Dan Simmons - The Abominable - A Novel

The silence stretches until it feels almost uncomfortable. There’s no more tea to drink to distract us, and only Jean-Claude and I have eaten anything. Finally the Deacon speaks.

“Lady Bromley, do you wish the three of us to carry out this…a year after Lord Percival’s disappearance is too late to call it a rescue mission, but it certainly can be a search and recovery mission…this coming spring when climbing becomes possible again at Mount Everest?”

She looks down, and I see white teeth softly biting her full lower lip. “The Everest Committee and the Alpine Club are not planning a nineteen twenty-five expedition, are they, Dickie?”

“No, ma’am,” says the Deacon. “The loss of Mallory and Irvine—and, of course, of your son—has so shaken the Club and Committee that it may be several years before another formal expedition is launched toward Everest. Also, the Tibetan authorities seem angered at the Alpine Club and the Everest Committee for reasons I don’t fully understand. Word is that the Tibetan prime minister and local chieftains might not allow another expedition soon. Yet, of course, both the Alpine Club and Everest Committee consider Mount Everest a British hill and can’t even dream of some other nation climbing it first, but there are rumors in the Alps that the Germans are considering such a bid. Although not, I think, for next summer. Not for nineteen twenty-five. But the three of us could do it.”

“But Mallory’s expedition which Percy joined had dozens of men with them,” says Lady Bromley. “More than a score of white men, I believe, and hundreds of porters and more hundreds of pack animals. I remember Percy writing and complaining from the plantation about their plan to use Tibetan army mules, which he said were all but impossible to manage. And Colonel Norton described to me how slow the process was of establishing one camp after the other, first on the glacier, then up onto that icy ridge between Everest and its neighboring summit—I studied my geography of the mountain, gentlemen, oh, how I studied it—with the white climbers cutting steps for the porters every few feet of the way up the initial ice wall of that ridge, the North Col. It takes that many men weeks upon weeks of slow ascent. How on earth could the three of you succeed—not in summiting the mountain, which is not my interest in this expedition, but in getting high enough to Camps Five and Six to look for my son?”

It’s Jean-Claude who answers. “Lady Bromley, we shall climb very quickly, alpine style rather than this military assault style that all of the Mallory expeditions used. We shall hire only a few Sherpas to act as porters, including high-climbing porters—perhaps finding these good men at your tea plantation with the help of Percy’s cousin Reggie—but from the time we reach the actual mountain, speed and efficiency will be our constant goals. We shall climb, sleep, and eat alpine style—often taking our bivouac gear with us in our rucksacks, not worrying about a series of established camps—and we should be able to carry out a comprehensive search from Camp Four on the North Col all the way to and above Camp Six within a week or two…rather than the five to ten weeks it takes to get that far with a huge expedition such as General Bruce’s.”

Lady Bromley looks at the three of us, and then steadily at the Deacon. Her gaze has suddenly gone…not cold, exactly, but distant, businesslike. “How much will this rescue…recovery…expedition cost, gentlemen?”

The Deacon answers, and his voice is as businesslike as Lady Bromley’s. “The Alpine Club set aside ten thousand pounds for the entirety of the first two attempts—the nineteen twenty-one reconnaissance and the nineteen twenty-two serious attempt on the mountain. Their estimate was that the reconnaissance would cost only three thousand pounds, the actual climbing attempt in ’twenty-two using up the rest of the ten thousand pounds. But they went over budget on both. And this year’s climb—the nineteen twenty-four climb on which your son, Mallory, and Irvine were lost—cost them almost twelve thousand pounds.”

Lady Bromley’s no-nonsense gaze never leaves the Deacon’s face now.

“So you are asking me for twelve thousand pounds to attempt this…recovery…expedition to seek out my son?”

“No, ma’am,” says the Deacon. “With just the three of us and perhaps two dozen good Sherpa climbing porters, everything—including steamship transportation to Calcutta, tents, climbing gear, including oxygen rigs such as Finch designed and Sandy Irvine refined for the last expedition, plus the rental of some horses and pack mules to get us and the gear to Everest Base Camp—I estimate the total cost of this recovery expedition at being no more than twenty-five hundred pounds.”

Lady Bromley blinks her surprise at the low figure. I confess that it does not sound low to me.

“We’re professional alpine climbers, ma’am,” the Deacon says, leaning closer to the woman in black. “We climb fast and through all weather, we eat light, we sleep in canvas bags tied to the mountainside by a rope or—failing that—sit out the night on a narrow ledge with a lit candle under our chins to keep us from nodding off.”

Lady Bromley looks at all three of us and returns her gaze to the Deacon. She remains silent.

“Lady Bromley,” says the Deacon, “as you mentioned, Norton and Mallory’s expedition which your son followed to Everest carried tons upon tons of supplies. The Army and Navy Co-operative Society alone added sixty tins of quail foie gras, three hundred one-pound Hunter hams, and four dozen bottles of Montebello champagne. You must understand that this will not be our kind of expedition—three expert alpine climbers, moving quickly, knowing in which places to look for your son, and capable of getting high up on the mountain quickly, doing that job, and getting out.”

It is a long speech for the Deacon, and I’m not sure if it has convinced Lady Bromley until she finally speaks.

“I will provide three thousand pounds for your expedition,” she says softly. “But there will be one condition.”

We wait.

“I want a member of the family along,” says Lady Bromley in a tone I haven’t heard from her before. It’s almost royal in its there-will-be-no-argument-about-this, soft but infinitely certain finality. “Percy’s cousin Reggie has climbed in the Alps—with Percy and many of the excellent guides I mentioned earlier—and is fully capable of going with you at least to the lower reaches of Mount Everest, perhaps all the way to Camp Three or whatever high camp you number up on that icy ridge between the mountains. You will, of course, make all climbing decisions, Dickie, but Reggie will be in charge of the overall expedition, of disbursing funds—to the Sherpas, to the yak sellers at Kampa Dzong—whatever is required. And Cousin Reggie will keep track of every receipt, every pound spent, every farthing. Agreed?”

The Deacon turns to look at Jean-Claude and me and I can read his mind. Having another Percy-type amateur along…it will probably slow us down, possibly put us in dangerous situations if we have to rescue him on the glacier or North Col ice face. But Lady Bromley’s tone has been clear enough: no Cousin Reggie, no expedition. And this “Cousin Reggie” obviously won’t be doing any of the truly high climbing with us.

“Yes, ma’am, we agree,” says the Deacon. “We will be delighted to travel with Percy’s cousin Reggie. It frees me from keeping track of expenses, a task at which I confess to be terrible.”

Lady Bromley stands suddenly, and the three of us quickly get to our feet. She shakes the Deacon’s hand, then Jean-Claude’s, and finally mine. I see tears filling her dark eyes, but she does not allow them to fall.