Jeff Long, himself a veteran climber, based this story on his own experiences in the
Himalayas. Author of a previous novel,
charged with hope and beauty' – David Roberts, author of
'An unbelievably powerful story... I would recommend this to anyone interested in the
Himalayas' – John Acklerly, Director, International Campaign for Tibet
The Ascent
Jeff Long
Copyright © 1992 Jeff Long
To Barbara
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
One writes the way one solos upon a mountain, alone and yet not at all alone. I owe
Wiedman, and Kurt Papenfus, all physicians, all climbers. Over the years, David
Breashears, Brian Blessed, Fritz Stammberger, Arnold Larcher, Matija Malezic, and
Geof Childs have shared their ropes and wings with me in the Himalayas. I give
special thanks to John Paul Davidson and all the members of the BBC crew of
to Craig Blockwick, James Landis, Gwen Edelman, Verne and Marion Read, Rodney
Korich, Jerry Cecil, and, as always, my parents for their support, and to Jeff Lowe,
Mary Kay Brewster, Annie Whitehouse, Karen Fellerhoff, and Brot Coburn for their
extraordinary tales. Elizabeth Crook, Steve Harrigan, Doe Coover, Pam Novotny, and
Rex Hauck helped raise me from the abysses of my own making.
I will remember forever Jeanne Bernkopf, who showed me that language is spirit,
and spirit, the rope with which we all inch higher. In the human rights arena, the
following people and organizations provided guidance and inspiration: Michelle
Bohanna, John Ackerly, Tenzin Tethong, Lisa Keary, Marcia Calkowski, Rinchen
Dharlo, Woody Leonhard, Spenser Havlick, Steve Pomerance, Matt Applebaum,
Leslie Durgin, Buzz Burrell, Chela Kunasz, the International Campaign for Tibet, the
Office of Tibet, the U.S.-Tibet Committee, and the Lawyers for Tibet. I am especially
grateful to Cindy Carlisle and Michael Weis for their vision and tenacity. Finally,
without my editor Elisa Petrini's magic these pages would be nothing but stone.
AUTHOR'S NOTE
The Kore Wall route is an imaginary monster, drawn in bits from the south and west
faces of Makalu and glued to the north face of Everest. Himalayan veterans will also
note my fiddling with certain geographical features of the region, for example the 'loss'
of the second road exit from the Rongbuk Valley, the blending of Shekar Dzong with
the Rongbuk Monastery, and the movement of Chengri La from some twenty miles to
the east. I hope these liberties won't ruin the mountain's realities.
This story is fictional, but the tragedy of Tibet is not. China's illegal occupation of
Tibet constitutes one of the great crimes against humanity in this century. Having
killed off one sixth of the Tibetan population over the past forty years, the People's
Republic of China continues to systematically plunder and destroy the Tibetan
culture, religion and environment. What was once Shangri La, however imperfect, is
now a graveyard and gulag garrisoned by Chinese troops and overrun by 7.5 million
Chinese colonists. A century ago, Native-Americans of the Wild West were conquered
with similar violence fueled by similar ideals of racial supremacy. However, a century
ago, there was no such sanctuary as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The
twenty-first century may yet see Tibet restored to its sovereign status.
PROLOGUE – 1974
From far North, a breeze rushed and the forest creaked in a wave. The rescue men
waited in the frozen white of their car beams, acid from too much coffee, souring
among the pines. Abe had never felt cold like this. He tried warming himself with the
memory of their midnight breakfast in a truck stop – the fake maple syrup, the bacon,
the men's jokes to a waitress with yellow teeth – but then another breeze came
through.
It had been an all-night drive to reach this dead end in the heart of Wyoming.
Sometime around one the Jimi Hendrix on their airwave had surrendered to
honky-tonk and then near four the cowboy ballads had fallen into dark mountain
static. The road had quit at dawn and the forest had swallowed them whole and now
here they were, kicking about a wild goose chase. If the dead or wounded – the lost –
in fact existed, there was ho evidence, none, no car, certainly no tracks, not with this
fresh dusting of snow.
None of them were big men really. And yet they mustered like unshaven giants – at
least to Abe's eye – stomping the snow with lug-soled boots and snorting great
streams of white frost through their nostrils. They scared him, though for the most
part that was because he had finally, at the age of almost eighteen, succeeded in
scaring himself. For as long as he could remember, Abe had wanted to climb
mountains. The trouble was he was no mountain man, just an east Texas oil patch
brat, a college freshman who'd never climbed in his life except through the pages of
A ghost of white powder cast loose from the boughs to ride the air in ripples. Snow
splashed Abe in the face, then went on. Once more he was left facing the forest in a
cupful of men, a watchful boy with a long blade of a face and brass wire-rims and a
squared-off homecut. He was wearing immaculate white-on-white winter camouflage
purchased with hurried guesswork yesterday afternoon at Boulder's army surplus
store. The rest of the men were dressed in real clothes: wool and down mostly, most
of it patched up and greasy from use.
Abe could tell they weren't yet finished hanging their jokes on him. It was hard
saying what stung more, the justice of their mockery or the mockery itself. He didn't
blame them. He looked ridiculous. He didn't belong here, that was sure. But then
again, they were all outsiders. Dawn had broken an hour ago with a bright but steely
winter sun. And so their engines were kept running and their headlights were on and
they were pretending to get illumination and heat from the man-made beams. To
some extent, they were all making believe.
At long last their wait ended. 'Got him,' a voice among them shouted, and the pack of
men thronged the short-waves set. It was a Fish and Game pilot calling in. He'd been
scouring the peaks since first light and had, he announced, just sighted one of the
