A sudden slip jerked him awake and the jolt once again started the adrenalin coursing through his veins. How long had he been asleep? He looked around. The sky was completely dark now. He realised that it was now even more urgent that he take some action to try and sort out their problem. What the hell was he going to do?
However the slip had started his brain working again. He could face the fact now that it didn’t matter what he did about Carlos. If the three of them stayed here for the whole night they would all be dead by the morning. Somehow he had to get help.
Although it was dark he could see the sky had cleared. The vehicle headlights could be seen far away as they scurried along the autostrada. How could he get their attention? He hoped Carlos had left a message with the mountaineering centre at Tortorro to tell them where they were climbing. Could the man be trusted? In any case Tortorro was thirty kilometres away. It might be hours before anyone would question why they hadn’t returned. It would also be difficult for rescuers to find them in the middle of the night. Something more urgent was necessary.
Rechecking his backpack, Ben worked his way through its contents. There was nothing which he could conceivably use to draw attention to their plight. It was mainly filled with empty food containers, an additional light sweater and a change of underclothing. So he started to check Toni’s pack. There was no mobile phone but there was something nearly as valuable. At the bottom of the pack was a small gas canister with a screw-in burner for heating a kettle. There were no matches, but a search of Toni’s clothing revealed a plastic cigarette lighter in one of the anorak pockets.
Fumbling awkwardly, Ben eventually got the stove to light. Then he released his own rucksack and tied it to the end of a length of rope with a quick-release knot. He chose a suitable crack above a flake of rock beside the funnel and wedged one end of the belay into it, leaving a couple of feet of tail which he looped around his belt.
Of course by then the flaring burner had blown out in the cold evening breeze. He laboriously relit it. Then he played the flame on the backpack which he had stuffed with non-essential items from both packs. When it was fully alight he threw it over the edge of the chimney and as far away as it would go. However it swung back in the breeze and acrid smoke came pouring up the funnel. Ben was suddenly afraid of charring the ropes on which Carlos was suspended below them.
Cursing himself for not having made sufficient allowance for the wind, he furiously jerked the burning pack to the other side of the chimney. That got it on the downwind side where the smoke was being blown away. All he could do now was hope that someone would catch sight of it and report what they had seen. So he turned off the stove and waited.
For a couple of minutes the flickering flame from the pack steadily increased. Then suddenly it flared up brightly and was gone, leaving only the smoking ends of the webbing. Ben doubted whether it would have been burning long enough for anyone to get a fix on it. It had probably not even been seen by anybody. There was nothing for it but to repeat the operation with the other pack. It wasn’t going to work. He knew it wasn’t. But he had to make the effort.
He set about removing anything which might be useful and packing it into his and Toni’s pockets. He tied a spare sweater around his friend’s neck and wrapped it over his ears and part of his cold face. Then he tied the pack onto the rope. With fumbling fingers he relit the burner.
Toni’s pack was larger and more solidly framed. From the conflagration which had overtaken his own, Ben realised that he must light it near the top and let the fire burn its way down, tying it so that the rope wouldn’t char through before the pack was fully burned.
Once it was alight Ben threw it over the flake of rock on the side of the chimney. But his hands were now getting cold. The action of throwing the pack caused the stove to slip from his nerveless fingers. Dully he watched as it bounced down the chimney and out into the void with flames still issuing from the burner. A few seconds later he thought he heard a clatter as it shattered at the foot of the cliffs far below. And he fancied he saw a sudden glow as the escaping gas ignited with a soft thump.
Despairingly Ben watched the flames from the burning backpack flicker for several minutes and then gradually die away. Now all he could do was sit and wait for morning. With little hope he started to try and rub some warmth into Toni’s frozen body.