Sarojini's messenger was a thin-featured Tibetan with long hair. He extended a dark bundle to Trent and muttered something in his own tongue.
"He says for you to put those on, Tajen," translated the muleteer.
Unrolling the bundle, Trent saw a long toga and a pair of heavy Tibetan boots. The latter he pulled on with some difficulty, then threw the toga about his shoulders.
The long-haired messenger touched his arm, motioning toward the garden. Hsiao, the muleteer, accompanied them to the wall, where he lent Trent his aid in reaching the top. Outside, the Englishman found himself in a narrow lane that opened upon the street.
Through ghostly highways they moved. Now and then a dog snarled viciously and slunk away as the Tibetan kicked at him. They traveled along constricted streets, some graduated into steps, and past silent, whitewashed houses that loomed spectral in the night. These ramifications led them to a stone bridge and a roadway between tall bamboo and the black blur of trees. Trent could see the city's walls now, beyond rounded clumps of bushes. From this clustered vegetation rose a large temple-like edifice whose dome shone dully through the drizzle.
A lane branched off from the main road and took them to the gates of the temple-like building. First, a courtyard, then an imposing doorway. Within, it was damp and cold. Butter-lamps made a feeble attempt to disperse rebellious shadows. Monster shapes, which Trent perceived to be idols, glowed sullenly in the semi-dark.
A hall with red-lacquered pillars led to a massive portal that was opened by a brass ring. It swung back, to release the odor of incense and rancid butter and to admit Trent and the Tibetan into a vast space that evidently was a temple. Butter-lamps hiccoughed and threw their reflections upon brazen images and old armor. In the remote end a dull mass of gold kindled in the temple-dusk, a form that took on the shape of a huge idol—and from beneath the shining god came a figure of familiar proportions.
"Greetings, man of many faces!" said Sarojini Nanjee in her sweet voice, a voice that rang like the notes of a gong in the ponderous silence of the temple.
Trent glimpsed behind her a man in claret-colored vestments. The face was strongly reminiscent of one he had recently seen, and after a few seconds recognition flashed into him. He was the one whom Na-chung had pointed out in the amphitheater as the Great Magician of Shingtse-lunpo. The woman, seeing Trent's look and misunderstanding it, announced:
"He knows only Tibetan and Hindustani; that is why I speak English." Then she added, "He is the third most powerful man in Shingtse-lunpo."