'Why the Bear's Ladder?' I asked. I was following so close my face was almost touching the battered canvas of his rucksack.
'An ol' bear used the route, I expect that's why.', 'Were there bears up in these mountains?'
'Course there were. Me fa'ver used ter 'unt them. There's still a few fa'nd. But they don't 'unt them nah.'
We fell silent as the slope became steeper. Soon we were struggling up under a sheer, buttressed wall of rock. The blood pounded in my ears. The sweat trickled down the small of my back. Mist and sweat gathered in beads on my eyebrows. We went through a drift of snow. The marks of nailed boots showed deep in the drift. Sunde pointed to them. 'All goin' up. None comin' da'n. We may meet Peer yet.'
'Has Lovaas been this way?' I panted.
'Can't tell,' he answered.
The world was very still in the mist. The river was no more distant than a rumble of water. A small grey bird chattered on a rock, dipping his body as he talked. Another drift and then the loose rock covered by snow rising right up into the mist. Beyond the mist, there was probably mile on ghastly mile of piled-up, snow-capped peaks. But I could see nothing through the sweat but that treacherous, snow covered trail winding up under the blank wall of the mountains we were climbing. Sliding and cursing, gripping with my hands as well as my feet, thrown off balance by the weight of my pack, sweating and panting, I worked my way up, I thought of the old bear whose ladder this was. He'd had four legs and had not been encumbered by pack and skis. There were patches bare of snow and there Sunde's feet dislodged rocks that rolled down against my legs. I, in turn, dislodged others that clattered below us, some losing themselves in the snow in sudden silence, others rattling down till the sound of them was lost in the distance.
More and more often Sunde paused to give me a hand. But at last we reached the top and in a wild spot of giant boulders loosened from the mountains by the frozen wedges of winter ice, we paused and slipped off our packs. I flung myself against a rock, tired, exhausted, throbbing with heat and weariness. Sunde produced what he called heimebaktflatbrod — wafer-thin home-made bread and brown goat's cheese. 'Better eat quick,' he said. 'We can't stop more than a minute or two. An' don't eat no snow.'
Whilst I lay back, trying to eat, he cast about in the snow patches, examining the footprints. But in the end he shook his head. 'Impossible ter tell 'ow many people bin past 'ere.'
I closed my eyes. I didn't care. I didn't care if Farnell were killed. I wouldn't have cared if Lovaas had materialised out of the mist and pointed a gun at me. To be shot would be a merciful relief. I was dead beat. The mist wrapped round me like a clammy blanket. It seeped through my sweat-damp clothing and right into my bones. From being hot I was in an instant shivering with cold. 'Okay,' Sunde said. 'We'll move on now.'
I opened my eyes. He was looking at me with a kindly smile. 'Yer'll soon get used to it,' he said.
I struggled to my feet, every muscle in my body crying out with pain. In that brief rest I seemed to have stiffened up so that every joint seemed rusted, immovable. Sunde helped me on with the rucksack. We struggled on through deepening snow across a shoulder of the mountain. Soon we had to put on skis. Sunde waxed them first. The Norwegians use different waxes, not skins, for climbing through snow. The skis felt heavy and clumsy on my tired feet. It was as though I had strapped a pair of canoes to them. New muscles began to cry out in agony as we sidestepped up the shoulder. Then for a brief spell we were running downhill, following the tracks of other skis. There were several ski tracks in all. The snow ended in rock. I stemmed. The heavy rucksack swung and I fell. Sunde helped me to my feet. 'Lovaas is ahead of us,' he said.
I nodded. I had already realised that.
More climbing. Then another run on skis, in and out amongst huge, snow-capped rocks. At one point Sunde swung backwards and forwards across the mountain side, quartering it as though in search of something. At last he stopped by a large rock. I saw the pistol I had given him in his hand. He moved forward quietly on his skis. I ran up carefully towards him. He disappeared as I approached. A moment later I stemmed and came up facing the back of a smaller saeter hut almost buried in snow.
Sunde emerged from the side, shaking his head. 'Holmen Saeter,' he said. 'No one there. The ski tracks pass above it. But Oi thort Oi'd just make sure.' He pulled a map out of his pocket. 'Just wonderin' if we can make anuvver short cut 'ere.' But after a moment he shook his head. 'No. We follow the others.'
