The Eiger Sanction

by Trevanian

  The men rose as Jonathan approached. Ben made introductions.

  "Jonathan Hemlock, this here's Gene-Paul Bidette." He clearly was not going to have anything to do with these phony foreign pronunciations.

  Jonathan offered his hand. "Monsieur Bidet."

  "I have looked forward to meeting you, Monsieur Hemlock." Bidet's slanted peasant eyes were frankly evaluative.

  "And this is Karl Freytag." Amused, Jonathan matched the unnecessary force of Freytag's grip. "Herr Freytag?"

  "Herr Doctor." He nodded curtly and sat down. "And this here's Anderil Mayor." Jonathan smiled professional approval into Meyer's wry, clear blue eyes. "I've read about you, Anderl," he said in German.

  "I've read about you," Anderl answered in his soft Austrian accent.

  "In which case," Jonathan said, "we have read about each other." Anderl grinned.

  "And this lady here is Missus Bidette." Ben sat down immediately his uncomfortable social duty was discharged.

  Jonathan pressed the offered fingers and saw his reflection in her dark sunglasses. "Madame Bidet?" She dipped her head slightly in a gesture that was, at one time, a greeting, a shrug at being Madame Bidet, and a favorable evaluation of Jonathan—a gesture altogether Parisienne.

  "We just been small-talking and eyeballing the hill," Ben explained after Jonathan had sent the waiter after a fresh pot of coffee.

  "I had no idea this mountain Jean-Paul has been talking about for a year now would be so beautiful," Madame Bidet said, taking off her sunglasses for the first time that morning and letting her calm eyes rest on Jonathan.

  He glanced up at the Eiger's cold, shadowed face and the long wisps of captured cloud at the summit. "I would not say beautiful," Bidet offered. "Sublime, perhaps. But not beautiful."

  "It is the possibility of conflict and conquest that is beautiful," Freytag clarified for all time and for all people.

  Anderl peered at the mountain and shrugged. Obviously he had never thought of a mountain as beautiful or ugly: only as difficult or easy.

  "Is that all you are having for breakfast, Herr Doctor?" Freytag asked as Jonathan's coffee was served.

  "Yes."

  "Food is an important part of conditioning," Freytag admonished.

  "I'll bear that in mind."

  "Meyer here shares your peculiar eating habits."

  "Oh? I didn't know you were acquainted."

  "Oh, yes," the German said. "I contacted him shortly after I organized this climb, and we have made several short climbs together to attune him to my rhythms."

  "And you to his, I assume."

  Bidet reacted to the cool tone of the exchange by inserting a hasty note of warmth and camaraderie. "We must all use first names. Don't you agree?"

  "I'm afraid I don't know your wife's first name," Jonathan said.

  "Anna," she offered.

  Jonathan said the full name to himself and repressed a smile that only a native English speaker would understand.

  "How are the weather reports?" Karl asked Ben officially.

  "Not real good. Clear today; maybe tomorrow. But there's a bunch of weak fronts moving in on us that makes it pretty dicey after that."

  "Well, that settles it," Karl announced.

  "What does that settle?" Jonathan asked between sips of coffee.

  "We must go now."

  "Have I time to finish my coffee?"

  "I mean, we must go as soon as possible." Ben squinted at Karl incredulously. "With the possibility of a storm in three days?"

  "It has been climbed in two." Karl was crisp and on the defensive.

  "And if you don't make it in two? If you're pinned down up there in heavy weather?"

  "Benjamin has a point there," Jean-Paul interposed. "We must not take childish risks."

  The word "childish" rankled Karl. "One cannot climb without some risk. Perhaps the young face these risks more easily."

  Jonathan glanced from the mountain to Ben, who turned down the corners of his mouth, closed his eyes, and shook his head heavily.

  Anderl had not been a part of this discussion. Indeed, his attention was fixed on a group of attractive young girls out on the terrace. Jonathan asked his opinion on the advisability of climbing with a two-day weather limit. Anderl thrust out his lower lip and shrugged. He did not care whether they climbed in good weather or bad. Either would be interesting. But if they were not going to climb today or tomorrow, he had other things he might give his attention to.

  Jonathan liked him.

  "So we reach an impasse," Karl said. "Two in favor of climbing right now, and two opposed. The dilemma of the democratic process. What compromise do you suggest? That we climb halfway up?" His voice was heavy with Teutonic wit.

  "It's three opposed," Jonathan corrected. "Ben has a vote."

  "But he will not be climbing with us."

  "He's our ground man. Until we touch rock, he has more than a vote; he has complete control."

  "Oh? Has that been decided upon?"

  Anderl spoke without taking his eyes from the girls on the terrace. "It is always like that," he said with authority. "The ground man has the last word now, and the leader once we are on the face."

  "Very well," Karl said to cut off discussion on a point he was losing. "That brings us to another issue. Who is to be leader?" Karl glanced around the table, ready to defend himself against any opposition.

  Jonathan poured himself another cup and gestured with the pot; his offer of coffee was declined by Karl with a brusque shake of the head, by Jean-Paul who put his hand over his cup, by Anna with a movement of her fingertips, by Anderl who was paying no attention, and by Ben with a grimace, his beer mug still a quarter full. "I thought it was pretty much set that you would lead, Karl," Jonathan said quietly.

  "And so it was. But that decision was reached before the American member of the team had his unfortunate accident and was replaced by a man of such international repute—up until a few years ago, at least."

  Jonathan could not repress a smile.

  "So that we start off with a firm understanding," Karl continued, "I want to make sure everyone is in agreement about who shall lead."

  "You make a good point," Jean-Paul said. "It is true that Jonathan has climbed the mountain twice before."

  Gallic reasonableness was countered with Teutonic exactitude. "A correction, if I may. The good doctor has failed to climb the mountain twice. I don't mean to offend you, Herr Doctor, but I am forced to say that I do not consider a record of failure automatically grants you the right to lead."

  "I'm not offended. Is it all that important to you that you lead?"

  "It is important to our group. I have spent months designing a new route that departs in significant ways from the classic ascent. I am sure that once I have gone over it with you, you will all agree it is well thought out and quite feasible. And taking the face by a new route will put us in the record books."

  "And that's important to you?"

  Karl glanced at him with surprise. "Of course."

  Anderl had pushed his chair away from the table and was watching the power struggle with amusement in the folds of his thin, heavily tanned face.

  Anna relieved her boredom by shifting her glance from Jonathan to Karl, the two natural leaders of the group. Jonathan sensed she was making a choice.

  "Why don't we leave it at this," Jean-Paul said, moderating. "This afternoon we shall all go over the route you have planned, Karl. If it looks good to us, then you will be leader on the mountain. But until we are on the face, Benjamin will be in command."

  Karl agreed, certain the appeal of his new route would convince them. Ben concurred with a glum glance at Karl. Jonathan agreed. And Anderl didn't care one way or the other.

  "So!" Jean-Paul clapped his hands together to punctuate the end of what had been, for him, an unpleasant encounter. "Now we will take our coffee and become better acquainted with one another. Right?"

  "Oh?" said Jonathan. "I had assumed that you and Karl we
re already acquainted."

  "How so?" Jean-Paul asked, smiling.

  "In a business way, I had imagined. Your company makes aerosol containers, his produces pesticides. It would seem natural that..." Jonathan shrugged.

  Karl frowned at the mention of pesticides.

  "Ah! I see," Jean-Paul said. "Yes, I can see that it would be a natural error. As a matter of fact, our meeting here is the first. It is sheerest coincidence that we are in related industries."

  Anna glanced out the window and spoke to no one in particular. "In fact, I had assumed that every manufacturer of liquids in Europe had been to our house at one time or another."

  Jean-Paul laughed and winked at Jonathan. "She finds some of my colleagues a little dull."

  "Oh?" Jonathan asked, wide-eyed.

  The conversation turned to social trivialities, and after fifteen minutes of this Ben rose and excused himself, saying he wanted to check over the equipment. Anderl decided to help him, and the two of them went off.

  Jonathan watched Ben depart with his characteristic hyper-energetic hopping gait with which he compensated for his limp. A thought crossed his mind.

  "I hear you were injured last month," he said conversationally to Karl.

  "Yes. A fall. Nothing really."

  "It was your leg, I believe."

  "Yes. I cut it against a rock. I assure you it will not hamper my climbing in the least"

  "Good."

  Karl and Jean-Paul fell to chatting about mountains they had both climbed, comparing routes and events. Jonathan had an opportunity to sit back with his cup and examine the three of them at his leisure. There had been nothing in the behavior of any member of the team to suggest he knew what Jonathan was and why he was there.

  Anna Bidet's thoughts had turned inward, hidden behind the long lashes which veiled her quick, intelligent eyes. For some time she had been withdrawn, quite content with the company of her own mind. From time to time she would focus out on the men around her and listen for a moment before deciding there was nothing to interest her in the conversation, then she would dissolve back into herself. Jonathan let his eyes rest on her. Her clothes, her rare comments, her glances occasionally flashing in question or amusement, then eclipsing with a sudden drop of the lashes—everything was studied and effective. She was at one time dignified and provocative, a combination that is the exclusive property of Parisian women of a certain class and age.

  She emerged from her reverie with the feel of Jonathan's gaze upon her. She returned it frankly and with amusement.

  "An interesting combination," she said quietly.

  "What is?"

  "Art critic, scholar, and mountain climber. And I'm sure there's more to you than that."

  "What do you make of it?"

  "Nothing."

  Jonathan nodded and turned his attention to Jean-Paul, who obviously did not come from her world. His recent wealth fit him like his clothes, a little imperfectly because he lacked the panache to dominate them. He was over age for a major climb, but there was no fat on his sturdy agricultural body. One eye dropped down like a tragic clown's, but his expression was alive with intelligence and conviviality. His nose made a long, thin line starting rather too far up above the eyes and taking a capricious jog to one side about halfway down. The mouth was crooked and mobile enough to grant him that facial plasticity so intrinsic to a French peasant's communication. All in all, the face looked as though Nature had designed a perfectly nondescript mold, then had laid its palm against the muzzle while the clay was fresh and had given a slight twist to the left.

  Jonathan appreciated his qualities. His dislike of conflict and his logical moderation made him the ideal lubricant among the dynamic and aggressive personalities common to climbing. It was a pity that he was a cuckold—at least an emotional cuckold. Jonathan pictured him with a nightcap, a candlestick in one hand, and a pispot in the other.

  It was an unkind image, so he shifted his attention to Karl Freytag who at that moment was carefully and significantly advancing an argument proving that the route Jean-Paul had taken up the Dru the season before had been poorly chosen. When Jean-Paul laughed and said, "All I know is that it got me to the summit and back!" Karl shrugged, unwilling to continue reasoning with a man who took the matter so lightly.

  Karl's face was broad and regular, but too immobile to be interesting; he was handsome without being attractive. His blond—really colorless—hair was fine and lank, and he combed it back in a flat pompadour from his wide, aggressively intelligent forehead. He was the tallest man in the party by two inches, and his excellent body tone enabled him to maintain his rigid sitting posture without appearing foolish.

  "Well!" Jean-Paul said, breaking off his chat with Karl and turning to Jonathan and Anna. "You two don't seem to have been chatting."

  "We were comparing silences," Jonathan said, "and hers turned out more interesting than mine."

  "She's a remarkable woman." Jean-Paul looked at his wife with undisguised pride.

  "I believe that."

  "She was in ballet before her unfortunate marriage, you know." Jean-Paul was in the habit of protecting himself by beating others to the assumption that the union had been socially and emotionally morganatic. It was not only that he was a manufacturer; his company made a comically common household article.

  Anna laughed softly. "Jean-Paul likes to think he snatched me from the stage at the height of my career. Actually, age and declining popularity were working toward the same goal."

  "Nonsense!" Jean-Paul asserted. "No one could ever guess your age. How old do you think she is, Jonathan?"

  Jonathan was embarrassed for both of them.

  "My husband admires frankness, Doctor Hemlock. He considers tact to be a kind of deviousness."

  "No but. Come on, Jonathan. How old would you say Anna is?"

  Jonathan lifted his hands palms up in a gesture of helplessness. "I—ah—imagine a man would only consider her age if he were trying to decide whether the praise should go to Nature or to the lady herself."

  It had not been very good, but Anna applauded mockingly, soundlessly tapping the tips of three fingers into her palm.

  Sensing that nothing of consequence was going to be talked about here, Karl rose and excused himself. Jean-Paul moved down one chair to tighten the party.

  "It is certainly magnificent," he said, looking dreamily out to the Eiger. "It's a perfect choice for my last mountain."

  "Your last?"

  "I am no longer young, Jonathan. Think of it! At forty-two, I shall be the oldest man to climb it. These two young men are fantastic climbers. We shall have our work cut out, you and I. You are—forgive me but—you are...?"

  "Thirty-seven."

  "Ah! Just my wife's age!"

  She closed her eyes and opened them tiredly.

  To change the subject, Jonathan asked, "Are you interested in climbing, Anna?"

  "Not especially."

  "But she will be proud of me when I return, won't you, dearest?"

  "Very proud."

  "I don't know when I've felt so good," Jean-Paul said, stretching his arms athletically and allowing one to drop across Anna's shoulders. "I feel I have achieved the best conditioning possible at my age. Each night for the past six months I have performed a complicated set of calisthenics. And I have been religious about them. I work so late that my poor wife is usually asleep when I join her." He laughed and patted her.

  "By now she must be very eager," Jonathan said, "to see you make the climb."

  Anna glanced at him, then looked away to the windows which were beginning to dapple with a light rain.

  From habit Jean-Paul cursed the break in the weather, but his experience in these Bernese Alps told him that the preceding sunshine, not this rain, was the exception.

  "This will bring fresh snow to the upper reaches," he said matter-of-factly.

  "Yes, some," Jonathan agreed. He refilled his cup and excused himself to step out onto the terrace where he stood u
nder an overhanging eave and enjoyed the smell of the rain.

  The sky was zinc, and the color of the few gnarled evergreens that clung to the rocky soil of Kleine Scheidegg had been subtracted to olive drab by the loss of sunlight. There was no wind, and he sipped his coffee and listened to the rustle of rain in the meadow grass.

  They were a cool lot. One of them, at least, was cool. He had met the possible sanction targets, but no gesture, no nervousness, no glance had given him a hint. Jonathan would be on dicey ground until Search contacted him with the target's identity.

  Gray and listless mists concealed the upper third of the North Face. He recalled the ghoulish pun German sports writers resurrected each time a team attempted the Eiger. Instead of Nordwand, North Wall, they called it the Mordwand, Murder Wall. The days were past when German and Austrian youths threw their lives against the Eigerwand with reckless Wagnerian Todeslieb; great names had mastered the face: Hermann Buhl, Lionel Terray, Gaston Rebuffat; and dozens of lesser men had climbed it, each eroding, with his success, a fragment of the glory accruing to the task; but nonetheless, as he stood in the half-shelter sipping his coffee and looking across the meadow, Jonathan experienced an expanding desire to try again the face that had twice driven him back.

  On his way up to Ben's room, he passed Anderl in the corridor, and they exchanged nods of greeting. He had taken an instant liking to this short, sinewy lad with his mop of dark hair so obviously unused to the comb, and his long strong fingers designed by nature for finding and clinging to the smallest indentations in the rock. It would be too bad if Anderl turned out to be the sanction target.

  His knock at Ben's door was answered by a booming, "Fuck off!"

  Jonathan opened the door and peeked in.

  "Oh, it's you, ol' buddy. Come on in. And lock the door behind you."

  Jonathan moved a coil of nylon line off the spare bed and stretched out. "Why the fierce greeting?"

  Ben had been packing the haversacks, evenly distributing the weight, but making sure each pair of kits contained every necessity for a good bivouac, should the team break into two climbing ropes. "Oh, I thought you were one of those reporters." He grumbled something to himself as he snatched tight a strap. Then, "Goddam my eyes if they ain't been pecking at my door every five minutes. There's even a newsreel team here. Did you know that?"