Extrait du livre "Prisonnier de l'Annapurna"
Extract from the book “Prisonnier de l'Annapurna".
There is a fabulous sight, which appears every morning after the sun’s rays begin to warm up the mountain at dawn.  It doesn’t last long as menacing, heavy storm clouds regularly appear during the day.
We worry that one of these will block our progression.  We only have a minimum of local weather information.  So it’s our gut feeling and great grandfather’s theories, which influence our thoughts.
I have a hallucinating memory of the evening of the 10th and the night that follows!
Imagine two Lilliputians, lost at 7400 meters, wiping constantly streaming snow off their heads and shoulders, permanently beaten by gusts of wind, repeatedly taking off in their duvets in spite of the étriers which keep them on the rock face like two tied up packets on the luggage carrier of a mad motorbike …
That is also the Himalayas.
Physically we’re not at our best.
During a night and a morning we’ve been digging into our reserves and it isn’t in this trapeze situation that we can put much energy back into our batteries.
Pierre doesn’t know what to think.
Its -15°, the sky is menacing and there are still more than 600 meters of rock face to climb.
This is without counting for the descent, which, allowing for the difficulty of the face will take quite a time. Whatever the itinerary chosen, Annapurna is a mountain, which knows how to play hard to get, but it is especially a summit, which has a very expensive exit ticket.  That started with the retreat endured by the French expedition in 1950, which collapsed in catastrophe, under the menace of avalanches during which not only Herzog and Lacteal, but also Terray and Rébuffat suffered in agony.
There are a great many roped climbs that, in this area have come across the worst agonies or death when on the second part of their venture.
Wedged in his sleeping bag, Pierre is no doubt conscious of this threat.
I’m in two minds, happy to be here even in this situation at such a level.
The summit is quite near, the altitude still doesn’t worry me and, if the cold is biting, it’s no more than in the Alps in the middle of winter.
This bivouac is dreadful, the tingling I feel at the end of my feet scarcely reassures me, but I’ve already been there.
Only the wind bothers me really; I’m fed up with it making such a dreadful row.
The discussion doesn’t drag on: from first light, we break camp and choose to leave …upwards!  We’ll see or rather verify that we are equal to the obstacle.
We know what is waiting for us. It’s a major difficulty: a layer of black schist of fifty to sixty meters of thickness running horizontally the length of the rock.
In the photos it is clearly visible and there again, Chris Bonington specifically mentions it in his report.  And who says schist says “hassle”.
When I leave I have all that on my mind: the cold, streaming snow, the treacherous terrain.  I go up twenty-five meters, perhaps thirty and install a first belay station.
Pierre takes his turn to come up with some difficulty.
Useless to speak: the die is cast.  The sky became darker and darker and the wind, always more ferocious hurls the evidence that continuing is not conceivable.  I don’t know any more: perhaps Pierre whispered, “Let’s get out of here” or was it the way which he rolled up his rope?  His expression was like a sentence.
Useless to ask for wisdom from one’s elders: the situation needs an immediate decision and quickly.
The pitons struggle to go in the rock.  At a really critical place – Pierre is already at the bottom of the rappel – I decide to “double up” a bad piton with one of my two ice axes.
This anchor simply driven into the ice is both reassuring and efficient.
But at the same time I rejoin Pierre, convinced that I’ve chosen the best solution possible, I realize I’ve made a mistake.  A beginner’s blunder.  OK, the belay point is reinforced, the rappel more secure, but all the same it is more sensible to have two ice axes rather than one!
In the minute that follows, I rack my brains as never before.  Is it my lack of experience that has let me down or my blinding state of fatigue?  Proof that I’m not in full possession of my faculties.

The rope broke with a sharp snap: the “friend” had released. Pierre fell without a cry.