Beyond the Mountain by Steve House

Author:Steve House [House, Steve]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780979065958
Published: 2012-06-14T16:00:00+00:00

Our ascent – done in 60 hours – was the third ascent. The first was done by a three-man team fixing ropes and being supported by another three-man team for the descent. It was completed in 11 days in 1984. The second ascent, and first alpine style ascent, was made a month prior to our climb by Kevin Mahoney and Ben Gilmore in seven days. The ledges chopped by Kevin and Ben were of great advantage to us. MARK TWIGHT

Mark and I look at one another, stunned. Mark knows Scott far better than I, and to my relief he picks up the discussion with Scott. “Scott. You’re right. It is your call. I know it’s before the time we’d talked about stopping. But there is this easy ledge here. Seems like we should use it.”

Scott lays into another round of curses as he turns in and starts climbing down to us. By the time Scott reaches the ledge, I am finished clearing the new snow off. I carefully empty my pack as Scott clambers down onto the ledge and starts pitching in, scraping the remaining snow away with his spiked boots. Putting together the two stoves, I kneel on my backpack, fill the pots with clean snow, and spark the white gas to life.

After we’ve all seated ourselves on our packs, Scott breaks the silence. “I’m sorry, guys. I’m sorry. You’re right. I was feeling so good. You two fuckers are tough acts to follow, and I’ve been dragging ass this whole trip. Just when I was feeling strong, feeling good, leading, you rein me in.”

Mark and I say nothing, but we both glance at each other, and then look at Scott in acceptance. The stoves let out their guttural, jet-engine growl.

“Tell you what. Tell you what.” Scott lifts his arms wide, his face breaking into smile again, reclaiming his charm. “This will forever be known as the incident on the first icefield. Naming it is letting it go, right? But later, when we’re in that nursing home someday, we’ll tell the story every damn day. Deal?”

“Deal,” we say in unison.

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