A Single Enemy

  A Single

  Enemy

  Nelson R. Capes

  Copyright © 2022 by Nelson R. Capes

  ___________________________________________________________

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or manner, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, without the express written permission of the copyright owner except for the use of brief quotations in a book review or other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  ___________________________________________________________

  Created in the United States of America

  ISBN: Softcover 979-8-88622-159-6

  eBook 979-8-88622-160-2

  Republished by: PageTurner Press and Media LLC

  Publication Date: 03/25/2022

  ___________________________________________________________

  To order copies of this book, contact:

  PageTurner Press and Media

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  Contents

  Prologue v

  Chapter 1 1

  Chapter 2 7

  Chapter 3 22

  Chapter 4 38

  Chapter 5 48

  Chapter 6 60

  Chapter 7 74

  Chapter 8 88

  Chapter 9 103

  Chapter 10 119

  Chapter 11 138

  Chapter 12 152

  Chapter 13 169

  Chapter 14 182

  Chapter 15 198

  Chapter 16 210

  Chapter 17 227

  Chapter 18 237

  Chapter 19 253

  Chapter 20 265

  Chapter 21 280

  Epilogue 293

  Author’s Note 297

  Prologue

  August 1966

  Believe me, a thousand friends

  Suffice thee not;

  In a single enemy thou hast more

  Than enough.

  Ali Ibn-Abi-Talib c. 600-661

  Franklin Pierce Adams, F.P.A. Book of Quotations, 1952

  The first enemy was the mountain. But not the whole mountain, not initially. Just an infinitesimal mountain fragment-the merest fraction of the huge mass of the mountain-a pebble. Yet that small pebble, falling into the still, deep waters of unborn events, produced ripples that forever changed the lives of a man, and a woman.

  The pebble was a small piece of granite about half an inch in diameter. Over the course of eons, the granite face that was the pebble’s parent had gradually become exposed by the forces of wind, rain, snow, and ice. In late summer, the pebble lay exposed to the elements on a small shelf about 50 feet below the summit. It was a mere pawn in the mountain’s war against climbers.

  The mountain lay on the Swiss-Italian border about ten kilometers from the tiny alpine village of Zermatt. At 4165 meters, the mountain was neither the tallest nor the most magnificent of the Alps. It had been climbed many times over the last fifty years and was considered a relatively easy summit. Because of this, it exerted a fatal attraction for newly minted mountaineers. In the past fifty years, it had killed 25 people.

  Bill and John Brixton were just such mountaineers. Bill, a college senior, had been climbing for three years and John for one year. Bill had done some “big walls” in Yosemite National Park, but he longed for the chance to do a real alpine climb. Against his better judgment, he took his younger brother John to Switzerland with him, as a climbing companion. Despite his limited experience and fear of the vertical, John adored Bill and would follow him anywhere, and had insisted on going with him to climb the mountain. Bill knew the mountain was unfriendly, so he carefully prepared his assault on the mountain’s stronghold. But he did not know about the pebble.

  ___________

  At 4 am on August 20, Bill and John, using headlamps, started up the slopes of scree and talus, chunks of stone chipped off the mountain by weathering and deposited at the foot of the mountain. They walked carefully, even in these relatively safe areas, because a small slip while hiking alone this far from help could be dangerous.

  About 6 am, as the sun rose, they reached the sheer cliffs of the mountain itself. They now put on their climbing harnesses, tightening the web straps securely about their waists and between their legs. In the event of a fall, the harness would tighten quickly, but would exert pressure against their waists, rather than against their chests. Earlier climbers had strangled dangling from a mountain when they were secured by chest harnesses. Bill, who was to lead the climb, now tied a climbing rope to his harness. He intended to climb “free”, using only natural footholds and handholds, until he reached a crack where he could pound in a piton. Then he would clip the climbing rope through a carabiner secured to the piton, and John would belay him from below.

  As Bill started climbing, the pebble was frozen solidly into the high shelf. It had withstood many courses of freezing and thawing during its time on the mountain. Today was to be different.

  The sun rose and began its relentless daily assault on the mountain. By 9 am, the sun had melted the pebble free. It lay there - an innocent, unsuspecting enemy - not knowing of the upcoming battle.

  About the time the pebble melted, they were halfway up a near-vertical Grade V pitch. As he ascended, Bill belayed himself at the most difficult points by hammering pitons into cracks in the face or jamming rocks in larger cracks, behind which he could thread his climbing rope. He carried a number of such rocks of various sizes in his rucksack. He was making good progress. He looked down between his legs at his brother and at the vertical half-mile of dark gray rock. Far below, he saw his car - a toy in a giant’s playpen.

  As the day grew warmer, Bill began to be peppered by small pebbles whizzing down the face. The sun was beginning to loosen these little missiles from their frozen overnight perches, and they began to slide. But Bill was not yet worried. He knew that the larger rocks would still be frozen solidly to the side of the mountain. He climbed on.

  Around 10 o’clock, rising air currents from solar warming began to gently rock the pebble. As the wind grew, the pebble was pushed closer to the edge of the shelf. It still awaited its destiny.

  Meanwhile, the brothers had made it about three-quarters of the way up the face. They began to hear the rattle of golf ball-sized rocks bouncing their way down the mountain. It was time to put on the helmets. They unhooked them from their rucksacks and fastened them on their heads with the chinstraps.

  Now John was getting very nervous. The sheer vertical pitch of the face and the constant bombardment by rocks terrified him. He wished that he had never begged Bill to take him along, and he pleaded with Bill to turn back. Bill thought this might be the time to cure John’s nervousness, and besides, he knew he had the situation well in hand. To Bill, life without risk was not worth a candle. Ignoring John’s pleas, he kept climbing.

  The rising wind pushed the pebble again, and finally the force of air overcame friction - the pebble fell off the shelf. Falling about 20 feet, it impacted on a one-inch rock that was lying on a 60-degree icefield. The rock came loose and began to bounce down the mountain. The pebble, its role over, settled into a gully. The golf ball-sized rock continued down.

  Just then, Bill reached a section of the face that had a fixed rope strung upwardly over the last hundred feet. He didn’t want to trust the fixed rope, not knowing how long it had been there. But this section of the face was smooth, without any cracks to drive p
itons. Reluctantly, Bill clipped his climbing slings and ascenders to the fixed rope and put all his weight on it. He climbed on.

  The golf ball sized rock fell about 50 feet and hit a fist-sized piece of sharp granite, which had been fractured out of the face by weathering and had a hard knife-edge along one side. The golf ball loosened, but did not dislodge, the sharp piece.

  Bill was nearing the end of the fixed rope. His brother was also entirely supported by the rope, about 50 feet below him. Bill now saw that the fixed rope came out over a shelf, so that the rope lay flat against the edge of the shelf. He remembered what had happened to John Harlin, a climber on the Eiger, just months earlier in such a situation. A fixed rope had been abraded by the constant weight of climbers forcing it against the edge of the shelf, and as Harlin had reached the shelf, the fixed rope had broken, plunging the climber to his death 5000 feet below. Bill looked around and saw a tiny crack about 18 inches away from the fixed rope. He quickly pounded a piton into the crack and clipped a carabiner through the piton’s ring, then clipped the climbing rope into the carabiner.

  Meanwhile, John continued his ascent up the fixed rope. He could find no places to pound in pitons, but he knew that Bill was secured to the mountain face and that he, John, was also linked to Bill by the long climbing rope. He was terrified of the exposure and the constant fall of rock, but he had complete confidence in his big brother.

  The sharp piece, loosened by the sun, finally came off the face and accelerated down the icefield. Reaching about 40 mph, it shot out over the edge of the icefield and dropped towards Bill.

  Seconds after Bill tied himself to the piton, the sharp-edged rock struck the fixed rope as the rope crossed the edge of the shelf and severed it cleanly. The brothers fell toward the valley, but the climbing rope caught them after only a short fall.

  The mountain cursed. But it did not give up.

  Now Bill was dangling from the face, with John suspended fifty feet below him. The brothers slowly pendulumed back and forth across the face in a short arc.

  At the extreme left of the arc, Bill could see a small rock shelf about twenty-five feet below him. He knew that he had to get to a secure stance where he could belay his brother: the piton would not take all this weight much longer. But how to do it, with John swinging below him?

  The answer seemed simple. Bill looped a short length of line through the carabiner and attached this rope to his harness. He then disconnected from the main climbing rope. Now he was secured to the piton independently of his brother. He then spliced a third length of line to the climbing rope, so that he could pull it toward him once he reached the shelf. Using the short piece of line attached to the carabiner, he lowered himself down to a point opposite the shelf and traversed across the face to the shelf.

  Once on the shelf, he searched for a crack to pound in a piton, but there weren’t any. Bill knew he had to act fast. He pulled the climbing rope, from which John hung, toward him, using the third line, and wrapped the climbing rope around him. He got enough line in to set up a partial hip belay, but John’s weight on the rope prevented him from getting enough rope wrapped around his shoulders to fully support his brother’s weight. If only there had been a crack near the shelf! Bill shouted to John “On belay. Climb up here as fast as you can!” Bill knew the piton would not hold much longer.

  The piton holding John’s climbing rope pulled out of the crack.

  John fell twenty-five feet from the point where the piton had been and his 170 pounds of weight on the climbing rope came forcefully and rapidly against Bill’s shoulder belay. The rope ripped through his shirt and burned his shoulders. Bill exerted every ounce of strength in his body, but he couldn’t hold his brother under the devastating impact. As he tried to hold John, he was pulled forward toward the abyss, with no piton to hold him. The survival instinct prevailed – he let go of the safety line. Screaming and flailing his arms and tumbling head over heels, John fell toward the valley.

  Bill screamed, “John, John, oh Johnny, no!” As his beloved younger brother disappeared down the face, he fainted and fell face down on the shelf.

  The mountain, Bill’s first but not last enemy, chuckled then slumbered.

  Chapter 1

  Day 1: September 16, 1968. Da Nang, South Vietnam.

  Bill Brixton woke slowly from an alcohol-induced slumber. As mosquitoes buzzed around his netting, he opened one eye, then the other. Overhead, he heard the whap-whap of rotor blades. Memories of the night before drifted back into his consciousness. An evening of carousing with his Marine buddies had led, inevitably, to the usual unsatisfactory bump-and-grind with a tiny Asian girl.

  As he came up through layers of sleep, memories of that fateful morning on the mountain also flooded back, drowning out any vestige of lust remaining from the night before. He groaned, and the anger came back, along with the guilt. He remembered the past two years...

  __________

  After his brother’s fatal fall, Brixton had lain for hours on the tiny shelf, overcome with grief. He had replayed the last moments of the encounter with the rock over and over - could he have done anything else? He didn’t think so, but he knew he should have turned back when John had pleaded with him to do so.

  Finally, he had known that he had to do something, or join John wherever he was now. And that would completely break their mother’s heart.

  So, reluctantly, he had gotten out the flare pistol and loaded it with a high-intensity magnesium flare. Sooner or later someone would come looking for them.

  Several hours had passed with no sign of help. The mountain, its vengeance complete, slept quietly. Then, just as he had prepared to spend a cold, lonely night on the mountain, a helicopter had flown by the face. Brixton had fired the flare and the helicopter hovered above his little roost. Even in his grief and shock, Brixton had been amazed at the pilot’s skill, as he kept the little craft exactly over the perch, despite the constant buffeting by air currents. Using a bullhorn, the pilot had told him that help was on the way and had lowered a winter-weight sleeping bag, food, and water.

  After a cold, but safe, night alone on the mountain, Brixton had had some food. Then, about 10 am, he had heard a “haloo” echo up and down the face. Looking down, he saw a team of climbers working their way toward his perch. He was saved.

  They had found John’s body that day in the scree and talus slopes that the brothers had climbed over the day before. He had been almost unrecognizable from the battering he had taken as he had caromed off pitch after pitch down the face.

  Bill had at his family’s wish, left John’s body with a mortician, to be buried in the nearby town of Zermatt. At the memorial service back in Minnesota, Bill had thought he could not live with the guilt and grief.

  He was wrong.

  After John’s death, nothing had seemed to be the same anymore for Bill. Formerly a cheerful, outgoing person, he had retreated into a shell of hurt. His friends had tried to help, but they could not reach him. His teachers had tried to find a way to get their former “A” student back on track, but Bill just didn’t care.

  Bill’s mother, devastated by John’s death, had tried to make Bill into the protected son that John had been. His father had died when he was five.

  Bill’s girl friend, Angie, had thought a stranger had returned from Switzerland. Where was the warm, loving, optimistic guy who had talked so much about climbing and who couldn’t wait to go to Switzerland? He had been replaced by a changeling who moped around the hallways at school and scowled constantly. Their relationship steadily deteriorated, as Bill didn’t call her for weeks. It broke her heart to see him like this, but there was just no way to penetrate that cold shell. Finally, another guy had asked her out, and, reluctantly, she had agreed to a date. Over the next months, she had lost herself in the new relationship, although she would forever remember Bill.

  Looking for some outlet for his anger and self
-loathing, Bill had taken up karate. He would spend hours pounding his fists against a punching bag or slamming his knuckles into a board to toughen them. He applied himself to the kata or forms with a dedication that his sensei had rarely seen. He quickly progressed through the ranks, and within a year he had gotten a black belt.

  But Bill had needed still more outlets for his self-hate. He had taken flying lessons, and in an incredibly short time his high intelligence and lack of fear had made him ready to solo. In post-solo training, he had loved to do stall series, where he had pulled back the nose of the little Cessna until the stall warning horn came on and the nose dropped like a rock. Occasionally, to make it more dangerous, he would kick in left rudder just as the stall occurred, resulting in a spin. As the checkerboard fields north of the Twin Cities had pinwheeled below him, he had peeled back his lips in a death’s-head grin and had shouted expletives at the uncaring sky.

  As graduation day approached, Bill had not been able to think about having the professional career that his parents had expected. One day, he had passed the Marine Corps Recruiting Office and walked in the door. He had walked out an hour later as an enlisted man.

  In boot camp, he had been a model recruit. He had obeyed orders without question and his shoes were so well shined he could use them for a shaving mirror. There had been only one area that caused his instructors concern: in hand-to-hand combat, there were no half-measures for Brixton. He had seemed to be without any fear at all. The drill instructors had known that a man without fear was a danger not only to himself, but also to his fellow soldiers. Furthermore, his earlier training in karate, combined with the deadly tricks, which the hand-to-hand combat instructors had to offer, turned him into a killing machine of frightening ability.

  His intelligence and his natural flying ability had also impressed the instructors, and they had recommended him for Officer Candidate School (OCS). The big green machine in Vietnam had badly needed officers who could fly, because the air war was growing very hot. He had graduated from OCS at the top of his class. He had had a few drinking buddies, but no close friends. Whenever someone had had a few too many drinks and started a mock fight with Brixton, they had quickly found themselves on the floor looking up at a steely countenance with eyes as hard as flint.