Pandora's curse m-4

by Jack Du Brul

  “What are you now, a cop or something?”

  “No. I just don’t hide behind my father while people are dying around me.” The fury in Mercer’s eyes made Marty look away guiltily. It wasn’t Bishop he was particularly angry with. In other circumstances he would agree with him. But this situation had Mercer on edge and anxious. Marty was just a convenient target to vent some of his bottled emotions. “You don’t want to come back, that’s fine. I am.”

  “I’m with you,” Ira said, directing a long look at Marty.

  He was silent for just a few seconds, but the change in him was profound. Mercer had hit his most vulnerable spot — his fear that he couldn’t live up to his father. The accusation stung. For his entire life, Marty Bishop had argued that he didn’t mind being under his father’s shadow, and he would have shrugged off Mercer’s comment. But for the first time he was prepared to face it and himself. Here was a chance to go beyond what was expected of him, and he wanted to take it. Shoulders squared, he met Mercer’s gaze and nodded.

  “Looks like we’re both with you,” Ira remarked. Having shepherded many young recruits onto the path of responsibility, he poured a congratulatory dram from his flask into Marty’s coffee. That Bishop was learning this lesson at fifty and not twenty was fine — many people never learned it at all.

  “Thanks.” Before they returned from Iceland, Mercer would tell Marty about everything — Elisebet Rosmunder’s warning, the radioactivity in Jack Delaney’s body, the stowaway on the chopper, and his own misgivings concerning Igor Bulgarin. He wouldn’t blame Marty if he recanted his decision to return to the base.

  The front door blew open, and a bundled shape was propelled into the mess hall. It was Anika Klein. She shook snow off her parka and danced from foot to foot to remove her moon boots. After slipping on a pair of sneakers and filling a coffee cup at the urn, she came over to the table. “Looks like I came at a bad time.”

  “We’re being kicked out of here,” Marty said.

  She glanced at Mercer. “Because of the fire?”

  He nodded. “You’re leaving too, along with Erwin and the others with him.”

  “What? Why?” Her dark eyes went from sympathy to anger in an instant. “The fire has nothing to do with my work. They can’t make me leave. I paid Geo-Research nearly ten thousand dollars for my part of the expedition. I’m not going anywhere. Whose idea is this?”

  “Greta claims it’s by order of the Danish government.”

  “Is the radio working again?” she asked quickly.

  “Not anymore.”

  The communication gear in the corner of the mess had been abandoned. Geo-Research hadn’t posted an operator to listen if the constant static that had assailed them for days would lift. They had even locked the cabinet to prevent unauthorized use of the equipment. As Mercer studied the stack of electronics in the Plexiglas case, it occurred to him that only Geo-Research personnel had been around when any messages had come through. His jaw hardened.

  “Ira, where’s the closest Sno-Cat?”

  “The one I used to save you is parked between here and the main lab. All the others are out on overnight survey for Werner’s people.”

  “Be right back.” Mercer stood and left the mess, donning his parka but not bothering with the cumbersome moon boots. His work boots would do for the thirty-yard walk.

  He returned in a few minutes, carrying a pair of heavy bolt cutters from the Sno-Cat, strode right to the radio cabinet, and snipped the lock as though it were tissue paper.

  “What the hell are you doing?”

  “It just occurred to me that the radio only works when none of us are here. Could be a coincidence or maybe not.” He sat at the operator’s station and flicked on the main power switch. The set was state-of-the-art and came to life instantly.

  One of the technicians who’d been on the DC-3 flight came over and grabbed Mercer’s shoulder. “You cannot do this.”

  Mercer smiled disarmingly. “Won’t be a minute, I promise.”

  “Nein. It is not permitted.”

  The radio returned nothing but white noise. Anika came over and said something in German to the irate lab worker. A shouting match quickly developed. Mercer used her distraction to begin scanning frequencies. He had a minute at most, and every time the SCAN function paused at a frequency, static burst from the speakers. The Geo-Research technician saw and heard what Mercer was attempting and reached over to kill the power. He called to one of his own people. Mercer heard his name and that of Greta Schmidt. The other worker threw on his coat and raced for the door.

  “I was done,” Mercer said, pushing back from the radio. “You didn’t need to send for your den mother.”

  Something about this crop of Germans had bothered him from the time they stepped off the plane, and now he saw what it was. As scientists went, the man standing over him had to be the toughest he’d ever seen. Polar research was a hard field, but this guy looked more like a soldier than a lab rat. He was beardless, and his brown hair wasn’t much longer than a military buzz cut. He had wide shoulders, a deep chest, and a rather dim expression. He scowled down at Mercer as if inviting a physical confrontation. After a moment, the German spat a curse and walked away.

  Mercer turned to Anika. “I assume he just insulted my manliness.”

  “Yours and a few past generations’ also.”

  “In case her walk back here hasn’t cooled her off, I’m going to my room before the Abominable Greta comes storming in.”

  “I think we should all call it a night,” Ira agreed.

  Their dormitory was on the opposite side of the mess hall from the one the senior Geo-Research people used, so they didn’t run into her. Mercer asked Ira to tell Erwin Puhl about the evacuation and walked down the building’s central hallway to his room. Once he’d decided he needed sleep, his exhaustion nearly overwhelmed him. His stamina had held him together through Anika’s autopsies, the fire, and the escape but he was at his limit.

  For whatever reason, Geo-Research didn’t want anyone at their base and they were playing their final hand by forcing the two teams thrust on them to leave Greenland. Mercer was determined to learn why. He harbored the suspicion that this evacuation had nothing to do with the Danes. He wasn’t convinced that his failure to pick up any broadcasts meant the radio was being blocked by atmospherics. It could have been altered somehow to stop others from reaching the outside world. He was impotent until they reached Reykjavik.

  There were no locks on the dorm room doors, so he pushed against his and crossed the threshold. He stopped dead. While not exactly torn apart, his quarters had been thoroughly searched. His bed had been stripped and the mattress pushed off its frame. The contents of his luggage lay strewn around the space. The Geiger counter was left on the single plastic chair as if the searcher had studied it before leaving.

  Stunned, Mercer knew there was no way this was random. The vandals had been looking for something specific and he was sure they hadn’t found it. From a compartment in his wallet he removed the folded piece of paper he’d recovered from Jack Delaney. It was a map of sorts with accurate lines of longitude and latitude. In the center was a pencil drawing of the crashed C-97 and off to the left was another drawing of what appeared to be Camp Decade as it had been fifty years ago with a number of chimneys and air vents poking from the snow.

  On the right side of the map was an X with a drawing of a man’s hook-nosed profile above it. The distance from the mysterious mark to the plane was given as twenty-eight kilometers in a direct magnetic heading of 187 degrees. If the map was done to any sort of scale, Delaney had walked nearly three hundred kilometers from the plane to Camp Decade on the same azimuth, an amazing feat of endurance. The only other item Mercer had that could interest anyone was the bundle of papers forwarded to him by Harry White, which he also carried in the inside cargo pocket of his parka. Because they were written in German, the only thing Mercer had managed to decipher from the pages was their authorship by a man name
d Otto Schroeder.

  His first thought — that someone from Geo-Research had rifled his room — dissolved as soon as it came to him. The undeniable fact was that Anika Klein was the only person who’d shown any interest in the bundle of papers. She was also the only one, other than him, to know about the scrap of paper, even if she hadn’t yet learned it was a map.

  “Ira?” Mercer shouted down the hall.

  “Yeah.”

  “Can you come over here?”

  “What’s up? Did the vodka fairy visit and leave you a present?”

  “Just pop over and bring Erwin.”

  “Coming, dear.” Ira appeared at Mercer’s side and peered into the ruin that was his room. “I like what you’ve done with the place.”

  “Wish I could say I did it myself, but this was someone else’s decorating job.” Mercer turned to Puhl. “How are you doing, Erwin?”

  “Oh, ah, fine,” Puhl mumbled. He looked terrible. What little hair he had was awry, and his glasses hadn’t been cleaned in a while. His breath reeked of stale alcohol. “What happened here?”

  “I was hoping you could tell me,” Mercer said gently, recognizing how fragile the meteorologist appeared. His grief over Igor Bulgarin’s death had deepened. “You’ve been here for most the night. Did you hear or see anyone enter my room?”

  Looking like he was about to lie, Puhl thought better of it. “I’ve been in the bathroom for a while,” he admitted. “I got drunk a while ago and wanted to sober up. I think I used everyone’s hot-water ration.”

  “That’s fine,” Mercer soothed. “You didn’t hear anyone over the sound of the shower?”

  “I don’t think so. I don’t remember. I fell asleep for a while.” Erwin looked down miserably, ashamed. “Actually, I passed out.”

  “Don’t worry about it.” Mercer smiled, touching the scientist on the arm. “Why don’t you go pack for tomorrow? I’ll give you a hand in a minute.”

  “Poor guy is reeling,” Ira said after Erwin returned to his room. “When I went in to tell him we’re being booted he just sat there staring at his Bible. I never saw him and Igor as being that close.”

  “There’s no proper way to mourn,” Mercer stated.

  “I get the impression you’ve been there a few times yourself.”

  “Yeah.”

  A silence hung for a second.

  “Since it wasn’t the vodka fairy making a delivery, any other suspects?”

  Mercer gave a quick laugh, thankful that Ira had broken the black mood coming over him. “My list includes our arsonist/murderer but I’m betting on the lovely, though enigmatic, Dr. Klein.”

  “What about the stowaway from her chopper?”

  “I don’t believe there was a stowaway after all.”

  “So who left those footprints at the crash site?”

  “I think Anika did when she went to bury something out there. I’m guessing some mail that was actually addressed to me.” Mercer held up the envelope that Harry had sent with the joke name on it. “She missed this one because I’ve got a friend who fancies himself a comedian.”

  Ira was quiet as he absorbed this. “If you’re right, what does that mean about the rest of her actions here? I mean, if she steals your mail and ransacks your room, lying about Igor being murdered would be a much gentler crime.”

  Mercer looked down the hall to make sure Erwin was still out of earshot. The last thing he needed in his brittle state was to learn the truth about Bulgarin. “I don’t know. Should be an interesting conversation on the plane back to Iceland though.”

  Ira chuckled. “If you think you can talk on a DC-3 it’s obvious you’ve never been on one. Those things are louder than hell, and that’s before you get airborne.”

  Mercer turned serious. “I want to thank you for backing me in the mess hall and for everything else you’ve done so far. You’ve had no reason to trust me and yet you have.”

  Lasko looked abashed. “Don’t sweat it. Twenty years in the Navy trained me to follow an officer’s orders.”

  “But I’ve never been an officer,” Mercer pointed out.

  “Which means,” Ira said, “you actually know what you’re talking about.”

  “Thanks.” Mercer guessed that receiving a compliment from Ira Lasko had the same odds as winning a lottery. “What about you? What was your rank when you got out?”

  “Nothing but a lowly chief,” the submariner dismissed. “Clean up your room. I’ll give Erwin a hand pulling himself back together and find the two other guys from his team who’re getting the heave-ho.” Ira turned to go, then paused at the door. “Mercer?”

  “Yeah?”

  “You have any idea what’s going on here? Honestly?”

  Mercer didn’t need to think about his answer. “No clue.”

  Roaring in from the east, the antique DC-3 Dakota shattered the peace of the morning. The weather had cleared for the first time in days. The sky was nearly cloudless and the wind was a negligible caress. According to the experts, the calm wouldn’t last for more than an hour or so.

  It was barely eight, which meant the pilot must have left Iceland before dawn to reach the base so early. Those leaving for Reykjavik were assembled in the mess hall and had a view of the makeshift landing strip. Werner had had a crew out at first light to plow aside the drifts of snow that had accumulated overnight. No one from Geo-Research was waiting with the evacuees. It was as if they had already left.

  “Our chariot awaits,” Ira said, trying to make light of the situation, but the attempt fell flat.

  “I hate leaving so much gear behind,” Marty complained for the tenth time.

  Werner had spoken with him that morning about the need to load the plane quickly and assured him that once they had a proper weather window the plane would return all Surveyor’s Society equipment to Iceland. Koenig had said the delay wouldn’t be more than a day or two and Geo-Research would pay any additional fees incurred by the arrangement.

  “We’ll be back by noon tomorrow,” Mercer said.

  “If we’re not,” Anika Klein chimed in, “I’m suing Geo-Research for my money.”

  “We all are,” Marty agreed. His father’s investment was twenty times hers.

  Ingrid approached the crowded table, not sure how to greet Marty outside her bedroom. “Guten Morgen.”

  “Morning,” Marty boomed, adding a significant look. “You all packed up and ready to go?”

  “Ja. Hilda und I are ready but neither is happy.”

  “Welcome to the club. We were just deciding the lawsuits.”

  “But it is Danes who said we have to leave, not Geo-Research. Hilda heard radio earlier this morning when Greta Schmidt spoke with office in Reykjavik.”

  “You heard them?” Mercer asked, leaning forward intently. He directed his gaze at Hilda Brandt, whom he saw standing a little behind the younger, slimmer cook. She blushed.

  “Ja.” Ingrid answered for her friend. “She heard her speaking to a Danish official from their embassy in Iceland. It sounded like Danes want entire facility shut down for good.”

  Mercer’s immediate reaction was to think the conversation had been faked. Greta could have easily been speaking to one of her own people pretending to be a Danish diplomat, staging the conversation so Hilda would overhear. It would help convince the Society’s team that she was innocent of ordering their removal from Greenland. And then he thought he was being paranoid.

  “Even if the evac order is legit,” he said at last, “I’m still going to fight it when we get to Iceland.”

  Anika was at the window for a better look at the landing. “The plane’s down and I can see Werner motioning to us.”

  “Then I guess this is it.” Mercer got to his feet and everyone followed.

  Their luggage had already been ferried to the landing strip, so they trooped out like a defeated army, trudging through newly fallen snow in the worn paths. Even at low idle, the sound from the plane’s engines was deafening. A blizzard of ice particles b
lew around the spinning props. Both pilots were on the far side of the aircraft, relieving themselves in the snow.

  Once they reboarded the aircraft, Mercer saw Bernhardt Hoffmann, the young worker nearly asphyxiated in Camp Decade, and a passenger he didn’t recognize jump from the rear door. Even with his feet encumbered by tall boots the stranger moved through the snow as if born to it, like a wolf. Greta Schmidt cried out when she saw him and ran into his embrace. This had to be the sometime-boyfriend Werner had mentioned. Greta, who was nearly as tall as Mercer, vanished in his arms. The man was huge. He had the hood of his black snowsuit down around his wide shoulders, so Mercer could see that his nose had a misshapen look that only came from being broken.

  They stayed away from the evacuees as they waited for their turn to climb the ladder into the plane. Werner Koenig did come over to Mercer to relay the message Greta had gotten that morning from the office in Reykjavik about the Danish attache. If he was lying about the conversation, his performance was Oscar quality.

  “The Danes are adamant about nonessential people leaving until they can send someone to determine if our facility is safe,” he shouted over the growl of the old Dakota’s radial engines.

  “What about your team?” Mercer held his mouth close to Koenig’s ear.

  “Most of them are out with the core drill taking samples. I’m hoping a safety inspector will be sent soon, so I don’t have to recall them and lose a few days of work.”

  “So we’re your sacrificial goats to Denmark’s bureaucracy?”

  Werner shrugged. “I’m sorry. My hands are tied.”

  If he was telling the truth, Mercer could understand Koenig’s position. “All right,” he said. “No sense blaming the messenger.”

  Anika was right in front of him at the boarding ladder when Mercer turned to take perhaps his last look at the camp. If not for traces of cooking smoke rising from the back of the mess hall and the generator enveloped in its own exhaust, the base would have looked completely deserted. The only motion came from the breeze lofting wisps of snow like dust in an old Western movie. Mercer felt like whistling the theme from High Plains Drifter.