The Boys of Everest

by Clint Willis

  Chris as he backed from the summit into the night was thinking that Doug might yet die. There was no way to carry him down the West Ridge. He reached Doug—a figure huddled in shadow—and fumbled in the dark to rig another rappel. Another rope length would take them to a snow-covered ledge where they could try to dig a cave. Doug tried to stand. Chris heard bone scrape. Doug screamed again and fell to his knees; he paused there as if considering his next move and fell forward onto his hands. He would crawl.

  He crossed the ledge to join Chris at the new rappel anchor. Chris went first this time. Doug followed, careful to keep his back to the rock as he slid down the ropes, his worse-than-useless legs dangling in space. The pain kept a sufficient distance if he didn’t move the legs.

  They spent the night in a ditch dug in the snow. Chris carefully took Doug’s boots off for him and removed his own. The two climbers took turns rubbing one another’s feet, much as Doug and Dougal had done for each other on Everest two years before. They didn’t talk much. Doug was occupied with his pain and Chris was thinking about the morning. The hours passed. The climbers were moving again before the sun hit the Ogre’s western slopes.

  Chris set up more rappels that took them off the summit block and down onto the col that led back across to the West Summit. Mo had come out to meet them. Doug looked up at Mo and asked if he and Clive would be going for the summit today. Mo looked down at him—fucking lunatic—and shook his head. He took custody of Doug while Chris carried on to the four-man cave on the col.

  Doug started crawling; he found he could manage the pain if he concentrated on this task. Mo couldn’t do much to help. It took the two of them another two hours to reach the cave.

  The four climbers were 9,000 feet above Base Camp. They were short of food; their remaining supplies consisted of a single freeze-dried meal and some soup and tea bags. The run of perfect weather that had seen Doug and Chris to the summit was drawing to a close. These circumstances would have posed serious problems for four healthy climbers. As it was, Doug would have to crawl up and over the West Summit and then down the West Ridge to their camp at the West Col.

  The climbers made plans. They would rest this afternoon and tonight and then start their descent. They played cards all afternoon; by evening it had begun to snow heavily. They ate the last of their food, and spent a restless night coping with spindrift that tried to force its way into the cave.

  They woke to a howling snowstorm. Clive set out to break trail to the West Summit, forcing his way through thigh-deep snow for more than an hour. He returned with half-frozen hands; he had managed to cover only 150 feet. Mo tried later and traveled 30 feet before he retreated; by then his eyelids were frozen to his eyes and he had lost feeling in his hands. The climbers stayed put for another day, playing cards. There was no cooking to do since there was no food. There was one gas cylinder for melting snow. There would be nothing to drink when that was gone.

  NICK ESTCOURT HAD watched two figures—Chris and Doug—leave the summit on July 13. He’d expected the four climbers down the next day; they had not come. The porters had arrived to pick up the expedition’s gear. Nick had loaded most of them up and sent them down toward Askole. Tut had gone with them. Nick had settled in to wait for Chris and the others, and to fend off his growing belief that they were all dead.

  He couldn’t go up to look for them; he’d sent his climbing gear down with Tut. The days were immensely long. He remembered the deaths of Ian on Annapurna and Tony and Mick on Everest. This new disaster seemed to weave itself into those as he gazed up at the storm that hung over the peak. It was like watching a spider come upon an abandoned web. The spider spun its thread so as to crowd and then encompass the old nest. The juxtaposition of the old musty web and the new living silk struck Nick as obscene.

  The notion of Chris dead confused him. Nick found that he was furious at Chris—for bringing him here and for leaving him here like this—and yet it was some kind of permission.

  There had been a moment when the two of them waited with the others for Mick to come down from Everest. Nick had imagined Chris at another camp looking up at a mountain like this one and waiting for Nick but knowing him dead as they had all known Mick to be dead.

  Nick had assumed that Chris would be the one to suffer in this way. Chris was the one who could bear it. He had shouldered this burden for Nick and the others and as if in return they had carried out their assigned tasks in support of his ambitions as well as their own, not understanding exactly but knowing that Chris was their protector—or that he would at least find a way to manage things if they didn’t come down.

  And now Chris had abandoned that work. Nick was furious at this betrayal. Nick had done everything that his own role required. He had been unselfish; he’d worked and taken ridiculous chances and let Chris choose others for the summits—Don and Dougal on Annapurna; Doug and Dougal and Mick and even young Peter Boardman on Everest. Nick had done this because it had fallen to him but also because it made sense, it suited him. Chris had known this about him and had used it. That was fine—but this was not. Nick hadn’t volunteered in any way for this.

  Grief lapped at his anger. He stood up to his thighs in it, scanning the empty sky, and on the fifth night as he lay in his tent he felt his grief and his helplessness pull him down into silence, dreams of light. He heard voices, someone calling his name—and he awoke to a bewildering relief. He was going to live to old age, finish raising his children; he wouldn’t do this kind of thing again; it wasn’t necessary now.

  He rose early and gathered the remaining porters and set about organizing his departure from the mountain. The next morning, July 20, he wrote a note—a gesture—and left it under a rock. He was in a hurry. He left Base Camp as if pursued by a former and suddenly alien life.

  THEY HAD BEEN two nights in the ice cave. It was still snowing this morning but they couldn’t stay longer. They’d soon be too weak to move at all. Clive left first, breaking trail through the heavy drifts, trailing a rope behind him. Doug clipped to the rope and hauled himself up the easy slopes toward the West Summit, drawing on the enormous strength of his upper body. Mo followed Doug. Chris waited until it was clear that they were not going to turn back and then he set out behind them. The last stretch of snow up to the West Summit was too steep for Doug to manage alone. Mo climbed past him and joined Clive to haul on the rope while Chris got beneath Doug and pushed.

  They reached the West Summit four hours after leaving their snow cave. They immediately began the long descent of the West Ridge. They established a series of rappels but they couldn’t risk letting the last man use them. They’d have to pull the ropes from below to retrieve them, and a rope could easily jam on this low-angle ground. Chris stayed behind each time to take apart the anchor. Then he down-climbed the pitch, carrying the rope. He picked his way carefully down through mixed ground or he plunge-stepped in snow, keeping his axe ready to attempt a self-arrest if he lost his footing.

  The storm had abated. They could see 50 yards or so. They were aiming for the snow cave they had dug five nights before, on their way up the West Ridge. The new snow made the ground feasible for Doug. He could not have crossed it otherwise. Mo took the lead, making the route and setting up rappels. Clive walked beside Doug and tried to help him past the most difficult spots. The four climbers’ personalities faded; they became more alike. There was nothing to be gained by looking ahead. Their discomfort and the difficulty of the work crowded out wishes, any thought of a future free of this burden of effort.

  They reached the snow cave. They had dug the cave for two climbers. Mo got on his knees and began to burrow to make room for four. He quit after a while. The climbers piled in and melted snow and shared the remaining tea bag. The snow hole was still too small. Doug had urged them to make it bigger, but they were too tired. The snow made its way into the cave and then melted. The climbers woke in the night to find their sleeping bags and clothes were wet.

  The storm continued the next day but
again they had to move. It was now July 17. Four days had passed since Doug’s accident. The climbers had been without food for two days. They were now just above the most difficult section of the descent, a thousand foot pillar of rock near the bottom of the West Ridge. That would bring them to the two small tents at the foot of the ridge, above the West Col.

  Their first task this morning was to descend a narrow subsidiary ridge to the top of the pillar. The ridge wasn’t steep enough here to rappel. Doug tied in and set off crawling while Clive held his rope.

  Doug reached the top of the pillar. The others followed and Mo set up a rappel. The climbers hoped it would take them to the top of the ropes they’d fixed to safeguard their retreat down the steepest section. The snow continued to blow past their faces, turning the world an unearthly gray-blue, stinging cheeks and noses. They wore goggles but they couldn’t see much in the half-light.

  Mo went first. Doug followed. He slid down the ropes quickly and straight off the ends; he couldn’t see anything in this shadow-world. He skated 15 feet down a gully, his mouth open to scream into the wind. The ground wasn’t vertical here but he gathered speed quickly. He had a glimpse of what was coming and turned his head from it and saw the first of the fixed ropes; his body hit something that hurt but it slowed him and he grabbed at the rope and held it in both of his clumsy mittened hands. He hung there for a moment, more stricken than relieved. He would have fallen perhaps 4,000 feet but here he was. He could not do the emotional or intellectual work to try to acknowledge or respond to the oddness of this. The storm and his hunger and the pain in his legs were enough to occupy him.

  Clive followed Doug down and tied off one end of the doubled rope, leaving the shorter end free. Chris, hunched in the wind 150 feet above Doug and the others, knew nothing of Doug’s new accident. He clipped into the ropes and followed the others into the storm. It occurred to him that they might all survive this. Thinking it made him aware of how physically miserable he was, everything dank and heavy as he slid down the ropes, careful to manage his speed. He caught a glimpse of Clive, a shape looming up like some sea creature in the murk of the storm. Chris thought of a walrus. He had the image in mind as he shot off the unanchored end of the rope.

  He felt naked falling head first into nothing. There was no thought, only this sense of being stripped. This gave way to aversion—he wanted it stopped—and a sense of the depth of his failure flooded his body. He felt something hammer at his chest—it was like being hit by an axe handle—and he stopped falling. He hung and swayed and tried to collect himself. He had come to the tied-off end of the rope; Clive’s anchor had stopped him.

  He had fallen 25 feet and he felt broken. He had done something to his ribs. He didn’t know what it was or what had happened. He found he could stand and move. The others reached him and the four climbers continued their descent.

  The fixed ropes ended at a gap—a bergschrund—where a snowfield had melted away from the rock. Doug couldn’t jump down and across to the snow. Chris had a short piece of rope and the climbers used it to lower Doug. The storm grew worse. The tents above the West Col were buried in three feet of dry snow. The climbers dug out their shelters. They found teabags and a pound of sugar in one of them. Chris examined himself in the tent he shared with Mo. He found a dent on the right side of his chest and his wrist seemed broken.

  The storm continued through the afternoon. It had been snowing for five days. Chris had coughing fits that tore at his chest and throat and brought up a bloody froth that frightened him. He began to worry that he had high altitude pulmonary edema—HAPE—which would flood his lungs and kill him before they could get lower.

  He paid a panicky visit to Doug and Clive in the other tent. They listened to his breathing and someone said it didn’t sound like HAPE. There was nothing to do about it, anyway. The whiteout would make it impossible to find their way across the plateau to the fixed ropes. They needed those ropes to get down the final wall to the glacier. Chris went back to his tent and lay fretting, scanning himself for further symptoms that might confirm his fears.

  Morning brought clear skies. The climbers descended easy rappels and crossed flat snow to Camp Two at the West Col, where they hoped to find food. Chris was aghast to discover that he was moving even more slowly than Doug. Mo and Doug got to Camp Two first. They found a trash bag that held some rice mixed with cigarette ash. There were also throat lozenges and a single candy bar.

  The four climbers shared out the scraps and the candy and left the West Col. They descended a mile and a half of low-angle snow to the top of the route’s last steep section. They set up their tents here. They were still some 2,000 feet above Advance Base Camp and more than 5,000 feet above Base Camp.

  Chris and Mo left first in the morning. The party seemed to be picking up a ragged momentum. Each climber was like someone pushed while descending a hill, slightly out of control, careening and staggering past obstacles. Chris couldn’t use his left hand. This handicap made the fixed ropes difficult. He turned occasionally to stare down at the glacier. He hoped to see Nick or Tut.

  The four climbers reached the bottom of the fixed ropes. There was still a short snow slope to descend. Chris punched his crampons into the slope, but the jarring gave his chest such pain that he gave up and sat down in the snow to glissade. He had his axe as a brake but only the one good hand. He lost control almost at once, first angry and then frightened as he picked up speed, cursing and clutching at his ribs until he came at last to a sudden but surprisingly gentle halt in a snow bank.

  He was back on the glacier. He stood and gathered himself, taking shallow breaths to stay clear of the pain in his chest. He tied in with Mo, who led across through deep snow and onto the glacial moraine—a wilderness of sand and jumbled rock—where the pair could unrope.

  Mo went ahead. Chris followed him in a haze of discomfort and worry. He felt unaccountably anxious now that he knew he would live. He felt as if all of this were somehow his fault. He had dreamed himself into a story that someone was telling about him. He couldn’t defend himself. He didn’t know what he’d done wrong or how things had come to this, picking his wretched way over this difficult ground. The sun felt like a punishment. Each irregularity in the ground that met his boots was torture to his feet—to his entire frame and everything it carried or contained. He felt unbearably fragile. He felt a child’s fear that everyone would be angry at him—that this time he’d not be forgiven.

  MO WAS THE first to reach Base Camp. He found Nick’s note and simply continued walking. He walked for two more days. That was how long it took him to cover the thirty-five miles to Askole. He staggered into the village and up a slope and Nick saw him and came running down the hill.

  Mo had never seen such happiness as this: Nick running through the streets of that filthy village, looking not relieved but overjoyed. It was the first time Mo really saw him, really took him in. Mo watched Nick during the week that followed, during the journey to Islamabad and after. He was moved by how Nick took charge and fussed—how he organized a rescue for Doug, how he worried when problems with the helicopter stranded Chris in Askole for a week. Chris had of course spent the week indulging in paranoid fantasies—the others had left; they weren’t coming back; they’d gone home without him—but Mo saw that Nick wasn’t right, wasn’t himself, until a new helicopter dropped Chris on the grounds of the British Embassy in Islamabad and they were all together, everyone alive, everything the way it had been.

  18

  AND SO K2 was still on. Chris’s injuries from the Ogre slowed his preparations during the fall of 1977 and into the winter. His ribs ached and his hand remained stiff and sore. He was seriously underweight. He couldn’t walk half a mile without resting. He developed bone infections that winter, and had surgery on his ribs twice. It was nearly spring before he could resume his customary jogs in the rolling hills around his Lake District home, the cottage Wendy had renovated while he was away on the first Everest trip almost six years before. He gra
dually regained his strength, but as he ran he sometimes asked himself why he would leave this beautiful place for the rigors of yet another high-altitude expedition.

  The world’s second-highest peak topped out at 8,611 meters (28,251 feet), a mere 800 feet or so lower than Everest. And while more than a dozen expeditions had put men on the summit of Everest, climbers had reached K2’s summit only once: the Italians had done it in 1954. That successful expedition had included fifty-two members—Walter Bonatti was one—and 1,500 porters.

  Chris had invited four of his companions from the 1975 Everest expedition to accompany him to K2. The four were Doug Scott, Nick Estcourt, Tut Braithwaite and Peter Boardman. Chris had counted on Dougal Haston coming as well, so he needed someone to replace him. Peter recommended his Changabang partner, Joe Tasker.

  Chris did not invite Martin Boysen. Martin had made important contributions on Annapurna in 1970 and on Everest in 1975. He was working hard to establish himself as an expedition climber, and this snub was a blow to those plans. More to the point, he had considered himself a friend and loyal supporter of Chris. He broke off his friendship with Bonington—as Don Whillans had done five years before. Martin would return to the Himalayas with Mo Anthoine and others, and evenutally devote himself to his first love, high-standard rock climbing.

  Chris had no interest in repeating the original route up K2—the Abruzzi Ridge, named for the Italian nobleman who had pioneered its lower reaches back in 1909. Chris first considered the Northeast Ridge, where a Polish expedition had recently made a strong attempt. The route was mostly on snow. It seemed feasible for a small expedition—but Peter and Doug wanted to try something harder. The climbers settled on the mountain’s West Ridge, almost as high and probably steeper than Everest’s Southwest Face.