Lena River Man

By Michael Bradford

Adventure, Mystery, Thriller

The action moves from Alpine glacier, to Las Vegas, then across the Siberian Sea to the geographic North Pole by Russian Nuclear Icebreaker.

State-of-the-art science, extensively researched by the author, involves a large number of the main characters. Profound ethical problems are raised.

An ingenious, and virtually unique method for commission of murder, keeps the suspense mounting, page by page. Much of the background draws upon the many years of author experience dealing with exotic wildlife both in, and out, of Africa.

A cold-blooded unscrupulous killer will do anything to continue an accustomed life-style.

American and Russian authorities confront the murderer as the nuclear powered vessel ice-breaks a path to the pole.

The scientific sub-plot will take the reader by surprise, as will the ending.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Oct 29, 2003
• ISBN: 9781469104126

Michael Bradford

Michael Bradford was born in 1975 in St. Albert, Alberta. He has worked as a grass cutter, waiter, pizza-delivery boy, literacy teacher, elementary-school vice-principal and published poet. Button Hill is his first novel. He lives in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, with his wife and two children.

Book preview

CHAPTER ONE

The two men switched to a scrambled circuit to secure the early morning dialogue.

When you have his undivided attention, Seppe . . . know how I mean? . . . leave the guard with distinct orders. If news ever leaks out, his official report must be that the cadaver was a product of one of the recent avalanches. It’s to be the border patrol’s only story.

Chiaro, accordo, Padrone. Those were almost my very words. He agrees entirely. He says the melting glaciers are releasing more and more ice-bound objects every year. He says many strange things are left exposed as the ancient ice melts and the glaciers recede. I believe it’s almost like what’s called Yukon Placer mining, Padrone. All the items trapped by the ice for thousands and thousands of years become concentrated and dropped to the bottom of the ice field and then deposited at the foot of the melt.

Seppe hesitated a moment, then, when the Padrone didn’t respond, continued.

And there’s little doubt, Don Carlo, that he appreciates cash for his efforts. These Italian border guards are notoriously underpaid. No question . . . his loyalty can be found in his pocket.

Okay . . . okay, nevertheless, remove any doubt from his mind. If the real discovery leaks to anyone—the authorities, the news media—the sciocco will never touch the rest of his reward. And, if loss of the extra cash doesn’t seem that important to him, see that he grasps the personal implications. Make him aware he really has no alternative . . . money, or no money. If he finds winter patrols along the CerviniaMonte Rosa Passes chilling, they won’t compare with an hour patrolling icebergs in Terra Nova.

Terra Nova B station is the frigid Italian Antarctic outpost at 75 degrees South Latitude on Cape Russell.

Giuseppe, recounting Count Carlo d’Grazzelli’s earlier instructions, continued.

I sent a couple men to the site to steer hikers clear of the area until the dottoressa arrives. As you directed, Padrone, no one must wander closer than the bottom edge of the Theodule Pass. Our cooperative captain of the border guard appreciates in all respects the significance of this discovery, Don Carlo. He’s especially aware that no mention of the find must cross the frontier into Switzerland, Giuseppe added, knowing that an international incident would unquestionably develop identical to the 1991 episode with the Austrians.

Carlo thought for a moment about the enormous international interest sparked by the Ice Man’s discovery. Leaks will be the most difficult aspect of this matter to control, he muttered.

A nervous cough often preceded Don Carlo’s mood changes. Seppe seldom missed the sign. This discovery was an event of emphatic importance to Don Carlo, of unique significance, and not to be underestimated.

I expect complete success in the secret recovery of these remains, Giuseppe—no matter the expense.

Though family for forty years, the Italian bodyguard, Seppe, became Giuseppe when the Padrone’s mood turned lethal.

You will recall, Signore, what happened to the Ötztal Man last year? A statement, more than a question. The genitals were hacked off before that pitiful scientific team reached the scene. The corpse had been badly vandalized even before they knew of it’s existence.

A second, nearly similar discovery within a few years is more than sheer luck, Guiseppe. Our laboratories alone are going to benefit from this rare opportunity. In the Don’s mind, chance fate had become preordained destiny.

Giuseppe had a special love for Don Carlo, yet the affection was held in cautious restraint. The assistant had consistently and successfully dodged Don Carlo’s poison over the years. The Don’s impulsive viperous strikes commanded the respect of the Italian mongoose. Giuseppe was one of the few individuals who had developed a shield against the venom. His longevity was his proof.

Count Carlo d’Grazzelli di Salaparuta at age 68 was probably the wealthiest Italian north of Rome. He cleverly avoided Italian politics with its inherent publicity. Each time short-lived Roman administrations crashed in flames, his judgment was reconfirmed like political clockwork. D’Grazzelli preferred to pull strings unseen, and was notorious with his influence among the international cognoscenti. Invited to head the International Olympic Committee, he had deferred the publicity. The unsophisticated rogue that the International Bosses had to accept in his place could crow about the 1992 Barcelona event.

Carlo’s broad and varied agilities showed early promise. At age 23 he had eliminated all competition in the Northern area, deftly engineering himself into position as the regional tax collector, and thereby guaranteeing himself a titled, lifetime fortune. The influential post, with his degree of finesse in utilization, positioned him on the cutting edge of Italian industry. Upon crossing d’Grazzelli’s threshold of influence, businesses and individuals paid handsome tribute, allowing the Count penetrating access to others’ brains and pocketbooks in the process.

By the 1990s Count Carlo could well afford an array of avocations and no longer toiled entirely for financial gain. The International Mob still sought his favors; however, the multinational d’Grazzelli Industries exhibited model respectability. Although he originally amassed the bulk of his fortune from a wide spectrum of underworld activities, the Don now cloaked himself under a mantle of philanthropy which adequately masked his true character. Although in reality, little had really changed; he very seldom lost anything in the bargain, being especially intolerant of associates’ stupidities.

Carlo d’Grazzelli shifted over to the tall window-wall of his microfiltered, air conditioned office and peered up through midsummer morning haze at the glacial ridge of the Pennine Alps where the long-frozen discovery lay. He allowed himself a moment’s reflection upon his late-in-life special achievements, hoping to redeem his soul from Artemis, the Goddess of Wildlife and Hunting. He was smugly proud of the growing sperm and gene banks maintained by his laboratories. There was so very much for him to accomplish, and still so much more after his demise, which was designed to be carried forward by his enduring counterparts.

As he stared up at the snowy ridge in the distance he contemplated the poor Ötztal wretch frozen into the glacial ice field some 5,000 years before, and retrieved only the previous summer. An eerie dark scenario crossed Carlo’s mind, a nightmare that, now for a year, frequently awakened him at night.

He imagined a regression in the dimension of time—the reversal of present and past—present society moving backwards in the direction of the primitive:

His dream always pictured a Copper Age shepherd peering down in puzzlement at the ruins of Salaparuta Scientifica, S.A. with himself, Carlo d’Grazzelli, locked for 5,000 years under glacial ice within his ultra-modern laboratories.

He once again deliberated a question of the ages: Did the dimension of time only move toward the future, ever expanding forward? Then, when the outward expansion of the universe finally ceased, would time reverse itself, beginning the slide backwards in-reverse through past ages, in cadence with the collapse of the universe—ending at the zero beginnings of primordial conception? No, for his purposes it could only expand toward the future. At least for the eons he required.

Still, how many future human generations could he, Carlo d’Grazzelli, expect to maintain his personal chain of human cloning unbroken? D’Grazzelli, and no one else, was the only sane person in the world who need question, or consider, human existence beyond a single normal lifetime.

He shrugged in the early chill of the air conditioning, returned to his desk, and eased into his chair. It wasn’t the correct moment to reconsider his grandiose plans for personal longevity. Shedding philosophical impulses, he picked up the phone and dialed into one of his interior scrambled lines. He would deal with the foreseeable for the moment; until now he had not scored too badly.

When the restricted circuit opened he spoke without hesitation.

Carina mia, I have a surprise for you. Could you spare a moment of your precious lab time, to break away, and come to my office? He knew his wife, Maria, was in the midst of an intricate gene-isolation experiment.

Of course, Carlo. She knew he would not have interrupted her had it not been something of significance.

Give me five minutes to process out of the lab. What we’re doing can be finished by Emilio. It’s really his own isolation work we’re dealing with today. I’ll be there shortly. You sound odd. Is everything okay?

Yes—yes. I’m fine. A bit excited, as a matter of fact. We’ve received one of those rare breaks we’ve been waiting for, which could add dramatically to the purity of our gene pool—placing us years ahead, carina. He let the news sink in.

A special goal was that the purest of genes must emanate from unpolluted sources—primal sources. She wouldn’t take long to guess the nature of the news.

Carlo dropped clues. Don’t have an accident getting over here. The surprise will keep. It’s been keeping for millennia already. He disguised a snigger with a cough. He knew he had her complete attention as he replaced the receiver and switched off the scrambler.

Maria Angela Pittore was the only child of Salvatore Pittore, Count d’Grazzelli’s key Italian-American hoodlum, killed while elephant hunting in Zaire in 1971. Maria Angela, then 24, European educated, had accompanied her father on random African safaris, including his fatal last. The particular hunt had been one of Don Carlo d’Grazzelli’s ultimate, damn-the-expense outings; not because of finances, or the death of Sal Pittore, but because human overpopulation had destroyed the wild Africa Carlo had cherished for twenty years.

Indeed, Pittore’s death marked the culmination of an era of worldwide excess—mindless waste of almost every available resource. Salvatore Pittore had become an embarrassment to the hunting world when an insatiable lust for elephant ivory abruptly took his life. In expiation of her father’s sins, Maria devoted herself to conservation, a form of conservation she hunted and found in test tubes.

The olive-complected, dark-eyed beauty focused her copious zeal on science with Don Carlo’s urging and financial backing. Fired with the fervor of a missionary, she realized her calling in bioengineering, and set out to counter Salvatore’s killer reputation through creative life-refining scientific achievements. Specifically, she chose the ambitious task of re-establishing the genetic purity of specific creatures. Only with d’Grazzelli resources was such a costly goal imaginable. Maria aspired to return the genetic pool of particular species to their purest origins, through recovery and reintroduction of unpolluted genes, together with the extraction of specific genes rendered mutant-defective through environmental degradation.

She had immersed herself for seven years in intense, highly specialized research. Then at age 32 she assumed assistant directorship of Salaparuta Scientifica (Sassa), Carlo’s Italian pharmaceutical company headquartered on the shore of Lago Maggiore.

Now, twelve years farther along, with fewer than half of Sassa’s scientific accomplishments published, Maria and the firm had bounded to the forefront of the bioengineering community—although privately, scientifically well beyond—a gigantic leap ahead in the field of genetic engineering.

Working under close industrial security, Sassa’s technicians tinkered with individual pieces of each genetic puzzle. Results were assembled by a select group at the top of the d’Grazzelli stable of wizardry. Methods of secrecy were similar to those employed during the Manhattan Project of the 1940s.

Maria focused into the eye-recognition device which accessed the elevator’s entryway, then punched a code into the lift’s computer and touched the start button to reach Carlo’s office suite. The private door opened onto an alcove, yet directly into his office, bypassing the entrance controlled by Carlo’s elderly spinster secretary, Luisa.

It was as if Caesar Romero was standing behind the desk. Wavy white hair. Thin neat mustache. Dark eyes and long aristocratic jaw. Count Carlo d’Grazzelli di Salaparuta waited behind the ornate furnishing, carved from two massive blocks of museshe wood (Erythrophleum africanum), retrieved years earlier on African safari.

Carlo was smiling broadly, white teeth glistening, as the elevator door open.

Feminine curiosity piqued and dark eyes flashing, Maria wasted little time reaching the side of the desk.

Trim and muscular, d’Grazzelli fully expected to carry on for years with an interminable agenda of projects. And the far-sighted realist had planned characteristically well, generations beyond the grave. Carlo d’Grazzelli had successfully cloned multiple identical likenesses of himself with wife Maria’s thorough cooperation.

Pushing away from the hug, Maria stood fascinated by the smile and the glint in Carlo’s eyes. What’s the mystery this morning, you rascal?

I’m not completely certain just yet, carina. But from the body’s location in the ice, and the scarfa, I’d estimate date of entombment to be no later than the remains found last summer, which as you know was, give or take, some 3,000 B.C.

Carlo’s reference to the ancient footwear confirmed her guess.

God . . . another? Then after thoughtful consideration, What a break it would be if the remains are substantially intact—or at least as well preserved as Ötztal Man. But it would be too much to expect. Excitement flashed across her eyes.

Hard to say. Yesterday a hiker stumbled upon a human foot protruding from blue ice along the receding edge of the Monte Rosa glacier. We could have a major problem with this, though. The find may be just inside the Swiss border above Colle Gnifetti. It’s difficult to fix the frontier boundary where the glacier covers the ridge. Fortunately, it was an American climber—and not a Swiss—who discovered the scarfa-clad limb. The footwear suggests a date, of course. The foreigner didn’t realize the age significance. He found a local shepherd who then contacted an Italian border guard—the captain, much to our benefit.

Yes, but how can we keep the news from spreading? The same problem will occur as before. It will travel like wildfire. Maria knew the ongoing certainties. Bureaucracies on both sides of the border would freeze matters more solidly than anything entombed in the glacier.

I don’t think we have that worry so far. Both the American and the shepherd are on an escorted paid-for vacation high up in Gran Paradiso National Park. Giuseppe and Raoul went by helicopter to reward the border guard, and to make certain he gets adequate time-off a safe distance from his post.

Maria’s mind did a sprint. She recounted the disastrous results of the disclosure of the Iceman’s location the previous summer. Publicity had hobbled, and for all practical purposes, destroyed research. Protracted bureaucratic squabbling had erupted over legal jurisdiction of the discovery even as fungus grew on the thawing corpse. Had the vandalism of the genitals not denied scientific evaluation, subsequent legal delays still had diminished much of the sophisticated laboratory value of the remaining retrieved body tissue.

Do you want to put Ceferino in charge of this, carina? You’ll want to go up there yourself, of course. That goes without saying.

We’ll need two teams. Maria all but ignored Carlo’s question for the moment. One scientific, to safeguard that nothing is destroyed or accidentally contaminated through haste or incompetence, the other as a work-party to free the remains from the ice. The extraction crew must be chosen carefully. We may have time only to free the cadaver and shift it by helicopter to the Verbania laboratory. That’s no more than fifty air kilometers distant, am I correct? I’ll want the remains well-packed in dry ice even for so short a journey, just in case we encounter an unforeseen delay. We must ensure that no temperature fluctuation occurs from the moment the corpse is released from the ice. And this time, high humidity control is crucial. In other words—no freezer burn. Maria rattled off a portion of her immediate mental checklist.

If we are first successful in the extraction and removal of the cadaver from the area, we could consider more calmly continuing to search for artifacts, that is until the authorities grind the process to a halt. We can expect immediate interference as soon as word is out. The Iceman’s personal effects were strewn about in the surrounding ice for over fifty meters. We may find similar items. But this really isn’t the time to waste on speculative chatter, she scolded herself, realizing she was doing all the talking.

Leave the heavy work crew for me to organize, Carlo told her. "Assemble your research team and technical equipment, carina. Might I suggest you take Emilio and Ceferino? They work well together. Keep in mind . . . someone may be needed to perform a dog-and-ponyshow for the authorities while you do your own sleight-of-hand magic. You’ll find more than enough to do, controlling scientific factors alone.

We have the remainder of the day to get your team organized, Maria. I will hire a heavy-lift helicopter to handle supplies and tools. Dropping gear on the glacier shouldn’t signify anything extraordinary to the hire company. For team transport, and the eventual extraction, we can use our own in-house machine—even if it means several short flights. If I were you, I’d plan to be there just before first light tomorrow morning. As added security, I’ll wait until the last moment to give ground coordinates to the pilots. Don’t concern yourself with finding the site. Seppe will remain up there on the glacier tonight, and contact me this afternoon. I’ll pass on any news to you if changes occur.

Maria, preoccupied in her planning, left Carlo’s office without further comment.

CHAPTER TWO

Maria calculated that no more than five human clonings had been successfully performed among the world’s eight major bioengineering laboratories since 1978. One successful and well-documented birth was general knowledge within the scientific community. It had utilized the more publicized, better understood and generally accepted method of dividing embryo cells, creating twins. However, Maria counted her success as absolutely unique among those five. Hers was body-cell activation, resulting in the cloning of a living human in its exact likeness. Maria Angela had finally isolated the process to fully switch on and awaken the entire spectrum of human genes, using liver cells extracted from Carlo d’Grazzelli. The significant barrier for the human egg, its nucleus extracted to accept a liver cell, had been scientifically achieved somewhat earlier in biogenetic technology.

Carlo, in his most charming manner, when he had foreseen the possibilities of replicating himself, had drawn Maria into a complicated 1975 pact when she turned 28. He needed an heir. Two previous marriages had produced no offspring. Italian laws of Patrimonio, regarding adoption and bastard children, were confusing and contradictory. Carlo preferred to obviate potential legal impediments through the time-honored method of birthright.

In exchange for a lifetime of financial security, Maria Angela became the lawful wife of Don Carlo and the surrogate mother of Carlito. Though there were no known genealogical links between the two families, Maria’s egg was stripped of its nucleus—a necessity for cloning. In that manner she could contribute no genetic input whatsoever from her side—acting strictly as egg donor and incubator.

The whole process had been stressful and exacting, with Maria working as both doctor and patient for much of the work. Her mentor, Dr. Philip Corneliussen, had come to join Sassa early after the company’s inception, drawn by the magnanimity and financial generosity of Don Carlo. Dr. Corneliussen’s age was his limiting asset, yet his experience and brilliance in the field of genetics placed him on a pedestal as a frontrunner. After Carlito’s exceptionally large 4.5-kilo birth in 1980, Dr. Corneliussen had only a short while to impart his experience to Maria and their assistants before his unexpected death. With him died his side of the secret of Carlito’s creation.

Carlito neither knew he was the exact copy of Don Carlo—nor that he had no traditional mother. Now at eleven years of age Little Charles attended the American school in Barcelona, and visited his parents as frequently as any child in boarding school does.

Fortunately for Sassa, reporting on cloning had become one of the few taboos observed by the media. Reverberations over soul tampering rattled the public when such biogenetics were examined; visceral hysteria shook the foundations of basic human mores. The human mind derailed over the sensitive issue of creation.

Cloning of domestic livestock provided a very small percentage of revenue for Sassa. Tinkering with domesticated animals had, by and large, been publicly accepted—so long as it was not the human animal. Large-breasted chickens, tasty low-fat beef, and abundant low-cholesterol bacon were appreciated.

Cloning of animals took some of the heat, and provided cover for Sassa’s clandestine human clone research—research which would have been suspected had ongoing achievements with livestock been withheld. Another division was highly successful with a full spectrum of genetic studies on agriculture, which promised to be a highly profitable department. Human cloning experiments, well-shielded within the covering activities of the company, nevertheless fell within the awful meaning of tinkering.

Carlo d’ Grazzelli had founded Salaparuta Scientifica, S.A. with the hope that what he might do for the preservation of animals, he could also do for himself, and eventually others—in their exact likeness. He planned within his own lifetime or Carlito’s, to carry science a giant step farther than Tony Murchison had ever suggested or imagined possible that day in 1971 in the forests of Zaire. Maria Angela had frozen dozens of cloned embryo replicas of Count Carlo d’Grazzelli di Salaparuta as copies for subsequent d’Grazzelli generations. Human eggs were regularly collected from women in several locations around the world. Sassa paid top dollar for the eggs which were transported by air to the Italian laboratory inside the wombs of live rabbits.

CHAPTER THREE

Ceferino Torras de Real was a rare Spaniard, likeable and practical, who at age 33 exhibited profound loyalty to those few who warranted his trust and respect. He was exasperatingly patient, and unselfish to a fault. Ceferino was one of only four people who knew all but a few details about the inner workings of the companies. Most importantly, he knew how to keep his mouth shut. He was hired by Tony Murchison to replace Karl Krohne as Safari Park manager when Krohne, an old professional hunter associate, had been caught unashamedly embezzling park assets.

Cefe, as he was known by close friends, traveled to Italy periodically to provide management assistance—yet primarily to report to Don Carlo on the status of operations in the Spanish Safari Park.

The sunrise shed glorious pink on the snowy heights as the company helicopter dropped down from high altitude, directly over a fix on the transponder beacon. A handheld light on the ground flashed a signal to guide the pilot to a quick level target landing.

Ceferino looked out the window at the full moon setting on the horizon to his left as he gathered his bearings. Where the shrinking glacial ice coursed southward toward the tongues of the Valle D’Aosta, heavy yellow smog churned northward; the two lines merged into an ugly sulfurous cloud flowing upward into the Alps from the Mediterranean. Mud rains, as they were called when the red Saharan dust carried north on the winds, regularly painted the stylish Italian automobiles parked on the streets of the Piedmont. Ceferino knew the same dark residue accumulating in the Alps absorbed heat, and was justifiably blamed for the accelerating melt of the glaciers. Objects and entombed climbers had been discovered with increasing frequency in recent years; the expansion of the Sahara desert was causing the contraction of the Alpine ice fields. However, while this pollution was an environmental penalty in the eyes of some scientists, its melting now worked as a bonus for Sassa. Life’s conditions were all relative to one’s field of endeavor, Ceferino reasoned. Environmental engineers were now making very respectable income dealing with man’s land development requirements.

The day’s timing was perfect, as was the weather. The mood of Monte Cervino, one of the highest peaks in the Alps, was unpredictable. If clouds had covered the 4,630-meter peak of Monte Rosa which was often the case, their chances of pulling off a secret scientific coup decreased exponentially. European weather patterns often ran in three-day cycles. Today was the second day of good weather, but tomorrow didn’t forecast well. The El Niño effect was throwing off meteorologists around the globe. Both air and water currents were swinging farther north and dipping farther south than usual.

The sky brightened, bleaching away the early morning pink luminescence. Emilio, Ceferino, Maria, and an assistant unloaded two crates of fragile instruments from the aircraft and waved the pilot off. Ceferino then radioed the larger machine to make a fast approach on the beacon and set down over the crossed strips of black cloth.

No orders were shouted over the roar of the helicopter for fear voices would travel down the valleys in the early morning cold; air was dead calm.

Guisseppe’s midsummer metabolism was unaccustomed to such frigid nights. Heavily clothed, he greeted the arriving party through chattering teeth. He had spent the night personally guarding the cadaver with his assistant, Raoul. Though each had slept in Arctic sub-zero sleeping bags, Seppe’s body was accustomed to summer heat at near sea level; he had developed an altitude headache. He was too old to be doing this at 60, but the wrath of his god, Carlo d’Grazzelli, would be worse than death by freezing if anything happened to the find. Given Seppe’s luck, some rare and ravenous carnivore would arrive during the night and chew the foot off. Apprehensive, Giuseppe remained awake all night, repeatedly shining the high beam torch on the scarfa-covered foot, certain it would mysteriously disappear after he had viewed it with the light.

As reassurance, he had left his sleeping bag, approached the leg and removed the footwear. He examined the well-preserved limb running back into the clear ice; he could swear the limb was that of a female. Having touched the foot and replaced the shoe, he had no difficulty remaining awake through the balance of the darkness.

Seppe greeted Maria with a customary hug, symbolically kissing both cheeks. They had known one another since she was a young child from New Jersey.

Your cheeks are freezing, Seppe. Get some hot coffee from the thermos, then let’s get those boxes out of sight while we’re still able before the other helicopter arrives. Where’s the ice tunnel? She looked about in the early light, hoping general access was convenient for handling heavy gear.

Seppe pointed to a sheltered cove at the lateral edge of the glacier while he poured the steaming thick espresso. Whatever was bound in the ice had been protected from abrasive grinding, locked in isolation at that same level for the full time it had been there. The mainstream of glacial flow had moved past and beyond like an unending baggage conveyor belt, leaving the cadaver a spectator in a side eddy during the march of time.

Ceferino and Emilio carried one of the crates, trailed by Maria; Seppe and the assistant finished their drinks. They gulped the remainder of the hot liquid, hefted the remaining box and hurried to catch up. As the whine of the first aircraft faded, the noise from the larger machine began to build. Seppe put down the box and trudged hastily back to the landing zone to vector-in the pilot while the others went to the cadaver’s location with Raoul.

Melt-water gurgled even at this coldest hour of the summer morning. The glacier was definitively losing ground, whether it be global CO2-induced warming, a round of cyclical heating, overgrazing of the Sahel, expansion of the Sahara, El Niño; whatever reasons people wanted to suggest, there was a meltdown in progress.

Ceferino commented to Emilio as they struggled with the crate. Even in this dim light you can see a coating of Saharan dust on the snow surface. You know, as the ice melts, that red deposit must become concentrated.

Yeah, said Emilio. The accumulation surely accelerates the summer melt. I’m curious to know whether a similar thawing process can be measured noticeably at the Poles.

As they deposited the crate Maria dialed on her satellite phone. She aimed the high intensity Mag Light at the covered foot, her heart pounding, while she waited for the call to be answered. After two rings, it was picked up. Only one person would be on the other end. She began without hesitation. We’ve arrived at the hospital without any problem. Our sick friend appears to be resting satisfactorily. It’s going to be difficult to discharge the patient, however. We’ll need all the assistance we can get. I’m afraid he’s thoroughly chilled.

Molto bene, congratulations are in order, carina, Carlo replied. You have the strongest team of six workers I could organize. They should be arriving momentarily. But I’m afraid you will be racing against time. There is heavy cloud cover spreading across your area from the west. It will reach you sometime later today. I considered sending an additional second team, but they would only get in each other’s way. Nevertheless, they will be standing by as replacements if needed. Should the situation demand, we can exchange teams with little lost time. Bear in mind, one real concern is the extra attention that would be drawn to midday aircraft accessing the area.

Maria preferred to be more cryptic, transmitting as she was from the hot zone. The medical rescue crew is arriving as we speak. Dammit, I hate being rushed. If you learn the weather will deteriorate sooner, please advise immediately. The longer we have to treat the patient before moving him, the better. I’ll keep in touch. She returned the satellite unit to her backpack. Two other back-up satellite phones were placed in two separate locations for security. She wanted to be certain of their ability to call in a helicopter at the very