Solo Faces (7 page)

The glacier is dangerous only when covered with snow. That year it had melted early. The surface was gray with pulverized rock and carried granite blocks of all sizes. They passed two other people, a man and woman, both deaf—they were signing to each other as they moved in silence. From the blue of crevasses came a chill breath and the sound of trickling water. On the far side they climbed the steep bank and started along the faint track that winds up through scrub and small pines. It was warm. They walked without speaking. The Dru, visible from the glacier, had vanished behind intervening ridges. Looking up now, they saw it again, only the tip like the highest mast of a ship, then gradually the rest. They continued the long, uphill walk. It had already been three hours. The trees and undergrowth ended, there were patches of snow. At last they reached the outcrop that stood like an island in the snowfields at the foot of the Dru, the
rognon,
it was called.

It was noon. The sky was clear, the air seemed still. Above them the mythic face soared as if leaning slightly backward. The light was streaming across the top. There was snow in the great couloir, snow on the high ledges. The rock was pale in places, almost rusted. There were huge sheets like this, gilded with age. From somewhere came a faint whispering and then a roar. It was off to the right. They watched a graceful flow of rock come down the face, the snow streaming ahead of it and bursting like the sea. The sound slowly died. There was silence. The air was cold. Rand took off his pack. He stared upward.

“That is some piece of rock.”

Cabot nodded. In the dank shadow it was somehow as if they had swum to this place and surfaced. The chill in the air was like spray, their faces dim.

They sat down to examine it closely. They rejected the couloir. It was off to the side as well as being the start of the normal route, but the rest was one vast apron filled with overhangs and downward-facing slabs. Almost in front of them, however, there seemed to be a slanting fault that led to a group of arches. They would come out on a sort of ledge five hundred feet up.

“Then there’s a series of cracks,” Cabot remarked. They were faint, vertical lines; in places they almost disappeared. It was difficult to tell if they really faded to nothing. There might be a way to link them.

Cabot was looking through binoculars—their field was small, the image unsteady and jerking. On up to an overhanging wall above which was wedged an enormous block, a well-known feature, the
bloc coincé.
Past that and up. They would be joining the end of the regular route which would take them the rest of the way.

For hours they examined it, noting every detail. Rand was writing it down with the stub of a pencil. The sun, coming over the left side, hit the face as they finished, flooding it with a vast, supernal light.

“That’s about it,” said Cabot finally.

Rand took the glasses for a while before they started down. He was silent. He felt a certain solemnity.

A great mountain is serious. It demands everything of a climber, absolutely all. It must be difficult and also beautiful, it must lie in the memory like the image of an unforgettable woman. It must be unsoiled.

“How long do you think it’s going to take?”

“Two days, maybe three,” Cabot said.

“How many pitons?”

“I think everything we’ve got.”

“Weight’s going to be a problem.”

Cabot didn’t answer. “That’s a terrific line,” he said, his eye ascending one last time. “It could take us right to the top, you know?”

“Or farther.”

H
E WAS SWIMMING, FAR
out to sea. Something was out there, a person, the air was ringing with faint, fading cries. His arms were heavy, the swells were becoming deeper. He tried to call out himself, his cries were borne away. Someone was drowning, he hadn’t the courage to reach them. He was giving up. His heart was leaden. Suddenly he woke. He had been dreaming. It was two in the morning.

There followed hours of the same thoughts repeated again and again. The dark face of the mountain filled not only sleeplessness but the entire world. Its coldness, its hidden terrors would be revealed only at certain times. Long before dawn he lay, victim to these fears. The iron hours before the assault. His eyes were already wearied by images of what was to come, the miraculous had drained from his palms.

The weather had not been good. The delay was eating at his nerves. Each morning they woke to overcast skies or the sound of rain. Everything was ready, ropes, pitons, supplies. Every day they sat in idleness.

Weather is critical in the Alps. The sudden storms are the cause of most disasters. The casual arrival of clouds, a shifting of wind, things which might seem of little consequence can be dangerous. The sun, moreover, melts the ice and snow at higher altitudes, and rocks, sometimes of unbelievable size, break loose and fall. This happens usually in the afternoon.

One must know the mountains. Speed and judgment are essential. The classic decision is always the same, whether to retreat or go on. There comes a time when it is easier to continue upward, when the summit, in fact, is the only way out. At such a moment one must still have strength.

It cleared at last. They walked to the station. Their packs were huge, they weighed at least fifty pounds. Ropes slung over their shoulders, when they moved there was a muted clanking like the sound of armor.

His chest felt empty, his hands weightless. He felt a lack of density, the strength to cling to existence, to remain on earth, as if he were already a kind of husk that could blow away.

This great morning, this morning he would never forget. Carol was standing among the tourists. A group of schoolchildren had arrived with their teachers for an excursion to the Mer de Glace. Rand stood near a pillar that supported the roof. The sun was warm on his legs. His clothing, different from theirs, the loaves of bread sticking out of his pack, the equipment, set him apart. A kind of distinction surrounded him, of being marked for a different life. That distinction meant everything.

They boarded the train. The seats around them were empty. Amid the shouts of children and the low, murmured talk of couples, young men with cashmere sweaters around their necks, a shrill whistle blew. The train began to move. Carol walked along beside it as far as the platform’s end.

The valley fell away. On the opposite side the Brévent reared like a wall, a faint path zigzagging up it. An elderly Englishman and his wife sat nearby. He had a turned-down hat. There were blotches on his face.

“Very beautiful, isn’t it?” he said.

“I prefer the Cervin. The Cervin is much nicer,” his wife replied.

“Do you think so?” he said.

“It’s majestic.”

“Well, here you have majesty.”

“Where?”

“There.”

She looked for a moment.

“No,” she said. “It’s not the same.”

The train rocked gently. The conversation seemed like scraps of paper floating from the window as they went upward. At Montenvers a crowd was waiting to go back down.

By three that afternoon they were camped beneath the Dru. That evening they had a good meal, soup, thick pieces of bread, dried fruit, tea. Afterward a bar of chocolate. They planned to start at dawn. Above them the face was silent. The slanting rays of sun fell on their shoulders, on the warm, lichened rock and dry grass. They watched the sun go down in splendor behind the shoulder of the Charmoz. Cabot was smoking. He held out the thin cigarette as he exhaled. Rand took it from between his fingers.

“Where’d you get this?”

“Brought it with me.” He leaned back, his thoughts drifting off. “And so,” he said, “they waited for morning. I love this time. I like it best.”

“Here …”

Cabot reached for it. He inhaled deeply, smiled. It seemed he was a different man here, calmer; the strength remained but not the vainglory that clung to him below. The well-to-do family, school, athletic teams, what these had done for him the mountains had done for Rand. A deep companionship and understanding joined them. They were equals. Without a word, it seemed, they had made a solemn pact. It would never be broken.

The light had faded. It was growing cold. By nine-thirty they were asleep. An hour later there was thunder, distant but unmistakable. By midnight it began to rain. In a torrential downpour they went down the next day, soaked and miserable. They slept in the back of the van, the three of them, piled together like dogs while chill rain beat on the roof.

Three times they were to walk to the foot of the Dru. The weather was against them. It had pinned down everyone else as well. Bray was in town. He had talked to one of the guides, a man from the villages who knew the lore.

“There’s something they call the wind for the year,” he explained. “It comes on the twenty-third of January. This year it was from the west.”

“What does that mean?”

“A good day, then two or three of rain, and so forth. Variable.”

“I could have told you that,” Cabot said.

In mid-July they started up again. The weather had cleared, climbers were swarming into the mountains. Two were near them on the glacier, one a girl carrying a big pack. Her boy friend was far in front.

“What’s he bringing her up for?”

“To milk her,” Cabot said.

She wore glasses. Her face was damp. Later, having fallen two or three times on the ice, she cried out in frustration and sat there. The boy went on without looking back.

On the
rognon
another party was already camped—two Austrians, they looked like brothers. Cabot was immediately alarmed.

“Let’s go to the other side,” he said.

That evening they could hear, from across the valley, the whistle of the last train going down. Later there was singing. It was the Austrians.

“What do you suppose they’re doing? Do you think they’re doing the same thing we are?”

“I don’t know,” Rand said. “Where were they when it was raining?”

“We’d better start early,” Cabot warned.

At five in the morning they broke camp silently and went down onto the glacier that lay between them and the base. It was already light. Their hands were cold. Their footsteps seemed to bark on the frozen surface.

“If they’re not up yet, this will wake them,” Rand said.

“They’re doing the regular route anyway.”

“How do you know?”

“There they are.”

There were two small figures far off on the right, making for the couloir.

“Nothing to worry about now,” Rand said.

“Right.”

Between the glacier and the rock there is a deep crevasse, the bergschrund; they crossed it without difficulty. The granite was dark and icy cold. Rand put his hand on it. It seemed he was touching not a face but something on the order of a planet, too vast to be imagined and at the same time, somehow, aware of his presence.

It was just before six that they began to climb.

“I’ll take the first pitch, all right?” Cabot said.

He took hold of the rock, found a foothold and started up.

“O
FF BELAY!”

After a bit, a rope came curling down. He tied Cabot’s pack to it with stiffened fingers and watched as it was hauled up, brushing against the rock. The rope came down again. He fastened his own pack to it. A few minutes later he was climbing.

At first there is anxiety, the initial twenty feet or so especially, but soon it vanishes. The rock was cold, it seemed to bite his hands. Pausing for a moment he could hear behind him the faint sound of trucks in the distant valley.

He reached the place where Cabot was belaying. They exchanged a few words. Rand went ahead. He climbed confidently, the distance beneath him deepened. The body is like a machine that is slow to start but once running smoothly seems it can go forever. He searched for holds, jamming himself in the crack, touching, rejecting, working himself higher.

By noon they were far up—they had reached a snow-covered ledge that formed the top of the apron. From here the main wall began. Rays of sun, far above, were pouring past the invisible summit. Sitting on a narrow outcrop they had something to eat.

“Not too bad, so far. Can I have some water?” Cabot said.

Somehow in taking it there was a slip—the plastic bottle dropped from his hand. He tried to catch it, but it was gone, glancing off the rock below once, twice, three times and dwindling into the white of the glacier which after a long pause it hit.

“Sorry,” he said calmly.

Rand did not comment. There was another bottle but now only half the supply remained. The mountain magnifies. The smallest event is irreversible, the slightest word.

A sequence of vertical cracks began. Rand was moving upward. At the top of the first one it was necessary to go to another off to the left. Between, it was nearly blank. The holds sloped downward. He tried, retreated, tried again. He had to reach a nub eight inches farther out. The smoothness threatened him, the lure of a last half foot. His face was wet. His leg began to tremble. Ready, he told himself. He leaned out. Reached. His fingers touched it. He moved across. From beneath, it seemed effortless as if he were skimming the rock and barely needed holds. Cabot merely saw him put in a piton and go on. Just then the sun passed from behind the face and blinded him. He shielded his eyes. He could not be sure but he thought he saw the
bloc coincé
far above.

From Montenvers that afternoon they were visible by telescope. Large sections of the mountain were pale in the sun. Some distance beneath the great, overhanging block, two specks could be made out, motionless. A white helmet glinted.

The afternoon had passed, they were still in sunshine. The warmth was pleasant. There is always endless waiting, looking up, neck stiff, while the leader finds the way. The silence of the face surrounded them, the greatness of the scale.

Suddenly, from nowhere, a frightening sound. The whine of a projectile; Rand hugged the wall. Something unseen came down, thudded, careened and was gone. He looked up. Above him, an awesome sight. The brush of a great wing seemed to have passed over Cabot. As if in obedience, slowly, he was bowing. His legs went slack, his arms slipped away. Without a sound he performed a sacred act—he began to fall.