Fifteen

Tony Salcito was huddled with Grant and several of the agents who’d come down from the mountain. Everything that had happened since the storm struck in full force was unknown to him. From what I could see, he was taking it like a professional.

Tom hobbled by me, shaking his head and limping badly. “The regular radios are digital and refused to function in the heavy snow. Things are still spotty even now and there’s no real communication taking place and with the backup system not functioning they’re fit to be tied. Tony thinks the reality is bad enough, getting the story out in bits and pieces is going to be even worse.” He went into our tent.

Then Stern came up to me, excited. “This is really something!” he said. “I knew I should have gone with you guys, now I’ve missed it. We’ve been cut off here, you know? Nothing in, nothing out.” He looked up. “Maybe if this clears we can get back in touch with the real world. Tell me what happened?” He had his recorder out.

“Ask someone else,” I said. “I’m tired.”

Stern rarely took no for an answer, but this time he shrugged and hurried off to find a source—or victim, as I preferred to consider anyone willing to talk to him.

One of the guides brought me a large, mug of hot, sweet tea and I thanked him profusely. I sipped it, waited a little while to let it cool a bit, then drank it all. I went and got more, not alone in that, as all the climbers had either gone straight into tents, unable to stand erect a moment longer than necessary, or were lining up for tea and hot food. I realized I was also hungry, took my place, then, with a steaming bowl of stew and brown rice, found a camp chair, and sat to eat.

As I finished, from the other side of the camp came a roar. I looked over to see Tony shouting at Hooker, who was standing his ground—I’ll give him that much, if nothing else. All but chest bumping, the pair reminded me of an umpire and baseball manager disputing a call.

The wind had picked up a bit and snow was again falling very heavily. Out of the fading light Tarja emerged, holding a mug with both hands. She sat nearby. With a worldly expression, she faced me and said, “During a short lull in this stuff Christopher managed to file a story.”

“What story?”

“Of the assassination attempt, how Opie saved his father’s life. He sent his unedited video out as well. Tony might throttle him. But it’s news, big news. What was he going to do? Wait for the White House to issue a press release? Which reminds me? Where’s Diana?”

“Sleeping.”

“Well,” Tarja gave me an unappreciated look, “at least you know she’s alone, right?”

Calvin took Tarja’s seat as she left to find someone else to insult. As near as I could tell, beauty, fame and a measure of wealth gave a woman the right to pretty much do and say whatever she wanted—at least in Tarja’s world.

Calvin turned his chair so his back faced the wind and ate without comment. While he was drinking his tea I asked how he felt, the universal question at this stage of any climb. I’d come on this climb in good condition, and I had ample experience on much more demanding mountains, but I was still aching from head to toe.

“The toes I no longer have hurt like hell. I twisted the knee on my formerly good leg. What else? Oh yes, I wrenched my back coming over some of those boulders.” He stopped, then resumed without prompting. “This is my last serious climb, Scott. I’m calling it a career.”

“Probably a good plan. How’s Tom? He folded as soon as we got in.”

“He strained a hamstring, and it’s hobbled him up pretty good. I’ve given him some pain pills, but what he needs is rest, and that won’t happen until we get off this mountain.”

“Tarja seems her old self.”

“No complaints from her,” Calvin said. “Brendan and Ian are all right. Upset, but physically fit.”

“Any more word on the killer?”

“Not much. They’re being pretty close-mouthed about him. From what little I’ve heard, a few of the guides are from another village—same clan, but not relatives like everybody else. Freeman got a lot of heat about not spreading the work around when this plum of a climb came along. Every guide who’s taken part expects to get a lot of mileage out of it for years to come with extra and preferred work along with big tips. His name was Moses, by the way.”

“Why did he do it?”

“Who knows? Mentally unstable, money, desire to be famous, maybe some imagined grudge. I don’t think anyone knows enough to say at this point. The main concern at this juncture is to get down and out of here.”

“Speaking of which, what’s the story with the storm? This was supposed to be a clean climb.”

“I don’t know. Everyone was caught by surprise. I understand you can set your watch by the monsoon. It arrives every year within three or four days of the same time. Occasionally it’s late or early, but not very often. We got caught napping. Aleister is fit to be tied. He pushed the president to make this climb, and here it’s turned into a disaster.”

“Why would he want the president to do something like this in the middle of the campaign season?”

“As I understand it, since he had no primary opposition, it’s been tough to get much media.” That struck me as odd. I saw the president on television and the Internet saying or doing something almost every day. “His opponent has been getting all the attention. This is a lull in the season, and the president was planning a vacation anyway. Onesphory came along, and they dodged a bullet there. That could have really turned against him. Plus, the internals don’t look good. The economy is crap and the president’s taking all the blame. This was a way to emphasize his youth and vigor, to give him a certain mystique by connecting him to Africa, and to turn his son into a campaign asset. They had a big role laid out for him.”

“Climbing any of the Seven Summits is unpredictable. Surely someone knew that.”

“Oh, sure, Tony knew and has argued against this from the start. I guess security is just impossible here. You’ve heard about the special forces teams on standby?” I nodded. “There are reports of a suicide squad out of Kenya in this region. I can’t say it strikes me as realistic, and in these conditions the president’s in more danger from the cold and altitude sickness than from Muslim extremists, but every threat has to be taken seriously.”

“How is the president?”

“He’s fine. Beat up more than he wants to admit, but he’s come through this in good shape.”

“How’s he taking Onesphory’s death?”

Calvin shrugged. “People react to grief in different ways.”

“In other words, you can’t see a reaction.”

He didn’t say anything for some time. Then, finally glancing about he said, “I’m turning in. You should, too. We’ve got a tough day ahead of us tomorrow.”

The storm resumed its power just as I crawled into the tent with Tom. I checked and found him deep in sleep, which was the best thing for him. At certain moments the gale struck the tent at a specific angle and caused a violent beating sound, like that of an unpleasant drum. Other times, all I could hear was the shriek of the wind. I was exhausted myself, and once I was settled into my sleeping bag, wind or no wind, I fell asleep almost at once.

Come morning I was awake for a few minutes without stirring from my bed, unable to hear the usual camp sounds. At such moments on climbs you feel remote, cut off, in some cases even abandoned. The relentless wind was still wailing outside, drumming the tent with its gusts. I finally peeked out the door and saw a foot of snow on the ground. I pulled back in and crawled into the bag to wait on events.

It was after eight before coffee was thrust into our tent, followed a few minutes later by two pans of hot water. Tom was up and we drank gratefully, then washed up and dressed.

“How are you feeling?” I asked Tom.

“Better, but I pulled a muscle, so this is going to be a tough day for me. I take it the weather is no better.”

“Not from what I saw. We’ve got snow now.”

“Wonderful. I love climbing in a winter wonderland.”

Outside, the falling snow was blinding in its intensity. I couldn’t see more than ten feet in any direction. Breakfast was ready and I ate with relish, finding myself famished. Summit days are always exhausting, and this one, coupled with Onesphory’s murder, had been especially so. Today my body wanted to rest and rebuild, but that would have to wait. We needed to get down from here as soon as we could.

Magumbo was helping out with the food. “Very bad day yesterday,” he said over the wind.

“Yes, very bad. I’m sorry about Onesphory.”

“A good man, but he died bravely defending his father. That is how it should be.”

“Do you know this Moses who killed him?”

“No. He and three others are from far away.”

Tom was out now. His leg was stiff, and he paced to loosen it as he drank more coffee, then remained standing while he ate. Afterwards, he told me he wanted to talk to Grant and see what he could learn. He’d be back shortly.

The guides were tearing down the tents and packing our supplies away, sure signs that we’d be setting out shortly. We expected to be back at the lodge this day. We were taking a different route off the mountain, a more direct one that dropped in a nearly straight line to Mweka Gate in just over three hours on a typical day. The terrain was undemanding, all the bad was now behind us. At least, that’s how it usually was. I’d sleep in a bed at the lodge tonight if all went as scheduled.

If the weather had been other than it was, one of the Blackhawk helicopters could have lifted the president from here or at any point along the route we’d take today. In fact, if a window developed, that was what I expected to happen.

I wasn’t looking forward to the descent. As we dropped in elevation, at some point this snow would turn to sleet, then to rain. By any measure it was going to be a miserable, miserable day.

I went over to Diana’s tent and found her up and drinking hot tea. Hooker was nowhere to be seen, which wasn’t saying much, given the heavy snowfall. “How are you?” I asked, sitting down beside her after first brushing away some snow.

“Much better,” she said. She looked exhausted. “I slept well, but I feel as if someone took a stick and beat me from head to toe. I hurt everywhere.” She reached over and squeezed my hand. “Thank you.”

“No problem. We can’t have a future if you don’t stay alive.”

She smiled weakly then said, “Is that what we have?”

Just then Hooker slinked up—at least that’s how it seemed to me. “Diana,” he snapped. “When you two lovebirds are finished I need to talk business with you.”

Diana turned her head to face him. “In a few minutes, Christopher. I need to speak to the president. I doubt you’re in the loop any longer after that stunt you pulled yesterday.”

“Stunt? What are you talking about? This is news! It still is. You can’t expect me to sit on this story. Now come on!”

Diana stood up to face him. “What we expect is for the pool reporter to follow the rules agreed to. You didn’t get approval to file and what were you doing filing a story all on your own? You are required to feed information to the reporters back at the lodge. After that you get to file your own story, once we tell you to.”

“You can’t expect me to follow guidelines in a situation like this! Be reasonable! I didn’t know how long the link would last, and the file was big. As it was, I just got it out.”

“You’re talking about the recording you were told not to release until the Secret Service had screened it and approved its release, you mean that file?”

“Come on Diana, be reasonable!”

“The only reason you got your camcorder back and were allowed to keep recording was because I arranged it and gave assurances that you’d follow the rules. You’ve screwed me in this, Christopher. Don’t look for me to do you any favors again.”

“You’re a prima donna, you know that? You’ve got no idea how this game is played. You got lucky in Afghanistan, then turned that pretty face and perky manner into a million dollar gig, but you still don’t know anything about reporting.”

“I’ll be speaking to the president about you. I think you can depend on not returning to the lodge with us.” With that, she stalked off.

“Hey! Wait a minute!” he shouted, tagging after her.

I went back to my spot and prepared for the descent. It would be after nine before we set out. I estimated we’d reach the gate late this afternoon, assuming no major obstacles presented themselves along the way. The storm was showing no letup. The wind had eased considerably, but the snowfall was simply amazing as well as unusual.

While I waited I grew cold and started pacing about to keep my blood flowing. Everything was ready. The tents had been struck and put away along with all our supplies. The guides had their loads ready beside them. We were just waiting on word.

Stern appeared from out of nowhere. “Sometime I’d like to climb one of these in decent weather, you know?”

“No one asked you to come. You forced your hand.”

“Don’t remind me. And I got a bum deal out of it.”

“Come on. You were on the climb when an attempt was made on the president’s life. His son was killed saving him. That’s a great story.”

“But I wasn’t there! Get it? I was down here, sitting on my ass.”

“Stern, when have facts ever gotten in your way?”

He brightened at that. “You’ve got a point. Who’s to know, right? See you later.” He went off into the snow.

A few minutes later Tom came hobbling up. “We’ve got trouble.”

“What’s that?”

“Where to begin. Okay, the Secret Service had a window of something like four minutes in which to communicate when we got here yesterday. They’ve got three systems it turns out. One is by sat phone, and they’ve not been working in this storm. The other is by relay from one of the jets we came in on. It’s actually a communications center and travels everywhere with the president. The third is by line of sight to the aircraft carrier task force offshore. That’s their scramble line in case of real need. They’ve got the Navy Seal teams, jets if needed, and helicopters.”

“So what’s happened?”

“The relay system wasn’t working, which caught them by surprise. It’s supposed to be failsafe, and this has never happened before. But they reached the carrier and got a brief message out about what took place up there. I don’t know how they managed it in these conditions, but a little bit ago they received bits and pieces of a message back. All of our airplanes at Kilimanjaro airport have been blown up.”

“What?”

“Someone launched a ground attack against them, using the storm as cover. Charges were placed on two, RPGs were used against the others. Even Air Force One. Something like 30 people are dead. The attackers were all killed. Muslims, the report says.”

“This means the attack on the summit wasn’t the act of a single man. It’s part of a concerted plan.”

“Or the most incredible coincidence ever.”

“No, Tom, it’s not a coincidence.”

“If you say so. There’s more. As I understand it, the media reports internationally are saying the president is dead. Tony doesn’t think all of his message got through, and Hooker’s video went out in bits and pieces. They think you can’t really tell who’s dead in it. There was an emergency meeting of the Cabinet while we were sleeping. The U.S. military has been put on alert, and, weather permitting, Seal teams are being inserted as close to us as possible, which, in these conditions, is a long ways away.”

“This is amazing.”

“Hooker’s had it, you’ll be glad to hear. He’s being told to exit back the way we came in, out Machame Gate. He’s making a scene, but the president, Tony and Grant are pretty pissed at him. The plan is to move the president toward Mweka Gate as planned. No one knows when, or if, this storm will ease, but the minute it does, he’s out of here by helicopter. Right now they’re trying to get word out that the president is alive and well.”

Tom moved closer. “As I understand it, the vice president wants to be sworn in.”