Girl in Ice(19)

“Depends on the secret.”

“Wow.” He grinned. “Complicated lady.”

Was he flirting?

“Why don’t you just try me?”

Was I?

“Here’s the deal,” he said over the roar of the motor. “You could learn a lot of important information out here, with that girl. Sensitive stuff. And whatever you learn, you need to share with me and only me. You and I, well, we’ll work out later how we’ll deal with whatever we find out.” He cut the motor, and we slid to a stop on the frozen expanse. In the lull that followed, he flipped up his glasses and turned to look at me, full on. Acne scars, squinting eyes, a raptor-ish focus. It felt intimate and aggressive in the tight space. A steady wind scoured snow pellets off the lake and gunned them at the windshield, rocking the snowcat. I wondered how quickly I would freeze to death if he left me out here. Hours? Minutes? He stuffed another dusty strip of spearmint gum in his mouth, big jaw working. “So, we’re partners, understand?”

“Of course. Sure.” My voice a touch too high.

He sighed and turned back to the ice, mountains and sky doubling in the glasses that rested on his forehead. Perhaps feigning a stretch to get closer, or perhaps he genuinely needed to move in the cramped space, he eased his arm around the back of my seat—never touching me—the fingers of his Polartec glove inches from my shoulder. I half closed my eyes and took in a narrow band of silver-blue lake.

“You’re so much like me, Val. I can feel it.”

“Not sure what you mean.”

“You’re passionate about what you do. You’re beyond curious. You’ve cracked the code on languages no one’s been able to before. You’ve got a rare sort of mind. Your brother was in awe of you. I hope you know that.”

At the mention of Andy, we both quieted a moment.

“He told me everything about you, Val.”

Everything? I shifted the tiniest bit away from him, my right arm pressing against the metal door, cold even through my parka.

“I’m glad he had a mentor like you.” I couldn’t think of anything else to say.

“Look, Val, it’s been a few days with the girl. She seems pretty calm around you, which is a good first step. But what are your thoughts? Do you think you can figure out what she’s saying?”

“I need time alone with her, uninterrupted. A week, or at least a few days.”

“Learn anything yet?”

“Not a word.” Did my face betray my lie? I looked down, examined my gloves.

“We’ve only got a matter of weeks here. It’s the middle of September. We lose an hour of sunlight every couple of days. True night—polar night—is coming. By the end of October, it’s dark twenty-fours a day, for four months. Temps get to sixty below, colder.”

“That happened to my dad once, in Antarctica. He stayed too long.”

Wyatt’s arm stiffened behind me; he removed it and studiously cleaned his glasses with the end of his scarf. “How’s your dad doing? Such a brilliant guy. I still reference his work in my classes.”

His change of tone knocked me off my tenuous balance. I suddenly felt claustrophobic; the air thick and too warm in the close cabin, the stink of spearmint nauseating. “He was fascinated by the story of the girl.”

He snapped his gum. “Thought we agreed we keep quiet about all that.”

Sweat prickled my armpits, dripped down between my breasts. “I left out the part about thawing out alive.”

“You sure, Val?”

“He would never have believed it anyway. He thought coming here would be great for my career.” Above us, dozens of big white birds with black-and-orange beaks circled, shrieking. Scat blotched the windshield. Thankful for the distraction, I said, “What are those birds?”

“Arctic tern. If we were out walking? They’d dive-bomb our heads.”

“Why?”

He peered up at them. “We’re on their turf. Actually, they consider the entire Arctic their turf. They’re just protecting themselves.” He folded his arms. “What’s life like for you back home? Anyone else missing you right now besides your dad?”

I turned to him, his face still too close to mine. “Can you show me where you found the girl now?”

“It’s your party, Val,” he said, starting up the cat. “But I’m telling you, you’re not going to learn a thing.”



* * *



BIT BY BIT, a deep blue line came into focus. It widened into a fissure nearly six feet across, zigzagging across the ice and out of sight. We came within a dozen yards of it before Wyatt turned off the machine. He leaned his forearms on the wheel, as if remembering. Silence filled the space between us like another person.

“How deep is this lake?”

“Could be more than a mile in places. It’s glacial ice. Thousands of years old.”

The sun shone diamond bright on the ice, reflecting sharply in the rearview mirror. Wyatt hooked his rifle over one shoulder, creaked open the door, and hopped out. Bitter cold filled the cabin in seconds.

“Coming?”

The temperature gauge on the control panel read ten below; a brisk breeze snapped at the small American flag on the hood. I willed my gloved hand toward the door, watched it grab the handle, observed myself step out and down. Wyatt hadn’t waited—already he was yards away. Wind came hooting down off the glacier. I cinched my hood tight over my face as I followed him, concentrating on his boots and his boots only as they crunched along in their rocking gait. The ice screeched under my feet; I took small bites of frigid air into my lungs. Eyes still lowered, I walked a bit past him, until the brilliant blue fissure came into view.