Hell Is Above Us: The Epic Race to the Top of Fumu, the World's Tallest Mountain, Jonathan Bloom [best ebook reader TXT] 📗

ridge immediately and set up Advanced Base Camp at the foot of Fumu. They would have to descend the ridge in the dark but he pointed out that the terrain was gradual and easy. Such an effort might save the sick Sherpas’ lives. Junk considered this and decided Pasang Dolma was right. They would climb down in the night and then rest until noon the next day at Base Camp. This would also allow the team to get as far from the traumatic experience as possible.

And so in the frigid night, lit up only by a smattering of torches and the light of Fumu’s eruptions, the exhausted team climbed down the other side of the ridge toward the base of Fumu. Healthy Sherpa aided ill Sherpa to the bottom. They had not yet started climbing Fumu itself and already a man was dead and several Sherpa were suffering from altitude sickness. Morrow wrote: “As we climbed down, Junk wore an expression I had not seen on him before: Defeat. In all of the years I had known him, I had become used to an upbeat, robust, hearty character. But on the climb down to the base of Fumu he looked beaten before the real climb had even begun and it deeply concerned me. It was too damned soon for this.”

It is quite possible Junk was not feeling defeat but rather guilt over the loss of River Leaf. He had convinced this poor woman to join him on a deadly voyage, even though by every stretch of the imagination she should have been safely in Boston right now or even better in the Dakotas with her family. Regardless of whether the feeling weighting down Junk was defeat or guilt, he was clearly distraught. He asked Cole to take the lead on the way down and allowed himself to lag. By the time they were reaching the bottom in the darkness, he was all the way in the back of the team with McGee.

Upon reaching the bottom, a yell came from the front of the line. At first it sounded like a cry of terror but then nuances in its wavering pitch betrayed a kind of joy. Junk ran to the spot where all torches were pointing. He could not see at what they were aimed, because a crowd had surrounded the object of interest. Junk pushed through and gave out a gasp as if he was looking at an apparition. Lit from all angles was River Leaf. According to Morrow, it was the first time the team had seen her smile. “The effect was potent. The men’s torches contributed only slightly to the brightness in front of us. The smile made her radiate energy as if lit from within by a thousand votive candles.” Junk could not contain himself. He apparently hugged her so hard her feet were off the ground. McGee also gave her a bear hug, probably elated to have the other non-climber back.

The obvious question followed: How? How did she survive the fall and how did she beat them to the base of Fumu? River Leaf did not answer with words. Instead she pointed up to the dark world behind them, the gradual slope they had just descended. The torches turned and aimed at the spot where she had pointed. About fifty feet up the slope and slightly to the west, between two large boulders stood the entrance to a massive cave.

Chapter Ten: Naked, Silly, and Godless

It was sunrise at the base of the Qila Pass, and no one was sleeping. The entire Hoyt expedition was worried that if they did not head up the Pass today, then they would have to head home by sunset. It had been nine days since they parachuted down and still there was no sign of the Sherpa. They were living off of rations given to them by the Japanese plus whatever they could salvage from Junk’s destroyed Base Camp, but everything was running low. If their Sherpa did not arrive today, August 29th, then the expedition had to leave for Darjeeling immediately or risk running out of supplies and not making it out of the wilderness alive.

Yuudai the Japanese soldier smoked cigarettes and organized his backpack. Drake the inventor was experimenting with an oxygen mask attached to two tanks capable of detecting low oxygen in one tank and automatically switching to the other. The experiment was failing and Drake kept passing out. Chatham the dashing thrill-seeker spent hours on nothing but his morning ablutions. Wilde the prim and proper gentleman folded his clothing with a style so meticulous it bordered on insanity. Thornton the young linguist and athlete read a book about conversational Sherpa in preparation for the arrival of their porters. Ferguson the altitude sickness specialist and disciple of Kellogg ate figs, yams, and yogurt very slowly, chewing fifty times per bite with almost a full second between bites.

Ferguson wrote:

I completed my breakfast an hour after sitting down to it. Then I entered Hoyt’s tent. He was sitting there, head down, studying the flag he intended to plant at the top of Fumu. It was made of white cloth with non-descript black lettering sewn in reading ‘W.J.H.’ I asked him how long we should give the Sherpa team before we give up and head home. An hour? The entire morning? Hoyt seemed to not hear me. He said ‘Do you know, young man, that when you get older, decades pass as fast as years did in your youth?’ That cheerful sentiment was the most he had ever said to me, or anyone else on the expedition for that matter. He finally turned to look at me and said, “We will give them the morning.”

The thought of an about face must have been deeply upsetting to Hoyt. It would mean he was done with climbing forever, he had lost the competition to Junk, and he had lost his brother and wife for no