North Face

by Matt Dickinson

  Karma used his good arm to steady himself. His bad arm was tucked inside his jacket.

  We got stuck into it, Tashi and me using the fixed line as a handrail and helping to support Karma when he stumbled. The blizzard was intrusive, stone-hard ice granules smashing into us at high speed. The cloud got thicker and darker, to the point where it felt like night was falling. Fresh snow was cascading all around us. I began to think about avalanches. Thousands of tons of snow was surely gathering on the slope above.

  At one point we thought we heard voices off to our left. Then came a shout, frighteningly near.

  ‘Chen?’ Tashi mouthed.

  I nodded. It had to be. We were level with the soldiers, some hundred metres away from them through the raging storm.

  ‘It’s the army men isn’t it?’ Karma’s voice quavered with fear.

  ‘Don’t worry about them,’ Tashi said confidently. ‘So long as the storm keeps up they won’t find us.’

  ‘We’re resting too long,’ I interjected. ‘Let’s get going.’

  Tashi got up, showing no signs of the fatigue that she had to be experiencing. My respect for her was growing with every hour of this adventure. She was an awesome person. So much strength and self-belief. So much unquestioning love for her brother.

  Together we pulled Karma upright, trying to favour his uninjured left side. I could see him flinch with the pain but he didn’t cry out. Then we resumed the descent, stepping down on to the shiny layer of ice, our legs crashing awkwardly through the crust. I took the lead, breaking the trail, trying to ignore the painful impact on my shins.

  I kept in front for an hour, then Tashi called:

  ‘My turn.’

  She shifted around me, letting me take position next to Karma. My knees started to play up, the constant jarring descent sending jolts up my legs.

  The storm intensified, the wind was gusting fast enough that it threatened to blow us off our feet. On occasions we had to huddle together, clutching each other for dear life as the howling wind raced across the slope. The clouds seemed to suck all of the light out of the day and I felt my mood darkening just as fast.

  I was beginning to become despondent. It was 5 p.m. and we were still struggling down the gully. Chen and his men would be arriving at the Camp 6 zone about now, I reckoned. Everything now depended on two factors: keeping Karma on his feet, and the cloaking effect of the storm.

  What if Chen had guessed our trick?

  I gave myself a mental slap. I had no right to be blue. It was Karma who had been shot and left to die at extreme altitude and he showed no signs of depression at all. Compared to him I was fortunate. I knew I had to pull myself together.

  ‘We can’t stop at any of the camps,’ Tashi said. ‘We have to keep going through the night, all the way down the col.’

  Darkness fell. We came out of the gully, on to the broader space of the ridge. Out of the protection of that narrow couloir, we were now subjected to the full force of the north wind.

  We kept on down, clipping from line to line with our slings, not wanting to risk a single second without the protection of the rope. We used the head torches sparingly, just a quick blast of light when changing from one rope to another. The gusts became irresistibly strong. Twice I was bowled over, hitting the ice hard before scrambling back up. Tashi placed herself upwind of her brother, protecting him as best she could.

  The fixed lines were arching into the night. Tashi just kept going. On and on – the strength of the girl was incredible. Karma was flagging though. Once or twice he stumbled forward. Tashi kept catching him, ever vigilant and fast to react.

  At some undetermined point of the night I had an out of body experience, the fatigue so extreme that I began to hallucinate. I saw myself from above, going through that endless process: place the ice axe, step down, place the ice axe, step down, over and over again. My movements resembled the juddery progress of an old man, I noted critically from my unreal vantage point, every limb stiff and spidery.

  Then a blast of wind acted as a wake-up call. I came round, regaining awareness of where I was and what I was doing.

  Karma could no longer hide his pain. Every step down caused him to gasp beneath his breath.

  Place the ice axe. Step down. Place the ice axe. Step down. Lean into the wind.

  From time to time I checked my watch: 2 a.m. … 4 a.m. The hours seemed to be crawling past at a cruelly slow pace, marked only by our own deterioration. We didn’t even have any proper landmarks to fix on, but since the terrain had steepened again I guessed we were close to the col. Our world contained just raging wind and driving snow. And a ghostly strip of rope, heading down into the void.

  Finally, just as I was beginning to fall asleep on my feet, a hint of daylight touched the night sky. Suddenly the steep terrain ended. I breathed a sigh of relief as the angle of the ground eased off. The debris of one of the lower camps was visible through the storm clouds. We had made it to the fixed ropes on the ridge.

  Karma was on the point of collapse. He had given everything to get off the mountain and had nothing left in the tank. He slumped down on to the ice.

  ‘No more walking,’ he said faintly. I could see his jacket was stained; he had been bleeding heavily through the night.

  At that moment four figures came out of the blizzard. Burly looking men. I feared they were soldiers. Then I saw they were wild-looking Tibetans, wrapped up in heavy yak hide coats and sheepskin hats.

  Tashi took a step towards them, her face brightening.

  ‘Nuru!’ she cried.

  The lead man smiled broadly.

  ‘The international team told us about your rescue,’ he said. ‘We came to help.’

  Tashi embraced the men warmly. Karma waved at them from his position prone on the ice. Tashi beamed at me with an expression of weary joy.

  ‘They are monks,’ Tashi told me. ‘Friends of mine from the monastery.’

  One of them was carrying a long object. He began to unravel it with his companion. It was a stretcher.

  That was when I realised Karma had a fighting chance.

  Chapter 11

  ‘We need to get back to Base Camp,’ Tashi said. ‘Without getting discovered.’

  I unfolded my map of the Everest region. We huddled down in a group to keep out the wind.

  ‘It is possible,’ Nuru said. He traced a line along the side of the valley wall with his finger. ‘There’s a high route here. We can miss all the checkpoints.’

  We placed Karma gently on to the stretcher. The four sturdy monks lifted him up.

  ‘Ok,’ Nuru announced. ‘Let’s go.’

  We did a big detour to avoid the main camping area at the foot of the col, then followed a faint yak herder’s track across the glacier.

  As we went, Nuru explained to Tashi that her parents had already left Tibet. They had rushed for the border as soon as they heard Chen had found out about Karma.

  ‘They managed to bribe a border guard,’ Nuru told Tashi. ‘We heard they made it to a refugee camp in Nepal.’

  Tashi thanked him for the news. She looked relieved to know her parents were safe.

  Nuru and his friends set a fast pace. A couple of Western climbers went past us, but we drew little response beyond a curt ‘hello’. The earthquake had created so many victims that another team with a stretcher was no surprise.

  By afternoon we were weaving through the ice pinnacles, trekking through them for a few hours before starting the climb up the valley wall.

  ‘This is a secret trail,’ Tashi explained. ‘Only a handful of the monks know about it.’

  We took it in turns to help with the stretcher, changing our positions every ten minutes. The weight was punishing but manageable, so long as we kept rotating between us. The cloud continued to cloak us.

  Just before nightfall, we stopped for a breather.
One of Nuru’s mates produced some bread and cold rice. We shovelled it down ravenously, caring little for the lack of taste, just intent on getting the calories inside us.

  Then it was back on the slog. One foot in front of the other, taking turn after turn on the stretcher.

  As darkness fell we were pretty well halfway, Nuru said.

  Karma was as brave as ever. Even when he was jolted around on the stretcher he never complained. I gave him an occasional painkiller, but his shoulder must have been agony.

  Tashi was exhausted; she stumbled often on the rocky terrain and took a long time to rise.

  Both of us were close to the limit after our lightning raid on to Everest.

  The trail became faint, a slender hint of a pathway which looked as if it had been abandoned many years before. By 2 a.m. the cloud was gone and there was no moon. We were forced to slow down as we found ourselves moving in total darkness.

  I followed on wearily, my legs numb with pain. I no longer had the strength to help with the stretcher.

  Some time later, Tashi gripped my arm. ‘There’s the lights of Base Camp,’ she said.

  I squinted into the darkness, my heart sinking as I saw the tiny pinpoints, miles and miles away.

  ‘How many hours?’ I asked her.

  ‘Don’t think about hours,’ she said. ‘Just think about keeping going.’

  Nuru and the others trekked on.

  I felt my throat seizing up. The raging thirst was back. I stuffed handfuls of snow into my mouth. It was cool but did little to help.

  My mind began to wander. I felt suspended halfway between reality and dream. Only by placing the shrine bell in my hand did I find the strength to continue. Thinking about my friends Kami and Shreeya helped me.

  We began to descend. It was a couple of hours before daylight. The trail dropped fast towards the valley floor, twisting in a series of zigzags. I could see expedition tents scattered across the moraine.

  Shapes loomed up in front of us. Freezing breath crystallising on the frigid air. Yaks.

  ‘We’re getting close,’ Tashi said excitedly. ‘Keep going, Ryan. Keep going!’

  At long last we reached the yak herders zone at Base Camp, where dark figures were waiting anxiously. Tashi greeted friends as Karma was placed gently on the ground.

  ‘We have to go,’ Nuru said. He kept his voice low, not wanting to alert any guards that might be snooping around.

  Karma and Tashi thanked the four monks profusely.

  I also embraced Nuru and his companions, thinking how incredible it had been to have their help. Of the risks they had taken.

  The monks said their goodbyes, melting into the night.

  Tashi and her friends began an urgent conversation. As they spoke, a darkened truck pulled up alongside their tent. A nervous looking driver poked his head out of the cab. His accent was Indian.

  ‘I can’t hang around,’ he said. ‘Get a move on.’

  ‘These friends are making a dash for the Nepal border,’ Tashi explained to me. ‘Bribing their way through. Going into exile like my parents. Karma and I are going with them. We can drop you on the Nepali side if you wish.’

  I nodded. I had to get out of Tibet somehow.

  Tashi and two others dragged a large tin trunk from a tent. I helped them to manhandle it into the back of the truck.

  ‘Faster!’ the driver urged. ‘Come on! The troops will catch us!’

  Suddenly Tashi gasped.

  ‘My camera! It’s still in the store.’

  Karma groaned.

  ‘Leave it, Tashi … ’

  ‘There’s no time,’ the driver said urgently. ‘We have to go now!’

  He started the engine.

  ‘Get on the truck!’ I told Tashi. ‘You can always get another camera.’

  ‘I can’t leave it!’ She sprinted away across the moraine, heading for the angular shape of the store hut.

  The truck driver shook his head. ‘We’re out of time. Look!’

  I spun around; saw the bobbing lights of head torches, coming towards us fast.

  It had to be Chen and his men.

  ‘Tashi come back!’ Karma hissed, but she kept heading for the hut.

  ‘I go right now!’ the Indian driver said. ‘Are you coming or not?’

  The other Tibetans climbed into the back, helping Karma to join them.

  ‘She can still make it,’ I urged the driver. ‘Just a few more seconds.’

  ‘Wait a bit longer!’ insisted Karma.

  A shout rang out.

  The driver threw my pack down from the cab. The truck lurched forward, Karma and the other Tibetans crying out for him to stop.

  I hurried for cover, hiding behind some bales of hay as angry voices called.

  It all happened so fast. One moment the truck was there, the next it was gone. I could see a commotion by the store hut. By the light of Chen’s head torch I saw Tashi pulled from the shadows.

  She’s been captured.

  Chen raised something above his head then dashed it violently to the ground in a tinkle of breaking glass.

  Tashi’s camera.

  I sank back into the darkness, my heart beating fit to burst. Tashi was hauled away to Chen’s tent. The truck raced wildly into the night. I slunk away further, ducking behind a boulder some distance from the camp.

  Soldiers buzzed around for a while but no one checked my hiding place. I waited for an hour, then trekked into the night, heading up a high ridge and dropping down into a valley on the far side.

  At daybreak I found a nomadic encampment. They brought me in and gave me butter tea and flatbread.

  I walked for the rest of the day, climbing two valley walls and then crossing a wide meltwater river which was so cold it left me with numb toes.

  Late afternoon clouds were sweeping in from the south as I caught my first sight of the small monastery. It sat at the confluence of two river systems, above a verdant green meadow. I had no idea what monastery it was, or whether they could help me, but I had no choice but to throw myself on the mercy of the monks.

  I was taken to a side entrance where a young monk advised me to leave my boots. I shuffled into the main part of the temple, my eyes adjusting to the low light as I heard the murmur of mantras being recited.

  The lama was an elderly monk by the name of Tsering. He greeted me in the assembly hall, a room lined with woven tapestries and dark paintings of demons. Decades of smoke from butter lamps had stained the cedar wood of the interior completely black, and I could see the ghostly shine of three vast bronze bells hanging from the rafters.

  ‘How can I help you?’ the lama asked.

  Tsering listened closely as I explained my story, nodding frequently and asking occasional questions. He was particularly interested in the role of Nuru and his friends, and I realised he knew them well.

  ‘Stay for as long as you need,’ he said finally. ‘You will not be bothered here.’

  I was shown to a simple room with a sleeping mat and washing bowl. And there I rested my head, more weary than I had ever been in my life. Sleep was still elusive though. I was too worried about Tashi. What would become of her now? I had to find out.

  My journey was not yet over. In fact the most dangerous part was about to begin.

  It took five days for Tsering’s spy to get me news about Tashi’s whereabouts. Five anxious days in which I recovered from my Everest epic and ate enough to feed an army.

  ‘They have taken your friend to a detention camp two hours to the east,’ the lama told me. ‘It’s a notorious place, mainly filled with political prisoners.’

  His words seemed to cause the air in the monastery to chill even more than normal. I shivered as I thought about Tashi behind bars. Vulnerable. At the mercy of brutal guards.

  ‘They say that Base Camp Comma
nder Chen is a friend of the prison chief,’ he added. ‘That’s why she was taken to that particular place.’

  ‘Oh.’

  We began to speak. I had a hundred things to ask the monk: how would Tashi be treated in the prison? Would she actually be tried by a court, or just locked away? Would they feed her? When was she likely to be released?

  ‘I wish I could answer your questions,’ Tsering replied with regret. ‘But these places are a mystery to the people of Tibet. The Chinese are extremely secretive about them. All we know is that Tibetan people can be held for years before they are released. And that sometimes they are never seen again.’

  ‘Show me where it is on the map,’ I begged him.

  He pointed out the location of the detention centre, far from any main roads in the middle of nowhere.

  ‘Do you think I can get there?’

  Tsering gave me a probing look.

  ‘What have you got in mind?’ he asked.

  ‘I don’t know … ’ The truth was I really didn’t know; I just wasn’t going to walk away and leave Tashi in the lurch like this. ‘Maybe I can get a photo of her, make some publicity online, get a campaign going to get her released.’

  Tsering nodded.

  ‘You’d need a sympathetic contact to help you,’ he said.

  ‘Do you know someone?’

  Tsering thought for a while.

  ‘There are people I can talk to,’ he said. ‘Give me a little more time.’

  Everything went quiet for three days. Then Tsering called me in.

  ‘There is a man called Zhong who knows a lot about this detention camp,’ he said. ‘We can help you to go and meet him.’

  ‘How?’ I asked. ‘Won’t I get stopped at a roadblock?’

  ‘We have a delivery service which comes in once a week,’ Tsering said. ‘I can ask the driver to take you. The truck goes back empty so it never normally gets checked.’

  ‘Sounds good to me.’

  ‘The driver can drop you at a roadway cafe where you can try and make contact with Zhong.’

  We shook hands on it.

  ‘You will leave tomorrow,’ Tsering said.