The Last Samurai

Now he unpacked the wings and assembled the harness. The child stood watching him warily; it was backing toward a thicket of bamboo on top of the rock. He stepped into the harness and beckoned but the child refused to come. He was not entirely sure himself that the contraption would work, but he could not test it first—he knew he would not be able to climb up again.

Meanwhile the wind was pulling at the wings, and one gust almost pulled him off his feet; he had to grab a tree to keep from being blown away. Another gust of wind tore at him and nearly swept him off the rock. When it died down he made a sudden rush for the child; it turned and ran, and tripped, and he seized it by the foot. And now a third gust of wind snatched at him, sharper than the first two, and he had only one hand free. He was pulled loose from the tree; he could feel himself being pulled toward the cliff. Quickly he seized the child’s other foot; ignoring its howls he pulled it toward him and gripped it tightly in his arms—and no sooner had he done so than the wind filled the wings and they were carried off into the air.

At once they were carried high, high above even those pinnacles of rocks which he had seen flaming the day before. A fierce wind bore them along so impetuously he was afraid it would tear the wings; up it swooped and down it dropped, and it swept them at last out of that valley and miles and miles to the west until at last it did drop him in a bare rocky plain. There was no sand, but this was what had gleamed yellow on the horizon.

There was light in the upper air, but as soon as he reached the ground the light was gone. The sun was a bloody ball on the horizon. While he was still unfastening the harness it dropped out of sight.

HC was now in a much worse position than he had been at the top of the cliff. There was no water here; before the light had gone he had seen only the endless rocky plain stretching in all directions, with no sign of human habitation. It was bitterly cold, and there was nothing to burn. But now he had no way to a quick death—both might well die slowly of cold or thirst.

But even though he might now die a painful death he could not stop laughing. The silk wings lay crumpled at his feet, and the child was whimpering on his back, and he kept laughing and exclaiming: It worked! It bloody worked! Christ Almighty, it bloody worked!

He realised that he could not lie down to sleep or he would freeze to death. So he put the child on his back and he set out to walk through the night.

HC was 6′4″ and when he walked fast he covered ground. By morning he reckoned he must have walked a good 60 miles. And when the sun came up he saw a railroad track. Even though he was cold and hungry he was still laughing. When he turned to look back the way he had come he could not even see the valley, and he said again It bloody worked!

He walked by the track all day, and in late afternoon a train came. It did not stop when he waved, but it was going so slowly that he was able to jump on the last car, and it did not stop to throw him off.

The train did not stop at the next village, but he jumped off again to buy food. They ate, and then he put the child on his back again and followed the track. The next train was going too fast, but he jumped on the one after that. He kept expecting to be stopped but he thought that he would just keep going until he was stopped.

He rode trains for five days, and on the morning of the sixth day he saw the Flaming Mountains of Gaochang.

HC was now in the heart of Xinjiang, Mongolia to the east Kazakhstan & Kyrgyzstan to the west, but he did not know which way to go.

He left the train close to the end of the line and set off on foot. He walked north, keeping his options open, and now he had another piece of luck. He came to a village, and it seemed to him that the people there looked a little like the child he had rescued.

At first he thought he might find a home for the child, but people looked at the child and shook their heads, & though he could barely understand the local dialect he thought he was being told that it came from the west.

There were no maps to be had. He did not have enough to buy a pack animal. So they set out on foot.

They crossed the border without being stopped, and together they went through increasingly harsh terrain.

They went very slowly for the child could not travel fast.

After many months they came out onto a plain where horses were grazing. In the distance some kind of encampment could be seen. On they went, both half-dead.

They came to the encampment but the men were gone. The women were preparing meals or repairing clothes. The man and the boy came to a halt in the centre of the tents and gradually all fell silent.