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By day the Italians struggled upwards. nailing down a rope-rail that stretched every inch of the way. Nights, they crouched in tents, often with half the canvas hanging over the slope for lack of level ground. K-2 gave no quarter, and after many days of heartbreak, they were driven back down to 25,000 feet. There the expedition reorganized, and Desio sent the fittest to try the assault again.
Victory at the Summit. They scrambled to the ice-ridge at 27,000 feet. At last they reached the top, and planted the flags of Italy and Pakistan on the treacherous summit itself. From Skardu last week came this laconic but triumphant message: "Victory dated July 31. All well. Together at base camp. Professor Desio." Anxious to avoid any repetition of the "who got there first" disagreement between Everest's Hillary and Tenzing, Desio had kept the names of the victors secret.
There would be glory enough for all. Back home in Italy, grave old (80) President Einaudi, immersed in a copy of the Economist, dropped the magazine and leaped out of his chair in glee. "It's like a flower in the buttonhole," glowed Turin's La Stampa. In absentia, Professor Desio, a reserve officer in the Alpini, was promoted from captain to major.
* The surveyors' method of numbering the peaks of the Karakoram range.