Shambhala Read Online Free Page B

Jeep, Ragesh, Nicholas, and Officer Singh sit in the back as they drive off. The trip is quick, and upon arrival at the Nishant Guest House, Nicholas runs up to the room as the others wait in the Jeep. Getting to the room he notices the padlock is latched and locked. Opening the door he realizes that no one has been there since they left early in the morning. His towel still hangs over the bed where he left it, and there are no visible signs that Paul has been there. He latches the door and hurries back downstairs to the officers, who are smoking and talking with the guesthouse owners.
    “Not here!” he yells out. Everyone rushes back into the Jeep.
    “No one see your friend today,” Officer Singh says, confirming his conversation with the guesthouse owners. Fireworks blast off into the night sky with loud, shotgun-like echoes, ushering in little Diwali, the first day of the two-day Diwali festivities. Ragesh explains the festivities to Nicholas, who understands them to be a sort of combination of Christmas and the Fourth of July here in India. Nicholas isn’t very interested in festivities at the moment, leaning in to inform the officers of where he last saw Paul as they drive off toward the waterfall.
    “So we will take torch and split me and you,” Officer Singh explains, pointing to Nicholas and Ragesh, “and they two, and we will find your friend,” he says as smoke pours out of his mouth from his last exhale.
    The opening of the trail is dark. The officers grab flashlights, which they call torches . They distribute one to each person, exchange a few words of instructions, in Hindi, and begin to search into the pitch-black jungle. The officers hold black, wooden sticks, which Nicholas imagines are for any fierce animals they may encounter.
    “Oh!” the officers call out over and again.
    Nicholas joins them, “Paul! Paul! You out there?”
    Carefully looking in every spot they pass, they reach a split in the path, where they break up into groups. Two officers go off alone to investigate another trail as Nicholas’s group heads toward the felled tree. Nearing the tree, they scan the area with their torches, but Paul is too deeply covered by the thick brush to be seen. Even in the light of day, they would have a difficult time seeing him. Moving slowly, they walk only a few feet from where he lies still unconscious, hidden from all sight. Only an owl, which sits high in the tree above, peers down into the opening of the brush, wondering what these strange men with lights are doing in the jungle at such a time. If the men could scan from the branches in daytime, like a bird in the tree, perhaps then would they see Paul lying perfectly still.
    After searching for hours, they finally rendezvous back at the Jeep.
    “In the morning we can again look,” an officer says to Nicholas.
    “He may already have walked very far, and maybe will come to the village and call you,” Officer Singh says, trying to console.
    Nicholas wants to keep searching, but the vast jungle is overwhelming, and so he reluctantly agrees with the officers to wait until daybreak. Piling back into the Jeep, they drive off, back to the Nishant Guest House, where they instruct Nicholas to meet them at the station at seven in the morning to begin the search again. Thanking the officers he confirms, “See you at seven then.”
    He turns to Ragesh and shakes his hand, “Friend, thank you so much for your help.”
    Still holding his hand, Ragesh replies, “Tomorrow I am coming and bring friend for help.”
    “Thank you!” Nicholas says, wishing words could express his gratitude as tears well up from confused emotions.
    As the men pull away, Nicholas makes his way up to his room, where he briefly fantasizes Paul will be waiting for him. The fleeting fantasy shatters as he reaches the top of the stairway, noticing the padlock is still secured from the outside. Entering the barren room, heavy with burden, he collapses onto the bed. Feeling empty and