Padrun went forward, and soon came his shout, “A fixed rope!” He lowered himself over, out of sight. I waited for his signal. “All right!” Cautiously I approached the brink and peered over. I must confess to a shock. Padrun was standing below me, grinning cheerfully on what seemed a most inadequate platform for one pair of mountain boots, let alone two. He assured me, however, that there was room and invited me to “come along.” From the rear came an order to the same effect. I was greatly troubled. How to lean down on the edge of nothing and catch hold of the fixed rope was a difficult problem. My feet were dreadfully far off. But the plunge had to be taken. I suppose I must have turned face in towards the rock, kneeled down and lowered myself on my arms until I had slithered far enough over to be able to grasp the rope—a pleasantly thick one it was! I scraped for footholds and found them at distressingly long intervals, so that practically all the time I was hanging on my hands. I had not yet learned to shin down a rope, sailor fashion, using feet as brakes. I was, of course, held securely from above on the Alpine rope. My nurse was conscientiousness itself, but the Alpine rope looked terribly puny, and I was not quite convinced that, if I released my hold on the fixed rope, the other could stand my weight. All manner of interesting information as to the strength and breaking strain of an Alpine rope had been vouchsafed to me, but I was sceptical. So I clung as if for dear life with my hands. Presently I joined Padrun on the little shelf, and, as soon as I had made myself secure, he went down the next pitch. “All right!” I passed the word up to my husband, who came down at an amazing speed as I took in his rope. Then he once more let me down to Padrun. And so it went on. I meant to count the ropes on the Italian ridge, but failed to carry out my intention. They seemed innumerable. In time the strain on my arms began to tell, and the friction was beginning to tear the skin off my hands, but still I could not be induced to trust to the climbing rope and permit myself to be lowered over. Finally, however, came the last straw that broke down the barrier of distrust. Half-way down one very long rope, my outraged arms struck work. Willy-nilly, I was hanging on the Alpine rope like a spider on its thread—and behold! it did not break under my weight. The pitch was safely negotiated, and almost immediately afterwards we were at the famous ladder of Jordan. It was a very pretty ladder with strong rope sides and wooden rungs, but it hung over a great bulge and dangled in space. Padrun held it as near the wall at the bottom as he could while I descended face towards the rock. As I approached the nose, the ladder showed a tendency to swing away from the rock, and when I actually arrived at the tip, the space between myself and the wall was disagreeably wide. It was the most thrilling part of the descent so far, but soon over. From the spacious platform at the foot, I watched carefully, on the look-out for the correct way to descend Jordan’s ladder, and I saw that when my husband reached the tip of the nose, that is, the edge of the actual overhang, he changed his position and came down on the inside of the ladder.
Descending the Italian ridge.
“... a pleasantly thick fixed rope.”
Facing page 174.
All the time since passing the first fixed rope, we had been working more or less down the face of the mountain. Now we turned slightly to our right and gained the ridge. On the broad shelf that marks the beginning of Carrel’s corridor, we rested for fully an hour. It had been our intention to snatch only a short breathing space, but two parties were coming up towards us, and, as the ground was loose and unstable, we waited until they approached. The first was a party of three, whose feet were continually getting entangled in their rope which lay in coils between each member and dragged loose stones about in a most disconcerting manner. It was warm and sunny, we had many hours of daylight at our disposal—for our destination that day was only the Italian hut—and the world was beautiful to look upon.
About eleven o’clock we again resumed work on the ridge. The ground was scaly and unpleasant. Thin, flat flakes of stone slipped out underneath the feet. Keeping close together we soon arrived at the Col Félicité, so called in honour of the first woman who reached it; but a more incongruous, name, from the point of view of appearance, could not have been found. A little later we came to a narrow snow bridge connecting the shingly slope of the Italian face above with the long level ridge of the Pic Tyndall. Some fifteen inches wide, the bridge falls away nearly perpendicularly on either side to a tremendous depth. I could not help thinking that it would have been much more agreeable if the approach to the bridge had been level and stable instead of sloping and loose, and the exit had not been blocked by a little vertical tower some fifteen feet high over which it was necessary to climb. Padrun sauntered over as calmly as if he were walking on the finest Roman viaduct, and scaled the wall of the tower at the other end. It looked a giddy proceeding. I felt sure that I would wobble to one side or other, and, despite the fact that I would simply dip for a moment into space and then be hoisted up on the rope, the demoralising effect would doubtless be calamitous. However, that “there’s nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so” is nowhere so true as on the mountains. The idea of the venture proved one thousandfold more dreadful than the actuality. I kept my eyes on the turret a few feet away, and was clambering up before I realised it. Daring greatly, I paused to look down, just for the good of my own self-respect. The effect was quite exhilarating.
Once on the ridge of the Pic Tyndall, the going was easy. A stretch of snowy crest provided a welcome change. At the farther end of this I suddenly felt fatigued. Padrun was encouraging. He indicated a great tower on the ridge. “The hut is just below,” he said. “It will take only fifteen minutes.” The result was marvellous; the distance did look short, and my husband, who must have known well enough how deceived Padrun was, had apparently not the heart to dispel our fond illusions. So tired was I, that even my scepticism had vanished, and my memory failed to remind me that ridges have a habit of magically stretching as you proceed along them. Their ends, like the tops of mountains, seem to recede as you advance, and indulge in the playful game until the very last moment. From the Pic Tyndall to the Italian hut took us almost exactly one and a half hours. Before arriving at the big tower we left the ridge and descended by an exceedingly long fixed rope well down into the face on the left, until we found a ledge that led us again to the right. The slope, known as the “Linceul,” over which it is customary to make one’s way by cutting a few steps, was devoid of ice, and a slight deviation from the normal route was necessary. Up and down we seemed to go, and once round a little natural balcony that hung out over space but proved not in the least heady. A handrail in the shape of a fixed rope was provided. Thence onwards the route was well-marked. Short, helpful ropes led down chimneys and over slabs to the hut where we arrived at three o’clock.