The following day I made a lot more height. The “trail” began to narrow, and it ran out in places, but it was easy to reach for the sky until another one occurred. So far, it had all been good rock. It was still tapering as it heightened, and balance was no problem. I did a lot of plain old walking. I ran up one long zigzag and hit it up a wide chimney almost as fast as Santa Claus comes down one. The winds were strong, could be a problem if the going got difficult. I was on the respirator full time and feeling great. I could see for an enormous distance now. There were mountains and mountains, all below me like desert dunes. The sun beat halos of heat about their peaks. In the east, I saw Lake Emerick, dark and shiny as the toe of a boot. I wound my way about a jutting crag and came upon a giant’s staircase, going up for at least a thousand feet. I mounted it. At its top I hit my first real barrier: a fairly smooth, almost perpendicular face rising for about eight-five feet. No way around it, so I went up. It took me a good hour, and there was a ridge at the top leading to more easy climbing. By then, though, the clouds attacked me. Even though the going was easy, I was slowed by the fog. I wanted to outclimb it and still have some daylight left, so I decided to postpone eating. But the clouds kept coming. I made another thousand feet, and they were still about me. Somewhere below me, I heard thunder. The fog was easy on my eyes, though, so I kept pushing. Then I tried a chimney, the top of which I could barely discern, because it looked a lot shorter than a jagged crescent to its left. This was a mistake. The rate of condensation was greater than I’d guessed. The walls were slippery. I’m stubborn, though, and I fought with skidding boots and moist back until I was about a third of the way up, I thought, and winded. I realized then what I had done. What I had thought was the top wasn’t. I went another fifteen feet and wished I hadn’t. The fog began to boil about me, and I suddenly felt drenched. I was afraid to go down and I was afraid to go up, and I couldn’t stay where I was forever. Whenever you hear a person say that he inched along, do not accuse him of a fuzzy choice of verbs. Give him the benefit of the doubt and your sympathy. I inched my way, blind, up an unknown length of slippery chimney. If my hair hadn’t already been white when I entered at the bottom…. Finally, I got above the fog. Finally, I saw a piece of that bright and nasty sky, which I decided to forgive for the moment. I aimed at it, arrived on target. When I emerged, I saw a little ledge about ten feet above me. I climbed to it and stretched out. My muscles were a bit shaky, and I made them go liquid. I took a drink of water, ate a couple of chocolate bars, took another drink. After perhaps ten minutes, I stood up. I could no longer see the ground. Just the soft, white, cottony top of a kindly old storm. I looked up. It was amazing. She was still topless. And save for a couple spots, such as the last–which had been the fault of my own stupid overconfidence–it had almost been as easy as climbing stairs. Now the going appeared to be somewhat rougher, however. This was what I had really come to test. I swung my pick and continued.
All the following day I climbed, steadily, taking no unnecessary risks, resting periodically, drawing maps, taking wide-angle photos. The ascent eased in two spots that afternoon, and I made a quick seven thousand feet. Higher now than Everest, and still going, I. Now, though, there were places where I crawled and places where I used my ropes, and there were places where I braced myself and used my pneumatic pistol to blast a toehold. (No, in case you’re wondering: I could have broken my eardrums, some ribs, and arm and doubtless ultimately, my neck, if I’d tried using the gun in the chimney.) Just near sunset, I came upon a high, easy winding way up and up and up. I debated with my more discreet self. I’d left the message that I’d be gone a week. This was the end of the third day. I wanted to make as much height as possible and start back down on the fifth day. If I followed the rocky route above me as far as it would take me I’d probably break forty thousand feet. Then, depending, I might have a halfway chance of hitting near the ten-mile mark before I had to turn back. Then I’d be able to get a much better picture of what lay above. My more discreet self lost, three to nothing, and Mad Jack went on. The stars were so big and blazing I was afraid they’d bite. The wind was no problem. There wasn’t any at that height. I had to keep stepping up the temperature controls on my suit, and I had the feeling that if I could spit around my respirator, it would freeze before it hit the trail. I went on even further than I’d intended, and I broke forty-two thousand that night. I found a resting place, stretched out, killed my hand beacon. It was an odd dream that came to me. It was all cherry fires and stood like a man, only bigger, on the slope above me. It stood in an impossible position, so I knew I had to be dreaming. Something from the other end of my life stirred, however, and I was convinced for a bitter moment that it was the Angel of Judgment. Only, in its right hand it seemed to hold a sword of fires rather than a trumpet. It had been standing there forever, the tip of its blade pointed toward my breast. I could see the stars through it. It seemed to speak. It said: “_Go back_.” I couldn’t answer it, though, for my tongue clove to the roof of my mouth. And it said it again, and yet a third time, “_Go back_.” “Tomorrow,” I thought, in my dream, and this seemed to satisfy it. for it died down and ceased, and the blackness rolled about me.