Summit: A Novel

by Harry Farthing

  “It is,” Josef replied, well aware of the conditions necessary to take the perfect photograph.

  Looking directly at Josef again, the girl asked, “So were you saying farewell to the cold as well?”

  “Not exactly.” He paused before adding, “I don’t think I am destined to escape it so easily.”

  37

  Josef continued to spend the first days on board largely alone, compelled to look out at a dull winter sea from a lower side deck or the porthole of his cabin. He had tried to return to the upper deck where he’d spent that afternoon before the departure but it was closed to all but first-class passengers. The exclusion was a disappointment because he wanted to meet the girl again. She had told him her name was Magda von Trier, and, in his mind’s eye, he constantly reconstructed the picture of her face saying she hoped to see him again during the voyage.

  It was beginning to look unlikely. Only Schmidt was actually traveling first class. On the train to Venice, he had revealed his first class ticket, waving it proudly like a flag, loudly delighted in the fact that the expedition’s benefactors had justly mandated that he travel with the status befitting the führer of a German expedition. Josef had listened to the team member nearest him mutter to another how his family could easily have afforded for him to travel first class but that he had decided against it to avoid upsetting Schmidt and risk being excluded from such a jaunt. The other had just nodded in sly agreement.

  Whatever the reasons, the remainder of the team was booked into second class, but Josef could find little fault in that. It was as luxurious as anything he had ever experienced. He even had a cabin to himself. It was comfortable, quiet, and filled with the new clothing and equipment he had been given before leaving Wewelsburg. Although Schäfer was going to supply him with the additional materials needed once he arrived at the mountain, Pfeiffer had seen that Josef was issued with the best mountain clothing available to take with him. His new, reversible, grey-white winter camouflage jacket and trousers were the latest SS issue. Insulated and windproof, they were better than anything Josef had ever used before. His goggles, crampons, gaiters, gloves, sweaters, woolen undergarments, and boots were also totally new. The only old equipment that now remained to him was his field cap and his ice axe. When Josef got bored, he would lock himself in his cabin and try it all on for size. Feeling the anticipation of the climb ahead, the mountain would rear up before him until his conscience reminded him of the price of his new wardrobe and he guiltily put it all away again.

  By his bunk, he stacked the books, maps, and notes on Everest that Waibel had given to him to continue his preparations during the voyage. On top, in pride of place, was a copy of George Finch’s Der Kampf um den Everest. Whenever he read the Englishman’s firsthand recollection of the 1922 British Everest expedition, oddly first published in German, the rare voice of its experience made Josef’s heart beat faster. He studied its recollections endlessly, imagining their climb, experiencing its difficulties, and worrying at how much the man believed in the necessity of using additional oxygen high on Everest. He already knew that the equipment Schäfer was sending to meet him at the mountain was not going to include oxygen cylinders. “If, by my count, four different Englishmen have been able to get to within three hundred meters of the summit without it, then one good German can do even better,” had been Pfeiffer’s only reply when Josef raised the matter. He hoped he was right.

  The specter of the climb that Finch conjured also pushed Josef to continue his fitness regime in the ship’s otherwise empty gymnasium. Using dumbbells and medicine balls, he worked his body as long and as hard as he could to keep the condition that his winter stay at Wewelsburg had provided. With every exercise he would tell himself, It’s just another climb. He said it so much he almost believed it, letting his thoughts be consumed all over again by the task ahead, forgetting, for a while, all else, even the girl with the camera.

  On the third day of the voyage, a knock on Josef’s cabin door interrupted his afternoon reading.

  Waiting at the door, a white-jacketed steward handed in a note that read:

  The sun is now shining enough for even you to escape the cold. Come and join me on the top deck. The steward will bring you. MvT.

  The invitation gave Josef a jolt of excitement that sent him rushing for his hat and jacket without any thought for the consequences, mountain books instantly abandoned.

  Joining Magda on the top sundeck, they took tea together. The conversation was light and pleasant, but also wary. Intent on avoiding too many personal details, Magda focused their attention, and her ever-present camera, on the moments of brilliance that only a sea voyage can provide: thin shafts of sunlight piercing the clouds and spearing distant circles of sea, the surprise of silver fish flicking out unexpected wings and launching themselves from the top of waves, the mystery of distant white islands that served as brief, anonymous reminders of land.

  Josef looked at the things she pointed out and, in each, saw a new world denied. In return he re-created for her some of the incredible things he had seen in his old world of the mountains until, the tea long finished, he said he should leave even if he wanted to stay.

  Magda walked him back to the second-class level, saying nothing until she said softly, “Let’s do this again tomorrow.”

  The next time they met, their conversation was faster, more eager, fueled by the break in their company. Magda spoke more personally, describing her interests in photography and ballet, but primarily of her love for the medicine she had studied at Leipzig University.

  While Josef was listening to her describe becoming a junior doctor, she suddenly diverted his attention to the very end of the deck. There, an overweight man in undersized white exercise gear was doing loud, exaggerated calisthenics as he looked out to sea.

  “I didn’t know Hermann Göring was on board,” Magda said to Josef in a deliberately wry fashion while they both watched the grunting, bobbing man. The sight was comical, the fat buttocks threatening to overwhelm the seams of the white shorts every time the preposterous man bent or squatted. Magda said nothing more but lifted her Leica toward the appalling sight, raising her eyebrows at Josef as, with mock horror, she feigned taking a photograph. Suppressing giggles that threatened to turn into tear-streaming laughter, Josef realized that it was the first time he had laughed since being captured five months before. There was a time when he used to laugh a lot.

  However, Josef’s amusement ceased the instant the man finished his elaborate exercise regime and turned to leave. With genuine horror, he saw that it was Schmidt. Knowing full well he was playing with fire by merely being there on the first-class deck, let alone sitting next to a beautiful girl, Josef instantly tilted his head forward to hide behind the brim of his hat. His disappearing act spurred Magda to gently poke him in the ribs as the professor strutted past. Each touch was like an electric shock but still Josef kept his face down.

  Only when the deck door had slammed shut, did he risk looking up once more. Magda poked him again and made a little snorting noise like a piglet. This time Josef laughed until the tears ran off the end of his chin and that she did photograph.

  Finally able to pull himself together, Josef said without a word of a lie, “You’re dangerous.”

  “You sound like my parents,” Magda said seriously, before asking with her smile renewed, “Now tell me, Josef, am I to assume from your behavior that you know that fine example of German physical perfection?”

  He looked back at Magda and, with all the credibility he could muster, recited his rehearsed reasons for being there with Schmidt’s expedition.

  It was not the truth, and the more he spoke, the more he wanted to tell it to her.

  38

  Dakshina Murti Road, Kathmandu, Nepal

  June 8, 2009

  1:25 p.m.

  As the rattling Land Rover neared Pashupatinath, the traffic increased exponentially until fina
lly the manic flow of trucks, buses, old four-by-fours, motorized rickshaws, small motorcycles, bicycles—all headed in the direction of the holiest Hindu temple in Nepal—ground to a halt.

  From the paralysis, a cacophony of car and motorcycle horns began to blare, drowning out the spirited ringing of hundreds of bicycle bells as, with difficulty, Sonam forced the old Land Rover up onto the side of the road. There, he gestured to Quinn that they should get out.

  “Many people are coming to the cremation, Mr. Neil. There is a lot of anger and grief about what happened to Pemba and Dawa. We can walk. It’s not far. This traffic is not going anywhere until the funeral is over.”

  Abandoning the vehicle, they started on foot. Quinn was actually somewhat confused as to why they were even going to Pashupatinath. As they pushed between the crowds on the pavement, he asked Sonam about it. “I thought the Sherpas were Buddhists. Pashupatinath is a Hindu place of worship, isn’t it? Why would they do the cremation here?”

  “It is often difficult to draw lines between religions here. Many Nepali are Hindu and Buddhist, sometimes a little Christian as well. They combine many gods into a single devotion to the holy. Kathmandu has always been a place of many gods. In fact, they used to say Kathmandu had more gods than people, more temples than houses. That is sadly, and obviously, not true now, but Pashupatinath is still a most important holy place suitable for everyone to show the greatest respect to Pemba Sherpa.”

  Following the flow of jostling humanity filing along the pavement, Quinn spied a little Mini Clubman car almost hidden in the traffic. About thirty years old and showing its age, the microscopic British car appeared utterly incongruous, sandwiched as it was between a dirty bus and a huge Tata truck covered in painted slogans and mirrors. Behind the driver’s wheel of the tiny Mini was Henrietta Richards with Sanjeev Gupta seated alongside her. The sight was almost comical. Quinn pushed out between the stationary vehicles to knock on the side window, beckoning Henrietta and Sanjeev to get out and join them. As he opened the door, Henrietta unfolded herself from the low seat of the small car, pulling a long golf umbrella from behind it. “Thank you, Neil. I was hoping that I might run into you,” she shouted above the continuing racket of the traffic jam. Then with a sigh she looked back at her car. “I suppose I will have to leave my baby here for now. It better be there when I get back.”

  The expanded party setting off again, Henrietta said, “Neil, I am glad you are back on your feet. It was a brutal attack. I have always thought Sarron was unstable, a horrible explosion waiting to happen, and I’m sorry that you and the two Sherpas got caught in it, particularly after the death of the boy on the mountain. Evidently Sarron’s instructions were that the three of you be taught a lesson but not actually killed. Unfortunately the two goons he used, ex-army sadists, were sloppy in their desire to continue freelance careers of torture and mayhem, something that wouldn’t have happened if he still had the services of the Vishnevskys. I must say, I do find it particularly interesting that, in your case, they were specifically told to beat you with that old ice axe you found and then bring it to Sarron.”

  “Probably in return for the axe being used against him when we fought in the mess tent,” Quinn offered in explanation.

  “Yes, possibly. I understand they weren’t able to take it, making off instead with one of your ice screws.”

  Quinn shook his head, thinking, How does she know all this stuff?

  The same words must have come out of his mouth.

  “I know nothing,” she replied in a faintly humorous voice, “just as no one else in this town seems to know how your two attackers ended up doing a good impression of a Tibetan sky burial on exactly the spot where Dawa was found.”

  “What?”

  “You must know what a sky burial is, Neil?” She didn’t wait for his reply, seeming to relish answering the question herself. “It’s when the Tomden or Yogin-butchers, Tibetan outcasts who answer only to the monks, take big meat hatchets to a recently deceased corpse. They slice it from head to toe, exposing the flesh and bone within, cutting it into small pieces that they then place out for vultures to devour. It is a very effective disposal system for dead bodies in a land with little wood to burn and where the rock-hard ground is not exactly amenable to the digging of graves.

  “Actually in this case it seems that your two assailants might not have been dead when the process started, and that it took quite a long time for them to become so. It appears also that the feral dogs that run the banks of the Bagmati River got more of a meal than the vultures. Unnecessary details perhaps, but you know me, I always seek the devil in the detail.”

  I’m sure you do, Quinn thought but asked instead, “Where’s Sarron now?”

  “Well, not in Kathmandu and no longer in Lhasa, I suspect. A lot of people are very keen to see him and likely to be none too gentle when they do. I doubt he has even gone back to France, for now. It’s much more likely that he will lose himself in India, Goa maybe, or perhaps one of his former French army hangouts in Africa. Not many could get to him in somewhere like Djibouti. However, Neil, you are going to need to be very careful. Sarron’s behavior strikes me as a vendetta almost as much as him simply having something to hide about the climb. I know his back was to the wall for a number of reasons before the climb and he was counting on the Tate summit bonus. Anyway, enough about him, how are you?”

  “I’m actually okay considering everything. Even sorer than I was from the fun and games on the mountain, but nothing major broken. I’ll mend.” Quinn’s voice trailed off as he thought instead of Dawa’s still— desperate condition. “I did, however, visit Dawa this morning. Now that’s a different story. He really is in a bad way, but they seem to think he will recover to some degree. Won’t climb again though.”

  “Neil, what those two thugs did was horrific even if I am sure that they came to regret it in full. It will be very difficult for Dawa to support both his and Pemba’s families.” Her voice slowed. “I remember you mentioning that Dawa saved your life on the Second Step. You do know that if there is more to the story of you finding that ice axe there, and let’s say, for argument’s sake, that you might also have found the body of Sandy Irvine, then there would be a lot of interest and not a little financial upside possible from such a discovery. Probably enough to support Dawa for a very long time.”

  Quinn knew what she was driving at before she even arrived.

  “I mean, if you could find the camera that revealed a picture showing Irvine and Mallory on the summit all those years before Hillary and Tenzing, then you too could probably retire. When they displayed just the small items that they found on Mallory’s body in 1999 in America, they were insured for nearly half a million dollars. Neil, we are not talking the contents of Tutankhamen’s tomb here, just some old climbing gear really, but there is value in this stuff to the right people. Even I will confess to the fact that I would love to have that blue and red paisley handkerchief they found Mallory’s letters wrapped in. It was still perfect. It even had his initials, GLM, stitched into it. Perhaps if you did find the camera, you could buy it for my climbing archive with some of the proceeds?” She smiled at her own flight of fantasy.

  “Perhaps I would, Henrietta, no one deserves it more, but isn’t that whole Mallory and Irvine camera thing just a piece of nonsense? I mean, if it still exists, it’ll have been up there for nearly a hundred years now. High altitude is not a perfect time capsule. Things break with freezing; they can rust up there even. I’ve seen it. Surely any film would have been destroyed long ago?”

  Henrietta tutted, shaking her head a little. “You’d think that, but it’s not impossible. I heard that Mallory’s watch, even if the glass crystal had broken and the hands had fallen off, still ticked when wound some seventy-five years later. I am not sure if that’s really true, but it is clear that things do survive up there for a long time. It is so high the atmospheric conditions are almost unique, parti
cularly if the item has been well hidden inside a pocket or a jacket. One of them had the camera, and it wasn’t on Mallory when his body was found, so it must be Irvine; I am also damn sure that if they got to that summit before they died, it would have been used to record the moment.”

  “So you really do believe in the possibility that it still exists and the film could be developed?”

  “Neil, it’s not only Everest that has its share of doomed eccentrics and frozen relics. In 1897, a Swede by the name of S. A. Andrée set off for the North Pole with two colleagues in a hydrogen balloon. They were never seen again. Thirty-three years later, seal hunters found two of the bodies, and then a later search found the third with a tin containing the expedition’s undeveloped photographic plates. The developed pictures revealed to the world the story of the trio’s ill-fated three-month attempt to walk home over the ice after the balloon had failed.

  “The film in that case had survived at a far lower altitude where moisture would have been a much greater factor, so it’s not impossible that one left high on Everest might last longer. Who knows really? But anyone who loves the Everest story has a natural appetite to learn the details of that final summit attempt by Mallory and Irvine and whether they might actually have made it to the top. Any news, concrete information one way or the other, would be massive. I imagine Time, Newsweek, National Geographic, you name them, would all bid through the nose to be able to reveal to the world that they really had made it to the top before anyone else. A photograph proving it would become one of the most famous and valuable of all time.”

  Quinn understood her need to hang on to the hope that he had found something related to Irvine and that the mystery of all Everest mysteries could be solved in her lifetime, but he hadn’t. Just as he prepared to say so, wondering whether he should mention instead his suspicions that the axe might actually be related to the Russian mystery as he’d first thought, Babu Sonam cut in. “Miss Richards, have you ever heard of a Sherpa called Ang Noru?”