Seven Summits

by Dick Bass; Frank Wells; Rick Ridgeway

  Camp 5 was established at the base of the Great Couloir. After several days rest, Marty was back up the mountain, and with some of the others started the effort to establish camp 6 at about 26,500 feet. Once that camp was in and sufficiently stocked they would be in position for the first summit attempt. The team for that first effort was now chosen: Larry Nielson (the team member with perhaps the strongest physical endurance), Jim Wickwire, Marty Hoey. Dick and Frank were both excited for Marty; she was now in position to accomplish her dream of becoming the first American woman on top of Everest.

  Meanwhile Dick had stayed in camp 3, each day humping loads up to 4, and now Frank moved up to join him. There was a third person in camp 3, Steve Marts, a Seattle-based climber and documentary filmmaker who was a one-man cinematography team shooting and recording a 16 mm film of the expedition. Both Frank and Dick had been impressed watching Marts, using a camera with a sound recorder strapped on and a microphone attached to the top, single-handedly get synced-sound coverage of the expedition, including the climbing up to about 25,000 feet.

  This was the first time since his illness that Frank had seen Dick, and as Marts was crowded by himself in the cook tent, Frank moved in with Dick. They were both pleased at the chance to share time together. They were the neophytes, the outsiders in a sense. Conversation relating to sex and mountains was interesting enough, but nevertheless they both had other common interests which they enjoyed talking about.

  But while they shared much, they were also very different from each other in some significant ways. Dick was open and gregarious, while Frank had a certain brusqueness that kept people at bay. Then, too, the pair were opposites when it came to the way they organized their lives. Frank was a delegating generalist, Dick the finicky, nitpicking do-it-himself type. Finally, they were at opposite ends of the political spectrum. Frank was a flaming liberal, Dick the arch conservative. And that led to some lively badinage during the many weeks they spent sleeping in the same two-man tent.

  “Frank, what I don't understand is why you can't be more intellectually honest about human nature and get past your bleeding heart advocacy of socialism.”

  “I don't advocate socialism. I advocate social welfare.”

  “Welfare! The only way you'll help man is to get man to help himself.”

  Steve Marts, listening in his nearby tent, thought, Boy, these two really are The Odd Couple.

  “Look,” Dick continued, “it's not the duty of the government to support the people, but rather the duty of the people to support the government.”

  “You got to admit, though, Kennedy was more eloquent.”

  “But he didn't practice what he preached. Frank, I’m telling you, you're wearing blinders. Now I figure you and I have a lot of tent time coming up together if we're going to do these Seven Summits, and by golly if there's one thing I want to accomplish it's to turn you around politically.”

  Now Marts yelled over, “What's Seven Summits?”

  Other than Marty, Frank and Dick really hadn't discussed their Seven Summits dream with anyone. It wasn't that they wanted to keep it a secret as much as they felt sheepish talking about such a bold plan in front of some of the world's best climbers, especially when they themselves were such amateurs. But now that the cat was out of the bag they saw no harm in describing the project to Marts.

  “Come on over here and we'll explain it,” Dick said.

  Dick told Marts about the plan, and when he finished he suddenly had an idea. He was annoyed it hadn't occurred to him earlier, but here he was about to commit a great deal of time, risk, and money and he ought to have a film of it, if for no other reason than to show it to his children and grandchildren, and to remember his adventures once he was an old man. He visualized how it would be when he was ninety-five. He'd be in a rocker, and all he'd have to do was push a button and a screen would come down and the movie would start, and he'd rock back and forth pointing at the screen yelling, “Look at that boy go.”

  “Marts, by golly, we've got to film the Seven Summits!”

  Marts didn't say anything for a moment. Dick could tell he was mulling the idea over. Then he answered, “Dick, that's a fantastic story line. I mean it's commercial: two businessmen at age fifty either give up or jeopardize their successful careers to try to climb the highest peak on each continent. Do you realize with a film you could pay for your climbs?”

  “You've got to be kidding!”

  “Not only that, but you'd be a folk hero.”

  Dick nearly gagged at that.

  “Marts, you're full of B.S.”

  “No, I mean it.”

  “You really think so?” Dick then looked over to Frank, who was reading a book. “What do you think, Frank?” “It'll never sell.”

  “Wells, sometimes you're such a wet blanket. What do you mean?”

  “First, it's hard as hell to even make your money back on an expensive documentary. Second, we're probably going to have to climb Everest in the wrong sequence. Our most likely chance is to hook up with one of the groups going next spring, and that means the drama will be backwards. You want the hardest to come last, so it climaxes. The way we're doing it, we go up Kosciusko last, and that's a hike up a trail to only 7,300 feet. In fact, there's a gravel highway going up it. The whole thing's scripted wrong.”

  “Frank, I’ve been telling you what my life is like back home, with people always telling me I can't do this or that, dampening my enthusiasm, and here I am at 24,000 feet on the side of Mount Everest and the same thing's following me up here. Now you might be some great Hollywood movie mogul but that doesn't mean you know everything about this stuff, and Marts here, who has years of experience in this documentary business, says it will go over like gangbusters. He even says we'll be folk heroes.”

  Frank smiled condescendingly and went back to his book, but Dick wasn't about to give up.

  “You've got to think positive. There's a solution to this getting the sequence in order.”

  While Frank read, Dick lay thinking of possible solutions and forgot the time. He looked at his watch and said, “Darn, forgot to turn on the radio for the afternoon call. I wanted to get news on how they're doing above.”

  “We'll get the morning call,” Frank said, and went back to his book. Dick slept hardly at all that night, pondering the film problem; at first light he shook Frank.

  “I got it,” Dick said.

  “Got what?”

  “Got how to end this film. How we're going to climb Kosciusko last and still have a great ending. You and I’ll put on running shorts with packs on our backs and we'll jog up there—that'll give it some interest—and while we're doing that we'll have had our wives and best friends flown over there and get the longest black limos we can find and they'll be in tuxes and evening dresses, see, and while you and I are jogging up the road they'll come by in this limo and lean out the window and the sun will glisten on their studs and jewelry and we'll be sweating—that'll get a good laugh—and when we get to the top I have this Swiss chef named Hans who is the consummate sculptor and can take a huge hunk of ice and carve it into a horse's head or an eagle—any darn thing you want—like no one you ever saw, so we'll get him down there and have an ice carving on the summit and a banquet table waiting for us. It'll be a feast that would make Nebuchadnezzar envious, and the others will be waiting …”

  “I’ll get my mother, too,” Frank said, “and a few other friends …”

  “… and then we'll go behind a rock,” Dick continued, “and out will fly our T-shirts and jock straps and then you and I will emerge looking resplendent in our tuxes, then we'll hug our wives and friends and we'll go to the food spread where there'll be a pig with an apple in its mouth, pheasant under glass, oysters and shrimp and caviar piled high—remember the eating scene from Tom Jones, Frank? Heck, that was nothing, this will be sensual like that—gorging ourselves on gourmet delights while overlaying this—now close your eyes and imagine it—overlaying this are scenes of us with ice in ou
r beards, and the wind blowing snow, and all this misery we got up here right now eating gruel out of tin cups, it'll be the juxtaposition of the incongruous that'll make it hilarious, Frank, and then we'll pop the bubbly and fade out, walking down the road into the sunset with our backpacks on over the tuxes and champagne in our hands.”

  Frank was smiling. “Not bad, Bass, not bad. That might work.”

  Buoyed with enthusiasm for his plan, Dick started dressing for that day's carry up to camp 4. Marts was in the other tent making breakfast for the trio. It looked like it would be another fine day and Dick wondered how things had gone yesterday.

  “Get your mush,” Marts yelled.

  Dick crawled out and brought back two bowls of oatmeal and finished dressing while he ate. He thought again about the climbers above. If they managed to get camp 6 in yesterday they could be in position for the first summit bid tomorrow or the day after. Which reminded him, time for the radio call. Frank picked it up and turned it on. Almost immediately Whittaker's voice from camp 1 came on the air.

  “Hello camp 3. Camp 3. Frank or Dick. Do you read?”

  “Morning, Lou. Frank here.”

  “We've been trying to get you guys since yesterday evening. I’m afraid I have some very, very bad news. We had a tragedy late yesterday afternoon, just below camp 6. We're not sure yet exactly what happened, but apparently her waist harness came unsecured and Marty fell to her death.”

  Dick dropped his oatmeal and stared at the tent wall.

  Dick felt as if somehow his nerves now extended through his skin so each pore burned as though he might incinerate on the spot, vaporize and disappear. He prayed he could purge his memory of what he had just heard, that he could edit out that overwhelming despair, that he could come back and things would have returned to the way they were before. But the burning stayed and he started to scold her, saying to himself, Marty, damn you, why did you foul up? You are the one always preaching safety, always yelling at me on McKinley about the proper use of my ice axe and crampons and rope. How can you expect me to listen if you don't follow your own preaching? How can we ever go and climb the Seven Summits now that you've done this? Without you …

  Then he was swept with guilt. He hadn't told Frank, or anyone except Marty, about the psychic in Dallas and what he'd said, that there would be a tragedy on Everest and someone would die. But he had told Marty back on Aconcagua, and she had said that that someone just might be her and now it had all come true, and was it somehow because he had told her in the first place about the prediction? Was he somehow an unwitting agent who created in her a self-fulfilling prophecy?

  Then he started to cry. Frank too.

  Wickwire showed up a short time later, visibly shaken, and told them the details.

  “The others were about a hundred feet above, looking for a site for camp 6, and Marty and I were at a rock in the middle of the Great Couloir. The weather was deteriorating and we could see the others only intermittently through the mist. I heard a call down from above for more rope, and I was just moving to put my pack on when Marty said, ‘Let me get out of your way.’ Then I heard this rattling of carabiners and I looked over to see her falling backwards. She grabbed for the fixed rope but couldn't quite reach it. She really gathered speed and then was gone. I looked back and saw her jumar still attached to the rope and to it her open harness, just hanging there. I guess she didn't loop the belt back through the buckle, and it pulled through when she leaned back. I’m sure she went the whole way, 6,000 feet of vertical.”

  Over the radio Whittaker told everyone to take the day off, and Dick and Frank descended with Wickwire to camp 2. Some of the others climbed over to the base of the North Wall to see if they could spot anything. There was no sign, and it was felt that Marty had probably disappeared into the heavily crevassed area that separated the wall from the glacier. In the camps there was quiet mourning. Nearly everyone on the team had worked with Marty for years, and to some she was a best friend.

  There was some talk of what to do regarding the expedition, and everybody was agreed that the next day they would resume the climb. They were now in position to make the first summit bid, and they knew Marty would have been upset had they passed on such a chance, especially after working so hard. But of more immediate concern was how best to get word to Marty's parents. Marty's mother—the Mayor, they called her—had already lost two of her kids, and now her third and last. They knew she would, of course, want whatever possessions Marty had left, so Dick and some others circulated around camp and collected them. There wasn't much, as Marty didn't cotton to material possessions, owning only what she needed. There was something, though, that Dick looked for in particular. Something he couldn't find. And that was good, because it meant she had them with her when she fell, and that's the way Dick wanted it. She had to be wearing those lapis earrings.

  5

  EARTHBOUND

  The day after Marty's death Larry Nielson, who after the accident had stayed at camp 5, was joined by two others of the lead climbers and together they made the first attempt to reach the summit. They climbed from camp 5 back up to their previous high point at camp 6, 26,500 feet. The next day they awoke early to make preparations to leave for the summit, but it was so cold they feared a predawn start would end in certain frostbite. Worse, their oxygen cylinders showed 25 percent less pressure than they should have, and without a full charge they decided it made more sense to leave the heavy bottles behind.

  So at the late hour of 7:00 A.M. the three set out. Even without oxygen Nielson kept a good pace. One of the other climbers, Eric Simonson, however, had an injured knee and couldn't keep up, so the second man, Geo Dunn, stayed with him while Nielson continued solo.

  Climbing without a rope, he made steady progress. As he got higher, though, he found the climbing increasingly steep and difficult. At one place he was forced to remove his mittens so he could grip the rock, and it only took a few seconds before he felt his fingers start to freeze. He realized his only chance of success was if the climbing difficulties higher above would ease. But soon he encountered a section in the rock band that was near-vertical.

  This would require careful consideration. He glanced down the steep North Wall below his feet.

  He thought, It's a one-bouncer if I slip.

  That was an estimate of how many times he might bounce before hitting bottom. A slight exaggeration, perhaps, but a good reminder that without a rope any fall was fatal.

  He sat on a small ledge to think it out. Was it worth the risk? He looked at his fingers: they were already frozen. Continuing would result in almost certain amputation. And if he did manage to get to the summit, would he be able to get back down?

  Still, he was now at about 27,500 feet, and he might never again get the chance. This was the summit of his dreams, the peak he wanted more than any.

  He sat for thirty minutes weighing both sides.

  Finally he decided this was not to be the day he climbed Everest. He stood up, and started down.

  During the summit bid Frank and Dick continued to carry loads to the intermediate camps. Frank was now fully recovered from his sickness, and knowing he had no chance of reaching even high camp, he set himself a new goal. He would be content if he could get as high as camp 4.

  Lou Whittaker had promised Frank he would take him up, but now Frank sensed Whittaker wasn't interested in going back up the mountain, so Frank enlisted world-class mountaineer, and chief guide on Rainier, Phil Ershler.

  “I would suggest one thing, though,” Ershler told Frank, “and that's not to worry about carrying a load to camp 4, but go light.”

  To Frank, accustomed as he was by now to heavy packs, the near-empty pack felt weightless and he made good time up the fixed ropes.

  This was not only the steepest slope Frank had ever been on but the biggest. The wall fell away below him 4,000 feet to the glacier; by now Frank had been on enough lesser slopes that the exposure didn't bother him, and, in fact, he found the bird's-eye vie
w exhilarating. He managed to keep up with Ershler too, who was pleasantly surprised and told Frank he was climbing strongly, adding to Frank's growing confidence.

  From camp 3 they reached the edge of camp 4 by noon, two tents perched on small platforms cut into the steep snow face. Wickwire was in camp and greeted them. Ershler unclipped from the fixed rope, and with a sigh of relief pulled off his pack and sat down. Frank made the last few moves up the rope and onto the platform, then following Ershler's lead unclipped his jumar.

  Frank was lackadaisical taking his pack off. Wickwire had noticed that Frank sometimes had a tendency to get a little sloppy once he thought he was out of danger, or past the point that demanded vigilance. Wickwire was just about to say something when suddenly Frank started slipping toward the edge.

  “Frank …!”

  Wickwire judged in a flash he was too far to make a lunge to catch Frank. His breath held in his throat as he watched, and his mind quickly played the scenario, so much like what had happened to Marty: the uncontrolled slide, the lightning-fast acceleration, then over the edge, into the abyss, still gaining speed, tumbling, tumbling …

  Just as suddenly as it had started Frank crabbed his hands into the snow and his crampons bit the surface. He stopped.

  For a moment no one said anything. Then Wickwire, trying to find his voice, said, “Don't ever, ever unclip from that rope until you know without any doubt you have both feet planted firmly on the surface.”

  Frank said he understood but Wickwire wasn't sure he fully realized how close he had come. After they had rested, Ershler scrutinized Frank as he connected his descending ring to the fixed rope and began the rappel back to camp 3.

  As he slid down the rope Frank was no longer thinking of his near mishap. Now his feet were moving effortlessly one before the other as he hopped down the slope. He gazed across the valley, past the glacier to distant peaks, feeling as though he were flying. It was another mark of his inexperience that he wasn't in any way shaken, that even in the wake of Marty's death he hadn't registered the fine line you balance on while climbing, the ease with which the guard that keeps that balance can let down, and the speed in which you can be one moment at complete ease enjoying the view and the next saying to yourself, just as you gather speed, “No, no, this isn't really happening to me, is it?”