When the sky clears, Paul chooses to remain behind, but tells Carla that she must continue in order to vanquish the demons of her father's death. The group is snow and fogbound, however, and Paul is dazed and drunk. The next morning, Martin, disturbed by Hein's fascistic selfishness, tells Carla that he has decided to climb to the top. Hein argues with Carla about Paul, stating that he would rather go on alone than be saddled with a weakling. Exhausted by the day's climb, Paul starts to drink and announces he is quitting. After Andreas finally returns, he, Carla and Martin brave a blizzard to catch up to Hein and Paul.

Once alone with Carla, Martin confesses his love and proposes, but Carla turns him down. Andreas insists on accompanying Nicholas for part of the way down, but Hein, who compares mountain climbing to war, refuses to wait for the guide and pushes on with Paul. Despite protests from Carla, who feels strongly that the group should remain together, Nicholas announces that he is turning back. While trying to climb the same difficult stretch, Nicholas almost falls, but is saved by Hein. Hein then dismisses Andreas' declaration that they have come to an impasse in the rock face and forges ahead to the next level. Soon after starting the climb, Paul and the middle-aged Nicholas stop briefly for a rest and are criticized by Hein. Just before the group is to depart, Martin observes Carla praying fervently at her father's gravesite and, moved by the intensity of her devotion, decides to accompany her for part of the trip. That night, Paul tells his beautiful but disapproving wife Astrid that he is making the climb in order to 'come alive again,' but she makes no effort to understand him. At Martin's urging, Carla puts aside her anti-Nazi sentiments and also asks Hein, a hearty young German, to go. Carla then asks English naturalist Nicholas Radcliffe, another old friend, and Paul Delambre, an alcoholic French author who has been writing a novel about the Tower, to join the group, and they both gladly accept. Despite his attraction to Carla, Martin, a former bomber pilot who has been drifting since the war, declines the invitation, stating that he has no reason to go. Carla, whose father, a world-renowned mountaineer, died while trying to reach the top of the infamous Tower, asks American Martin Ordway to make the climb. Although Carla's dear friend Andreas, a veteran mountain guide, warns her that none of the local guides wants to join her party because of what happened to her and her father years before on the Tower, Carla is undaunted. In a Swiss Alpine village, mountain climber Carla Alten, who has just arrived from Italy, organizes a climbing party, intending to scale the nearby 'White Tower' peak.

The white tower (film)