Forester looked around. ‘When O’Hara comes up here he’ll be in a hell of a hurry. What about building him a wall at the entrance here? We can leave a note in the hut telling him which tunnel to take.’
‘That is well thought,’ said Rohde. ‘There are many rocks about.’
‘Three will do better than two,’ said Forester. ‘I’ll roust out Peabody.’ He went back to the hut and found Peabody still in the same corner gazing blankly at the wall. ‘Come on, buster,’ Forester commanded. ‘Rise and shine; we’ve got a job of work on hand.’
Peabody’s eyelids twitched. ‘Leave me alone,’ he said thickly.
Forester stooped, grasped Peabody by the lapels and hauled him to his feet. ‘Now, listen, you crummy bastard; I told you that you’d have to take orders and that you’d have to jump to it. I’ve got a lower boiling-point than Rohde, so you’d better watch it.’
Peabody began to beat at him ineffectually and Forester shoved and slammed him against the wall. ‘I’m sick,’ gasped Peabody. ‘I can’t breathe.’
‘You can walk and you can carry rocks,’ said Forester callously. ‘Whether you breathe or not while you do it is immaterial. Personally, I’ll be goddam glad when you do stop breathing. Now, are you going to leave this hut on your own two feet or do I kick you out?’
Muttering obscenities Peabody staggered to the door. Forester followed him to the tunnel and told him to start gathering rocks and then he pitched to with a will. It was hard physical labour and he had to stop and rest frequently, but he made sure that Peabody kept at it, driving him unmercifully.
They carried the rocks to the tunnel entrance, where Rohde built a rough wall. When they had to stop because of encroaching darkness, they had built little more than a breast-work. Forester sagged to the ground and looked at it through swimming eyes. ‘It’s not much, but it will have to do.’ He beat his arms against his body. ‘God, but it’s cold.’
‘We will go back to the hut,’ said Rohde. ‘There is nothing more we can do here.’
So they went back to the hut, relit the fire and prepared a meal of canned stew. Again, Peabody would not eat, but Rohde and Forester forced themselves, choking over the succulent meat and the rich gravy. Then they turned in for the night.
Oddly enough, Forester was not very tired when he got up at dawn and his breathing was much easier. He thought—if we could spend another day here it would be much better. I could look forward to the pass with confidence. Then he rejected the thought—there was no more time.
In the dim light he saw Rohde wrapping strips of blanket puttee-fashion around his legs and silently he began to do the same. Neither of them felt like talking. Once that was done he went across to the huddle in the corner and stirred Peabody gently with his foot.
‘Lemme alone,’ mumbled Peabody indistinctly.
Forester sighed and dropped the tip of his boot into Peabody’s ribs. That did the trick. Peabody sat up cursing and Forester turned away without saying anything.
‘It seems all right,’ said Rohde from the doorway. He was staring up at the mountains.
Forester caught a note of doubt in his voice and went to join him. It was a clear crystal dawn and the peaks, caught by the rising sun, stood out brilliantly against the dark sky behind. Forester said, ‘Anything wrong?’
‘It is very clear,’ said Rohde. Again there was a shadow of doubt in his voice. ‘Perhaps too clear.’
‘Which way do we go?’ asked Forester.
Rohde pointed. ‘Beyond that mountain is the pass. We go round the base of the peak and then over the pass and down the other side. It is this side which will be difficult—the other side is nothing.’
The mountain Rohde had indicated seemed so close in the clear morning air that Forester felt that he could put out his hand and touch it. He sighed with relief. ‘It doesn’t look too bad.’
Rohde snorted. ‘It will be worse than you ever dreamed,’ he said and turned away. ‘We must eat again.’
Peabody refused food again and Forester, after a significant glance from Rohde, said, ‘You’ll eat even if I have to cram the stuff down your gullet. I’ve stood enough nonsense from you, Peabody; you’re not going to louse this up by passing out through lack of food. But I warn you, if you do—if you hold us up for as little as one minute—we’ll leave you.’
Peabody looked at him with venom but took the warmed-up can and began to eat with difficulty. Forester said, ‘How are your boots?’
‘Okay, I guess,’ said Peabody ungraciously.
‘Don’t guess,’ said Forester sharply. ‘I don’t care if they pinch your toes off and cut your feet to pieces—I don’t care if they raise blisters as big as golf balls—I don’t care as far as
you’re concerned. But I am concerned about you holding us up. If those boots don’t fit properly, say so now.’
‘They’re all right,’ said Peabody. ‘They fit all right.’
Rohde said, ‘We must go. Get your packs on.’
Forester picked up the suitcase and fastened the straps about his body. He padded the side of the case with the blanket material of his old pack so that it fitted snugly against his back, and he felt very pleased with his ingenuity.
Rohde took the primitive ice-axe and stuck the short axe from the Dakota into his belt. He eased the pack on his back so that it rested comfortably and looked pointedly at Peabody, who scrambled over to the corner where his pack lay. As he did so, something dropped with a clatter to the floor.
It was O’Hara’s flask.
Forester stooped and picked it up, then fixed Peabody with a cold stare. ‘So you’re a goddam thief, too.’
‘I’m not,’ yelled Peabody. ‘O’Hara gave it to me.’
‘O’Hara wouldn’t give you the time of day,’ snarled Forester. He shook the flask and found it empty. ‘You little shit,’ he shouted, and hurled the flask at Peabody. Peabody ducked, but was too late and the flask hit him over the right eye.
Rohde thumped the butt of the ice-axe on the floor. ‘Enough,’ he commanded. ‘This man cannot come with us—we cannot trust him.’
Peabody looked at him in horror, his hand dabbing at his forehead. ‘But you gotta take me,’ he whispered. ‘You gotta. You can’t leave me to those bastards down the mountain.’
Rohde’s lips tightened implacably and Peabody whimpered. Forester took a deep breath and said, ‘If we leave him here he’ll only go back to O’Hara; and he’s sure to balls things up down there.’
‘I don’t like it,’ said Rohde. ‘He is likely to kill us on the mountain.’
Forester felt the weight of the gun in his pocket and came to a decision. ‘You’re coming with us, Peabody,’ he said harshly. ‘But one more fast move and you’re a dead duck.’ He turned to Rohde. ‘He won’t hold us up—not for one minute, I promise you.’ He looked Rohde in the eye and Rohde nodded with understanding.
‘Get your pack on, Peabody,’ said Forester. ‘And get out of that door on the double.’
Peabody lurched away from the wall and seemed to cringe as he picked up his pack. He scuttled across the hut, running wide of Forester, and bolted through the door. Forester pulled a scrap of paper and a pencil from his pocket. ‘I’ll leave a note for Tim, telling him of the right tunnel. Then we’ll go.’
It was comparatively easy at first, at least to Forester’s later recollection. Although they had left the road and were striking across the mountainside, they made good time. Rohde was in the lead with Peabody following and Forester at the rear, ready to flail Peabody if he lagged. But to begin with there was no need for that; Peabody walked as though he had the devil at his heels.
At first the snow was shallow, dry and powdery, but then it began to get deeper, with a hard crust on top. It was then that Rohde stopped. ‘We must use the ropes.’
They got out their pitiful lengths of rotten rope and Rohde carefully tested every knot. Then they tied themselves together, still in the same order, and carried on. Forester looked up at the steep white slope which seemed to stretch unendingly to the sky and thought that Rohde had been right—this wasn’t going to be easy.
They plodded on, Rohde as trailbreaker and the other two thankful that he had broken a path for them in the thickening snow. The slope they were crossing was steep and swept dizzyingly below them and Forester found himself wondering what would happen if one of them fell. It was likely that he would drag down the other two and they would all slide, a tangled string of men and ropes, down the thousands of feet to the sharp rocks below.
Then he shook himself irritably. It wouldn’t be like that at all. That was the reason for the ropes, so that a man’s fall could be arrested.
From ahead he heard a rumble like thunder and Rohde paused. ‘What is it?’ shouted Forester.
‘Avalanche,’ replied Rohde. He said no more and resumed his even pace.
My God, thought Forester; I hadn’t thought of avalanches. This could be goddam dangerous. Then he laughed to himself. He was in no more danger than O’Hara and the others down by the bridge—possibly less. His mind played about with the relativity of things and presently he was not thinking at all, just putting one foot in front of the other with mindless precision, an automaton toiling across the vast white expanse of snow like an ant crawling across a bed sheet.
He was jolted into consciousness by stumbling over Peabody, who lay sprawled in the snow, panting stertorously, his mouth opening and closing like a goldfish. ‘Get up, Peabody,’ he mumbled. ‘I told you what would happen if you held us up. Get up, damn you.’
‘Rohde’s…Rohde’s stopped,’ panted Peabody.
Forester looked up and squinted against a vast dazzle. Specks danced in front of his eyes and coalesced into a vague shape moving towards him. ‘I am sorry,’ said Rohde, unexpectedly closely. ‘I am a fool. I forgot this.’
Forester rubbed his eyes. I’m going blind, he thought in an access of terror; I’m losing my sight.
‘Relax,’ said Rohde. ‘Close your eyes; rest them.’
Forester sank into the snow and closed his eyes. It felt as though there were hundreds of grains of sand beneath the lids and he felt the cold touch of tears on his cheeks. ‘What is it?’ he asked.
‘Ice glare,’ said Rohde. ‘Don’t worry; it will be all right. Just keep your eyes closed for a few minutes.’
He kept his eyes closed and gradually felt his muscles lose tension and he was grateful for this pause. He felt tired—more tired than he had ever felt in his life—and he wondered how far they had come. ‘How far have we come?’ he asked.
‘Not far,’ said Rohde.
‘What time is it?’
There was a pause, then Rohde said, ‘Nine o’clock.’
Forester was shocked. ‘Is that all?’ He felt as though he had been walking all day.
‘I’m going to rub something on your eyes,’ said Rohde, and Forester felt cold fingers massaging his eyelids with a substance at once soft and gritty.
‘What is it, Miguel?’
‘Wood ash. It is black—it will cut the glare, I think. I have heard it is an old Eskimo practice; I hope it will work.’
After a while Forester ventured to open his eyes. To his relief he could see, not as well as he could normally, but he was not as blind as during that first shocking moment when he thought he had lost his sight. He looked over to where Rohde was ministering to Peabody and thought—yes, that’s another thing mountaineers have—dark glasses. He blinked painfully.
Rohde turned and Forester burst out laughing at the sight of him. He had a broad, black streak across his eyes and looked like a Red Indian painted to go on the warpath. Rohde smiled. ‘You too look funny, Ray,’ he said. Then more soberly, ‘Wrap a blanket round your head like a hood,
so that it cuts out some of the glare from the side.’ Forester unfastened his pack and regretfully tore out the blanket from the side of the case. His pack would not be so comfortable from now on. The blanket provided enough material to make hoods for the three of them, and then Rohde said, ‘We must go on.’
Forester looked back. He could still see the huts and estimated that they had not gained more than five hundred feet of altitude although they had come a considerable distance. Then the rope tugged at his waist and he stepped out, following the stumbling figure of Peabody.
It was midday when they rounded the shoulder of the mountain and were able to see their way to the pass. Forester sank to his knees and sobbed with exhaustion and Peabody dropped in his tracks as though knocked on the head. Only Rohde remained on his feet, staring up towards the pass, squinting with sore eyes. ‘It is as I remembered it,’ he said. ‘We will rest here.’
Ignoring Peabody, he squatted beside Forester. ‘Are you all right?’
‘I’m a bit bushed,’ said Forester, ‘but a rest will make a lot of difference.’
Rohde took off his pack and unfastened it. ‘We will eat now.’
‘My God, I couldn’t,’ said Forester.
‘You will be able to stomach this,’ said Rohde, and produced a can of fruit. ‘It is sweet for energy.’
There was a cold wind sweeping across the mountainside and Forester pulled the jacket round him as he watched Rohde dig into the snow. ‘What are you doing?’
‘Making a windbreak.’ He took a Primus stove and put it into the hole he had dug where it was sheltered from the wind. He lit it, then handed an empty bean can to Forester. ‘Fill that with snow and melt it; we must drink something hot. I will see to Peabody.’
At the low atmospheric pressure the snow took a long time to melt and the resulting water was merely tepid. Rohde dropped a bouillon cube into it, and said, ‘You first.’
Forester gagged as he drank it, and then filled the can with snow again. Peabody had revived and took the next canful, then Forester melted more snow for Rohde. ‘I haven’t looked up the pass,’ he said. ‘What’s it like?’
Rohde looked up from the can of fruit he was opening. ‘Bad,’ he said. ‘But I expected that.’ He paused. ‘There is a glacier with many crevasses.’
Forester took the proffered can silently and began to eat. He found the fruit acceptable to his taste and his stomach—it was the first food he had enjoyed since the plane crash and it put new life into him. He looked back; the mine was out of sight, but far away he could see the river gorge, many thousands of feet below. He could not see the bridge.
He got to his feet and trudged forward to where he could see the pass. Immediately below was the glacier, a jumble of ice blocks and a maze of crevasses. It ended perhaps three thousand feet lower and he could see the blue waters of a mountain lake. As he looked he heard a whip-crack as of a stroke of lightning and the mutter of distant thunder and saw a plume of white leap up from the blue of the lake.