Peter emerged and regarded the sky critically. He portioned granola into three bowls and laid out his climbing gear. He tried to entice us to tackle a rock face with him, tried against his declared politics to catch us by competition. But that morning Murphy and I were almost like lovers, and cooperatively we demurred. Instead we two mapped a hike for ourselves that went back over Italy Pass, to another lake.
Take a poncho, said Peter. We may get some weather.
Murphy and I traipsed to the pass in silence. He stooped once to examine some lichen, burnt orange and black on the gray rock, that strange collaboration of the lowest animal with the lowest plant. Design of darkness, he murmured.
From the pass we descended into Granite Park, then left the trail. Across another bowl ringed by peaks we hiked. Clouds were scudding in. When we stopped for lunch the sky was overcast. A moist wind came steadily from the west.
An hour later the temperature dropped suddenly. We were about five miles from camp when it started to snow. All at once the indifference of nature was no comfort to me.
Let's get back. This looks bad.
It may blow over, Murphy said.
I don't think so. Look at it come down. Let's get out of this while we can.
Returning, we almost missed the trail. We followed it up toward the pass.
A few inches of snow had fallen there. The surrounding mountains had faded. Wind billowed a thick white curtain all around us. I stopped. Oh Christ.
It's that way, Murphy said calmly.
I know it's that way. But you can't see a hundred yards.
What should we do?
I don't know. Can we hike out?
It must be ten miles to the road.
Half that, from here. It's downhill. Maybe we can get below the snow.
What about Peter? We should go back to the tent.
It's a good four miles back to the tent. We have to climb into the storm, over the pass, do you remember that boulder field? Could we find the notch in this?
Okay. Whatever you think.
His diffidence frightened me into anger. He would make me make the choice.
We should go down. We can make it out by dusk.
But that was not our luck. Crossing the stream out of Granite Park, Murphy lost his footing and soaked himself to the knees. The wind came up and the snow increased. Wet and heavy, its runoff swelled the stream. When we reached the next ford, Murphy balked. Rocks flumed the water, cast up pearls of foam.
Something else you find when you go downhill, he said. Do you remember the ford on the way in? What will that be like? Maybe we should go back to the tent.
Maybe, maybe, damn it, we're committed now!
He shrugged.
I could see perhaps thirty yards. Beyond the ford everything was a white blur.
All right, we can't cross here. Give me the map.
He shrugged off his day pack, unzipped it, and handed me the folded map.
Farther on the trail met the stream again. I thought we could traverse the arms of the trail's U and avoid a crossing.
We were not dressed for this. The morning had been mild. I was wearing a shirt, sweater, poncho, and wool cap, Murphy a light hooded parka. Snow, caked around my boots, was seeping into my socks; my toes stung. I could feel my sweat chilling as we stood there.
Here, look. We can stay this side of the stream most of the way down. We cross once at Upper Pine Lake, pick up the trail here and follow it down.
Hands in pockets, hunched, he stared at the rushing stream. It's up to you.
I cursed at him, and we went on. I guessed fifteen minutes until we regained the stream. We slipped and stumbled on snow-covered rocks. Still, it was soothing to have a direction. I marched on and on, occasionally glancing back at Murphy's lagging figure. Then a panic jolted me; I could no longer hear the stream. I stopped and looked at my watch in disbelief: forty minutes had passed since we left the trail.
Murphy, marching numbly on, bumped into me. Staring at the map I tried to think. In a couple of hours it would be dark. We were not yet a third of the way. Murphy sighed and said: I have to sit down.
He went to his knees, and I grabbed him.
Up! Stand up!
I picked up the sodden map. It went to pieces in my hand. A gust took the scraps and blinded me with hard stinging snow. I turned to shield myself.
Now I could not see thirty feet. The ground seemed level all around. I had no idea which way I faced. I strained for the sound of the stream and heard only the buffet of wind, the accumulating silence of snow. The light seemed to be failing. Colder, granular snow rustled on my poncho as it fell.
Now? said Murphy.
I chose a direction. After five minutes I felt sure that we were going downhill. We walked close together, jogging against one another. We came to a ridge. I heard falls. We had found the stream, or, no, another, surely another, for before us was a moonsharp cliff, impossible to descend. I turned us before Murphy saw. He stumbled against me.
I held him. I would have given my life for him then. The feeling rose as a dull wash of anger that kept me going for ten steps more. Then a memory of his voice reached me: You, you want to die. I took another step and stopped. In despair I looked up, as if to summon the sun. Murphy too looked up. Then he raised his arm and shouted: Look! Look there!
I squinted into the chaos of nothingness.
God, it's enormous!
I saw nothing. There was nothing. I was enraged that he should debase our deaths with his hallucinations. Then I grew weak and sat in the soft snow, thinking that this, being a voluntary act, might cure him. Dimly it came to me that I would not get up. This I wanted. He was right, I did want it: a clean death. And I had brought him along into it.
He shouted again.
They're here!
He began to sing.
From the dusk emerged two figures. They were hikers. It was coincidence they had come, lost as us, just as Murphy's insanity began. I made a murderous effort in every muscle to rise and realized stupidly that I had not moved at all. The two stumbled to within a foot of us.
Help us, I said.
The taller man, rime-bearded, shook his head leisurely. He smiled. The two went on into the snow. Murphy gave a last cry and ran after them. Another gust blinded me.
I began to dream. It was a dream without pictures or actions. It was a dream of words. At times they passed before me as though printed. At times
I heard voices, familiar and alien. Most of the words were incoherent but clearly articulated. I knew they were the names of things, and I strained like an infant listening to its parents to ferret their meaning. I imagined that Murphy and I were seated cross-legged in the snow, naked, reciting the true and secret names of every species of life. Each name caused the extinction of another species. The world became sparer, more orderly. We chanted outside of time, beyond death and strife; we sealed our secret compact in a clean new light neither fictive nor random.
When I emerged from this into a pellucid state of waking, he was curled beside me. He had run in a circle. I put my hand on his forehead. I confusedly thought I could tell if his body had enough heat to keep him alive through the night. It was dark now. The wind had fallen. Sparse large flakes dropped straight down. Above us was a dim light and I could see the ghost of a half-moon racing through clouds. In the obscurity I watched Murphy's lips to see if fresh flakes melted as they touched. I burrowed deeper into the whispering snow. All words were passing from me, words of power, curses, benedictions, stories, words to shape and be shaped by, all passed. My life was a riot of vivid pictures, twists of emotion, inchoate cries of pain and exultation, and gladly I welcomed all this namelessness. Words bowed and broke, vowels scattered ripples across the face of darkness, the armature of my body weakened, and the support of fictions fled from me, until the final fiction, the simplest word, the simplest name, I, also lost its meaning and its power. So I knew that either dawn or death was close and I was glad that these were, at last, the only possibilities, and beyond my choosing.