Chapter XVII: The Monster of the Mountains

In the harrowing moments that followed, Biff saw two shapes go slithering off the slanted bridge and continue spinning, tumbling in huddled helpless fashion into the gaping jaws of the roaring gorge. Biff shut his eyes as they disappeared, and his mind flashed back to those tiny figures that he had seen against the snowy background of the mountain pass.

Uncle Charlie, Li, and Chuba. The boys were two of a size, like those two forms that had just plunged from the collapsing bridge. So they must be Li and Chuba—or else the two porters. But no, not the porters; those somersaulting shapes weren’t big enough. Biff tightened his fists grimly as he opened his eyes for one last hopeless look.

Biff was right: It wasn’t the porters.

At the first warning quiver of the bridge, they had dropped their heavy burdens and made a desperate dive for safety. Nearly across, first one, then the other, had managed to grab the high edge of the canted runway and scramble to the ground beyond. But as Biff looked past them, his eyes opened really wide.

It wasn’t Li or Chuba either!

Both boys were still there, near the center of the bridge, with Uncle Charlie!

The moment the bridge had tilted one way and they had felt themselves sliding with it, all three had made a frantic grab in the other direction. Instinctively, they had gripped the upper side and the slender grass ropes that supported it. They were still hanging on.

What Biff had seen tumble into the gorge were the bulky packs that the porters had flung aside. Those bulging burdens, when falling, had looked exactly like a pair of huddled humans. Now, Uncle Charlie and the two boys were lightening weight by letting their own packs follow the path of the others.

That still didn’t guarantee them safety. The whole weight of the bridge was now swaying on a single rope cable. Sooner or later it was sure to snap; then all hope of rescue would be gone. Now, chunks of the runway were breaking loose from the dangling ropes, which no longer bore their proportionate shares of the weight. That produced a new dilemma.

It was impossible for Uncle Charlie, Li, and Chuba to work their way along that upper edge, because of the gaps. They would have to reach the one remaining cable, climb it to the top of the tower post and come down to the ground. Li and Chuba might manage it; but not Charles Keene, with all his weight.

Chandra had the answer. He had brought along the rope from his log bridge. He tossed one end to Biff, saying, “Hang on tight!” Then, carrying the other end, Chandra scrambled up the lone cable and practically slid from the post top out to where Li and Chuba clung. There, Chandra, Li, and Chuba tied their rope end to the cable; while Biff, Mike, and Kamuka hauled the rope taut and hitched the other end around the tower post.

That filled the gaps along the level route to safety. Chandra went first, pausing to tie dangling liana strands to the new rope to keep it from sagging. Li and Chuba followed, stopping to wait for Charles Keene, even when he twisted one arm in the rope and waved them on with his other hand. If Biff’s uncle tired, they hoped to help him; but what Uncle Charlie lacked in agility, he made up for in endurance.

After minutes that proved long and nerve-racking for Biff and his watching companions, the other boys reached solid ground with Charles Keene right behind them. A moment later, Biff and the rest were swarming around Uncle Charlie and congratulating him, while Barma Shah spoke approvingly.

“That was very good, indeed. And just in time, too. The wind is getting brisker from the gorge. What is left of the bridge will soon be gone.”

At a combined order from Tikse and Hurdu, the bearers gathered their packs. Then they were on their way again. As they veered away from the gorge, Biff took a last look back. The remains of the bridge were swinging like a hammock now, its single strand due to snap at any moment.

Chandra, who was walking beside Biff, touched his arm. “The rope, Biff,” he said in a low voice. “Somebody cut it!”

Biff stared at him. “Are you sure?” he gasped. When Chandra nodded, Biff said soberly, “Then that means there’s an enemy right in our own party.”

That evening, when they pitched their tents in the shelter of some trees on the rim of a rugged valley, Charles Keene remarked:

“Losing a few packs didn’t hurt us, because we were short on porters anyway.”

“Short on porters?” inquired Barma Shah. “How?”

“We had sixty yesterday morning, but there were only fifty-four when I counted them as they crossed the log bridge. That’s why I brought up the rear, to see that no more of them skipped.”

That news brought a grim expression to Barma Shah’s face. In response, he said:

“They may have heard our talk of Yeti. What is more, I saw some big tracks in the snow before we broke camp yesterday. I obliterated them, but perhaps some of the porters saw them first.”

That night it snowed again, though only lightly. In the morning, Biff awoke to hear the camp babbling with excitement. He crawled from his sleeping bag and emerged from the tent, where he promptly ran into Chandra, who told him:

“Yeti tracks again. Hurdu found them on the hill.”

Biff joined Charles Keene and Barma Shah up near some barren rocks. The tracks were much larger than a man’s foot, but clumsy and roughly formed. They led in from the rocks, then back again, as though some creature had come down from the craggy hill toward the camp, only to return to its lair.

Some of the Ladakhi bearers were gabbing among themselves and repeating, “Yeti—Yeti,” much too often, as they walked along beside the big footprints and compared them with their own smaller tracks. Back at camp, Barma Shah conferred with Tikse, who gave the porters a pep-talk in a mixture of Hindi and Ladakhi. They responded in grunts of half-agreement as they gathered up their packs.

“Those sound like yak grunts,” declared Chuba. “Good and bad. They don’t want to go along, but anyway, they go.”

“That is right,” stated Chandra, who had caught the meaning of the speech. “Tikse says they have to go along because they can’t go back, as there is no bridge across the gorge.”

That night, the porters pitched their tents much closer together when they camped. There was another light snow, and in the morning Hurdu found new Yeti tracks beside a rocky slope nearby. Charles Keene was frankly skeptical about them.

“Anybody could have made them with a piece of brushwood,” Biff’s uncle declared, “or in half a dozen other ways. But I guess Tikse can’t convince his crowd of that.”

“Tikse thinks they are Yeti tracks himself,” returned Barma Shah. “That is the real trouble.”

All day the Ladakhi porters kept watching the barren ground above the tree line, for that was the high altitude at which the Yeti supposedly dwelled. They quickened their pace and reached the next campsite well before dusk. There, trouble seemed over, for this was a valley where two trails crossed, and already a nomadic tribe was camped there. They greeted the party from Leh and gladly sold them fresh provisions.

That night, there was music and mirth around the campfires. The morning dawned crisp but pleasant, for there was no sign of any snow. Nor was there any sign of Tikse and his Ladakhi porters. They had pulled out at dawn, taking the other trail the long way back to Leh, leaving only Hurdu and a dozen others who were not Ladakhi.

That automatically promoted Hurdu to chief guide, and when he suggested hiring some of the nomad tribesmen as porters, Barma Shah favored the idea, but asked for approval from Charles Keene, as joint leader of the expedition. Biff’s uncle was all for Hurdu’s suggestion.

“They look to me like Sherpas,” he declared. “Like those friendly chaps we met in the valley where we landed our plane.”

“They are not Sherpas,” put in Chuba politely. “I listen to their talk, Sahib Keene. They call themselves _Changpas_. They do not come from the south, but from the north.”

“That means that they are not Nepalese,” stated Barma Shah, “but Tibetans. They are accustomed to these high altitudes perhaps better than those who live in Ladakh or Nepal. What is more”—he lowered his voice—“they have probably heard less about the Yeti.”

“Then let’s hire them quickly,” returned Charles Keene, with a knowing smile, “before they can change their minds.”

Hurdu hired the Changpa bearers, and the march was resumed. But the nomads, though sturdier than the old crew from Leh, lacked their steady-going qualities. They paused frequently to rest and eat, even hinting that they might drop their packs and quit. So Barma Shah told Hurdu to cut the day’s trek short as soon as they reached a suitable campsite.

That went on for three days, which pleased Biff and the other boys, as it gave them more time to roam at large. They had found little to talk about with the porters from Leh, but this Changpa crew were mostly hunters. They had brought throwing spears as well as bows and arrows, and at every halt, they let the boys try the weapons.

On the fourth morning, Biff awoke to find more snow on the ground. Nobody else was up, for the carefree Changpas were late risers. Glancing off beyond the camp, Biff saw something that riveted him. Going back into the tent, Biff wakened the nearest boy, who happened to be Chandra. Motioning for silence, Biff whispered: “Yeti tracks! Come on!”

Chandra came, bringing his trusty hand-axe. Biff nodded approval and promptly “borrowed” a throwing spear that was standing outside a Changpa tent. He then led Chandra to the first of the marks that he had noticed in the snow. They looked like footprints and big ones, half the size of snowshoe tracks. Breathless, Chandra gestured back toward the camp.

“Maybe we better call others?”

“Not yet,” returned Biff. “Let’s see where these lead. Then we can plan ahead, before everybody gets excited.”

The tracks led up the slope, but instead of ending there, they followed a snow-covered ledge. Beyond that was a huge, chunky rock, and as Biff glanced in that direction, he saw a great tawny figure with a shock of thick, black hair, as it bounded from cover.

Then it was gone, among another cluster of rocks. Biff was after it, beckoning Chandra along, and they saw the thing again, as it sprang to another snowy ledge. There it dropped to all fours, and by the time the boys reached the ledge, it was gone again, but its footprints showed in the patchy snow. The two boys passed a slight turn where the rocks rose like jagged steps, tufted with snow. As Chandra started in that direction, Biff noticed an arched gap in the jagged wall that rose beside the ledge itself.

Biff turned and called, “Wait, Chandra. There’s a cave here—maybe that’s where he went—”

Chandra looked back, and his face froze with horror. He was too startled even to shout a warning, but the look in his eyes, which were staring straight past Biff, told enough. Instinctively, Biff wheeled about, then recoiled as he turned his eyes upward.

From the cleft in the rocky wall loomed a tremendous hulk of reddish brown. Tiny eyes were glaring above wide-open, long-toothed jaws, while massive, sharp-clawed paws clamped downward, inward, toward the boy’s dodging form.

Biff Brewster was all but in the grip of a gigantic Tibetan bear, one of the most dangerous creatures that roved those rocky heights!