lucasunburned face and matted hair made him look weathered and somehow uncivilised, a far cry from the pale academics who normally inhabited Jack’s study.

‘Why didn’t you call?’ he demanded. ‘We hadn’t heard from you in so long, we thought the worst had happened.’

He pulled his nephew forward, hugging him tight in his arms. Eventually, with a couple of awkward pats on his back, Jack stepped away and turned to the window. Behind his reading glasses, Luca could see his eyes were clouded with tears.

‘Next time you go on a trip, I’m giving you a bloody satellite phone,’ he said, busying himself by making some coffee. Pouring the dregs from the glass pot into the top of the coffee machine again, he packed in some new grounds from a well-thumbed packet and pressed the switch. Soon they were settled into the two armchairs, facing each other.

For over an hour Luca talked. In all that time Jack did not interrupt or ask questions, but sipped his coffee long after it had turned cold. A mixture of disbelief and horror spread across his face as his nephew related every step of the journey. When Luca explained what had happened to Bill, Jack reached up his hands to his face and covered his eyes. His shoulders shook from sobs and for a long time after that they both sat in silence. Eventually Luca got up from his chair and poured his uncle another coffee, resting his hand briefly on his shoulder as he passed him the cup.

When Luca had finished what remained of his story, he reached into his satchel to pull out two battered books, setting them down on the wide armrests of his chair.

‘So the Chinese captain was dead when you saw him on the cliff-face?’ Jack asked.

Luca nodded. ‘He was on a ledge, about ten minutes down from the top, pressed up against the back wall with his eyes frozen open. Must have died of exposure during the night.’

‘Bastard deserved nothing less,’ Jack said vehemently. After another pause, he exhaled deeply. ‘So how did you get back to Lhasa?’

Luca almost smiled as an image of René came to mind. He had been there when Luca finally got down off the mountain. Approaching the charred remains of Menkom village, Luca had spotted him in a makeshift chair that was tilted towards the cliff-face, fast asleep in the heat of the midday sun. A towel shaded his face as he slept, while his right leg lay trussed up in bandages, resting on a gnarled wooden tree stump.

He had woken as Luca drew closer across the field, pulling the towel from his face and letting out a shout of laughter. Despite being in obvious pain, he had been tireless in organising yaks with the locals he had befriended, arranging to take them back along the trail to Tingkye, where they had then rejoined a proper road.

‘René waited for me that whole time,’ Luca said, shaking his head. ‘He got me out of Tibet, risking everything once again to smuggle me over the Friendship Bridge into Nepal. All that, and I barely even knew the guy.’

‘The kindness of strangers,’ Jack said. ‘It never ceases to amaze me what human beings are capable of.’

Then he shifted forward in his chair, eyes resting on the two books lying in front of his nephew. Luca followed his gaze, picking up the first and holding it out in front of him.

‘I found this in my rucksack when I got back to Lhasa,’ he said, unclipping the delicate gilded clasp. ‘Shara must have put it there without my knowing.’

As it fell open on Luca’s lap, Jack’s eyes passed over the white writing set on thick black parchment. The book looked old and well travelled, with angular Tibetan characters stamped across the densely packed pages. Jack’s hand reached out, hovering just above it.

‘Is that what I think it is?’

‘The Kalak Tantra,’ Luca said, watching the expression on Jack’s face change.

‘So Sally was wrong. It does exist,’ he murmured. Jack looked up into Luca’s eyes. Aside from everything else, the book corroborated so much of what his nephew had said.

‘Shara obviously trusts you,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘It was a big risk to give a foreigner this book.’

Luca nodded. Then, shutting the book, he got up from his chair and returned the Kalak Tantra to his satchel. He then picked up the other book. It was much smaller: a slim, leather-bound journal, laced together with twine.

‘I need you to do something for me, Jack,’ he said, handing it over to him. ‘Give this to my father. It’s my diary and a complete account of what happened. Maybe then he’ll understand.’

Jack tried to push it away. ‘You give it to him yourself,’ he said, a frown appearing on his forehead. ‘I know what your father is like, but it would be so much better coming from you.’

Luca shook his head, swinging the satchel over his shoulder.

‘I can’t. I’ve got to go and see someone first.’

As he tried to leave, Jack grabbed hold of his arm.

‘You will be all right, won’t you, Luca?’

For the first time in their whole meeting, a smile crept across Luca’s face. He gently pulled his uncle’s hand from his arm.

‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘I think I will. You take care of yourself, Jack.’

With that, he walked out of the dusty study, leaving his uncle staring at the book in his hands.

For a while after that, Jack jumped whenever the phone rang, but it was never Luca. Against his better instincts, he left a few messages on Luca’s phone but never received any response. It struck him that, as ever, Luca would let him know when he needed him, but as the weeks passed with still no word, he decided that he should try and track him down.

He discovered that soon after leaving his uncle, Luca had sold his flat, drawing the entire sum of money in a cashier’s cheque. He had then gone to Bill’s house, spending several hours with Cathy and the kids, before handing over the cheque and leaving once again.

After that, he seemed to vanish.

Some days, Jack sits in his study looking at a satellite map of the Himalayas and thinks he knows where his nephew is. On others, he’s not so sure.

But then again, it was always like that with Luca.