Thieves of the Black Sea. Joe O'Neill

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      Foster was amazed at the sights and sounds of Calcutta and by the nautical journey they had taken to get there, which took only six weeks, followed by a caravan to Kathmandu, which took three weeks. Nepal was notoriously closed to any foreigners, but Foster’s father had bribed the right officials. After Kathmandu, it had been a four-day journey to the town of Pokhara.

      In Pokhara, his father hired two sherpas; they purchased the appropriate provisions, and their hunting party disappeared into the Annapurna range of the Himalayan Mountains. His father justified his time away from school by saying a little “worldly” experience would do him good.

      Foster always wanted to be close to his father, yet his father remained distant and aloof. A tall man with jet-black hair and a narrow moustache, his father almost never smiled and rarely showed emotion. He was a decorated Belgian soldier who had fought in the Force Publique in the Congo and helped subdue Congolese insurrections. He smoked his pipe incessantly and spent every waking moment watching everything around him, his eyes darting about like a lizard eyeing a fly. Nothing escaped his father’s gaze, and every mistake Foster made was instantly recognized, ridiculed, and corrected. His father seemed to relish, a little too much, finding fault in all of Foster’s endeavors and personal traits.

      His father loved hunting for sport more than anything else in the world. Their castle in Belgium was adorned with hundreds of stuffed heads from animals killed by his father over the years. Tigers, wolves, lions, cheetahs, apes, deer, antelope, and even the full body of a black bear stood at attention in the cold stone interior. Each animal head was displayed with its mouth open, in an attempt to emulate its terrifying nature.

      On this expedition, his father was hunting a rare tiger only found in the high altitude of the Himalayas. The tigers were said to live only above 10,000 feet and were able to navigate the steep and treacherous terrain of the stark landscape. Even in the snowy landscape, these tigers were little more than ghosts, as there was scant evidence of their existence.

      Foster wanted nothing more than to please his father by killing a tiger. He practiced shooting each day—his father had given him a brand new Springfield 1871 rifle, a new model from the United States. It was the first gift his father had ever given him, outside of one present each year on Christmas day.

      Day after day, Foster practiced shooting until his shoulder was so sore from the rifle’s recoil that he could barely move it in any direction. Every night, he studiously cleaned the rifle both inside and out. After dousing it with linseed oil, Foster carefully oiled the chamber and ran a cotton cloth over and over the steel barrel. He polished the handle with a homemade beeswax formula. When he’d finished, it was so shiny that Foster could see his reflection in the wood.

      When they set out on the trek, his father informed the sherpas they were planning on going to Machapuchare—a smaller mountain in the Annapurna range.

      The sherpas looked at each other and then shook their heads. In broken English, they explained that the mountain was revered and considered to be sacred to the Hindu god Shiva and not to be climbed.

      Foster’s father took out some gold sovereigns, enough money to feed these men’s families for a year, and then told them, in no uncertain terms, that they were going to climb Machapuchare.

      The sherpas looked at one another and had a brief discussion in Nepalese. In agreement, they took the coins and then hoisted the bags on their shoulders to begin the arduous trek.

      “Do you think we should go if this mountain is sacred, Father?” young Foster had asked.

      His father shook his head at him.

      “Do we look like simple peasants who believe in superstitions?” he replied and then set off behind the sherpas.

      It took two weeks to reach Machapuchare, and the hunting had been almost completely fruitless. The only thing his father managed to shoot was a wild yak—which the sherpas made into stew and then prepared the hide, which later would be dried and made into jackets and pants.

      Reaching the base of the mountain at last, Foster noted the stillness in the air. He felt like he was trespassing on sacred ground. He couldn’t shake the feeling that he was being watched. A few times he even looked over his shoulder to see if someone was watching him from behind, but each time he saw only the mountain staring back at him. At night, in the confines of his small tent, Foster swore he could hear voices in the wind.

      As they continued up the mountain, the air became thinner as they climbed higher and higher, and it became more difficult to hike. Foster needed to stop for a break every five or ten minutes. His surroundings became nothing but rock, snow, and ice.

      Setting up camp well below the summit, his father declared they would camp for two days to rest and hunt.

      The next morning, Foster and his father headed out to hunt early, before daybreak. The air was cold and Foster stomped his feet as they walked. He was still sleepy, but he knew better than to complain to his father. The sun had just come up on the horizon, and Foster struggled to keep up with his father’s long stride.

      They had walked for two hours in silence when, after coming around a bend, they saw a huge albino tiger standing right in their path!

      The tiger was massive, perhaps three or four hundred pounds, and looked to be of the Bengal variety. Albino tigers were the rarest of all tigers, and only a select few had ever been seen in the wild. The big cat’s fur was completely white, save for the black stripes down its body and head. Its coat was wet around the back, and droplets of water dripped from its rib cage. The cat was gently licking the melted snow off a rock and did not notice Foster or his father nearby.

      Quickly and silently, Foster’s father brought the rifle stock to his shoulder, steadied his gaze down the front sight at the end of the barrel, and aimed the chamber right at the cat’s midsection. After taking a quick breath, he relaxed and allowed his right index finger to pull back on the steel trigger. Foster mimicked his father, bringing his own rifle to his shoulder and looking through the sight at the tiger. He understood that he was to wait for his father to fire first.

      Instead of firing, his father’s rifle jammed!

      The tiger, hearing the click, looked up and growled and looked right at Foster.

      “You’ve got the shot, Foster, take him down!” his father shouted.

      Foster pressed the butt of the rifle against his shoulder, allowed his right index finger to caress the trigger, closed his right eye, and brought the tiger within his sight.

      The tiger growled, but it did not attack. Perhaps a hundred feet away, it stared at Foster and growled again. Looking into the tiger’s eyes, Foster felt a strange, otherworldly connection to it. For a moment, Foster could swear he could hear the tiger’s thoughts.

      “Take the shot!” his father ordered.

      But Foster did not shoot. He thought of all those animal heads in their trophy room in their cold castle. He looked at the tiger and something from deep within his soul told him not to shoot—he just couldn’t see a reason to. All this time, all he wanted to do was please his father, but in that moment, he didn’t care about his father’s approval at all. He knew, intrinsically, what he was doing was wrong.

      Lowering his rifle, he looked up at his father.

      “No,” he whispered.

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