by L. A. Larkin
Wolfe doesn’t respond. She is transfixed by the photo. All four men lean against a BTR-80 - an amphibious armoured personnel carrier in camouflage khaki - and behind them is a convoy of off-road camouflaged trucks that look to be Ural-4320s, but one is definitely a BM-21 rocket launcher. They are on a rocky, mountainous road. A high bank on one side of the road is covered in thick tree cover. She tries to translate the copy, but struggles, the complexity of the sentences and the military jargon are mostly beyond her limited knowledge. Under the photo is a date, 25 March 2000, and a location.
‘A bit before my time,’ she says. ‘Ring any bells?’
‘I know about this,’ Cohen says. ‘The photo would’ve been taken just before the Zhani-Vedeno ambush. I was a correspondent back then. The Second Chechen War. Mujahideen forces ambushed a column of Russian troops from the Interior Ministry. It was carnage. Few survived.’
‘Well, Yushkov did.’
‘You know some Russian. What does the bloody thing say?’
The next few sentences are beyond her but she recognises the word for bomb disposal expert in reference to Yushkov.
‘He was clearing landmines ahead of the convoy. Dangerous job.’
Wolfe skim-reads. She recognises a word in the last sentence that surprises her.
‘This document accuses Yushkov of cowardice.’
‘Does it, indeed?’
‘He doesn’t seem cowardly to me. In fact, quite the opposite.’
‘And the word stamped diagonally across the page in red means Confidential?’ Cohen guesses.
‘Top secret.’
On her way back to the mess tent, Wolfe passes the back of the lab and overhears Price and Heatherton.
‘Somebody unlocked the tool shed last night,’ Price says.
‘That’s the least of our worries.’ Heatherton sounds irritated.
‘Wait!’ Price says. He must be walking away. ‘If we get a chance to drill again, we must be more careful. And I don’t just mean security. I mean, we don’t know what life form we’re dealing with.’
‘Keep your voice down, will you?’
‘But it’s so aggressive.’
‘You’re overreacting, Stacy.’
Wolfe hears no more because Charles Harvey yells at her.
‘You’re a disgrace!’ He is doing his best to storm towards Wolfe, but his clumsiness on the ice makes him look like an under-stuffed scarecrow. ‘How can you even face these people?’
‘Come on, Charles. You know me.’
‘You’re no better than the worst hacks. If you can’t find a story, you make it up. Well, I’ve just filed one of my own. It’s about a journalist sabotaging a British Antarctic project.’
‘That’s ridiculous. Your producer will never run it.’
Heatherton and Price intervene.
‘Break it up, you two,’ Heatherton says. ‘We don’t have time for this. Charles, come with me.’
He leads Harvey into the lab. Price gives Wolfe a poisonous glare, then leaves her feeling stunned at the ferocity of Harvey’s outburst. He can’t seriously believe she destroyed the bacteria? Is everybody going mad?
Left alone, she heads for the ice cave’s narrow entrance and crawls inside, hoping to find a clue to her attacker’s identity. Whoever knocked her out must have dragged her unconscious body into the igloo-like interior. Being of light weight, almost anyone on the team could do it, even Price. The cave is empty, the crates and canisters removed. She uses her torch. A few drops of blood near the entrance have frozen solid like tiny rubies. Her blood. She must have lain there. Near the back wall, blobs of gritty sediment are strewn like bird seed. She systematically searches every bit of the ice cave’s floor and finds nothing helpful. Wolfe is about to leave when she sees a blemish on the concave wall. Kneeling, she finds a white downy feather stuck to the ice. Odd, given there are no penguins or birds of any kind for miles. She blows warm breath over it several times and carefully peels it off the wall. Was it buried beneath the ice for years or carried in on somebody’s clothing? She tucks it in an inside pocket.
‘What are you doing here?’ The accent is unmistakably Russian.
Wolfe turns to find Yushkov bent forward, his spine pressing against the cave roof. He fills much of the central space and blocks her exit. Unsure of his intentions, she swings the torch up and over her right shoulder and points the beam straight into his eyes, making it hard for him to see her. She’s also in a position to swing the torch down hard on his head or clavicle if he attacks her. But Yushkov doesn’t even blink at the light.
‘I thought coming here might jog my memory, but I can’t remember a thing.’ She keeps her voice level and calm. She doesn’t want to antagonise him.
Wolfe takes a step towards the exit but Yushkov doesn’t shift out of the way.
‘Why are you here? Tell me the truth.’
‘Get out of my way, Vitaly.’
‘You answer my question.’
His eyes have that hard glint in them she’s seen before. Even if she screams, she doubts her voice will carry beyond the thick ice walls. She’s going to have to talk her way out.
‘Okay. How about this for an idea? For every question of yours I answer, I get to ask you a question of my own. Deal?’
‘I don’t play games with traitors.’
‘I’m no traitor, Vitaly. I’ll answer your questions, providing you answer mine.’
‘Lower the torch.’
She lowers the beam, pointing it at the floor, but she still holds her only weapon above her shoulder. The Russian kneels and straightens his back. He is no fool, though; he still blocks her exit. He nods his agreement to their dialogue.
Wolfe decides to come clean.
‘I came here because I don’t believe Kevin Knox’s death is an accident and nor does Heatherton, who invited me. I also don’t believe the multiple equipment failures are down to bad luck. Since somebody has destroyed the lake samples, there’s no doubt we have a traitor amongst us, somebody willing to kill to ensure this project fails. I intend to find out who.’ Yushkov doesn’t give her any response. He just watches her face. ‘Now it’s my turn to ask a question. What were you doing at six this morning, entering Harvey’s tent?’
Yushkov’s gaze never falters. Wolfe searches for a tell. Nothing. He doesn’t blanch or flush or tug at an ear or cover his mouth. God, he’s good. It takes training to control facial reflexes. A spy’s training.
‘You are mistaken.’
‘I am not. You and I were the only people awake, except the person who smashed me over the head. Did you see who hit me?’
‘That’s two questions,’ says Yushkov, his eyes creasing at the edges, but they don’t lose their steeliness. ‘I have answered your question. It is not my problem if you do not like my answer. I now ask you: who are you working for? And please do not insult my intelligence and tell me a newspaper.’
Wolfe senses he has an agenda. Has somebody been filling his head with lies?
‘You find this question difficult?’ Yushkov asks.
‘Why are you so determined to believe I am the saboteur?’ He doesn’t reply. ‘Talk to my editor. I have a sat phone in my bag. Will that satisfy you?’
‘Who sent you here to destroy our work?’
‘Look, Vitaly, I work for the Post. I’m not working for any government organisation, either British or foreign. If anyone has said otherwise, it’s probably someone with a vendetta against me. A lot of powerful people would like to take me down.’
He calls her a liar in his native tongue. She keeps her eyes glued to his and hopes she hasn’t given him any indication she understands what he’s just said.
‘If you’re testing me, you’re wasting your time,’ Wolfe says. ‘It’s my turn to ask a question. How do you feel about your mother country, Russia?’
Yushkov raises his chin. ‘That is a stupid question. I am British citizen and am loyal to my new country. One thing you will learn about me, Olivia Wolfe, is that I am a man of h
onour.’
‘Why don’t you want people to know you were in the Army?’
‘It is not relevant to my work here and it is not your business.’
‘Are you a deserter?’
Wolfe has never seen a bear roar, but she has heard it’s truly terrifying. He is up and leaning over her in one step, bellowing into her face, his eyes slits of fury.
‘You know nothing of me! How dare you judge me! I was protecting the innocent.’
Yushkov stops suddenly. He’s said more than he should. He spits on the ground, then crawls out of the narrow entrance. Wolfe is trembling. She thought he was going to rip her head off. She waits a minute or two, trying to calm her heart rate, then she too leaves.
‘Olivia!’ calls Heatherton, jogging over, his face muscles taut with anxiety. ‘Please tell me you didn’t phone Dr Trankov and let him in on our little mishap.’
‘Of course I didn’t. I can’t believe you think so poorly of me. Speak to Moz. He’ll vouch for me.’
Heatherton is pacing the ice, hands on hips.
‘Then how the hell does he know exactly which parts we need for both the probe and the drill? Huh?’
‘How would I know? Anyone could’ve contacted him. People here, someone at BAS, or Grantham Electronics.’
‘Never! They all know how hush-hush this is.’
‘You use the VSAT satellite system for your voice and data links, don’t you?’
‘Yes, why?’
‘All it takes is a quick email to Trankov from the privacy of their sleeping quarters. Anybody here could have done it. But I didn’t.’
Which might explain what Yushkov was doing trying to enter Harvey’s tent. Perhaps he didn’t want an incriminating email trail from him to Trankov, so he opted to use Harvey’s sat phone instead? Is Yushkov making her the scapegoat? Last night, Harvey was so drunk he wouldn’t have woken even if a charging elephant seal had entered his tent. Wolfe considers telling Heatherton her suspicions, but doubts he’ll believe her. In his eyes, she has shifted from ally to potential enemy.
‘What did Trankov want?’
‘He claims he’s developed a drilling system that doesn’t use contaminants, a drill he can’t use because it’s unseasonably cold, even for Vostok. At minus seventy Celsius, he can’t drill and he can’t keep the bore hole open. He’s offered it to us.’
‘Why would he do that?’ Wolfe asks.
‘Because it’s better to share first place with us than to come a miserable second. In return for giving us his drill, this project becomes a joint British-Russian venture and he gets equal credit.’
‘And Trankov can get his drill here faster than four days?’
‘Eight hours. But it makes no difference.’ Heatherton’s eyes rest on the silent drilling equipment. ‘I’m not having a bar of it. This is a British project and it’s staying that way.’
17
They have only been given an hour’s warning, too late to demand the pilot turn back. The Russians know that, of course. The Ilyushin Il-76 four-engine, strategic airlifter, with a fifty-metre wingspan, is spotted by Sinclair first, as it appears over the top of the Ellsworth Mountains, ripping through the wispy clouds and belching out fumes that stain the sky murky brown. Landing a plane on the Lake Ellsworth ice sheet has never been done before. With little time to prepare, the British team has done its best to set up a temporary runway. Using the tractor’s snowplough, Rundle has flattened the worst of the undulating surface. Then the tractor is positioned on one side of the makeshift airstrip and the Ski-Doo on the other, leaving the headlights on and facing in the direction of the plane’s approach: from ninety degrees east.
Only Ironside has any experience of guiding planes to land on ski-ways, having done a season at Rothera Research Station and learned aircraft marshalling signals. Multi-skilling is just part of life on Antarctic stations. He stands in a yellow reflector jacket, facing the approaching airborne beast, right arm raised, giving the pilot the all-clear. The scientists scurry around like squirrels hoarding nuts, locking away research data and computers. Yushkov and Beer ensure the drill head and probe are secured inside a padlocked shipping container.
‘So much for the spirit of scientific co-operation,’ grumbles Matthews, who clearly does not regard Trankov’s team with the same degree of suspicion as Heatherton.
‘Oh, give me a break,’ says Price. ‘Trankov gave us the finger when we begged them not to pollute Lake Vostok. He doesn’t believe in co-operation. He wants to take over our project and steal the glory.’
The grey and white airlifter, with its high tail and bulbous glass nose, lumbers towards the tiny British camp, dropping lower and lower in the sky, its enormous wheels like vulture’s talons ready to grip the hazardous ice surface. The screaming engines are so loud, Wolfe covers her ears. She feels the throb of its engines vibrating through her ribcage. The icy ground shakes as the 190,000-kilogram plane touches down, the perilously uneven terrain barely causing the plane’s wings to dip, the wheels holding the ice just as well as if it had landed on concrete and asphalt. It thunders past the waiting team, who watch in stunned silence as loose ice is sucked into the air behind it, rendering the giant plane almost invisible. Ironside has to squat behind the bright orange Ski-Doo, pummelled by the backdraught. The Il-76 rumbles off into the distance, then makes a wide arc as it turns towards the camp - the vulture circling its prey.
Heatherton grinds his jaw, his shoulders hunched with tension. Sinclair can’t keep his feet still and shuffles nervously from one boot to the other, hands in pockets. Wolfe is surprised to see Yushkov standing next to Heatherton, his feet wide set, his hands gripped behind his back, his expression wary, as if protecting his leader. Perhaps, as the only Russian speaker, he’s been asked to provide the introductions, but her research tells her that Trankov speaks English very well.
‘What the hell are they up to?’ says Beer to himself, but it’s loud enough for Wolfe to hear. ‘We said no, yet the buggers came anyway.’
‘Trankov must’ve got permission from his government to land on such a dangerous ice runway,’ Wolfe says. ‘Which means he has approval from the highest level.’
‘How do you know that?’ Beer asks.
‘I did my homework,’ Wolfe tells him.
The Il-76 seems to move painstakingly slowly as it completes the circle and follows Ironside’s signals. The engines’ roar makes further conversation difficult. Finally, some hundred and fifty metres from the camp’s outer perimeter, the plane grinds to a halt.
‘It’s bloody enormous,’ Matthews shouts.
The engines are cut but still whir, whipping up ice fragments, blurring Wolfe’s view. But she can just make out the detail of the Il-76’s nose. It has a grey bulbous point, like a snub nose, surrounded by panes of glass, so the pilots can see ahead, above and below. A side door is opened and the steps are lowered.
The first to walk down the steps is short and dumpy. He wears a red parka, but no hat or hood; his hair and beard are white. From photographs she’s seen, she knows this must be Dr Trankov and, if he has come bearing gifts, he’s going to find no takers. Three others disembark, also dressed in red, carrying backpacks.
The first is very tall, well over six foot with square shoulders. He walks with the surety of a man used to difficult terrain. His hair is blond and fine and cut short.
The second man is shorter and wiry. He strides, almost in a march, towards them. The third, who walks with shoulders forward and arms wide, has short brown hair and the body of a shot-putter. As the third arrival draws near, Wolfe realises she is a woman. She doesn’t wear her red parka, just a fleece, and Wolfe can’t take her eyes off the width of the woman’s arms and neck, imagining that in an arm-wrestling match with Yushkov, she could give him a run for his money.
Ironside drives Trankov to them by Ski-Doo. The others follow on foot. The leader of the Russian group offers Heatherton his hand, smiling jovially, his cheeks puffing out like a hamster chewing food. Heatherton
shakes the proffered hand, his smile forced.
‘My friend!’ says Trankov, ‘It’s good to see you. A long time, I think.’
Before Heatherton can respond he is gripped in a hug by the rotund Russian, and it is all Wolfe can do not to smirk at Heatherton’s sour expression. Releasing Heatherton, Trankov chats jovially about the flight until his companions have joined him.
‘Anya Snigir. Our chief drilling engineer.’
Snigir has downward-slanting, hooded brown eyes that make it difficult to see their expression. Her wide, pudgy face is androgynous. She nods her head at the welcoming party.
‘She does not speak English,’ Trankov adds.
Wolfe takes a sideways look at Yushkov, who is studying Snigir closely. Heatherton glances nervously at both Yushkov and the woman. Perhaps Heatherton still suspects Yushkov is a spy and doesn’t like the idea they can speak to each other in a language he doesn’t understand.
‘Sergey Grankin,’ Trankov says next, gesturing to the tall man whose patchy beard is relatively new, probably a week’s growth. ‘Engineer.’
As Grankin moves down the line shaking hands, Heatherton provides the introductions to his team, and to Wolfe and Harvey.
‘Ah, the great British press,’ says Trankov, with a hint of mockery.
When Grankin shakes Wolfe’s hand, she notices his defined cheekbones and his long bony nose has a kink in the middle. It’s been broken in the past. His smile reveals a crowded mouth with teeth that stick inwards.
‘Do you speak English?’ she asks.
‘Yes, a little.’
When he shakes Yushkov’s hand he stands a fraction too close, eyeballing the man who is no longer a Russian citizen. It is subtly threatening. Yushkov doesn’t flinch.
‘Demitri Magnitsky. He designed and built our drill. He is machinist,’ Trankov says.
The dark-haired wiry man stands stiffly, but smiles as he says, ‘It is very nice to meet you.’
‘And your pilot?’ Heatherton asks. ‘Does he need any help?’
‘No, no. Mikhail will secure the plane and join us later.’
Harvey steps forward and introduces himself.
