Touching the Void (12 page)

When it ceased I realised that I had stopped moving. Simon had managed to hold the impact of my body suddenly coming on to the rope. I was confused. I didn’t understand what had happened, except that I was hanging free in space. I grabbed the rope and pulled myself up into a sitting position. The spinning continued but it was slowing down. I could see an ice wall six feet away from me every time I completed a spin. When I stopped spinning I was facing away from the wall and had to twist round to look at it. The spindrift had stopped. I shone my torch up the wall following the line of the rope until I could make out the edge I had gone over. It was about fifteen feet above me. The wall was solid ice and steeply overhanging. The rope jerked down a few inches, then stopped. Another avalanche of powder poured over the edge, and the wind blew it in eddies round me. I hunched protectively.

Looking between my legs, I could see the wall dropping below, angled away from me. It was overhanging all the way to the bottom. I stared down trying to judge the height of the wall. I thought I could see the snow-covered base of the wall with the dark outline of a crevasse directly beneath me, then snow flurries blocked my view. I looked back at the edge above. There was no chance of Simon hauling me up. It would have been extremely hard with a solid belay. Sitting in the snow seat, it would be suicidal to attempt it. I shouted at the darkness above and heard an unintelligible muffled yell. I couldn’t be sure whether it had been Simon or an echo of my own shout.

I waited silently, hugging the rope with my arms to stay upright, and feeling shocked as I stared between my legs at the drop. Gradually, and with a sense of mounting dread, I began to get some perspective into what I was looking at. I was an awfully long way above the crevasse at the base of the cliff, and as it slowly dawned on me I felt my stomach lurch with fear. There was at least 100 feet of air below my feet! I kept staring at the drop, hoping to find I was mistaken. I realised that, far from being wrong, I had been conservative in my estimate. For a moment I did nothing while my thoughts whirled and I tried to assess how things had changed. Then one fact jolted through my thoughts.

I swung round and stared at the wall. It was six feet from me. At full arm’s reach, I still couldn’t reach the ice with my axe. I tried swinging towards the wall but ended up spinning helplessly. I knew that I had to get back up the rope, and I had to do it quickly: Simon had no idea what I’d gone over. The other steep drops were short walls. He had no reason to assume this would be any different. In that case he might lower me. Oh, Jesus, I’ll jam on the half-way knot long before I get to the bottom!

It was impossible to reach the wall, and I realised quickly that it wouldn’t help me. I couldn’t climb fifteen feet of overhanging ice with one leg. I fumbled at my waist for the two loops of rope I had tied there. I found them but couldn’t grip them with my mitts on. I wrenched off the mitts with my teeth and reached for the two loops again. I slipped one over my wrist and held the second in my teeth. In reaching for the loops I had let go of the rope and tumbled over backwards so that I hung from the waist. My rucksack had pulled me over, and I hung in an inverted curve with my head and legs lower than my waist. I struggled to swing up until I reached the rope and pulled myself back to a sitting position.

I crooked my left arm around the rope to hold me upright, and took the loop from my teeth with my right hand. I tried to twist the thin loop of cord around the rope but my fingers were too numbed. I needed to get a Prussik knot on to the rope, so that I could slide the knot up and hang in tension as the knot tightened. The effort of holding myself up was exhausting. At last, using a combination of teeth and hand, I managed to twist the loop around the rope, and then tried repeating the process. I needed at least three twists before the knot would be of any use. By the time I had succeeded I was almost crying with frustration. It had taken me nearly fifteen minutes. The wind nudged me into a gentle spin and blasted the incessant avalanches into my face, blinding me. I clipped a karabiner into the Prussik loop and fastened it to my waist.

I shoved the loop as far up the rope as I could reach and leant back on it. The knot tightened, slipped a few inches, and then held me. I let go of the rope and hung back. I remained sitting up. The second loop had to be tied on to the rope but this time I would be able to use both hands. It wasn’t until I tried to slip it off my left wrist that I realised how useless my hands were. Both were frozen. I could move the fingers of my right hand, but my left hand, which had been still as I held on to the rope, had seized. I thumped them together, bending the fingers in against my palms. I hit them, bent them, hit them, again and again, but there were no hot aches. Some movement and feeling returned but it was minimal.

I took the loop from my wrist and held it against the rope. At my first attempt to twist it around and back inside itself I dropped it. It fell on to the main rope knot on my harness and I grabbed at it before it was blown off. Then, as I lifted it to the rope, it seemed to slide out of my hand. I grabbed at it with my left hand and managed to catch it against my right forearm. I couldn’t pick it up. My fingers refused to close round it, and as I tried slipping it up my arm it dropped again. This time I watched it fall away beneath me. I knew at once that I now had no chance of climbing up the rope. It would have been hard enough doing it with two loops, and now, with both hands so useless, I had no chance. I slumped on to the rope and swore bitterly.

At least I wasn’t having to hold myself up. It was a consolation although I knew it achieved little else. The rope ran up from my waist taut as an iron bar. The loop I had attached gripped the rope three feet above my harness. I undipped it from my harness and then threaded it through my rucksack straps so that it pulled them together across my chest. I fastened it with my last karabiner and leant back to test it. The effect was good. The loop now held my torso up on the rope so that I sat in space as if in an armchair. When I was sure it was as good as I could get it, I slumped back on to the rope feeling utterly weary.

The wind gusted against me, making me swing crazily on the rope, and with each gust I was getting colder. The pressure of the harness on my waist and thighs had cut off the circulation and both legs felt numb. The pain in the knee had gone. I let my arms hang slackly, feeling the deadweight of useless hands in my mitts. There was no point in reviving them. There was no way out of this slow hanging. I couldn’t go up, and Simon would never get me down. I tried to work out how long it had been since I had gone over the edge. I decided it could be no more than half an hour. In two hours I would be dead. I could feel the cold taking me.

Twinges of fear lurked round my mind but even these were fading as it crept through me. I was interested in the sensations, wondering idly how it would take me. At least it wouldn’t hurt—I was glad of that; the hurting had worn me out and it felt so calm now that it was over. Above my waist the cold slowed its progress. I fancied how it would ease its way up, following veins and arteries, creeping inexorably through me. I thought of it as something living; something which lived through crawling into my body. I knew it didn’t work like that, but it felt as if it did, and that seemed a good enough reason to believe it. I wasn’t going to argue about it with anyone; of that I could be sure. I almost laughed out loud at the idea. I felt so tired; sleepy tired, and weak. I had never felt so weak; a limbless, disembodied feeling. It was odd.

I jerked down sharply, and bounced on the rope. When I turned to look at the wall I realised I was going down. Simon was lowering me again. I shook my head, trying to clear the lethargy. He had no chance. I was sure that he was gambling on being able to get me down before the knot jammed. Secretly I hoped he could, and knew with certainty that he had no chance. I screamed a warning into the night. There was no reply. I continued falling steadily. I looked down and saw the crevasse below me. I could see it clearly. When I looked up I could no longer make out the top of the cliff. The ropes ran up into snow flurries and disappeared. There was a small jerk, then another, and I stopped.

Half an hour passed. I stopped shouting at Simon. I knew he was in the same situation as me, unable to move. Either he would die in his seat or be pulled from it by the constant strain of my body. I wondered whether I would die before this happened. It would happen as soon as he lost consciousness, and maybe he would do so before me. On the rope I was clear of the worst avalanches. He would be colder than me.

Each thought of death, of mine or his, came quite unemotionally—matter-of-fact. I was too tired to care. Perhaps if I was scared I would fight harder, I thought, and then dismissed the idea. I was scared tying the loops and it hadn’t helped. Toni Kurtz had fought and fought when he was dying on the Eiger. He had never once stopped fighting, and he had dropped suddenly dead on the rope still fighting to live. Rescuers had watched him die. It seemed strange to be in the same situation and not be bothered…maybe it’s the cold? Won’t be long now. I’ll not last till morning…won’t see the sun either. I hope Simon doesn’t die, that’s hard…he shouldn’t have to die for me…I jerked upright, the drifting aimless thoughts pushed away and replaced with a consuming anger at what had happened. I screamed at the wind. Swearing and yelling blind.

‘On the last bloody lower, and after all that pain. YOU SHIT. YOU FUCKING BASTARD.’ Words wasted into the snow and wind, shouted to no one in particular in a shaking fury of bitterness and grievance. Idiot words, as meaningless as the hissing empty wind around me. Anger surged through me. It warmed me, shook me, driving the cold off in a tirade of obscenities and frustrated tears. I cried for myself and swore at myself. Everything came down to me. It was my knee that was smashed. I had fallen, and I was dying, and Simon with me.

The rope slipped. I bounced down a few inches. Then again. Had he freed the knot? I slipped again. Stopped. Then I knew what was about to happen. He was coming down. I was pulling him off. I hung still, and waited for it to happen. Any minute, any minute…

Joe had smiled as I let him slide away from me. It wasn’t much of a smile. His pain twisted it into a grimace. I let him go fast and ignored his cries. He was quickly gone from my torch beam, and as another avalanche swept over my head the rope disappeared as well. Apart from his weight on my waist there was no sign of his existence.

I kept the speed going. The belay plate was easy to control despite my deadened fingers. They were bad now. I worried about them, as I had done since we left the col. I knew Joe’s climbing days were over, but now I was scared for my hands. There was no telling how bad they would be. I had a quick look when it was light but I couldn’t see how deep the damage was. Four fingertips were blackened, and one thumb, but there was no saying whether the others wouldn’t also go the same way. I heard a faint cry from below, and the rope jerked slightly. Poor bastard, I thought. I had hurt him all the way down. It was strange being so cold about it. It had been hard not to feel for him. It was easier now. We had made such fast progress. Efficient. I felt proud about it. We had held it all together, and that was good. The lowering had been easier than I had expected, especially with Joe digging the seats for me. He had really held it together. That was some control! I’d never asked him to dig the seats, but he just went ahead and did it. Wonder whether I would have done that? Who knows.

My hands were stiffening again. They always got bad before the knot; stiff, like claws. The rope ran out smoothly. I had been careful to avoid any tangles. The idea of holding Joe with one hand and trying to unsnarl a tangled and frozen rope didn’t bear thinking about. The pull at my harness increased. The slope must be steepening again, I thought. There were another seventy feet to go before the half-way knot had to be changed over. I increased the rate of descent. I knew it was hurting him. When it had been light I could see his pain for a long way down, but we had got down. It was necessary. Another faint cry came from the darkness. A rushing flow of snow poured over me again. I hunched deeper into the seat, feeling the snow settle and crumble slightly. The seats lasted for the lower but by then they were well on their way to collapse.

Suddenly I jolted heavily forward from the waist and nearly came out of the seat. I threw my weight back and down into the snow, bracing my legs hard against the sudden pressure. Christ! Joe’s fallen. I let the rope slide slowly to a stop trying to avoid the impact I would have got if I had stopped it dead. The pressure remained constant. My harness bit into my hips, and the rope pulling tautly between my legs threatened to rip me down through the floor of the seat.

After half an hour I let the rope slide again. Whatever Joe had gone over had stopped him getting his weight off the rope. My legs had numbed as the pressure on my hips cut the blood supply away. I tried to think of something to do other than lower. There was nothing. Joe had not attempted to climb back up. I had felt no trembling in the rope to tell me he was attempting something. There was no chance of hauling him up. Already the seat was half its original size. It had steadily disintegrated from beneath my thighs. I couldn’t hold the weight much longer. The steep sections higher on the face had been less than fifty feet high. I decided that he would be able to get his weight off the rope after a shortrdistance, and set a belay up. I had no choice.

As the rope ran out I realised that the pressure wasn’t easing. Joe was still hanging free. What in hell’s name was I lowering him over?

I looked down at the slack rope being fed through the belay plate. Twenty feet below I spotted the knot coming steadily towards me. I began swearing, trying to urge Joe to touch down on to something solid. At ten feet I stopped lowering. The pressure on the rope hadn’t changed. I kept stamping my feet. I was trying to halt the collapse of the seat but it wasn’t working. I felt the first shivers of fear. Snow hit me again from behind, surging over and around me. My thighs moved down fractionally. The avalanche pushed me forward and filled the seat behind my back. Oh God! I’m coming off.