Death could come for her on Everest. It had come for many others.
But one did not die traversing an aluminum ladder over a fathoms-deep crevasse in metal-tipped boots, with ropes to hold on to. One found the experience revolting in every way. One privately, deeply, and without reservation hated it. But one did not die.
Probably.
“Does he think the weather’s going to turn?” Rosemary asked.
“He says the route isn’t safe, there’s too many people on the mountain, the mountain isn’t happy, you name it. The upshot is, everyone should call it a day.” Anna shook her head. “I’m trying to maintain my summit frame of mind here. I don’t need his bad energy messing with my good vibes.”
Rosemary glanced at the man. He wore a red jacket. He was taller than the other Sherpa. She’d seen him around Base Camp and knew he was one of the ice doctors, and that he spoke perfect English with an American accent. She thought he might have helped her onto one of the ladders on a previous passage, but she couldn’t be certain.
“He’s always this way,” Aisling said. She had attempted Everest twice previously but never made it to the summit. “Comes back every year, works the icefall, tells everyone who will listen they shouldn’t be climbing.”
“You’d think another line of work might suit him better.” Rosemary said it with a smile, but no one smiled back.
Right. Jobs on Everest were more lucrative by far than any other form of employment available to the Sherpa people. To be an icefall doctor was to possess a high-status job in poverty-stricken Nepal. Her joke had been in poor taste. “I only meant—”
“His father was Merlin Beckett,” Aisling said. “And his mother—”
“That’s Yangchen Beckett’s son?”
“Yep.”
Rosemary turned to look at the man again, astounded.
Sixteen years had passed since Yangchen Beckett became the first Nepalese woman to reach the peak of Everest and return alive. In total, she’d summited seven times—more than any other woman—and become a controversial subject in the small world of elite mountaineering.
Shortly after her most recent summit, an article had appeared on one of the online climbing websites depicting Yangchen as a sinister figure: a talented young climber, she’d become a battered wife whose husband didn’t allow her above Base Camp. Yangchen and Merlin Beckett had taken their domestic strife to the slopes of Everest, where, according to the writer, Yangchen cracked Merlin Beckett’s head open with a rock and left his body to cool while she climbed to the top of Everest to claim her first summit.
The article cast doubt on Yangchen’s sanity and the truth of her claim to having summited so many times—doubt that others were only too delighted to amplify. But Rosemary wasn’t convinced there was anything to it. The writer cited unnamed sources and offered little hard evidence.
Yangchen herself had never given an interview.
Now, standing so close to the woman’s son, Rosemary could only think how fantastic it would be to get the inside scoop on Yangchen Beckett. There had to be a story there, a real story more interesting than the penny dreadful gossip the article had inspired.
It was too bad she hadn’t learned of Doctor Doom’s background at Base Camp. She didn’t know when or if she’d see him again.
Indira touched her arm. “You ready?”
She whipped around to see Anna preparing to lead the next push.
Rosemary’s heart pumped a wash of dread through her veins, and she took a deep breath. It would be a long and exhausting day, followed by a night spent in thin air, shivering behind the thin walls of their tents, lucky if they could sleep even fitfully.
Then more climbing. More shivering. More climbing. Hours to endure, one breath at a time. One step after the next. Thousands of footfalls to count.
She’d wanted to climb Everest since she was a girl. At twenty, she’d told her boyfriend—later her husband—that it was the first thing of consequence she’d do with her life after university. I’m going to climb Mount Everest and write a book about it.
Pregnancy had stopped her. Marriage had stopped her. Or, she supposed, she’d stopped herself, using motherhood and marriage as an excuse not to live her life.
No more.
This was her adventure, years in the planning, month after month of relentless hard work. Rosemary would screw her courage to the sticking post, test the outermost limits of her mind and body, and find, deep inside herself, the woman she’d always been meant to be.
This wasn’t the moment to think about her book. This was the moment to have the experiences that would give her something to write about.
Smiling, she turned her face toward the mountain. “I’m ready.”
Chapter 2