I opened my mouth to speak, but no words came out.
“The Germans will not pursue you, Jake,” continued Reggie. “They have no interest in you. None whatsoever. They’ve come back here for the second straight year because they were unable to retrieve what Kurt Meyer had, what he gave to my cousin Percy, and because they think there’s one chance in a hundred that the five of us may have found it. Or that they can find it themselves somewhere up on the mountain.”
“They killed thirty Sherpas, thirty men,” I say, blinking away tears of sheer fury and frustration, “to get back…what?…some goddamned blueprints for a dreadnought or plans for some more effective reciprocating airplane machine gun or some such goddamned nonsense?”
Reggie shook her head. “These Germans, however many there are of them—I’m convinced there were only seven of them last year, under the command of Bruno Sigl, and that they did see, or even make, Percival and Meyer fall, somewhere on this mountain. But for whatever reason, Sigl and whoever was with him weren’t able to retrieve the item Meyer had been trying to get into British hands. Into my British agent cousin’s hands. Just remember that these Germans don’t represent the Weimar Republic, don’t represent Germany. Yet. But they may someday…all of these monsters who follow that monster named Hitler…and whatever Meyer was trying to give to Percy was something that can hurt them. Hurt him, their leader. And that’s all I care about.”
I was too tired to follow that.
“All I know,” I said, “is that if we climb up to the North Col again, we’re trapped. Like rats. Even if there are only four or five Germans, they have guns—we don’t. They have rifles. What’s the effective distance of your ’scoped Lee-Enfield, Richard?”
“Effective range is somewhere above five hundred yards,” said the Deacon. “Maximum range is somewhere around three thousand feet.”
“The better part of a mile,” I said.
“Yes,” said the Deacon. “But not terribly accurate at that extreme range.”
I ignored his footnote. “Accurate enough to pick us off the North Col or even the low parts of the North Ridge without their shooter even climbing onto the Col,” I said.
The Deacon shrugged. “Probably. Depending upon wind and weather conditions.”
“Well, the goddamned wind and weather conditions haven’t exactly been friends to us so far,” I cried.
No one responded.
Finally Jean-Claude said to Reggie, “I agree with Jake that it would be folly to surrender our lives for the sake of a machine gun or dreadnought design that other spies will certainly steal someday anyway. Besides, we’re not currently at war with Germany. I have already given three brothers, two uncles, and five cousins to fighting les boches, Reggie. You would have to assure me that whatever Herr Meyer stole from the Germans or Austrians is, first of all, unique, irreplaceable, and, second of all, truly something which the survival of my country as well as yours might hinge upon.”
Reggie sighed deeply. It was the only time I ever saw her close to tears. “I can’t be certain of the second thing, Jean-Claude. But I can guarantee that whatever it was that took the better part of a year for Meyer to try to hand off to Cousin Percy, it was unique. That much Percival himself assured me of before he headed off to his death here last year. It was not anything as banal as the plans for a new machine gun or bomb.”
“So Percy admitted to you last year that he was a British spy,” I said. I didn’t know if it was a question or not.
Reggie smiled slightly. “I’d known that for years, Jake. Percy loved me. I’ve told you that we were more brother and sister than mere cousins. We’d played together as children, climbed in the Alps and the foothills of the Himalayas together as adults. He had to let me know that he was not a traitor to England…or even a decadent playboy, for that matter.”
“But you don’t even know,” I pressed, “what Meyer had and carried with him across all of eastern Europe, the Middle East, and China…all the way into Tibet? Something so important that your cousin was ready to give his life for it, but you don’t have a clue as to what it is?”
“No, only that it was very portable,” said Reggie. “That’s all Percy would let me know. He was supposed to have returned to Darjeeling by early July…with the thing, whatever it was. Sir John Henry Kerr, the acting governor of Bengal, and Sir Henry Rawlinson, currently the CIC and head of British Intelligence in India, both have been briefed by London—at least to the extent that Percival was trying to retrieve something of vital importance—and both are still awaiting word from me.”
“I don’t understand,” I said dully. “Why would anyone choose the slopes of Mount Everest for such an exchange? That’s nuts. There’s no way off once you’ve gone up—if someone’s waiting for you, I mean.”
Reggie looked at me. “Percy and Meyer didn’t choose Everest, Jake. They met up in Tingri Dzong. But Bruno Sigl and his thugs were close behind Meyer. In the end, Percy must have gone up the ladder that Mallory’s expedition left behind—first onto the North Col, and then, according to Kami Chiring, much higher, perhaps even to the North East Ridge. He must have prayed that the Germans couldn’t climb as high, couldn’t follow Meyer and him that far up the slopes—perhaps Percy thought that with the extensive caches of food that the Norton-Mallory Expedition had left behind on the mountain they could outwait the Germans below, or slip away in the imminent monsoon storms. Percy guessed wrong. Sigl must have brought some of Germany’s best climbers with him…all political fanatics. And now they’re back.”
There was more silence, broken only by the ever-lessening sound of wind through the ice walls around us.
Finally the Deacon said to Reggie, “But you’re willing to risk—even give up—your life to retrieve what your cousin Percy died to get.”
“Yes.”
“I’m going up the fixed ropes to the North Col with you tonight,” the Deacon said flatly. “We’ll keep climbing until we find Percy or until…” He stopped, but we all heard what came after the “until.”
“I’m going as well,” said Jean-Claude. “I hate the goddamned boches. I’d like nothing better than to plant a thumb in their eye.”
Before I could say anything, Reggie said, “I’m serious about you slipping away over the Serpo La and heading straight for Darjeeling, Jake. As an American, you’re neutral in all this.”
“The hell we are!” I said. “‘Lafayette, we are here!’ The Battle of Belleau Wood. The Battle of Cantigny. The Second Battle of the Marne. The Battle of Château-Thierry. The Meuse-Argonne. The…the…” I was so tired that I’d run out of American battles. “Tippecanoe and Tyler, too,” I added irrelevantly. Well, it had sounded good in my buzzing head.
“I’m going with you guys,” I said. “Just try to stop me.”
No one said anything or patted me on the back. Perhaps we were all too tired.
“One thing,” said Jean-Claude. “Do the rest of you think we have enough energy left to get up that thousand-foot snow wall and climb the rope ladder to the North Col, then cross the Col to Camp Four? Tonight?”
“We’ll find out soon enough,” said the Deacon.
Far below us and behind us, somewhere in the Trough forest of seracs and penitentes and 60-foot-high snow-shrouded ice pinnacles, came the echoing sound of three pistol shots. Then silence.