The Beckoning Silence Read online

  Contents

  Copyright Notice

  List of Illustrations

  1 Games on a dangerous stage

  2 Intimations of mortality

  3 High anxiety

  4 Given wings to fly

  5 The coldest dance

  6 Rite of passage

  7 Because it’s there

  8 The stretched dream

  9 The Eigerwand

  10 Against the dying of the light

  11 Heroes and fools

  12 Touching history

  13 Do nothing in haste

  14 Look well to each step

  15 The fatal storm

  16 The happiness of a lifetime

  17 Half silences

  Acknowledgements

  Selected Reading

  List of Illustrations

  Section 1

  Joe cutting loose on Quietus Stanage Edge, Derbyshire

  Ian Tattersall on the summit of Alpamayo

  A ghostly face in the ridge watches over climbers following our tracks on Alpamayo

  Joe on the top pitch of Bridalveil Falls.

  Given wings to fly: Joe launches on a 56-kilometre cross-country flight in Brazil

  Ray on Bridalveil Falls, Telluride, Colorado

  Joe ice climbing in Vail, Colorado.

  Rigid Designator, Vail, Colorado.

  Joe climbing in Ouray Canyon, Colorado.

  Section 2

  '...the beckoning silence of great height.' Eiger North Face, September 2000.

  Trudle and Anderl Heckmair with Joe and Ray. Kleine Scheidegg. September 2000.

  Sedlmayr and Mehringer's names in the Hotel des Alpes Register, Grindelwald.

  Joe, Anna Jossi and Alice Steuri, with the register, Grindelwald.

  Joe beneath a sunset-washed Eigerwand.

  (left) A sombre Ray packs for the climb. (right) A sobering reminder of previous attempts.

  Joe climbing the Difficult Crack.

  The face turns into a deadly trap after a violent storm.

  Ray belaying as the storm sweeps in.

  Joe crossing the Hinterstoisser Traverse during the storm.

  Ray at the Swallow's Nest.

  Ray dodging stone-fall while retreating across the Hinterstoisser Traverse

  Alpenglow over the Scheidegg Wetterhorn.

  Joe at the Swallows Nest

  Joe retreating on the Hinterstoisser Traverse.

  The North Face of the Eiger from the Kleine Scheidegg Hotel.

  The Eiger looms above Kleine Scheidegg.

  Section 3

  The wildest dream: George and Ruth Mallory.

  Moon rises over the Walker Spur. Grandes Jorasses, Chamonix. Photo by Bradford Washburn.

  Chris Bonington cutting steps into the Spider on the first British ascent, 1962.

  Don Whillans climbing the First Ice Field using an ice dagger.

  Brian Nally retreating across the Second Ice Field after the death of his partner, Barry Brewster.

  Carruthers and Moderegger on the Second Ice Field before they fell to their deaths.

  Karl Mehringer and Max Sedlmayr waiting for good weather at the Hotel des Aples, Alpiglen, August 1935.

  'We are deeply indebted to Frau Jossi for her hospitality. She was always there with a helping hand. From two poor climbers, with our warmest thanks.' Entry in the visitors' book of the Hotel des Alpes, Alpiglen.

  'Bivouac on 21/8/35. Max Sedelmajr, Karl Mehringer, Munich. Munich H.T.G. Section Oberland.' In June 1976 a Czech rope found a cigarette tin with this yellow note on the Second Ice Field, 41 years after it was written. It was probably Mehringer who wrote the note, since he misspelled the name of his climbing companion.

  A youthful Toni Kurz smiles back at us from the past. Alpiglen, 1936.

  'If only the weather holds,' said Andreas Hinterstoisser to the photographer, Hans Jegerlehner. Unluckily for Hinterstoisser and Kurz, the weather did not hold. But that was only one reason for the disaster.

  Austrians Heinrich Harrer and Fritz Kasparek and Germans Anderl Heckmair and Ludwig Vorg (left to right) on 24 July 1938 after the first ascent of the North Face of the Eiger.

  Stefano Longhi, trapped above the Traverse of the Gods, waves to a passing plane. 'Fame! Freddo!' were his last desperate words.

  Using a 370-metre steel cable, Corti is recovered from the face. This was the first time a climber had been rescued from the Eigerwand.

  Section 4 - The Filming of the Beckoning Silence

  Joe and Cubby Cuthbertson preparing to be filmed below the Stollenloch window.

  Cubby about to be winched down to the Swallows Nest.

  Joe on the 1st Icefield.

  Tough filming conditions.

  Roger Schaeli in costume as Toni Kurz.

  Hinterstoiseer checks his digital camera while Kurtz calls home.

  Toni Kurz gets 'frostbite' sprayed onto his left hand.

  Kurz death scene.

  Keith Partridge descending gingerly towards the Hinterstoisser Traverse.

  Keith Partridge, mountain cameraman extraordinaire with the 1,000 foot high Rote Fluh looming behind him.

  The team preparing to film rockfall sequences on the summit slopes of north flank of the Monch.

  Joe waiting for the rockfall scene.

  Joe filming at the Swallows Nest.

  Joe descending for a piece to camera on the Hinterstoisser Traverse.

  Copyright Notice

  This eBook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author's and publisher's rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

  Copyright Joe Simpson 2002

  Version 3.0

  eISBN 978-0-9575193-2-9

  Published by DirectAuthors.com Ltd.

  Verry House

  Chine Crescent Road

  Bournemouth

  www.directauthors.com

  All rights reserved

  First published in the United Kingdom in 2002 by Jonathan Cape

  The right of Joe Simpson to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

  Acknowledgement is due for permission to quote from The Wildest Dream by Peter and Leni Gillman (Hodder Headline Ltd), The White Spider by Heinrich Harrer (Flamingo/HarperCollins Publishers), Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer (Pan Macmillan) and ‘No Woman, No Cry’ (Words & Music by Vincent Ford) Copyright (c) 1974 Fifty-Six Hope Road Music Ltd./Odnil Music Ltd./Blue Mountain Music Ltd. (PRS). All rights for North and South America controlled and administered by Rykomusic, Inc. (ASCAP) and for the rest of the world by Rykomusic Ltd. (PRS). Lyrics Used By Permission.

  All Rights Reserved.

  The Beckoning Silence

  by

  Joe Simpson

  Dedications

  To Ian ‘Tat’ Tattersall

  ‘We miss you, kid.’

  Climb if you will, but remember that courage and strength are naught without prudence, and that a momentary negligence may destroy the happiness of a lifetime. Do nothing in haste; look well to each step; and from the beginning think what may be the end.

  Edward Whymper, Scrambles amongst the Alps

  In memory of Matthew Hayes and Phillip O’Sullivan whose dream stretched to the very end.

  1 Games on a dangerous stage

  The ice was thin and loosely attached to the rock. I could see water streaming beneath the opa
que layer undermining its strength. I glanced down to the left and saw Ian ‘Tat’ Tattersall hunched over, stamping his feet at the foot of the ice wall. He was cold and I was taking far too long. I could sense his impatience. This first pitch of Alea Jacta Est, a 500-foot grade V ice climb looming above the valley of La Grave in the Hautes Alpes, France, should have been relatively straightforward. It had felt desperately difficult and precarious.

  I looked down at where I had placed my last ice screw in a boss of water ice protruding from a fractured and melting ice wall 35 feet below me. If I fell now I would drop 80 feet and I knew the ice screw would not hold me. The ice boss would shatter and it would be instantly ripped out. It had quickly become apparent that the route was in poor condition. Lower down I had found myself moving from solid ice onto a strange skim of water ice overlaying soft, sugary snow. It was just strong enough to hold my axe picks and crampon points but it would never hold an ice screw. Hoping for an improvement I had climbed higher and moved diagonally towards the right side of the wall. Then the ice began to resemble something more commonly found furring up the icebox in my fridge. I moved tentatively over rotten honeycombed water ice and onto frightening near-vertical slabs of rime ice – a feathery concoction of hoarfrost and loosely bonded powder snow. It was now impossible to down-climb safely and I tried to quell a rising tide of panic as I had headed gingerly towards the ice boss that was gleaming with a wet blue sheen near where a rock buttress bordered a rising curtain of ice.

  As I twisted the ice screw into the boss, I watched in dismay as a filigree pattern of cracks spread through water ice. I saw water seeping out from beneath the fractures and stopped winding the screw. Clipping the rope to the screw I tried to ignore the fact that it was my first point of protection and that it wouldn’t hold my weight let alone a fall. If I fell, I knew that I would hit the ground from over 100 feet. I glanced back at Tat but he wasn’t looking at me. It was surprising how very lonely you can suddenly feel.

  I moved up slowly, gently hooking my axe picks in melt holes in the ice, careful to pull down and not out. My right foot slipped away as wet ice sheared from the rock and I shuddered down, then stopped. I breathed deeply and stepped up again, forcing the single front-point of my crampons into a shallow crack in the rock and balancing on it as I reached higher and planted my axe into a marginally thicker layer of ice. There was a cracking noise as the ice flexed free of the underlying rock, then silence as it held my weight. I held my breath and pulled steadily on the axe shaft.

  The route description mentioned a near-vertical wall of ice trending rightwards. I remembered the old adage about ice climbing which stated that 75-degree ice feels vertical and vertical ice seems overhanging. I felt physically strong but mentally my resolve had begun to crumble. It had been a slow, insidious leeching away of my confidence directly proportional to the height I gained. Above me a rock wall reared up and the ice curved into a short corner. I spotted a small piece of red tape poking out from beneath a fringe of wet snow. The belay, I thought with relief, protection, safety at last.

  My spirits rose at the welcome sight and I made delicate moves up the ice wall until I was perched cautiously on the tips of my crampon points digging into a moustache of frozen moss and turf. I was alarmed to notice that the turf was not part of a rocky ledge but simply a tuft of vegetation glued to the rock wall. I reached up with my axe and carefully pushed the pick through the small loop of red tape. An experimental tug indicated that it was a solid anchor and I relaxed as the tension ebbed away.

  ‘I’ve found the belay,’ I shouted over my shoulder. There was no answer from below. I swept the dusting of snow from around the tape, hoping to reveal a couple of strong bolts. My heart sank as I saw two knife-blade pitons that had been driven half their length into a hairline crack in the rock. The tape had been tied off around the blades to reduce the outward leverage that would have been exerted if the eyes of the pitons had been clipped. I looked quickly around for some other protection to back up this worryingly feeble belay. There was nothing. No cracks for wires or pitons and the nearest ice was too thin and weak to take an ice screw.

  I looked down past my boots. A rocky buttress plunged away beneath my crampon points. There was now a fall of over 150 feet if the two blade pegs ripped out. I began to feel nervous. A shout from below was muffled by the sound of a passing truck on the nearby road.

  ‘What?’ I yelled.

  ‘Are you safe?’ Tat yelled.

  I glanced at the two pegs and my stomach tightened. This isn’t good, I told myself sternly. We’re on holiday. This is supposed to be fun!

  ‘I’m not sure,’ I muttered to myself, then leaned out and shouted. ‘OK, Tat. Be careful. The ice is crap and the belay isn’t much better.’

  ‘What?’

  Great. He can’t hear me.

  ‘Climb!’ I yelled, trusting that Tat was too good a climber to fall off the pitch. When he reached the last ice screw and was in earshot I told him about the belay.

  ‘Is it in the right place?’ he asked.

  ‘Well, I think so, but having said that I was expecting bolts, so maybe not.’

  ‘Why didn’t you carry on?’ Tat asked. His tone was critical.

  ‘I was a long way above a bad runner, the ice was bad and I saw what I thought was the belay,’ I said, sharply angered that my efforts on the first pitch hadn’t been appreciated. I knew that to follow it with the security of a rope from above would have presented few problems to a climber of Tat’s skill but surely he must have noticed the poor ice and lack of protection?

  ‘I thought it was pretty hairy down there,’ I added, with a note of petulance in my voice. It had unnerved me and I felt embarrassed to have displayed such weakness. Tat remained unconvinced. ‘And I didn’t like the look of that,’ I added nodding at the vertical 20-foot rock corner draped on its left side with mushy, crumbling ice. In truth, I was scared. The pitch below had seemed insecure and although I had climbed it competently I had constantly been aware that it was much harder than it should have been. The conditions were deteriorating and the short corner looked horribly risky.

  ‘I don’t think this is in good nick,’ I said, as Tat climbed up to stand level with my feet.

  ‘No,’ Tat said as he examined the corner.

  ‘You’ll have to get a runner in before you try that,’ I cautioned. ‘Otherwise you will be falling directly onto the belay.’ I leaned to the side so Tat could see the knife blades.

  ‘Two pegs. What’s wrong with that?’

  ‘They’re tied off. I don’t even like putting my weight on them.’ I glanced at the drop to the foot of the climb. ‘They won’t hold a fall.’

  Tat shrugged. He didn’t seem as concerned as I was. Maybe I’m being a wimp? Perhaps it’s not so bad? I reasoned to myself but the bluff didn’t work. I knew it was bad. I was climbing well, feeling strong, but doubts were crowding in on me. Trust your judgement. It’s your life.

  I passed a bandolier with ice screws down to Tat. He swung it around his neck and moved to the left, making a long stride out with his boot to get his crampons onto the ice. A large plate of ice cracked off and tumbled down and over the buttress. I watched it, mesmerised, as it wheeled out into the sucking, empty space beneath my feet.

  I tensed and grabbed Tat’s shoulder to steady him. He tried the stride again and I watched intently as he made precise, soft placements with his axes, weighted them, and shifted to the left until he could stand directly over his left foot. He made a perfunctory examination of the ice then reached up with his axe. Clearly there was no chance of placing an ice screw.

  I shifted uneasily. Tat was tall and probably weighed 175 pounds. There was no way I could hold him without putting heavy force on the belay.

  ‘Gear, Tat,’ I said tensely.

  ‘I’ll look under that roof,’ he said and nodded towards where a small overhang of rock jutted from the rock corner. ‘There may be a crack underneath it.’

  He lifted himself smoot
hly up on his right axe and braced the front-points of his right boot against the back of the rock corner. There was a cracking sound and Tat dropped down as the ice disintegrated and his left foot detached again. I gasped with shock and instantly braced for the fall. He stopped moving and calmly replaced the boot slightly higher.

  ‘Jesus, Tat, get some gear in.’

  He said nothing.

  I felt sick with anxiety. Tat was absorbed in the technical difficulty of climbing while I could only watch and worry and try not to think about the pitons. Any fall would kill us. An edgy hysteria was beginning to flood through me. This is bad. This is really bad. Yet I did nothing. I stared, transfixed by Tat’s movements, scarcely daring to breathe, trying to will his axes and crampon points to hold firm.

  After what seemed an age I found myself looking directly upwards at the red plastic soles of Tat’s Footfang crampons. If he fell he might hit me. The impact would knock me off my frail stance. If he slid past me he would fall 20 feet straight onto my harness and then the belay. It would rip out. The frozen turf would not take the strain and the moment it collapsed I would lunge down onto the tied-off knife blades. Then we would be airborne.