The Snow Tiger / Night of Error (29 page)

Stenning watched him walk away, his face expressionless. He lifted the cup to his lips and found the coffee cold, so he called for another cup.

Witness after witness passed before Harrison and his assessors, their actions minutely scrutinized, their utterances tested; a long parade of townsfolk, policemen, mountain rangers, doctors, engineers, scientists, soldiers and civil defence workers. Dan Edwards, wearied in the Press gallery, said to Dalwood, ‘I think the old bastard is hoping for a new job when he dies – he’s understudying the Recording Angel.’

There was a movement in the valley. At first there was just a handful of rescuers but the number swelled hour by hour, brought in by helicopter and ski plane. The mountain rangers came from Mount Cook, from Coronet Peak, from Mount Egmont, from Tongariro – men knowledgeable and skilled in their trade of snow rescue. Doctors came in Air Force and US Navy helicopters, which took out the children and the badly injured.

The mass of snow which blocked the Gap was attacked fiercely. Steps were cut and guide ropes laid so that within hours it was possible for any moderately active person to enter or leave the valley. This was done by volunteers from the mountain clubs who had come in dozens at a time to the place of disaster, many of them flying from as far as North Island.

These men knew what to do and, once in the valley, they formed teams to probe the snow, at first working under the general direction of Jesse Rusch. They were aided by a force of police and an even larger detachment of troops. Even so, they were not too many; the area to be patiently probed, foot by foot, was over four hundred acres.

At first Ballard acted as co-ordinator, but he was glad to be relieved by a professional civil defence man flown in from Christchurch. He stayed on to help Arthur Pye. The identification of the survivors and the dead and the listing of those still missing was work in which local knowledge was vital. There was pain in his eyes as he saw the name of Stacey Cameron on the list of the dead.

He said, ‘Any news of Joe Cameron?’

Pye shook his head. ‘Not a sign of him. He must be buried out there somewhere. They’ve found Dobbs dead. Funny thing about that: the chap who dug him out said that Dobbs had cut his throat. The body was drained of blood.’ He rubbed his eyes. ‘God, but I’m tired.’

‘Take a break, Arthur,’ said Ballard. ‘Get something to eat and have a nap. I can carry on.’

‘If I went to sleep now I feel as though I’d never wake up again.’ Pye rose from his chair and stretched. ‘I’ll take a walk outside. The fresh air might do me some good.’

Ballard checked to find if he was needed and then walked over to a pew where Liz Peterson was lying swathed in blankets. Her face was deathly pale and she still appeared to be dazed. He knelt beside her, and said, ‘How are you feeling, Liz?’

‘A bit better now.’

‘Have you had some soup?’

She nodded and moistened her lips. ‘Have you found Johnnie yet?’

He hesitated, wondering whether to tell her or not. She had to know sooner or later, so he said gently, ‘He’s dead, Liz.’ She closed her eyes and sighed. ‘He died well. Young Mary Rees says he was trying to get Mrs Scanlon out of the exchange when it happened.’

Liz opened her eyes. ‘And Stacey?’

Ballard shook his head.

‘But she was with me – she was standing right next to me. How can she be dead when I’m not?’

‘You were lucky. You were one of the first to be found. Stacey was only a few feet from you but nobody knew that. When there were enough men to make a proper search it was too late for Stacey. And Joe is still missing.’

‘Poor Stacey. She was on holiday, you know.’

‘I know.’

‘She thought a lot of you, Ian.’

‘Did she?’

‘More than you know.’ Liz leaned up on one elbow. ‘I’ve seen Eric, but where’s Charlie?’

‘He’s all right. Take it easy, Liz. He volunteered to go up the mountain with Mike. Mike is afraid there’ll be another fall so he’s gone to check.’

‘Oh my God!’ said Liz. ‘It would be terrible if it happened again.’ She began to shiver uncontrollably.

‘Don’t worry. Mike wouldn’t be on the mountain if he thought it was that dangerous. It’s just a normal precaution, that’s all.’ He put his hands on her shoulders and pressed her back, then tucked the blankets closer about her. ‘I think you’ll be going out on the next flight.’ He looked towards his work table. ‘I must leave now, but I’ll see you before you go.’

He went back to the table where Bill Quentin was standing. ‘I hope it’s good news, Bill.’

Quentin nodded. ‘Mrs Haslam – they’ve just got her out. She’s still alive but in pretty bad shape. The doctor said she’ll be all right, though.’

Ballard crossed her name off one list and added it to another. ‘Any news of her husband yet?’

‘Not a thing.’ Quentin hesitated. ‘I made a damn fool of myself before the avalanche, Mr Ballard. I’m sorry about that.’

Ballard looked up. ‘Not to worry, Bill. I’ve made some monumental bloody mistakes in my time, too. And while we’re about it, my name is Ian. Those who have gone through this lot together are entitled to be on first name terms.’

Quentin swallowed. ‘Thanks. I’ll be getting back.’

‘Bring good news.’

Miller wandered up. His face was pasty white and his eyes looked like two burnt holes in a blanket. ‘Any news of Ralph Newman yet?’

‘I’m sorry, Mr Miller. Nothing yet.’

Miller moved away again, mumbling to himself as he went. He had been asking that same question at ten minute intervals.

Ballard looked down at his lists. The papers were dog-eared and the lists confused, with many scribbles and rough erasures. He took fresh paper and began to transcribe them anew in alphabetical order, a tedious and mundane but necessary task.

Brewer, Anderson, Jenkins, Newman, Castle, Fowler – and Haslam; seven men – one dead – locked in a cave by snow and ice. They had no key.

‘It’s cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey,’ said Anderson.

Newman did not reply. It was the eighth time Anderson had uttered that conversational gem and it did not improve on rehearing. He pulled his anorak closer about his body and tried to control his fits of shivering.

‘How long has it been?’ asked Brewer.

Newman peered at his watch. ‘Nearly six hours.’

There was a spasm of coughing from Jenkins. He spluttered a while before he brought it under control, then he gasped, ‘Where are they? Where the devil are they?’

Newman said into the darkness, ‘Brewer?’

‘Yes?’

‘What about another try?’

‘It’s bloody useless. You dig into the snow and it falls in from the top. You could get trapped that way.’

‘Is that light still working?’ For answer Brewer switched it on and there was a feeble glimmer. ‘What if I tried?’

‘It’s too bloody dangerous.’

Newman shivered violently. ‘I’d still like to try.’

‘You’re safer here in the cave. They’ll be coming for us pretty soon.’

‘If there’s anyone left up there. Like to bet on it, Brewer?’

‘I’m not a rich Yank,’ said Brewer. ‘I don’t have the money to bet with.’

‘Just your life,’ said Newman. ‘If we stay here we’ll die anyway.’

‘Shut up!’ shouted Jenkins. ‘You flaming well shut up!’

‘Yes,’ said Brewer. ‘That kind of talk’s no good.’ He paused. ‘Let’s have another sing-song.’

‘Singing won’t get us out, either,’ said Newman. ‘We’ve got to work at it. We can’t rely on anyone digging down to us. Who would know where to look?’

‘Jenkins is right,’ said Brewer sharply. ‘If you can’t be more cheerful you’d better keep quiet.’

Newman sighed.
What’s the use?
he thought. Something occurred to him, and he said urgently, ‘Sound off!’

‘What’s that?’

‘Call out your names. I haven’t heard Fowler or Castle for a long time.’

Castle said, ‘Fowler’s asleep.’

‘Then you’d better wake him up before he dies.’ Newman was boiling with frustration. ‘Brewer, how much snow above us, do you think?’

‘Too bloody much.’

‘It might be only ten feet – it could be six feet. That’s nothing.’

‘For the last time,’ said Brewer. ‘Shut your big mouth.’ Newman stirred and inadvertently put his hand on Haslam’s face, knocking the hat aside. It was icy cold.

Newman was wrong.

The cave was in a jumble of big rocks, the debris of long-gone glaciation. The rock immediately above the cave was a big one, more than sixty feet high, which was why the place had been chosen as offering good shelter from the avalanche. It was reckoned that, when the snow came, it would pour over the top of the rock and anything at the bottom would be relatively sheltered.

And so it was – but the hollow in front of the rock had filled with snow as a housewife fills a cup with flour. The snow was level with the top of the rock. Newman was entirely wrong. The depth of snow above the cave entrance was not ten feet, or an optimistic six feet.

It was sixty feet.

Cameron shouted.

He had been shouting for a long time and all he had achieved was a sore throat and a hoarse voice. The truck rested upside down and he was still trapped with his foot jammed in the pedals. He had tried to release it but the pain caused by his movements soon made him stop. Consequently he, like the truck, was still upside down and he had the eerie impression that his head was bulging with the pressure of blood.

He also had a headache of such intensity that it nauseated him.

He shouted again. Even to him it sounded weak and when he stared at the snow through the shattered windscreen, which was feebly illuminated by the last glimmer of the roof light, he knew that the sound was being absorbed by that cotton-wool whiteness. For the tenth time he decided to stop shouting in order to conserve his strength. He knew he would break that promise to himself; the idea that someone might be quite close and not know he was there was too frightening. But he did stop shouting for a while.

He wondered how much snow there was above him. Three feet? Six feet? Ten feet? There was no way of knowing. He thought he detected a little stuffiness in the air of the cab, and that made him afraid. It would be hell to die slowly of lack of oxygen. With his technician’s mind he began to make calculations of the probable permeability of snow with regard to air, but his mind was confused in any case, he did not know enough about the variables.
McGill would know
, he thought dimly.

There was something else Cameron did not know, and it was better for him that he should not. The truck was upside down in the river bed, and the snow which had dammed the flow of water was being eaten into upstream of him. Slowly but inexorably the river was coming to him.

High on the west slope McGill paused for breath and leaned on his ski-poles. ‘This’ll do,’ he said. ‘We’ll test it here.’

Charlie Peterson stared down the slope. ‘Lots of activity down there.’

McGill watched another helicopter land. ‘Yes, they’re coming in faster.’ He glanced at Charlie. ‘We want no bouncing about. Try to imagine you’re walking on custard and don’t want to break the skin.’

‘I’ll be light-footed,’ said Charlie, and laughed. ‘I never thought I’d ever try to imitate a bloody ballet dancer.’

McGill grunted and looked along the line of the slope. ‘Your brother told me he grew a hay crop here. Did you have cattle grazing?’

‘Hell, no! It’s too steep. You’d have to breed your cows with short legs on one side and long legs on the other.’

‘That figures,’ said McGill. ‘Professor Roget was right about his cow test.’

‘What sort of test is that?’

‘It was in the early days of skiing in Switzerland. Someone asked Roget how to tell if a slope was safe for skiing. He said you had to think like a cow, and if you reckoned you’d be uncomfortable grazing then the slope wasn’t safe.’

‘I reckon we’ll lose a lot of stock.’ Charlie pointed up the valley. ‘There’s bad flooding up there on the farm.’

‘The river is blocked, but it’ll soon clear.’ McGill turned his ski-pole over. ‘This is eyeball science,’ he said wryly. ‘I lost my kit.’ He pushed the stick into the snow, keeping up a steady pressure. When it hit bottom he marked the depth with his thumb and withdrew the stick. ‘Under three feet – that’s not too bad.’ He looked down at the hole he had made. ‘I wish to hell I knew what was down there.’

‘Why don’t we dig and find out?’

‘That’s just what I’m going to do. Charlie, you stand upslope from me about ten yards away. Keep your eyes on me. If anything gives then mark the place where you last saw me.’

‘Hey, you don’t think …?’

‘Just a precaution,’ said McGill reassuringly. He jerked his thumb towards the valley. ‘If I thought what I’m doing would cause any more damage down there I wouldn’t be doing it.’

Charlie climbed up the slope and turned to watch McGill, who started to excavate a hole. His movements were gentle but he worked quickly, piling the snow up-slope of the hole. Finally he thrust his arm down as far as it would go and came up clutching some brown strands. ‘Long grass. That’s not too good.’

He straightened. ‘We’ll go across diagonally and upwards, making a hole every hundred yards.’ He shaded his eyes from the sun and pointed. ‘I have a good idea that the avalanche broke up there by those exposed rocks. I’d like to have a look at the place.’