Blood and Chrysanthemums Read Online Free Page B

door rang and two young men tumbled in, talking enthusiastically. To Mark’s relief, Steve seemed to know them and before long he was involved in showing them the latest snowboards. Mark sauntered casually back to the other side of the store and looked at the skis.
    Ardeth had a T-shirt draped over her arm and was holding another up contemplatively. Mark shifted sideways a little to see the slogan: “Fear not—you can only die once.”
    “Nice sentiment,” he said and she glanced up sharply, eyes narrower and harder than he remembered. “I’m Mark Frye. We met the other night at the gym.” She seemed to recognize him then and her face relaxed, eyes losing some of their wary look. Her lower lip was distractingly full and red. He tried very hard not to notice. “Words to live by?” He caught the faint ghost of a smile, a quirk of the lips that seemed both amused and bitter.
    “The first part’s a reminder to myself,” she admitted. “And the second part isn’t true.” Then she was sidling by him to the cash register. Steve dragged himself away from the snowboards to take her money and shoot Mark a smirk that suggested he knew exactly what “store inventory” Mark was really interested in.
    Mark managed to feign indifference as Ardeth collected her change, then moved to open the door for her and follow her out. She gave him a brief smile of thanks but didn’t seem inclined to do any more as they approached the street. Say something, say anything, you idiot, a voice inside him wailed. Before she walks away again.
    Then, in a rush of desperate inspiration, it came to him. “I’ve been thinking about your proble. . . . you know, the sun allergy thing.” She paused and looked at him and he could see reluctant curiosity in her gaze. “I’m on a break from work but I’ve got a few minutes. I was just going to get a coffee. Why don’t you come with me and I’ll tell you about it.”
    “All right,” she said after a long moment. “Thanks.”
    Mark breath a small prayer of relief—and a larger one that whatever god protected mountaineers and fools would help him figure out an answer to her problem before their coffee got cold.
    In the end, he was the only one with coffee as they settled into chairs at a corner table. And he had an answer.
    “There are some climbs on the other side of Tunnel Mountain. They’re in shadows by four or five o’clock these days and dark by about seven. You could do most of them by the time it got really dark.” Stirred by sudden enthusiasm, he dug a pen out of his jacket pocket, jumped up to beg a sheet of paper from the bemused cashier and began to sketch the mountain. “This is the southwest corner here and over here’s the southeast.” His pen drew the long lump of the mountain and added a few tiny trees on top. “Here at the southwest are the Gonda routes, Le Soulier and Mark One. The Gonda Roof’s an aid route so you probably wouldn’t want to try that one right off. Over here,” his pen settled on the south-east corner, “is Gooseberry. It faces mostly east so it’ll be in shadows by mid-afternoon. It’s a little more complicated.” The other side of the page filled up with lines and scratches designating ledges and roofs, cracks and corners.
    “How hard are these climbs?” Ardeth asked, leaning over to peer at the growing map.
    “Mostly 5.5 to 5.7.”
    “Which means?”
    “Moderate.”
    “As in moderate chance of killing myself?”
    “As in moderately difficult, with very little chance of killing yourself if you do it properly,” he corrected her with a grin.
    “And that means?”
    “With the right gear. And with someone who knows what they’re doing.”
    “Meaning you?” He looked up from the diagrams to meet her eyes.
    “If you’d like,” he said, then found himself holding his breath waiting for her answer. Her eyes dropped back to the cryptic scratches.
    “Could someone do these by moonlight?” He let out his breath and frowned,