The voice of Peter Roux’s widow sounded soft and subdued on the other end of the line, but her heartache was loud enough to be heard from her Tennessee home.

Words seemed hard to come by for Ann Roux as she talked about her mountain-climber husband, the man she met her first weekend of college at the University of Maine in Orono. Surprisingly, they had never crossed paths in Lewiston, where they grew up three miles from each other.

“He was my best friend. I couldn’t have asked for a better husband,” the 39-year-old said of her mate of 15 years.

Peter Roux died Friday after being caught up in an avalanche in Huntington Ravine’s O’dell’s Gully. “He was never down. He was just so upbeat about things.”

Nearly 1,500 miles away from Tennessee, in Lewiston, friends and family echoed similar sentiments about the man they lovingly called “Petue” as a child.

“He was just very caring about everybody and everything around him,” Gene Roux said of his nephew and godson. “I didn’t get to see him too often, but I thank God I got to see him Christmas Eve.”

Peter Roux’s body was recovered early Saturday morning after a search organized late Friday night by U.S. Forest Service snow rangers.

Roux had traveled north to New Hampshire following a business trip last week in Ohio and was set to mountain climb with his friend on Saturday.

An avid hiker and climber, he left the Pinkham Notch area alone Friday morning with the intention of climbing O’dell’s Gully in Huntington Ravine and returning later that day.

Concerns surfaced Friday afternoon when he didn’t call. Fear set in by Friday evening when friends and family were unable to reach him on his cell phone.

According to a news release issued by the U.S. Forest Service, snow rangers searched lower elevations on the eastern side of Mount Washington until midnight Friday.

But for family and friends, apprehension tempered by hope collapsed into heartache at 7:15 a.m. Saturday when volunteer teams from Mountain Rescue Service and Androscoggin Valley Search and Rescue discovered Roux’s body 400 feet below the first pitch of the gully, near the base of it in Huntington Ravine.

“We were all hoping they’d find him in a tent with a broken leg,” said Gene Roux.

The U.S. Forest Service investigation reported that while climbing in the gully, slope fracture and failure occurred, causing an avalanche that carried Roux down the slope amid debris.

Roux, 39, was a finance manager with International Paper in Memphis. The 1986 Lewiston High School graduate accepted a position with the company’s Jay operation following his college graduation. His job brought he and his wife first to Pennsylvania and then to Tennessee, where they’ve lived for the past six years.

Now, Ann Roux, a 1986 graduate of St. Dominic’s, returns home to Maine this evening for a homecoming she never expected. Funeral services for Roux will be held locally later this week, and arrangements are being handled by Pinette/Lynch Funeral Home.

Family and friends are still trying to make sense of the weekend tragedy. For his Uncle Gene, it’s the memory of driving around with his nephew as toddler – and the way young Peter Roux practically wanted to sit in his lap and drive – that will carry him through the coming days.

“We never put anything off for retirement,” said Ann Roux, adding that she and her husband traveled extensively and believed in living their lives together to the fullest.

In the end, Ann Roux finds herself holding close to her heart a quote from Abraham Lincoln that Peter’s best friend shared with her – “And in the end, it’s not the years in your life that count. It’s the life in your years.”