“You make it sound so easy,” Skyler said.
“Only fair to warn you, Sky,” Peter Bjoernsson said. “When we get down there, we may find that the millions of tons of ice that have accumulated over so much time have crushed the plane into a sheet of metal no thicker than the Sunday edition of the New York Times.”
“Let’s hope we don’t,” Skyler said as he felt an icy chill from a blast of Arctic wind.
CARTAGENA MEETING
The armor-plated Mercedes limousine pulled up to the entrance of Demente on an unassuming street corner in the Getsemani neighborhood of Cartagena. Famous for its aged steaks and exotic seafood, Demente was the gathering place of the rich and the ultra-rich like Pablo Escandoza. Each month, he traveled to Cartagena to meet with Alejandro Ramirez, the Director of Banco de National, the largest bank in Colombia, and one of many financial institutions owned by Escandoza. The two men would often dine at Demente.
As Escandoza scrutinized the wine list, Ramirez, a short, balding man in his late fifties said, “I have not seen you smile so much since the day you made the cover of Fortune magazine. Have you finally convinced Teresa Castillo that she would be much happier sleeping with you than one of the lesbian fashion models she collects like coins?”
“I should be so lucky,” Escandoza said with a sigh. “I’m afraid, Alejandro, that Teresa will spend the rest of her life never wanting or needing what lays between my legs.” He flicked his finger and the wine steward who had been waiting a short distance away stepped forward. Escandoza picked an ’89 Chateau Latour Blanche and also requested a bottle of Don Perignon to start the evening.
“Very good.” The steward bowed before scurrying away.
“Then we truly have something to celebrate?” Ramirez said.
“It is so close, my friend, that I can almost taste it.”
“So the last of the hold-outs have put down a deposit?”
“The Blackstone’s little demonstration in the sky over Hawaii was more than enough to convince both our customers in South Africa and Iran to commit.”
The steward returned and opened the bottle of champagne. After he poured the golden liquid into the crystal flute, he waited for the drug lord’s approval.
“Exquisite,” Escandoza said with a warm smile.
The steward filled Ramirez’s glass and then Escandoza’s before leaving the two men alone.
“So what’s the latest news from Greenland?” Ramirez asked.
“The salvage company OceanQuest has located the plane and is about to start drilling. The apparatus they will use to recover the korium is being transported to the site with a crew of locals, all handpicked by Rainer Knebel.”
“So this man, Knebel, is with the Afrikaner Resistance Movement?”
“An offshoot. One with some very wealthy donors who want things back the way they were. Notice how everyone wants to take their countries back. Anyway, Knebel insisted on protecting his investment in person. He not only arranged for the accidental demise of OceanQuest’s project director, but he presented an impressive resume to the director of OceanQuest. It was convincing enough for him to secure the position as new project director. Now the man in charge of the whole recovery operation is our business partner, so to speak.”
“He sounds very clever,” Ramirez said. “I look forward to meeting him.”
“So do I, my friend.” Escandoza sipped the champagne. “Once Knebel recovers the korium and eliminates all witnesses from the picture, he will personally escort the ore back to Colombia. I may even consider offering him a permanent position with my organization. We will need resourceful men like him when the delivery process begins.”
“I would like to see the faces of the OceanQuest recovery team when they find out Knebel’s true identity.” Ramirez leaned back in his chair.
“That would be a treat,” Escandoza said with a confident smile. “As in all of life, the secret to success is to never let them see you coming.”
VULCAN
With a loud hiss and a billowing cloud of steam, the Vulcan probe touched the frozen surface of the glacier. Suspended by steel cables and wenches from a massive derrick, the ten-foot-wide bottom of the cylinder-shaped probe glowed bright red. With the twin diesel meltdown generators roaring as they powered the Vulcan’s internal heating elements, the probe began its descent into the ice.
Thick cables and a collection of high-pressure vacuum hoses ran bundled together down into the top of the Vulcan. The cables supplied the electricity for the heating elements that turned the solid ice to boiling water, and the hoses suctioned off the water through a series of intake holes in the probe’s head. The water traveled up through the hoses to a pump a few hundred yards away. There it sprayed out over the glacier and turned back into ice.
The Vulcan could melt through thirty feet of ice in a twenty-four-hour period. Working around the clock and with only two minor breakdowns, it took just over nine days before the probe reached the DC-4 260 feet below. Entombed for over fifty years in the frozen grip of the ice, Arctic Air Cargo 101 once again felt the rush of air on its skin.
“We’re there,” Dr. Bjoernsson said into the two-way radio.
“Coming, Peter,” Skyler answered. He and Gates left the command Quonset hut and walked over to the derrick supporting the Vulcan. They watched as the probe was pulled from the shaft and swung away.
“Would you like to do the honors?” Skyler asked Gates.
“Normally I would say yes, but this is definitely your show, Sky.”
With a nod and a broad smile, Skyler strapped on a harness connected to 100 meters of nylon rope. Swinging out over the edge of the shaft, he gave a confident salute before repelling down.
The light on top of his hard hat cast an eerie glow on the translucent walls — the black hole beneath him seemed endless and foreboding. Because the depth of the shaft extended below the water table, the constant dripping made it feel like he was in light rain.
With a thud, Skyler found himself standing on the partially exposed cowling of an airplane engine — its surface was battered and bumpy but intact. The blade of a propeller stuck out of the ice — its paint scarred and the tip bent back, evidence of a hard impact.
“What have you found?” Gates’ voice boomed out over the two-way radio strapped to Skyler’s waist.
“Contact Chief Inspector Smyth,” Skyler said with a grin. “Tell him to pack his bags.”
Based on the motor block’s serial number, Skyler confirmed that what he had first stood on was the DC-4’s #2 engine. That meant they had reached the plane’s left wing not far from the cockpit. Over the next two days, the hot-water hoses were used to melt through the ice in the direction of the fuselage. Once there, the crew started melting the ice toward the aft of the plane to locate the cargo door.
The glacier had not been kind to Arctic Air Cargo 101, Skyler thought as he stood back watching the slow melting process. The outer skin resembled the surface of the moon, pitted and dented from the force of crushing ice. The #2 engine had moved several inches forward, tearing it from its mounts, linkages and connections. Oil, once contained in the suspended animation of the frozen tomb, now covered the floor of the cave — its alien texture and color seemed to violate the virgin ice. As more of the fuselage was revealed, Skyler realized that even he had underestimated the force of the glacier. The plane had suffered a torturous death.
Over the last week, he had watched Rainer Knebel working with the Inuits. They seemed more than eager to do whatever the South African asked including working in round-the-clock shifts — an unusual characteristic. Skyler had had no such luck with them in the past. The locals usually worked on their own timetable, one that rarely synchronized with the outside world.