by Lincoln Hall
“Lincoln!” called Peter. “Your mind is playing tricks with you.”
My mind was groggy. I could hear him, but I did not reply.
“They are trying to help you down. Help yourself.”
But still I did nothing.
“Please try to change what’s happening in your mind!”
Suddenly I understood. Usually it was me shouting encouragement to the coal miners battling their fear on the volcanic cliffs of the pinnacle. For eight months in 1998, and again in 2002, Tenzing and I had worked with Peter and his small team, turning around the fortunes of a coal mine that had been suffering from the hard times that had hit the industry. Every five-day team-building course in the bush involved a different bunch of miners, and each course had culminated in a rappel descent of the fearsome pinnacle. What was different this time, I now understood, was that Peter was putting me through the course not as a facilitator but as a participant.
“Everyone is trying to help you.”
The issue here is trust, I thought. Trust above fear. Peter was testing me, trying to push me to do something that I felt I shouldn’t.
“All you have to do is use your rock-climbing skills to get down quickly.”
“Okay then.”
It didn’t feel right, but I did trust Peter. And so I let myself go. I slipped out of the cleft far too quickly, my grasp of the rappel rope too loose. Suddenly I was plummeting down the rope. Instinctively, I pulled the rope into braking mode across the descender. I slowed down just as I shot over the bulge, then I came to a stop, dangling in space. Fear kicked in as I realized this was not a test I had to pass but a fight for my life. I was no longer with Adventure West, no longer in Queensland. Pemba was there, rappeling alongside me. As my rope slipped across the lip of the bulge above, I swung toward him. I thought to absorb the impact by bending my legs as we collided. His feet hit mine and the sharp points of our crampons locked together. As I disentangled my feet from his, I kicked the crampon points on one of my boots into his thigh. My shouted apology was muffled by my oxygen mask. To avoid swinging away from Pemba, I held on to him. He implored me to let go, and I could see there was a danger of our ropes twisting around us, threatening to tangle us together and leave us hanging in space like two insects suspended from a spider’s web.
To avoid such a potentially fatal entanglement, I pushed away from Pemba and swung like a pendulum. My momentum carried me just far enough for me to pull myself onto a small ledge, which felt marginally safer than hanging in space. It was obvious I could not stay on the ledge for long, but I did not want to relinquish its illusion of security. Adrenaline had given me a burst of energy when I first slipped from my niche, but it was wearing off and I felt myself fading. My mind seemed to disassociate itself from all decisions, which left me simply standing there, empty.
Then I was able to see myself from somewhere else. My point of view was thirty feet away from the cliff and ten feet above the small ledge where my figure stood motionless facing the rock wall. I was hovering in midair above the huge drop of the North Face, looking at myself like a dispassionate spectator. There was no fear, no need to do anything.
Someone called my name, and suddenly my focus was on the rock one foot from my face. Fear flooded back in. Voices were urging me to swing away from the ledge and rappel down. I glanced around for a way to climb out of my predicament, but that was clearly impossible. I braced myself and leaned away from the rock to rappel. There was little strength left in my hands so I was not able to brake effectively as I slid down the rope. I landed unceremoniously in a heap on what passed for a ledge at the base of the Second Step.
Immediately, Sherpas grabbed me and started pushing and pulling me in the direction we needed to go. I recognized none of them. In my semi-delirious state I wondered why they were hurrying me so forcefully. Now that I was down the accursed Second Step I no longer felt in danger. But, of course, the danger zone for me now was the entire remainder of the mountain. I was higher than all of the summits around me. We were now well into the afternoon, yet I had descended only 600 feet during the last seven hours. We were still a thousand feet above our closest camp, and more than a half-mile away horizontally, with some tricky terrain ahead and less than three hours to nightfall.
My mind was groggy, but Pemba made me see sense. I had to grasp reality and clamber across the rock-face as quickly as I could.
“We must hurry,” he urged. “Still very far. We must hurry.”
He wore no oxygen mask. I could hear the worried tone in his voice, see the desperate look on his face. At midday he had watched Thomas die and had then climbed up to the Third Step to help me down. He was strung-out and with huge responsibilities.
Suddenly I shared his urgency and decided to make a radio call to Base Camp.
“This is quite an exciting spot,” I began. “I’m certainly compos mentis, whereas before I was really freaky. I had this gear to go down there, go down the Second Step. I couldn’t even put the bloody gear on. A couple of the guys did it for me. I was out of it then, but I’m definitely into it now.
“These guys have got a huge amount of knowledge in terms of rescuing people. If you want to find the greatest density of rescue people in the mountains, this would have to be it. So we’re going pretty well. Keep you posted. You don’t have to keep ringing and saying how are we ’cause there’ll be times when there’ll be a lot going on and there’ll be times when there’s nothing much going on. Cop you later.”
I finished by dropping in those last three words of Aussie slang, complete with their coarse double entendre. Even when I was struggling, I could not curb my tongue.
The radio crackled back. “Lincoln, Lincoln, good to hear from you. This is Kevin at ABC. The problem is your Sherpas are becoming very, very weak and very, very tired, and you only have about three hours of workable daylight left. So please get all your strength. If you don’t move, you won’t get off this mountain. Come down, Lincoln.”
WE FOLLOWED A SYSTEM of ledges. Whenever one ledge petered out, another could be reached by stepping down or around an obstacle. As we moved away from the Second Step, I could see the route ahead for several hundred yards, a well-trudged line of footsteps below the crest of the ridge. The route tended downhill but with little loss of altitude, and that made me worry. We needed to lose height quickly. Five people had already died this season above our top camp, which for us was still at least two hours away.
Pemba was in front of me, with Lakcha and Dawa Tenzing following behind. I was unsure of Dorje’s whereabouts, but I sensed he was ahead of us. Pemba stopped constantly, turning to face me and urging me on. Whenever I paused to unclip and reclip my harness sling at a fixed rope anchor, Lakcha sped up the process by reaching from behind and doing it for me. I plodded along as best I could, taking advantage of the cliff above me, resting my right hand against it for balance. But soon exhaustion began to overwhelm my instinct to keep moving.
We came to a rise in the ledge we were following. It was a huge effort to make a few uphill steps, but then a blessing came in the form of an anchor which tied the fixed rope low to the ground. The anchor’s special aspect was that it allowed me the chance to kneel while I clipped past it. I dealt with the task of clipping but continued to kneel.
“Jom! Jom!” said Lakcha. “Let’s go! Let’s go!”
I knew I had to keep moving, but because I was on my knees, I began to crawl. It wasn’t easy, but it was easier than standing up. Lakcha grabbed me and pulled me to a sitting position so that I was now facing outward, leaning with my back against the cliff, my feet hanging over the huge drop. Lakcha tried to drag me to my feet, but—out of oxygen and on the go for sixteen hours—he no longer had the strength. I crawled to the crest of the rise in the path and lay there. Ahead I could see Pemba, who seemed to be talking with someone, maybe a Sherpa who was waiting for us, maybe Dorje.
Together, Lakcha and Dawa Tenzing pulled me to my feet. With the help of the cliff-face I stayed vertical. Aft
er one or two steps I leaned against the cliff, like a drunk leaning on a wall, and took a few more steps. Then I managed to stagger a few more yards without support. Ahead of me was a slight broadening in the trail, which was an obvious place to rest. A couple more steps and I reached out for the cliff, then slid against it down to the ground. I lay on shards of rock, free of snow. In the late afternoon sunshine, the rock looked warmer than the snow, but at these heights it was just as cold. For now, this spot was where I needed to be. I would rest for a few minutes, then I would continue down. The perfect weather created the illusion that all was well with the world and our circumstances. Dawa Tenzing and Lakcha insisted that I stand up, but I took no notice.
I shook my head and said, “Ek chin bosneh.” Sit for one moment.
Lakcha called out to Pemba, who came back up along the ledge to where I lay.
“Other Sherpas stay with you,” he said. “I must go down. You will spend the night just along from here. Very close.”
I knew this was not right. It was still a beautiful sunlit afternoon. I did not want to stay here; I had only stopped to rest. Deep in myself, I knew I had to keep going until I reached somewhere safe. Many times I had descended from the summits of mountains in darkness after burning up daylight hours on prolonged climbs. In 1984 Andy, Tim, and Greg had reached the top of the North Face as the sun set. Tim and Greg stood on the summit as darkness fell, and the three of them returned to me and our camp at 27,700 feet at three thirty in the morning.
Now, on this highest ridge of Everest, I faced yet another occasion when I would have to push myself through walls of pain and exhaustion to reach the relative safety of our camp. Survival was not guaranteed; I would have to fight for it. But what I needed now was a few minutes’ rest, then I would climb down and continue through the night until I reached Camp Three. But I could not convey this to Pemba. I could barely speak.
“Very close for you to spend the night,” Pemba repeated, and gestured to the place where he had been standing when Lakcha had called him.
The spot was only twenty yards away, where the trail of footprints led toward the crest of the ridge. Although I could not see past that point from where I lay, I sensed there was a drop-off beyond it. The route from the Second Step had been a long traverse just below the crest of the Northeast Ridge, and we had not lost much height. The crest itself was a mass of jagged tors, cliffs, and jumbles of boulders, so the obvious route to follow was where the narrow but easy-angled slabs at the very top of the North Face met the rocky crest of the ridge. The drop-off to the north was steep but not vertical, which made it all the more frightening because you could see exactly how far you would fall—8,000 vertical feet, starting from where my boots hung over the edge. My back leaned against the low rocky rampart that formed the crest of this part of the ridge. On the far side of the rampart the Kangshung Face plunged two miles of height to the glacier below. We were at a very exposed part of the ridge. This was certainly not a safe place for me to spend the night.
“Not far,” Pemba repeated, the matter decided. “You must go along just a little way and stay where there is more space.”
I did not want to hear what Pemba was saying. Instead, I heard something altogether different. I was no longer capable of distinguishing between the reality of the mountain and the fabrications of my mind, so I was not surprised to hear the pronouncement in a voice I did not recognize.
“There are three women along here and they’ve got a shelter—you can join them.”
Then Pemba spoke again. “I must go,” he said. “Sherpas will be with you.”
I understood that three women were camped in a little space among the rocks where Pemba wanted me to spend the night, but he was now gone. I could hear women chattering and laughing, but I couldn’t be bothered visiting them. I didn’t have the energy. I couldn’t face the social interaction.
I sensed that other Sherpas were with me, but they could only be Lakcha and Dawa Tenzing, and maybe Dorje, whom I had not seen for a while. There could not be others as the upper reaches of the mountain were deserted. I promised I would stay where Pemba had suggested, but I don’t know to whom I made the promise. I could not hear the women now. Silence surrounded me. Wind noise was muffled by the hood of my down suit. The only sound was my own breathing. And then that stopped as well.
I was alone now.
I did not think of my whereabouts at all. The thought that I had climbed Mount Everest did not enter my mind. Of most importance was what I could see. The panorama stole my attention completely. The sun was low in the sky, casting a yellow hue across the upper reaches of the Northeast Ridge. Gone was the black-and-white contrast between the snow and the rocks. The soft light gave texture to the snow and patterns to the rock surfaces around me. The dark rocky ridges of the mighty peaks stood even more proud, parading their sharp, conclusive angles. Clouds appeared high above. They framed not only the mountains, the glaciers, and the sky but also the silence, giving a depth to the landscape that I had never before experienced. There was much to be said for letting time vanish like this. I could see forever, for one thing. I could also see the curvature of the earth. A sight to die for.
Only when the sun left my high ridge was the tick-tock of time kick-started again by the cold. The entire landscape was freezing now, pulling the clouds down toward me, pulling the color out of the sky.
I WAS SITTING AT that same spot when a man appeared from the direction of the Second Step, a Westerner with a beard, wearing mountaineering gear. I knew that I was the only Westerner alive and close to the summit of Everest, but I did not comprehend the contradiction of his appearance out of nowhere. He stopped and looked at me but did not speak at all. I did not think this was strange either. Somehow I understood that he had come to make sure that I kept my promise, the promise to go to the place Pemba had said would be best for me. I insisted that I had kept my promise, but the man just stood there waiting for me to provide proof.
And so I gestured for him to follow me down the narrow path, which now ran alongside a wall built from rough-cut but well-fitted stones. It was a style used for houses in rural Nepal, much like the walls that line country lanes in Britain. The top of the wall remained level, so as we went downhill, the wall became higher. I had to step up onto it to show the man that I had been here before. There were no cheerful women—no women at all—and no sign of a camp. Without speaking, I pointed at the pair of socks which I had placed there, tucked into each other to form a ball, lying on top of the wall. The whole time the man kept his silence and a close-lipped mirthless smile on his face. I picked up the socks and showed them to him, then I placed them back on the rock. This seemed to reconcile any issues between us.
At that point, I sensed that the rock wall was the side of a building and that there could be people inside. The man waited while I headed down the track, with the top of the wall above my head level. I took a ninety-degree turn to the right and continued a few steps along the wall to a doorway. It was big and squarish, but there was no door. Inside, it was dark, but the doorway shed light upon a few stone steps that led to a flagstone floor. I went down the steps. To the left, a second doorway framed a huge wood fire. There were people sitting around the fire, quietly talking and laughing. I turned on my heels and retraced my steps, as I needed to see the bearded man go. He was waiting where I had left him, the same inscrutable expression on his face. I followed him until we reached the place where I had been sitting, then he looked back up toward the Second Step. I was not capable of realizing that the only people left above me on the mountain were dead. Without a backward glance, without another footstep, the man disappeared.
Alone again, I realized how cold I was, even though I was wearing my down suit. I decided to revisit the room with the fire. Light was fading as I hurried down beside the wall. I turned the corner only to find that there was no doorway in the wall. I continued past where the doorway had been, panic rising within me. I rounded the building’s next corner, which led me bac
k uphill. There was no doorway there either. I continued up beside the wall. Boulders blocked the way, so I scrambled over them and onto the roof of the building, which was also built of flagstones, although the blocks were bigger than those used for the walls. Nowhere was there an entry or exit. I lay on the rough-hewn slabs, hoping there would be some heat transmitted through the rock from the fire inside. But everything remained as cold as ice. There was no joy to be had here.
Dusk was upon me, so I scrambled back onto the path that I had originally followed. My socks were no longer there. I returned to the spot where I had sat to watch the end of the day. There were no colors now, only whiteness swallowing the gray shapes of the mountains across the empty valley. I thought of setting up camp, but my pack was gone. In it had been my oxygen, my thermos, my two headlamps, my spare gloves, my ice axe, and my Australian flag. The whiteness came even closer. Soon the only things that were solid were the narrow ledge I sat upon and the gray tooth of rock against which I rested my back. I thought about climbing the tooth, which was only five or six feet high, but where would it take me?
I sat where I was and thought about how simple life is when there are absolutely no options. I lay down among the rock shards, with my knees brought up to my chest and my hands in my groin. I felt the need to rest, rest in peace. Darkness was not far away. Snow began to fall.
Sixteen
TIME TO KILL
FOURTEEN MILES FROM Base Camp, near the head of the East Rongbuk Glacier, Alex Abramov was up early at Advance Base Camp. He was monitoring as best he could the progress of those few of us still high on the mountain. During the night I had forgotten about the radio nestled in an internal pocket of my down suit. At first light, Lakcha, Dorje, Dawa Tenzing, and I had drawn well ahead of Harry, Thomas, Pemba, and Passang, but it had not occurred to me to make a progress report to ABC until we stood on the summit at 9:00 A.M.
A snail’s pace is the norm for those lucky enough to be approaching the highest point on Earth. Although Thomas had been feeling strong, his seriously impaired vision forced him to trudge even more slowly. Suddenly, other factors came into play. The summit was in sight for Harry, Pemba, and Passang, but Thomas’s already compromised vision now worsened to almost total blindness. He stopped responding to the directions given to him by Harry and Pemba, and he almost stepped over the huge drop of the Kangshung Face. Harry knew there were no second chances this close to the summit. Shortly after my call to Advance Base Camp, Harry radioed to say that he and his team had no choice but to retreat. So, 150 feet below the summit, the four of them turned for home—which in every sense was a very long way away.