Conquistadors of the Useless (45 page)

I forced myself to reason with him, to explain that there was no hope but to spend the night at the camp, but he didn't want to listen. Thus we carried on a sort of deaf man's dialogue for some minutes, while the gusts cut the snow across our faces like a whip. Finally he gave in. Puffing and panting I hacked furiously away at the slope, while he followed on all fours, at the end of his tether.

As soon as we were back in the tent I tried to unlace his boots, but everything had gone as hard as a block of wood and I had to cut the leather with a knife before I could get them off. My heart sank at the sight of the feet inside, white and utterly insensible.

Annapurna, the first eight-thousander, was climbed, but was it worth such a price? I had been ready to give my life for the victory, yet now it suddenly seemed too dearly bought. But this was no time for meditation – I must act, and quickly.

So began a night more deeply dramatic than any ever described in fiction. Seated on packages of food which had to serve as insulation in the absence of an air-mattress, I rubbed and whipped till I was out of breath. When I missed my aim and my blows landed on still living parts Lachenal would cry out in agony. Every so often I would stop and make hot drinks for the two invalids. From the other tent came sounds of Rébuffat going through the same processes for the benefit of Herzog. The hours crawled by and sometimes I would fall asleep at my work and collapse on top of Lachenal, always starting up again with a new burst of energy. As I toiled away my friend told me the story of the assault.

The tent had almost collapsed under the weight of snow the night before, and in the morning they had been forced to set out without even a hot drink. The higher they climbed the farther away the summit seemed as cold and fatigue took their toll, but at last they had got there. Those moments when one had expected a fugitive and piercing happiness had in fact brought only a painful sense of emptiness. He could remember nothing of the descent except the fall and being resigned to death as he bounded madly down the slope, followed by the unexpected and inexplicable stop and the return to life and fear and suffering.

I listened to him in silence. The willpower and sacrifice of my friends had crowned all our efforts and dangers. The action of the hero had fulfilled years of dream and preparation. Those whose work, undertaken in the service of a pure ideal, had made it possible for us to set out, were rewarded. And with what typically French panache Herzog and Lachenal had set the coping stone in this great arch of endeavour, showing the world that our much-decried race had lost none of its immortal virtues!

Outside, the hurricane had risen to unheard-of heights, threatening to tear the tents from their moorings. Snow had filled up the gap between them and the slope, and was now pushing us gradually towards the edge. In spite of everything we could do to shake it off it continued to encroach in a most worrying way. But my night's work had not been in vain. Lachenal could now move his toes, and the horrid pallor of the evening before had given place to a healthy shade of pink.

Having heard no signs of life for some time, I called to our companions in the other tent. They had dropped off to sleep, utterly worn out. Dawn was approaching, and to our bitter disappointment the storm did not abate as usual. Was our wonderful luck giving out on us at last? It was the first time in two months that the normal afternoon blizzard had not died down during the night. Was it the vengeance of the goddess Annapurna at the desecration of her shrine, or simply the more mundane but redoubtable arrival of the monsoon? Whichever it was we had to get down fast. Tomorrow we should only be weaker and the mountain in worse condition.

I began to dress Lachenal for the fray, but immediately came up against the problem of footwear. His feet were too swollen to be squeezed into his boots. It would be a cruel fate for him to wade through the snow in stockinged feet when I had only just succeeded in getting rid of the frostbite, and anyway how would we fasten his crampons? He would never be able to keep his footing on the hard-frozen slopes without them. We might be able to lower and tow him at first, but we would never manage it once we got to the traverses. What a silly sounding but insoluble problem!

At first I could not think of any way out of it, but suddenly I had an inspiration: my own boots were two sizes larger than his, and would now fit him perfectly. No sooner had I thought of this than I realised the implication, and a shiver ran through me. If he wore my boots I should have to wear his, too small and hacked about with a knife. Without a doubt it would then be my turn to get frozen, yet try as I might I could think of no other solution. The weight of destiny crushed me for a moment or two. To sacrifice a portion of one's own body seemed somehow more horrible than death, but in every fibre of my being I felt the duty more urgently than instinct itself. To give way would be dishonour, a crime against the name of friendship. There was nothing else for it, and with the feelings of a soldier going over the top I hauled off my second pair of stockings and stuffed my feet into the new instruments of torture.

The spirit of action now possessed me completely. Foreseeing the worst, I crammed some food and a sleeping bag into my sack, calling out to Herzog and Rébuffat to do the same. I also intended to carry a tent. Four of us, taking turns with two sleeping bags in such a tiny space, ought to be able to resist the cold for a long time. Outside it was still blowing an icy gale, and we had trouble doing up our crampons. As Lachenal had lost one of his the day before I had to be content with the remaining one. But where was my ice axe? In my haste the previous evening I had forgotten to put it away carefully, and now it was nowhere to be found. As Lachenal had also lost his during his fall we only had two left between the four of us, and Gaston and I took over these as of necessity. I wanted to fold up the tent, but the first pair had already started off down the slope. The gale was still at its height but it had stopped snowing for the moment and visibility was not too bad, so Lachenal, more impatient than ever, tugged at the rope and bellowed:

‘Hurry up! What the hell do you think we're going to do with a tent? We'll be at Camp Four in an hour.'

Suddenly I felt a wave of optimism. We ought to be able to see far enough to find the way back through the séracs without going wrong. In the upshot I let him have his way. We should just have to take our chances. It was up to luck now.

We ran down the first couloir of hard snow easily enough, and the difficulties only began when we reached the first séracs. The wind had fallen and it had begun to snow in huge flakes, making it difficult to see a man at fifty feet. It was impossible to recognise a thing. An awful feeling of being lost came over us, the full gravity of our situation appearing in all its horror. In these conditions we hadn't one chance in twenty of finding Camp Four B, but it was Hobson's choice – we just had to keep on trying while there was any daylight left. Tomorrow, if there were any survivors after a bivouac without equipment, they would be in no fit state to help themselves, and only the return of fine weather could possibly save them.

We wandered backwards and forwards for hours and hours, constantly thinking we had found a way out of the maze only to meet each time with the same bitter disappointment. The flakes fell thick and fast, building up so quickly on the ledges that you could see it happening. It was getting harder and harder to break the trail; we sank in up to the thighs, then to above the waist, though fortunately the light powder was not too difficult to pack down. I was amazed at my own reserves of energy. Rébuffat took regular spells at the job too, showing a great deal of courage. His legendary stubbornness worked wonders, and I well remember how, after I had retreated from a particularly trying bout with a steep, loose slope, he patiently advanced up it inch by inch until he had won. Sometimes we would sit down in discouragement, and I would take advantage of the respite to remove my boots and rub my numbed feet back to life. Though ready for death, I had no wish to survive mutilated.

Herzog followed his leader without a murmur, but Lachenal gave me more trouble. Convinced we were wasting our energy to no purpose, he wished for no more than to dig a hole in the snow and wait there for fine weather. To get him to budge I had to haul on the rope and curse him roundly. Personally I had reached the stage of complete detachment. In perfect consciousness of what I was doing, but without any sensation of fear, I crossed zones that were ready to avalanche and wandered happily in my one crampon over steep ice slopes, surprising myself by the manoeuvres I was able to perform. The object of all these peripatetions was to find the narrow exit on the left of the séracs which alone gave access to Camp Four, but unfortunately the cloud distorted everything and upset one's judgement to such an extent that one might have passed by it a hundred times without recognising it. In case anyone happened to be at Camp Four B we periodically shouted for help. We had now eaten practically nothing for twenty-four hours, yet our energy was amazing for men who had lived and worked for several days at an altitude of over twenty-three thousand feet. Did we owe this miraculous state of affairs to the drugs which Oudot insisted on our taking regularly?

While we fought for our lives time had gone by unnoticed, and now, suddenly, it was almost night. The essential thing was to find a crevasse which would shelter us from the rising wind. I therefore began to explore the various holes which surrounded us, and in the meantime Rébuffat and Herzog made one last effort to reach a landmark we thought we recognised. There seemed to be nothing but bottomless abysses or tiny hollows round which the wind howled unimpeded. I had already given up the search as a bad job and was trying to deepen a hollow with my ice axe when there came a terrible cry from Lachenal just behind me. I jumped around, but he was nowhere to be seen, a fact explained by the presence of a small round hole in the snow from which issued a muffled voice assuring me that he had accidentally fallen into the very place we needed. A twelve-foot jump down proved that he was telling no more than the truth. We were in an ice cave the size of a small room and perfectly sheltered from the wind. It seemed almost warm by comparison. After a certain amount of arranging we managed to settle down in relative comfort. I hauled out my sleeping bag, only to learn immediately that the other pair, overexcited at the prospect of leaving our wretched camp that morning, had neglected to bring theirs.

I was absolutely perished by the cold, and the soft touch of the down-filled bag sent waves of warmth along my limbs. With the brute selfishness to which men return in moments of suffering I slid it up round me, carried away on a tide of voluptuous bliss. Beside me my friends sat freezing in silence, huddled up against each other. I soon began to feel my disgusting egoism, however, and after some contortions Herzog, Lachenal and I all managed to squeeze our lower portions into the providential bag. Little memory remains of that terrible night. I only know that the constant struggle against the cold, the cramps that racked me and the intermittent bouts of rubbing my friends' hands and feet kept me so busy that I had no time to think of anything else. Perhaps this was just as well, since I knew that only fine weather could save us. Yet hope springs eternal, and so we concentrated all our energy on surviving until daybreak. There would be time to think of dying after that. After hours of resistance sleep and exhaustion finally overcame me.

I awoke chilled to the marrow. A faint light seemed to be filtering through to our cavern, but I could not distinguish anything in particular. I was trying to understand what was wrong when suddenly there was a heavy shock just above us and a mass of snow fell on top of me. I realised at once that an avalanche had passed overhead, demolishing part of our roof. We were not buried so much as lightly covered, and a few shakings and flailings soon brought us back to the fresh air, whereupon it became plain what my trouble had been: I was partly snow blind. Gaston was in the same condition. Well, so what? The first thing was to have a look outside and find out what the weather was like.

Our equipment had been scattered all over the cave, so we had to grope for it under the snow. Gaston was the first to find his boots and climb up into the daylight. We shouted up questions about the weather, but he could only reply that there was a strong wind blowing; otherwise he could see nothing. I found my boots next, but was so blind I had to get Lachenal to help me put them on, which he was too impatient to do properly. In the end I had to use all my strength to force my feet into these clogs of ice. As I emerged from the cave sharp gusts buffeted me, and overhead all seemed grey and misty. Judging that the weather had not improved I therefore gave myself up to despair. There seemed no further hope.

Lachenal was yelling his head off behind me, so I turned to give him a hand up. He was still in stockinged feet, having been unable to find his boots. No sooner was he up than he started bellowing again: ‘It's fine! It's fine! We're saved! We're saved!' – and ran off towards the end of the trough in which our cave was situated. Out of all this verbal delirium I at least managed to gather that the sun was shining, and that my opthalmia was responsible for my not being able to see it. This condition had been provoked by taking off our goggles to see better in the previous day's storm, through which the rays had nevertheless penetrated sufficiently to do damage.

Down in the cave Herzog the realist was still sifting through the snow for our gear. I hoisted up successively two pairs of boots and several rucksacks, then it was his own turn. Unfortunately he could do little to help himself with his poor frozen hands, and for all my natural strength and professional technique I could not haul his hundred and eighty pounds on my own. Several times he slid back, but finally, by a supreme effort, I succeeded in getting his head and shoulders sufficiently far over the edge for him to seize my legs. As he lay there gasping it was his turn to feel a moment of despair, and he said: ‘It's all over, Lionel. I'm finished. Leave me and let me die.' I encouraged him as best I could, and in a minute or two he felt better.