Snowman (16 page)

"Jim, why didn't you tell me this at the beginning? Your friendship isn't worth a damn," Garson said. He looked scornfully at the three of them. "I had a responsibility. I'm going to have to swing for this—and so help me, I'll put the three of you under arrest for withholding evidence if I don't get the truth."

People were pounding on the door, and Garson picked up his walkie-talkie and instructed his men to clear the building and ask the state trooper captain to come up.

Inside the gondola Bradford scanned the mountain with his binoculars. Contour lines had altered; he could make out through the sheets of snow new fissures in the glacier—crevasses of great depth running in crazy zigzag patterns. The scope of the avalanche had not been as great as it had first seemed from ground level.

He was worried about the condition of base camp; if it was buried they would have to return to the lodge and wait for more equipment to arrive from L.A. But as they moved higher the weather was clearer. The storm had changed direction, which was in their favor.

They left the gondola at the experts' slope and broke into three parties, Bradford's consisting of himself alone. They were at the source of the avalanche and could not begin to climb higher until they tested the stability of the lower slopes. They would be forced to use dynamite at this altitude and hope that the upper slopes would not be disturbed.

Bradford gave out hand charges of dynamite for them to set off at various points of the mountain, in an effort to shift the weak walls of snow and ice and allow the huge mass of rock to consolidate. He could see that the various depressions were now blocked with ice; this would make the climb easier.

He gave the others the simpler tasks of skiing to the intermediate and beginners' slopes. He would blast at the higher runs. He nervously skied under a new cornice, the mass of snow precariously overhanging a contorted ridge. He set off two charges on four minute fuses, dropped them under the cornice, and skied along rock stubble into a wooded copse which the avalanche had bypassed. He jammed cotton into his ears. The blast shook the ground beside him and shifted a group of screes filled with loose stones under the cornice.

At a signal, Packard and Spider skied down to the intermediate slopes and repeated the action beside a moraine where debris had been brought down from the snout of the glacier. Jamie and Pemba were at about thirty-five hundred feet on the lower slopes, and they skied in opposite directions to clear two immense séracs which had blocked the runs. In twenty minutes the three groups had set off forty charges, and it was with a sense of relief that Bradford studied the mountain for any further sign of weakness. He discovered that it had firmed up; it would become more durable as the temperature dropped.

They reconnoitered at the gondola hut when he sounded a hand siren. The climb up to the base in the waning sunlight was not as difficult as he had anticipated. They were on familiar terrain, and the route was girdled to avoid newly formed screes. The sangar had been out of the path of the avalanche and the camp remained as it had been left. Bradford checked the radio transmission.

"This is Survey One," Bradford said over the mike.

"Identify yourself," Sheriff Garson answered.

"Who is this?"

"Sheriff Garson. Repeat, identify yourself."

"Daniel Bradford."

"How many men are with you?"

"Four."

"Okay, Bradford. Get your men together and come down."

"I can't. We dynamited, and the area around the lifts is blocked."

"Well, then give me your grid position and we'll send a rescue helicopter up for you."

"The weather's bad," Bradford lied.

"Can you hang in till morning?"

"Sheriff, we're not coming down."

"Look, if you don't you'll all be under arrest. The mountain's been officially closed by my office." When there was no response, he asked, "Do you read me?"

Bradford had closed down the radio transmission, but Garson persisted. "Bradford, I don't want you dead. Now fire some flares . . ."

Garson shook his head disconsolately and said to Ashby, "You disgust me . . . anything for a story."

Ashby sensed that he had Garson boxed in. He could still manipulate him so that he would come away with his trophy.

"Pat, I'm not going to apologize, but I'm going to give you some realistic advice. If you go out there and tell those vultures that you believe there's a Snowman on the mountain, you'll be finished. There's no real evidence yet. Sure, you can show them the pictures of the footprints, but who's to say they weren't doctored? And you can't show the pictures of the girl or they'll hang you for keeping quiet so long. Stick with the story of a giant bear and an ice weakness and you've got a chance to ride through this. Especially since you've got professional climbers already up there.

"I'll run a special edition describing how you took control of the situation. The choice is yours. Either you come out a hero or an incompetent who didn't know what the hell was going on in his own town. You'll be vulnerable, and no matter what you say to the contrary, it'll look like you were part of a conspiracy to hush this up because you wanted to protect vested interests. Man, they'll send a couple of hot-shit reporters down from L.A. and they'll eat you alive because I'll cooperate with them. So before you shoot your mouth off, think about it . . . you'll be spending the rest of your life in courtrooms and giving lawyers depositions. I wouldn't want to see you in that position."

Garson shambled out of the room, broken and dispirited.

In the kitchen tent, Pemba cut thick slices from the smoked pork they had brought up. He fried them with eggs and pinto beans on the primus stove and boiled some snow to make coffee, which he spiked with rum.

After dinner, Spider took charge. He brought out cards and started a four-handed game of low-ball, which took the men's minds off what lay ahead.

The first day's climb would be the hardest, because they would have to establish a temporary camp on the icefall. They'd all be carrying upwards of forty pounds of weight, and both Spider and Packard would have trouble breathing without oxygen in the rarefied air. The going would be slow and laborious.

Crouched low outside his tent to avoid the violent hack of the night wind, Bradford stared into the darkness. The sky was bright with clusters of stars; he prayed for snow during the day rather than at night, so that when the Snowman came out they'd have a better chance at him. He decided to initiate a three-hour watch, which would give them all six hours of sleep. He had brought along a supply of Doriden as well as Dexedrine to combat drowsiness. The lack of humidity would cause them all to have insomnia for several nights until they adjusted to the sharp, arid, dehydrating air. The pills would allow them to have uninterrupted sleep until they were acclimatized.

He shone his flashlight up the flank of the slope. Perhaps the Snowman responded to light. Was there any way to bring him out, or were they completely at his mercy?

He took out his ice ax and climbed a short distance above the camp, so that he could get some perspective on the Snowman's path of attack if he left his hiding place during the night. Would it merely be snow that brought him out, or some other primitive instinct? Could he smell or see them now? Was he watching? Did he attack only for food or to defend his new domain? If only there was some way to incite an attack so that they could be ready for him.

Bradford was on a small, firm, rectangular snowpacked shelf, exposed to the wind; sharp-honed ice needles bit into his skin. He listened to the men complain when Pemba won a pot. They'd be all right; Pemba would hold them together. Bradford flashed the light at another section, and in the whine of the wind he thought he heard the muffled cry of an animal.

He climbed down from the shelf and headed for his tent. He set his wrist alarm for midnight, the curfew he had imposed on the men. He would take the first watch. He pulled off his boots and climbed into the rectangular sleeping bag. The bulky ensolite pad was raw with cold, and made his skin burn on contact. He rolled over on his side and softly chanted, "
Om Mane Padme Om . . .
" until his lids became heavy and he saw Cathy's face touching his.

The gray morning carried gelid blasts of air which bit into their faces. Pemba wore a Sherpa balaclava. The woolen hood covered his head and neck and left only a small opening for his face, which was coated with oil.

Ahead of him, on the ice wall, Spider turned, shivering, and demanded in outrage, "What the hell's that stink you giving off? I never smelled that brand of suntan oil."

"It's goose fat," Pemba said, laughing.

"Goose fat! Lay some of it on me, monkey. My skin feels like a bear's ass."

Nearing a great outcropping of rock, Bradford paused and fired his spring-loaded harpoon. A grapnel landed in the spur, and Bradford cut the trail ahead. He pulled hard at the rope to insure that the grapnel was anchored. He then passed the rope from man to man so that they could climb belayed. When he reached the top of the spur he found himself on a platform leading to the icefall. The step was a gigantic frozen cascade of ice. The surface of the glacier was badly split from the avalanche. Tottering blocks of ice hung on feathery threads of snow. The glacier itself was in a constant state of change and movement. He heard ominous underground noises as the gut of the glacier expanded and contracted.

The team scoured the flanks of the mountain from the platform. The fresh snow overlying the existing layer made the direct route too dangerous; it was unstable and could peel off in avalanches. Heavy eaves of snow near the summit leaned forward portentously. Ahead of them crevasses appeared, widening and closing with startling suddenness. In the distance Bradford made out a shape of some kind, but even with his binoculars he could not identify it. He and Pemba decided to go ahead, leaving the others to rest.

As their crampons crunched into the ice, Bradford spied a series of barely discernible tracks crisscrossing a pitch. It seemed impossible for anything to have climbed that stretch of icy rock between the ledges above the icefall.

"Yeti," Pemba said nervously.

"Could be." He tried to control his nervousness. They were above fifteen thousand feet, traversing the icefall, and as they moved in a northerly direction, the snowfall increased, slowing them down. If any place was ideal for an encounter with the Snowman, this was it. On this flat surface there was no danger of falling. The team could spread out and encircle the Snowman in a pincers attack, cutting off any retreat.

They lowered their snow goggles and made for the object that Bradford had seen. It was difficult to judge distances over the vast icefall. They were shocked by how fast they reached it, and more so when they saw what it was. Lying exposed on the icefall was the severed body of Barry Harkness. The eyes had been gouged out, and the sockets were filled with slivers of ice. Part of the trunk had been eaten, and there were deep zigzagging wounds as though he had been thrust into an industrial saw. His hair had turned white, and sections of his skull had been torn open. Bradford stooped down and with his ice ax began to dig up blocks of hardened snow. In a moment, Pemba was helping him in the grizzly job of burial.

"He was carried up here and left," Bradford said.

Pemba shook his head ruefully. He laid his red Khada scarf on the mound of ice.

"I don't want you to tell the others."

"
Kai chai na
."

"But it does matter," Bradford insisted. "They'll run out on us."

They staggered back across the desolate frozen plain of ice and snow. Sharp waves of ice granules bit into their skin. It was like hacking their way through a frozen white jungle.

The five men decided to establish a provision dump at the base of the icefall. Later that afternoon, when the weather cleared, they located a negotiable pass running beside the icefall so that they could girdle the peaks beyond their position. They made a diagonal traverse across the top of the spur, reaching an altitude of sixteen thousand eight hundred feet.

Bradford was following the tracks he had seen earlier. They were covered with fresh snow. He cautioned the men to be ready to use their crossbows at any moment.

All the guests had now been evacuated from the lodge, and as Cathy peered out of the window at the disaster area she spied only highway patrolmen erecting barriers and newsmen huddled in small groups passing thermoses of coffee. Garson had been forced into a bind and was now under control. He had stuck to Ashby's account of the tragedy, but he had been pressured to reveal that a party of big-game hunters were now tracking the bear. He refused to give further details, and closed the mountain to any but official air traffic.

Monte had spent most of the day on the telephone talking to Wright and trying to explain what had occurred. His face was drained of all color, and he could hardly string two coherent sentences together.

The state of confusion in his office was maddening. Salesmen were lined up demanding their checks; the captain of the highway patrol was on the phone to the National Guard, who were waiting for approval from the governor's office. A new batch of journalists were on their way from the national magazines.

"I suggested to the National Guard that we bomb the mountain," the highway patrol captain said confidently. "That way, whatever the hell's up there won't get another chance."

"What're you talking about?" Cathy protested. "Five men are up there. You can't bomb them."

"Hell no, just get them on the shortwave and order them down."

Sheriff Garson pointed to the set.

"Care to try raising them, Captain? I'd be obliged if you could. We've been trying to make contact all day, but there's a storm up there and just a little interference."

"You've lost contact with them?" he asked in astonishment.

"Afraid so," Ashby replied. "Now, have you got any idea what might happen to the town, not to mention the rest of the state, if you try to bomb?" He pointed at the colored relief map on the wall. "Here's Convict Lake and here's the Jeffrey Pine Forest, which leads up to Minaret Summit. This area is filled with volcanic domes. And as you can see, there's an earthquake fault right in the middle. This is only one of hundreds of fractures in the glassy volcanic rock covering the mountain. So bomb away, and we'll just head down to Berkeley and keep an eye on the seismograph. If you get lucky we might get a biggie on the Richter scale—maybe a nine-five. And that, Captain Olafson, ought to get you a nice place in the history books."