Temple - The Mantis

The longest day. The few extra minutes of light that Blackmore needed. Already the bottom of the mountain was in night shadow and he doubted if the orange and red tents would show up. There, through the big wide-angle lens, he could just see them on the edge of the glacier, bottom left of frame. Damn the tripod. It still wasnt level. But there was no time left it would have to do. It had been like that since they started the march-in. No time for side excursions to get those big panoramas he had promised himself. Sorry Mike, Strickland had said, but weve got to try and pull back a day or two of lost time. Blackmore smiled. After ten days in Islamabad waiting for a plane, Joe Dodge had said, If Allah had wanted the Pakistanis to fly hed have given them fucking magic carpets.

Blackmore fumbled for the bulb of the shutter release, his fingers numb from the frost of the camera metal. God what a mountain. He squeezed off the first shot and re-cocked. Watching the summit wind-cloud glowing with the false heat of sunset, he imagined it on the cover of Mountain. A certainty if they made the first ascent; still likely even if they didnt. The scale of Puthemojar was such that even the big wide-angle was inadequate for Blackmore to capture the image of the mountain he had registered in that first visual shock of granite and ice: an image of the ultimate tower standing victor over the remains of a collapsed adversary, loser in some ancient tectonic battle.

He released the shutter again and straightened up. The light was going fast. One last shot. He would have to return the next day, climb back up this bluff overlooking the glacier, and take some more pictures when the sun was high on the south face. Then it would throw the summit tower and ridges into granite relief against the indigo sky. In lunar shadow, every subtlety of the Curtain wall would be revealed, and the icefall which amputated its western shoulder, and the spurs and ridges which climbed brokenly to the uppermost icefield.

The ridges of Puthemojar lost all light and the summit tower demonstrated its special height, pink and violet, the ice patch below its brow a bloodshot eye. Blackmore had not learned the meaning of its name until Afzal Hussein had pointed among the bushes of the garden at Islamabad.

Puthemojar, hed said. Like your mountain. Yes? and laughed. Perplexed, Blackmore had shrugged and Afzal had shaken the branches until it fell into his hand, an insect erect with exaggerated menace. Oh, I see, said Blackmore. A mantis, a praying mantis.

Yes, yes, of course, said Afzal slyly. The Puthemojar. Grinning at him.

The air radiated the glow of the glacier. Blackmore shivered, zipped up his duvet and pulled on his anorak. He packed the camera and tripod into his rucksack and slung it over his shoulder. Before darkness drove him down to Base Camp, he looked up once more. Now why would they call it that? And how many Balti travellers had come up here before the climbers? Maybe Afzals pulling my leg. Then Blackmore fancied he saw the parallel. After all, the peaks Moitok and Katok either side of the summit tower were of about equal height, raised up like the high forelimbs of the insect at Islamabad. Maybe. The eye of the Mantis was now blank.

Among the mugs and farts, books, dirty canteens and stench of stale food, Blackmore picked out Joe Dodge from the words, This Side Up knitted into the crown of his balaclava. Welcome home, chuck, Dodge said. Afzals saying is prayers over yer clangers and smash. Should be fit for human consumption by now. He belched and sucked his Gauloise. Its smoke was pulled up by the heat of the pressure lamp and dispersed in a blue tide across the peak of the tent.

Here, said Afzal. He handed Blackmore a pannikin of half-congealed stew and rehydrated potato. Ill go out now. Blackmore began eating without looking into the dish.

Just take it easy on Afzal, Joe, Strickland said. He stared at his file with studied care. The Fhrer Buch, Doug Lowrie called it. Mein fuckin Kampf more like, Joe Dodge had said.

I dont see much point in deliberately offending him, Strickland added. Hes only doing his job.

Yes sir, Captain Afzal Hussein, sir, three bags full sir, said Dodge. He took a last drag on the Gauloise and flicked it neatly through the small aperture Blackmore had left in the zip-door for ventilation. I thought this was a bloody climbing trip.

Strickland turned a page: Knock it off.

Blackmore swallowed hard on the last lump of stew and considered the doubtful truth of the mountaineers adage that it didnt matter what the food was like providing there was some. At the back of the tent, Alan Wyllie said, Hussein didnt want to be a liaison officer. His pale eyes and off-white hair rose over Doug Lowries recumbent shoulder. He was just posted. Told me at Askole that his wifes expecting.