Polar Shift Read online

  “Not at all. I don’t blame you for wanting to meet Karla. She’s a brilliant as well as lovely young woman. She worked on the Gerstle River Quarry site about seventy miles from here. That’s where we found some carved mammoth tusks. It was very exciting. Her paper on the exploitation of the mammoth by early hunters was one of the best expositions I’ve seen on the subject. I know she’d be eager to meet someone with your academic background.”

  Schroeder had found his academic credentials at a Kinko’s printshop in Anchorage. The business cards he had made up identified him as Herman Kurtz, professor of anthropology at Berlin University. He had borrowed the last name from the enigmatic character in Conrad’s Heart of Darkness.

  Throughout his shadowy career, it had never failed to surprise him how powerful words on a sheet of paper were when combined with an air of confidence. The hardest part of the masquerade was faking an Austrian accent after all the years he’d been speaking western ’Merican.

  “I read that paper,” Schroeder lied. “As you say, very impressive. I also read the article stating her thesis about the demise of the mammoth.”

  “That was typical of Karla. After she concluded that man had only a negligible impact on the mammoth’s extinction, she made the great leap to a catastrophic event being the cause. You can imagine the controversy.”

  “Yes, it’s rather an innovative theory, but I liked the boldness with which she put it forth. Does her extinction theory have anything to do with her field trip?”

  “Everything. She’s hoping to find evidence to support her theory on a remote island in Siberia.”

  Schroeder puffed his cheeks out. “Siberia is a long way from here. How does one go about getting there?”

  “In Karla’s case, she flew to Wrangel Island, and then hopped aboard an icebreaker that took her to the New Siberian Islands. The boat will pick her up in two weeks, and she’ll be back in Fairbanks a few days after that. Will you still be in Alaska?”

  “Unfortunately, no. But I’m quite envious of her adventure. I’d drop everything and follow in her tracks in a minute, if I could.”

  Mumford leaned back in his chair and folded his hands behind his head. “Ivory Island must be the new Cancún,” he said with a grin.

  “Pardon?” Schroeder said.

  “Ivory Island is where Karla is working. A guy from the Discovery Channel came into my office yesterday and said he was with a crew in Alaska to do a special on Mount McKinley. Guess he heard about Karla’s work. He seemed extremely interested when I told him about Ivory Island. Talked about making a side trip. Asked all about the project. I guess nothing’s an obstacle when you’ve got a fat checkbook.”

  “What was his name?” Schroeder said. “Perhaps I’ve come across him in my travels.”

  “Hunter,” he said. “Scott Hunter. Big, muscular guy.”

  Schroeder smiled, but there was contempt in his eyes for the thinly veiled wordplay behind the fake name. “Can’t say I know him. Of course, you informed him of the difficulties of getting to Ivory Island?”

  “I sent him to the airport to talk to Joe Harper. He’s a former bush pilot who operates a company called PoleStar Air. They run packaged adventure tours into Russia.”

  Schroeder gulped down the rest of his tea even though it burned his throat. He thanked Mumford for his hospitality, and drove his rental car to the Fairbanks airport. The airport’s location near the Arctic Circle made it a convenient refueling stop for big cargo planes flying the circle route between the Far East and America. Schroeder saw a 747 taking off as he parked. The airport itself was relatively small, and it took only one inquiry to find the office for PoleStar Air.

  The receptionist gave Schroeder a pleasant smile and said Mr. Harper would be free as soon as he got off the phone. Harper came out after a few minutes. He looked as if he had been picked for the role of a bush pilot by central casting. He was a lean man with alert eyes and a strong set to his mouth, and, judging from his appearance, he was still making the transition from bush pilot to tour operator.

  His beard was neatly trimmed, but his hair was shaggy and over the ears. His shirt was new and pressed and tucked into a pair of faded jeans that were at about the stage when they get comfortable. He projected a professional capability, but there was a hint of worry in his eyes. He leaned close to his receptionist’s ear and whispered something about a fuel bill, then ushered Schroeder into his office.

  The work space was barely big enough for a desk and computer. Any excess space was taken up by stacks of files.

  Harper was acutely aware of the disarray. “Pardon the mess. PoleStar is still a family operation, and I’m doing a lot of the paperwork myself. In fact, I do almost everything with the help of my wife out there.”

  “I understand you’ve been flying a long time,” Schroeder said.

  Harper’s face brightened. “I came up here in ’84. Had a Cessna, flew that for years. Expanded into a fleet of puddle jumpers. I sold them all to buy the little corporate jet you see out on the tarmac. It’s the blue one with the stars all over it. The high-end clients like their adventure tours fast and first-class.”

  “How’s it going?”

  “Business is coming along okay, I guess. Can’t say the same for myself.” Harper picked up a pile of papers and dropped it back on his desk. “I’m stuck doing this stuff until we get big enough to hire someone. But that’s my problem. What’s yours?”

  “I talked to Dr. Mumford at the university a little while ago. He told me that you’re taking a television crew to an island in Siberia.”

  “Oh yeah, the Discovery people. They’re taking a plane that will hook up with a fishing boat at Wrangel.”

  Schroeder handed Harper one of his newly minted business cards. “I’d like to get to the New Siberian Islands. You don’t suppose I could hitch a ride with them.”

  “Okay by me. There’s plenty of room on the plane. All you’d need is the price of admission. Unfortunately, they’ve reserved all the seats on the plane and boat.”

  Schroeder pondered his answer. “Maybe I can talk your clients into letting me tag along.”

  “You’re welcome to try. They’re staying at the Westmark Hotel.”

  “What is your estimated time of departure?”

  He checked his watch. “Two hours and twenty-one minutes from now.”

  “I’ll go talk to them.”

  Schroeder got directions to the hotel, and inquired at the desk about the Discovery crew. The desk clerk said he had seen them go into the bar a few minutes earlier. Schroeder thanked him and went to the lounge, which was only half full, mostly singles and couples. The only group sat at a corner table, talking with their heads close together. There were four of them.

  Schroeder bought a newspaper in the lobby, took a nearby table in the lounge and ordered a club soda with lime. A couple of the men glanced briefly in his direction and went back to their conversation. One advantage to getting old is invisibility, he mused. Younger people simply stop seeing you.

  He decided to put his suspicions to the test. He watched one of the men leave his table to go to the restroom. Timing it just right, he rose from his table and deliberately bumped into the man on his way back. Schroeder apologized profusely, but the man only swore, and cut him dead with a fierce glance.

  The encounter told him two things. That his new appearance, with his shaved beard and dyed hair, was working, and that the television man was carrying a gun in a shoulder holster. He decided to press the matter further.

  After emerging from the restroom, he approached the group’s table. “Hello,” he said in his western accent. “I understand you folks are from the Discovery Channel. Mr. Hunter?”

  A large man who seemed to be the leader examined him through narrowed eyes. “Yeah. I’m Hunter. How’d you know my name?”

  “It’s all over the hotel. We don’t often get celebrities here,” Schroeder said, provoking grins around the table. “I just wanted to say how much I enjoyed the show you d
id on the ancient Hittites several months ago.”

  A puzzled expression crossed the big man’s face. “Thanks,” he said, regarding Schroeder with hard eyes. “We’ve got some business to take care of, so if you’ll excuse us.”

  Schroeder apologized for taking their time and went back to his table. He could hear the men laughing. He had made up the Hittite reference as a test. He watched the Discovery Channel constantly. There had never been any program on that subject in the last six months. The crew was phony.

  He pondered a course of action while he finished his club soda and decided to take the most direct route. He went out to his car, and from under the seat retrieved a pistol with a sound suppressor attached to the barrel.

  He was relieved to see that the men were still in the bar when he returned to the hotel. He was just in time. They had paid their bill and risen from the table. He followed them to the elevator. He rode up with them to the third floor, chatting like an old fool, enduring the smirks and hard looks. He got off on the same floor, mumbled something about a coincidence. He ambled down the hallway, acting confused, as if he had forgotten where he was, but when the group broke up and went into their rooms he noted the room numbers.

  He waited a minute, then went over to one room. Holding the pistol behind his back, he glanced up and down the hallway to make sure he was alone, then knocked. The door opened a moment later. The man scowled when he saw Schroeder standing there. It was the man he had jostled. He had taken off his jacket, and, as Schroeder had suspected, he was wearing a shoulder holster with a handgun in it.

  “What the hell do you want?”

  “I seem to have lost my room key. I was wondering if I could use your phone.”

  “I’m busy.” He put his hand on the holster. “Go bother someone else.”

  The man started to close the door. Schroeder quickly brought the pistol around and snapped off a shot between the eyes. The man crumpled to the floor with a look of abject surprise on his otherwise unmarked face. Glancing up and down the corridor, Schroeder stepped over the body and dragged it just inside the room.

  Schroeder followed the same routine, with slight variations but similar results. In one case, he rushed his first shot and had to fire twice. In another, he heard the elevator door open just as he pulled the body into the room. But when it was over, he had killed four men in less than five minutes.

  He felt no remorse, dispatching them with the cold, murderous efficiency of his old days. They were simply violent thugs, no different from many he had encountered, even worked with. Worse, they were sloppy and careless. The team must have been assembled in a hurry. They were not the first men he had killed. Nor were they likely the last.

  He hung DO NOT DISTURB signs on each door. A few minutes later, he was back in his rental car headed for the airport. Harper was still in his office, burrowing through his paperwork like an overgrown mole.

  “I talked to the TV crew,” Schroeder said. “They’ve changed their minds. They’ve decided to head down to Kodiak Island to shoot a feature on bears.”

  “Shit! Why didn’t they tell me?”

  “You can call them and ask. But they were on their way out when I called them.”

  Harper snatched up the phone and called the hotel. He asked to be connected to the TV crew’s rooms. When no one answered, he slammed the phone down on its cradle. He rubbed his eyes, and seemed on the verge of breaking into tears.

  “That’s it,” he said. “I was counting on a check from this run to make the monthly payment on the big bird. I’m ruined.”

  “You don’t have any other charters scheduled?”

  “It’s not that easy. It takes days, sometimes weeks, to put together a deal.”

  “Then the plane and boat are free for charter?”

  “Yeah, they’re free. You know anyone interested in chartering them?”

  “As a matter of fact, I do.” Schroeder reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a thick packet of bills, which he tossed onto a pile of papers. “This is for the trip out and the boat. I’ll pay you an equal amount for the return flight. My only condition is that you stand by for a few days until I’m ready to leave.”

  Harper picked the packet up and riffled the edges. They were all hundred-dollar bills. “I can practically buy a new plane for this.” He frowned. “This isn’t something illegal, is it?”

  “Nothing illegal at all. You’ll be carrying no cargo. Only me.”

  “You got papers?”

  “Passport and visa are all up-to-date and in order.” They should be, for the money he paid for them, Schroeder thought. He had stopped in Seattle and waited impatiently while his favorite ID forger had cooked up a set of papers for Professor Kurtz.

  Harper extended his hand. “You’ve got yourself a deal.”

  “Good. When can we leave?”

  “Any time you’re ready.”

  “I’m ready.”

  The plane took off an hour later. Schroeder sat back in his seat, enjoying the solitude that came from being the only passenger on the plane, and sipped on a glass of Scotch that Harper had thoughtfully provided. Harper was at the controls. As Fairbanks faded in the distance and the plane struck off toward the west, he took a deep breath. He was aware that he was an old man trying to do a young man’s job. Schroeder had asked not to be bothered for a while. He was tired and needed some sleep.

  He would need deadly clarity for the task ahead. He cleared his mind of all emotion and closed his eyes.

  17

  THE NOAA SHIP Benjamin Franklin limped along like a sailor who’d been in a bar brawl. The tug-of-war with the whirlpool had taken its toll on the ship’s engines, which had to be babied so they wouldn’t break down completely. The Throckmorton trailed several hundred yards behind in case the NOAA vessel ran into trouble.

  As the two ships slowly made their way toward Norfolk, a turquoise-colored utility helicopter with the letters NUMA visible on the fuselage appeared in the western sky. It hovered over the Benjamin Franklin like a hummingbird before touching down on the deck. Four people scrambled out, carrying medical supplies and equipment.

  Crewmen directed the medical team to the ship’s sick bay. None of the injuries sustained when the ship nearly went vertical in the whirlpool were life-threatening. The captain had requested the team to help the ship’s paramedic, who had been overwhelmed with the sheer volume of bruises and concussions.

  The helicopter was refueled, and two crewmen who had suffered broken arms were loaded aboard. Austin thanked the captain for his hospitality. Then he, along with the Trouts, Zavala and Professor Adler, climbed into the helicopter. Minutes later, they were airborne.

  The helicopter touched down at National Airport less than two hours later. The injured were unloaded into waiting ambulances. The Trouts caught a taxi to their Georgetown town house, taking Adler with them as their guest, and Zavala drove Austin to his house on the Potomac River in Fairfax, Virginia, less than a mile from the Central Intelligence Agency headquarters in Langley. They all agreed to meet at eight the next morning after a good night’s rest.

  Austin lived in a converted Victorian boathouse overlooking the river. He had acquired the turreted building when he worked for the CIA. The mansard-roofed structure was part of an old estate, and the previous owners had let it run down. It had become a waterfront condominium for countless families of mice by the time Austin gutted and redid the interior and restored the exterior to its former glory. The space under the living quarters housed his racing scull and small, outboard hydroplane.

  He dropped his bag in the hall and walked into a spacious living room. His house was an eclectic combination of the old and the new. The authentic, dark wooden, colonial furniture contrasted with the whitewashed walls hung with contemporary originals and painterly primitives and charts. Floor-to-ceiling bookcases held the leather-bound sea adventures of Conrad and Melville and the well-worn volumes of the great philosophers he liked to study. Glass cases displayed some of the rare du
eling pistols he collected. His extensive collection of music, with a preference for progressive jazz, mirrored his steely coolness, his energy and drive, and his talent for improvisation.

  He checked his phone for messages. There was a pile of calls, but nothing that couldn’t wait. He flicked the stereo on, and Oscar Peterson’s frenetic piano fingering filled the room. He poured a drink for himself of his best aniejo tequila, opened the sliding glass door and went out onto the deck with the ice tinkling pleasantly in his glass. He listened to the soft, rippling sounds, and breathed into his lungs the misty, flower-scented river air that was so different from the briny scent of the ocean where he spent much of his working days.

  After a few minutes, he went back into the house, pulled a book on ancient Greek philosophers from a shelf and opened it to Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave.” In Plato’s parable, prisoners chained in a cave can see only the shadows cast by puppets on the wall and can hear the puppeteers moving behind their backs. On that slim evidence, the prisoners must decide what is shadow and what is reality. Similarly, Austin’s brain was sorting the strange events of the last few days, trying to impose order on his mental chaos. He kept coming back to the one thing he could grasp. The mysterious ship.

  He went over to a rolltop desk and powered up his laptop computer. Using the Web site information from Dr. Adler, he called up the satellite picture of the giant wave area. The image showed that all was quiet. He backed up through the image archives to the date of the Southern Belle’s sinking. The two giant waves that had startled Adler were clearly displayed on the date the ship had disappeared. The ship itself was shown as a small blip that was there one minute, gone the next.

  He zoomed the picture out so that it showed a greater area of ocean and saw something he hadn’t noticed before. Four ships were clustered around the area of the sinking. There was one at each point of the compass, equidistant from one another. He stared at the image for a moment, then backed up a few days. The ships were not there. He jumped ahead to shortly after the sinking. There were only three ships. When he went to a day after the Belle went down, no blips were visible.