The Last Man on the Mountain: The Death of an American Adventurer on K2 (15 page)

“Jesus, what happens if it never stops?” he wrote miserably, as terror and boredom alternated through his thoughts. Camp IV was proving to be his Waterloo. “My attitude about K2,” he wrote, “is to get the hell out of here.”

Day after day, the storm raged on and tempers reached their limits. On the 28th Dudley and Fritz began arguing about their options, screaming all day at each other over the din, as George huddled nearby scribbling in his journal. Throughout the storm, all three suffered coughing jags, a common malady at high altitude, which left them gasping for air in the tiny tent.

Below them at Camp II, Jack and Tony were increasingly anxious for their safety. With everyone trapped where they were on the mountain by the 100-mile-per-hour winds, there was nothing to do but worry, write in their journals, and read aloud to each other. Jack read Goethe to Tony and Tony read Tennyson to Jack. Jack also wrote a letter to his father asking for money as the “expedition [is] getting poor.” Fritz had been imploring Jack to write his father, a school principal turned real estate broker, for funds; the coffers were close to empty.

On June 29 the storm finally subsided enough for the men at Camp IV to stand outside. It was the first time they had done so in eight days and they all stretched carefully. The three men suffered from frostbitten feet and stumbled about as blood started to flow through the frozen tissue. Looking over at George, Dudley could see that they’d lost him from the climb. The storm, boredom, fear, crippling inaction, and painful frostbite had broken the young man’s spirit and strength. Although Fritz thought that all George needed was a good rest in order to resume the climb, Dudley had seen that dead look in men’s eyes on the front lines when they had simply had enough and would rather risk court martial or death than fight one more day. For George the war was over, the expedition finished.

At Camp II the boredom and inaction also took its toll, especially on Jack. He now endured near-chronic insomnia, migraines, nausea, dizziness, and depression—all classic symptoms of high-altitude sickness. While he continued to organize the ferrying of the team’s supplies up the mountain, none of those loads seem to make it out of camp, in large part because he was unable to lead the Sherpas. This was a bitter defeat, made somehow worse by watching the older, less experienced Wolfe move ever higher on the mountain.

After the storm, as Jack watched George Sheldon descend to Camp II, he looked up the mountain for a second figure in retreat, expecting to see that Dudley too had had enough. But George was alone and when he reached camp told Jack,
Nope, Dudley is feeling great and continuing up
, although his feet had also been frostbitten during their eight-day ordeal. Jack and Tony were outraged to hear this. Even though Dudley was doing well, they thought he had no business climbing any higher and, on July 1, they sent a note to Fritz saying as much. Dudley had proven himself adequate to follow on Fritz’s rope, they said, but for him to go any farther would be unnecessarily dangerous.

The warning again fell on deaf ears. Between Tony’s ill will, Joe’s laziness, and Jack’s inability and—in Fritz’s mind—increasing unwillingness to work higher on the mountain, it sounded like sour grapes to him. When Fritz shared the note with Dudley, Dudley again asked,
Who are they to criticize me when they can barely make it out of Camp II?

In response, Fritz sent a note of his own, beginning, “Dear Jack and Tony, I am very disappointed in you.” He admonished the men to get off their asses and start bringing loads up the mountain. Feeling totally abandoned by Fritz and merely working as his “puppets,” Jack, Tony, Joe, and now George, who had remained at Camp II nursing his swollen feet, railed against the leader and his expedition, which they felt was increasingly a one-man show. But the note did serve its purpose; it nudged them toward a semblance of action. That afternoon they finally prepared themselves and loads for a carry to Camp IV. Unfortunately, weather again intervened and in the morning, when Tony looked out the tent flap at a foot of new snow, he announced that he for one was not moving from his sleeping bag. With insomnia and ennui now chronic problems for Jack, he too was unable to motivate himself and he simply zipped the bag closer around his neck and went back to sleep. Nearby, Joe and George barely stirred.

A few days later, when George’s feet had recovered enough for him to put weight on them, he left Camp II and made his last trip down to base camp, where he reunited with Chap over almost an entire bottle of Tony’s rum. With the weather clear, Jack and Tony also left Camp II, finally headed up to Camp IV with a load. But as was so often the case, after a late start and slow climbing through deep snow and clinging to frozen ropes, they barely made the equipment dump at Camp III (at 20,700 feet) before they had to turn around in the retreating light. On their descent, Tony slipped in an icy couloir and began falling, gathering speed as he careened out of control down the steep slope. Fortunately, Jack worked quickly and was able to anchor the rope around a rock and stop Tony’s fall before he pulled them both off the mountain.

Over the next few days, storms and a general enervation once again kept the men at Camp II, with Tony complaining about a pain in his side and Jack plugging his ears to shut out the Sherpas’ “incessant monkey chatter.” One day bled into another and still Jack and Tony remained at Camp II. Soon Joe returned from base camp with a load of mail and a fresh supply of Sherpas, but Jack and Tony did not leave camp.

Meanwhile, Fritz, Dudley, and two Sherpas, Tendrup and Kikuli, steadily pushed up the mountain, first tackling one of K2’s most famous obstacles: an 80-foot chimney of rock pioneered the year before by Bill House, who had climbed it without a rope or any fixed protection. This was then the world’s highest known free ascent of a rock wall and to this day remains one of the greatest climbing achievements in history. The notorious House’s Chimney is a steep, narrow gully of crumbling rock and ice. Even after a safety rope was finally anchored to the rock after House’s ascent, because there are almost no footholds, the 1938 and 1939 climbers pulled themselves up with arm strength. As a result, the packs were brought up separately so as to reduce the weight on the rope and the arms. Today there is a steel ladder permanently affixed to the wall.

After taking most of the day to set the safety rope in the chimney and pull their gear up after them, Fritz, Dudley, and the two Sherpas established Camp V at 22,000 feet on July 1. Once the camp was built, Fritz, Kikuli, and Tendrup continued up, leaving Dudley to help the Sherpas bring supplies up through the chimney. While Fritz was disappointed that only Dudley seemed willing and able to climb the mountain, he was pleased with the strength and experience of his Sherpas. Kikuli was proving to be as talented and loyal as his reputation indicated, and although Tendrup often needed prodding to quicken his pace on the mountain, the younger Sherpa was also a strong and able climber on the demanding slopes.

Benjamin Franklin Smith, circa 1909.
(Courtesy of the Dudley F. Rochester and Dudley F. Wolfe Family)

Dudley, far left, with his siblings and mother, 1900.
(Courtesy of the Dudley F. Rochester and Dudley F. Wolfe Family)

Dudley, far left, at the Hackley Hall School, circa 1904.
(Courtesy of the Dudley F. Rochester and Dudley F. Wolfe Family)

Dudley, second from right, front row, with Phillips Academy football team, circa 1914.
(Courtesy of the Dudley F. Rochester and Dudley F. Wolfe Family)

Dudley, rear right, and Grafton, front right, with two summer employees in BF Smith’s Old Orchard, Maine, tourist business.
(Courtesy of the Dudley F. Rochester and Dudley F. Wolfe Family)

Dudley, Mabel, and unidentified friend, circa 1919.
(Courtesy of the Dudley F. Rochester and Dudley F. Wolfe Family)