The Summit of Unnamed Peak 23a, Northwest Sikkim—20,376 feet
April 3, 1939
11:47 a.m.
Arrival on the summit gave the utterly spent Schmidt just enough of a boost to pull a swastika flag from his pack and insist that Josef take photograph after photograph of him holding it. As Josef squinted through the viewfinder of Schmidt’s camera, the image sickened him. It was a sham. He, Namgel, and Ang Noru had virtually dragged Schmidt to the top, and there he now was, waving his damn flag as if he had run up there. To make matters worse, when Schmidt was finally satisfied he had enough photos of himself on the summit, he told Josef to pass the camera to Ang Noru to photograph them together with the flag. Josef knew why Schmidt wanted that photograph and just as quickly told himself that he wasn’t going to have it.
To Josef’s relief, even though it was something he needed to remedy, it was obvious Ang Noru had no idea what to do with the camera. But then Namgel, saying a sahib had once showed him how on Everest, took over, pointing the camera at them expertly as he clicked and wound. When he finished, he offered the camera back. Josef quickly took it, telling Schmidt he was going to take some views of the other mountains, turning away from them all as if to scan the horizon. Feigning that he was taking long-distance shots, he actually released the base cover of the camera within his hands to let the brilliant high-altitude light leach in. Only when he was as sure as he could be that the film inside was ruined did he resecure it and return the camera to Schmidt, saying to them all that it was time to go down.
It was a long and slow descent all the way to the upper edge of the glacier that took most of the afternoon. There, drained from having almost dragged the ever-weakening professor back down the mountain, Josef and the Sherpas could do little more than just sit for a while. Eventually Josef suggested they brew some tea. He knew that Schmidt needed it badly if he was to go any further and the time to prepare it would ensure it was night when he did arrive back at the camp. The cover of darkness was essential for the deceit ahead.
Ang Noru instantly broke out a small metafuel burner from one of the packs, while Namgel took a pan and his axe to collect some ice from within the glacier.
When he was sure Namgel was out of earshot, Josef whispered, “It is time now, Ang Noru. We will make tea, and then you and Namgel must take Schmidt on to Base Camp. Carry him if you have to. I stay here. You will tell the others that I am sick and that they must send people to bring me down.”
The Sherpa nodded as he battled to light the burner. He already knew the plan. When Fischer had taken him aside with Schmidt and Josef in Darjeeling and explained Operation Sisyphus in his own language, Josef had watched Ang Noru listen intently without a flicker of emotion. Afterward Fischer had told them that when he had asked the Sherpa to swear to secrecy on the spirits of his ancestors, the reply had been that it wasn’t necessary, that he wanted to do it as much as they did.
Josef looked across at Schmidt. He was a mess, collapsed against a large rock that projected from the snow, dragging slow, shuddering breaths into his lungs. His eyes were closed. He was drifting into sleep. Leaning closely into the side of his head, Josef said slowly and firmly, “Do you hear me, Schmidt? You need to stay awake. We are making some tea. It will help you make the last few hours down the glacier to the camp. It is easier going from here. Ang Noru and Namgel are going to help you. You need to pull yourself together if you are going to be the one who sends me away. Do you understand me?”
Schmidt grunted unintelligibly in reply as Namgel reappeared with the pan full of broken ice and water. When the Sherpa set the pan onto the sooty burner and huddled down alongside Ang Noru to wait for it to boil, Josef stared directly at Namgel and forced himself to cough violently.
The Sherpa immediately looked back at Josef with an expression of horror, his eyes glancing repeatedly upward at Josef’s SS cap badge. He pointed to it as he muttered to Ang Noru. He then began mumbling to himself, turning his eyes down to stare worriedly into the faintly steaming pot while Josef continued to force himself to cough and groan.
The combination of the tea and the lower altitude of the glacier basin slowly put a little life back into Schmidt, even if it took another ten fits of coughing from Josef before Schmidt finally took the hint.
“Sahib Becker is sick,” he eventually slurred to the two Sherpas. “We must go on and send help back for him.”
Upon hearing Schmidt say this, Namgel became instantly alarmed, raising his voice as much as he dared. “No, Sahib, no. We cannot leave him. I will stay. He must not be left alone here.”
Namgel continued to plead to Schmidt causing Ang Noru to say something to him in their own dialect. The conversation between the two Sherpas became heated until, with difficulty, Schmidt broke it up, saying between deep gasps for air, “Look, you two ... I give the orders ... And I say we go now ... We will leave Sahib Becker with what he needs ... Then send help for him when we get to the camp.”
While Ang Noru made an elaborate display of making Josef comfortable, he said to him under his breath, “Namgel says you are the strongest sahib he has ever seen on the mountains, strong as the Sherpas, but that you carry the mark of death on your head. He says the bones have attracted mountain devils. He says they will come for you if you are left alone, and they will eat your heart and lungs to take your strength for their own. He says you must rid yourself of the bones, or you will die.”
“Tell him, Ang Noru, he is right. I will die if he doesn’t get back to the camp and bring help as soon as possible. Now go. You know what to do. It is time.”
“But the bones …” Ang Noru began to question.
Josef cut in. “Ang Noru, think about it. You know the plan. It is not the bones.”
“Yes, Sahib Becker.”
When Josef watched them leave, Namgel was still protesting, wanting to stay. He looked back at Josef with fear in his eyes, Ang Noru pulling him on until they disappeared with Schmidt into the broken ice towers of the glacier.
The bones, indeed.
Alone, Josef told himself that now was the time to be rid of them but for his own, not Namgel’s, reasons. He reached for his pocketknife and, with the point of its blade, delicately unpicked the stitching that held the metal skull and crossbones badge to the front of his cap.
For the next half hour, as the sky darkened and the cold closed in, Josef occupied himself by placing the badge on a rock and hammering it with the pick of his ice axe. It gave him a strong feeling of satisfaction to finally cast its mangled shape onto the snow. He then turned his attention to preparing for his rescuers’ return.
First he retied his army cap into a roll and hid it back inside his jacket. Then he reached into his pack and pulled out a small tin of baking soda. Opening it, he emptied a handful of the powder into the pocket of his wind jacket. Putting his woolen hat back on, he pulled it down over his eyes and the sleeping bag up over his head to settle in for the long wait. He would bite the inside of his lip to draw some blood and put some of the baking soda in his mouth to create a foam when he heard them returning. There was no need to suffer yet. It was going to be a long night.