The Ascent
Page 34
Throwing himself partway onto the ice, he stretched long and snatched a handful of
the boy's quilted pantleg. He hauled the soldier back to safety.
Instantly the soldier scampered off, back up the pebble bank to where he'd fallen.
Daniel was not much farther off now, but it was clear to the soldier he didn't have a
chance of physically apprehending the climber and the monk. He would have to force
their surrender. Or end their escape.
Even before the soldier unslung his rifle, Abe knew he was going to use it.
'Daniel,' Abe yelled. His voice ricocheted across the ice. 'Just show him the body.'
Daniel twisted at the waist and the monk's head bobbed alertly. 'We're going to
make it just fine,' Daniel said. His words bounced off the glass. 'I know the way now.'
A gust of wind tugged curtains of rose light between them. Then the curtains
receded. Daniel hefted his burden. The monk seemed to look around.
'He has a gun,' Abe warned. 'Just show him the dead.'
'He wants a little peace,' Daniel said. 'It's not so much higher, really. I'll bury him
where he can rest out there. I have a knife.' A sky burial, Abe realized. Daniel was
going to give the monk up to the birds and the wind.
'Daniel,' Abe yelled. But he had nothing more to say. There was no more warning to
offer nor forgiveness to give and take nor times to speak of. They'd said it all.
'Tell Gus to meet me at the...' But the wind swept his destination away. Curtains of
spindrift bloomed like moving wheat, then disintegrated, then rose again.
Daniel plodded on, storming the vapors. The crystalline basin swept upward. Where
the pass crested, snow dervishes spun and raced about, pierced by the crimson
sunlight. Daniel climbed into their midst and the monk's flapping arms seemed to
wave the dervishes to one side. If Daniel could just gain the next hundred yards, Abe
saw, he would be looking out into Nepal.
A precise metal clatter sounded. Abe turned. The soldier had chambered a round.
He was lying on his belly and his rifle was balanced on a rock. He was taking careful
aim.
Daniel's crampons flashed in the light. It was getting harder to see as they mounted
the swell. From Abe's stance, it looked as though the monk were pointing out new
routes on the North Face above. Indeed, the monk and the climber seemed to have
merged into one.
'No,' Abe said to the soldier. 'Don't.' He was too far away to dive at the boy. Besides,
it was far too late for heroics.
The bullet cracked. The back of the monk's yakskin jacket twitched. It could almost
have been a puff of breeze: The soldier had aimed well. His bullet struck the monk
high between the shoulder blades, a killing shot.
Daniel never quit moving. Waves of spindrift surged across the ice. The upper
mountain was burning bright now. The light seemed to be spawning deep inside the
towering walls.
The soldier chambered a second round. He nestled his cheek against the rifle stock.
'Please,' Abe begged the soldier. The boy lifted his face from the rifle and looked at
Abe. They didn't have a word in common.
'Please,' Abe repeated. Somehow he needed to ask this young man if a single death
more could ever begin to fill the vastness around them.
But they had no words in common. Abe lifted his hands in entreaty. He watched the
boy watch him.
For whatever reason, the boy changed his mind. He lifted the barrel of his rifle up
and away, off toward Everest. He pulled the trigger to empty the rifle. The shot
banged hard. It echoed in sharp cracks across the basin.
Abe lowered his hands. The boy got to his feet.
That was when the third and final crack resounded.
Abe ducked because it was so loud and crashed through the entire basin. Both he
and the soldier whirled around to see who had followed them up and what huge
weapon they had fired. But downvalley the shadows were empty. There was no one
there. The soldier's face mirrored Abe's confusion. Then Abe thought to look up.
From high upon the summit band, a vast white rose blossomed. It seemed a mile
wide up there, absolutely beautiful. The soldier uttered his astonishment. Head
craned back, mouth open, he was mesmerized by the thing. Ever so slowly the great
white flower lost its petals and the snow came tumbling down.
'Daniel.' Abe bellowed. But Daniel was already looking up at the avalanche. The
mountain wall funneled directly into his basin. It would strike Daniel first, then flood
the basin.
The sound of thunder reached them. Abe pulled the soldier by one arm, dragging
him from his trance. He shoved the boy toward the trail and away from the basin's
expanse. They could never hope to outrun the beast. But with luck they could turn
the corner of the ridgeline and get down the valley far enough to dodge the slide's
direct onslaught.
The soldier dropped his gun. Instinctively, he stopped to grope for it, but Abe
pushed him on. They were close to the ridgeline. He looked up.
The avalanche had consumed the entire mountain nearly to its root now. Nothing
showed but the front curtain of snow and, behind it, a tempest of billowing whiteness.
The thunder encased them. It rocked and deafened them.
Abe threw one final desperate glance up the pass, and there he discovered Daniel in
search of him. Daniel knew better than to run. He looked calm up there, with only one
thing on his mind, this glance from Abe.
And so it was. The last thing Abe saw of Daniel was the same thing Daniel saw of
him, two upraised arms, hands reaching.
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