The dark clouds were coming closer.
He looked down, at the tops of the pine trees and the waters of
Big Lake, and he knew that this system would not work. It was taking too long, and he did not dare keep her out on the mountain for another night. He decided to go for broke. Shedding every ounce of unnecessary equipment, and stripping down to his climbing shorts and T-shirt, he strapped her to his back, with her arms dangling down at her sides, her crushed yellow helmet resting on his own shoulder, and started climbing down. Either he would make it to the bottom and carry her out of the forest below, or they would die together, falling out of the sky.
All the way down, he whispered to her. �Now, hang on,� he'd say. �I've just got to find a toehold.� Or �Don't let this worry you, but I think my shoulder is starting to separate again.� Or �What would you say to a nice big steak at the Ponderosa? You're buying.� Her head would loll around his shoulder, and sometimes he could feel her warm breath on his neck, but that was enough�he knew that she was with him, that she was alive, that he would get them out somehow. By late afternoon, the storm clouds had completely filled the sky, but they hadn't burst. There was only a faint mist in the air�its coolness actually felt good�and an occasional drop or two of rain. �Please, God, do me one favor�hold the rain till I get off this damn mountain.�
And God had kept his part of the bargain. Michael had made it across the slope at the foot of Mount Washington and into the shelter of the pine forest before all hell broke loose. Thunder clapped and sheets of rain poured out of the sky. Briefly, he knelt on the wet earth, breathing in the rich scent of the pine needles, letting the rain wash over him. He had used it to wash the grime off Kristin's face, and wet her lips with it. Her eyelids quivered when the droplets fell on them. But otherwise, there was no sign of life.
He tried to pick her up again, but all his limbs were quivering with exhaustion and he could barely move. He didn't care. He pulled Kristin up into his arms and leaned back against the trunk of a tree, his face lifted toward the branches above, and lay there, for how long he never knew. When he stirred again, soaking wet and shivering, it was dark. The rain had stopped, and a full moon was out. He draped Kristin across his back once again, and staggered in the moonlight back toward the Big Lake parking lot, where he'd left his Jeep. When he broke out of the trees�filthy, wet, and bleeding, with an unconscious girl on his back�he saw two young
guys in U. of Washington sweatshirts, unloading a pickup truck. They watched him coming toward them as if he was a Sasquatch. �Help,� he mumbled. �We need help.�
And then, according to the two frat brothers, he had passed out cold.
The moment Darryl had seen the two figures in the ice, he knew it was time for him to step in. Enough of the ice had been cut away� or melted away by Michael's lights�that he could actually see, when he crouched in front of the block, the pommel of a sword at the man's side. Its gold tassel was frozen in an upside-down position.
�You've done great work,� he said again to Betty and Tina, �but let's get this inside my lab now and finish the job.�
Michael had gone for the phone, but Betty and Tina acted as if they wanted to wait for his verdict. �Michael will be back in a few minutes. Let's talk about it then.�
But Darryl was no fool, and he knew what was afoot. Give scientists�even glaciologists, why should they be any different?�a taste of something really extraordinary, and they'll never let go. So much of science was routine lab work, endless experiments, blind tests, statistical breakdowns, that when they found something groundbreaking, something that had come out of nowhere�and that, in addition, had the potential to make some headlines in the outside world�there was a natural reluctance to let go.
He had to work fast, and decisively. He scurried back toward the equipment sheds, where the snowmobiles and Sprytes and augers were kept, and rounded up Franklin and Lawson, who were already privy to the find. He brought them back with an industrial dolly, the ones they normally used to transport drums of diesel fuel, and while Betty complained that Darryl was moving too fast, and Tina fretted about the scientific integrity of the specimens, Darryl had his two recruits throw the tarp back over the substantially diminished ice block, then tip it back onto the dolly. Carting it around the corner, they pushed it up the ramp that led into the safe harbor of the marine biology lab.
�Now what?� Franklin said, looking around at the cluttered space, packed with hissing oxygen tubes, clattering instruments, and tanks filled with alien creatures bathed in lavender light.
�I want it in there,� Darryl said, stepping to the large aquarium tank. Earlier, he had removed the subdividers, emptied out the old water, scrubbed the tank from top to bottom, and refilled it with fresh seawater. It was now one large tub. He'd taken the resident cod out to a hole in the ice and slipped them through. If they were still part of someone else's experiment, then they should have been so labeled. Through the ice cover, he could dimly make them out as they slithered away�along with a darker form, swiftly approaching. No doubt a leopard seal who had suddenly spotted his lunch buffet. Life in the Antarctic was a precarious business.
Franklin moved the dolly to the lip of the tank, and Lawson stepped into the water; wearing his trademark kerchief on his head, he looked a bit like a buccaneer about to wade out to his prize.
�You know the water displacement's gonna wet your floor, right?� Franklin said, and Darryl replied, �That's why we've got the floor drains. Go ahead.�
With Lawson bracing it from inside the pool, and Darryl helping Franklin to tilt it forward gently, the ice block slowly made its way over the rim of the pool, then, as Lawson jumped back, it completed its descent, splashing into the water and sending, as Franklin had predicted, a wave of temperate salt water sloshing onto the floor and over the tops of their boots. As the tarp drifted free, the ice seemed to float and settle for a few minutes, with the two figures lying back to back, before the ripples in the tank subsided and the block became still.
His prize, at last.
Franklin took a long look at it, then said, �I wouldn't want to work in here alone with that.�
Lawson, stepping out of the tank drenched, looked like he felt the same way.
But Darryl wasn't bothered in the slightest. His eyes were riveted on the slab of ice, which now rested, horizontally, in the pool; the seawater rose enough to cover nearly all of it. If his calculations, based on the thickness of the ice and the temperature gradient in the aquarium, were correct�and his calculations generally were� the bodies would float entirely free in just a few days. Cool, but still intact and well composed.
Once Franklin and Lawson had gone, he closed up shop. There wasn't much he could do in there immediately; the most important
thing was to go out and check some of his underwater nets and traps, and see what fresh examples of the antifreeze fish�as the marine biology crowd referred to them�they might yield. You never knew when, or how, the additional specimens might come in handy.
Before leaving, he turned off the overhead fluorescents, but the lab still glowed in the lights from the tank and the aquarium, radiating a pale purple that pervaded the steel-and-concrete space, and only failed to reach into the farthest and darkest corners. He pulled on his coat and gloves and hat�God, it got to be a nuisance after a while, all this dressing and undressing�and opened the door to a blast of freezing wind. Closing it firmly behind him, he tromped down the icy ramp and off toward the shore.
Inside the lab, the various denizens of the tanks, ranged all along the walls and shelves, went on about their quiet, confined, and ultimately doomed lives. The sea spiders stood up on their spindly hind legs and used several others to probe the glass. The worms moved through the water, spooling and unspooling like ivory ribbons. The starfish spread themselves flat, suctioning themselves to the walls of their prison. The big-mouthed, nacreous ice fish swam in endless tight circles. The hoses burbled, the space heaters hummed, the wind howled around the outside of the module.
And the slab of ice in the aquarium slowly, imperceptibly, melted. Little by little, the cool water circulating in the tank eroded the thickness of the ancient ice. Occasionally, there was a crackling sound, as the seawater found a minuscule fissure and rushed to fill it. Tiny, almost invisible striations appeared here and there, like scratches on a mirror. Air bubbles surfaced and popped. The black PVC pipes that brought the freshwater into the tank and removed the same amount of water that had now been cooled by the melting ice kept the temperature at a steady thirty-nine degrees. In a day or two, the ice would become thin enough to see through clearly, thin enough to let in the faint purple glow of the lab � so thin the block might begin to split and crumble.
And then the ice would have to relinquish, however grudgingly, everything it still held captive.
���
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
December 13, 12:10 p.m.
RIDING IN A DOGSLED
was actually much more comfortable than Michael would have imagined. The cargo shell of the sled was a hard, molded polymer plastic, much like a kayak, but you rode a few inches above its bottom, cradled in a sort of hammock. Even when the dogs ran over a rough patch in the ice, or hit a bump, you were cushioned by all the cold-weather gear you had on. The snow and ice whizzed past on either side, as Danzig, standing straight on the runners behind Michael's head, shouted encouragement to the dogs�the last dogs, as Michael had learned from Murphy back at the base, in the entire Antarctic.
�Dogs have been banned,� Murphy'd explained. �They were passing on distemper to the seals. This is the last team still in operation, and the only way we could grandfather them in was by claiming they were part of a long-term study.� He'd rolled his eyes. �You have no idea of the paperwork, but Danzig wouldn't let it go. They're the last dogs at the South Pole, and Danzig's the last of the mushers.�
Even from his less-than-ideal vantage point, Michael could see how perfectly the pack ran together, pulling at the harness, following Kodiak's lead. He was amazed at the speed and the power they could muster. At times, they just seemed a blur of gray-and-white fur, bobbing and heaving like the painted horses on a carousel, and the sled seemed to soar behind them. Even without Danzig's occasional cry of �Haw!� for left, or �Gee!� for right, the dogs knew exactly where they were going�they were heading for the old Norwegian whaling station, about three miles down the coast; Danzig made this their regular exercise run. He had suggested Michael might want to come along��while your Sleeping Beauty melts��to photograph the abandoned outpost. Michael had decided to take him up on the offer. He'd visited the marine biology lab earlier in the day, but there was nothing much new to photograph, and Darryl had assured him it would be another day or two before any big change occurred.
