Douglas Preston - The Ice Limit

"Three days later, the wreck they were on struck the reefs around Diego Ramirez Island, southwest of the Horn. Honeycutt drowned, and only the seaman made it ashore. The man lived off shellfish, moss, cormorant guano, and kelp. He kept up a constant fire of turf, on the remote chance some vessel would pass by. Six months later, a Spanish ship saw the signal and brought him aboard."

"He must've been glad to see that ship," said McFarlane.

"Yes and no," said Britton. "England was at war with Spain at the time. He spent the next ten years in a dungeon in Cádiz. But in time he was released, and he returned to his native Scotland, married a lass twenty years his junior, and lived out a life as a farmer far, far from the sea."

Britton paused, smoothing the thick linen with the tips of her fingers. "That common seaman," she said quietly, "was William McKyle Britton. My ancestor."

She took a drink from her water glass, dabbed at her mouth with the napkin, and nodded to the steward to bring on the next course.

Rolvaag,

June 27, 3:45 P.M.

MCFARLANE LEANED against the maindeck railing, enjoying the lazy, almost imperceptible roll of the ship. The Rolvaag was "in ballast" — its ballast tanks partially filled with seawater to compensate for a lack of cargo — and consequently rode high in the water. To his left rose the ship's aft superstructure, a monolithic white slab relieved only by rheumy windows and the distant bridge wings. A hundred miles to the west, over the horizon, lay Myrtle Beach and the low coastline of South Carolina.

Assembled on the deck around him were the fifty-odd souls who made up the crew of the Rolvaag , a small group, considering the vastness of the ship. What struck him most was the diversity: Africans, Portuguese, French, English, Americans, Chinese, Indonesians, squinting in the lateafternoon sunlight and murmuring to each other in half a dozen languages. McFarlane guessed they would not take well to bullshit. He hoped Glinn had also registered that fact.

A sharp laugh cut across the group, and McFarlane turned to see Amira. The only EES staffer in attendance, she was sitting with a group of Africans who were stripped to the waist. They were talking and laughing animatedly.

The sun was dropping into the semitropical seas, sinking into a line of peach-colored clouds that stood like mushrooms on the distant horizon. The sea was oily and smooth, with only the suggestion of a swell.

A door in the superstructure opened and Glinn emerged. He walked slowly out along the central catwalk that ran, arrow straight, over a thousand feet to the Rolvaag 's bows. Behind him came Captain Britton, followed by the first mate and several other senior officers.

McFarlane watched the captain with renewed interest. A somewhat abashed Amira had told him the full story after dinner. Two years earlier, Britton had run a tanker onto Three Brothers' Reef off Spitsbergen. There had been no oil in the hold, but the damage to the ship had been considerable. Britton had been legally intoxicated at the time. Though there was no proof that her drinking caused the accident — it appeared to be an operational error by the helmsman — she had been without a command ever since. No wonder she agreed to this assignment, he thought, watching her step forward. And Glinn must have realized that no captain in good standing would have taken it. McFarlane shook his head curiously. Glinn would have left nothing to chance, especially the command of the Rolvaag. He must know something about this woman.

Amira had joked about it in a way that made McFarlane a little uncomfortable. "It doesn't seem fair, punishing the whole ship for the weakness of one person," she'd said to McFarlane. "You can bet the crew is none too pleased. Can't you just see them in the crew's mess, sipping a glass of wine with dinner? Lovely, with just a touch of oak, wouldn't you say?" She had finished by making a wry face.

Overhead, Glinn had now reached the assembly. He stopped, hands behind his back, gazing down at the maindeck and the upturned faces.

"I am Eli Glinn," he began in his quiet, uninflected voice. "President of Effective Engineering Solutions. Many of you know the broad outlines of our expedition. Your captain has asked me to fill in some of the details. After doing so, I'll be happy to take questions."

He glanced down at the company.

"We are heading to the southern tip of South America, to retrieve a large meteorite for the Lloyd Museum. If we're correct, it will be the largest meteorite ever unearthed. In the hold, as many of you know, there is a special cradle built to receive it. The plan is very simple: we anchor in the Cape Horn islands. My crew, with the help of some of you, will excavate the meteorite, transport it to the ship, and place it in the cradle. Then we will deliver it to the Lloyd Museum."

He paused.

"Some of you may be concerned about the legality of the operation. We have staked mining claims to the island. The meteorite is an ore body, and no laws will be broken. There is, on the other hand, a potential practical problem in that Chile does not know we are retrieving a meteorite. But let me assure you this is a remote possibility. Everything has been worked out in great detail, and we do not anticipate any difficulties. The Cape Horn islands are uninhabited. The nearest settlement is Puerto Williams, fifty miles away. Even if the Chilean authorities learn what we are doing, we are prepared to pay a reasonable sum for the meteorite. So, as you can see, there is no cause for alarm, or even anxiety."

He paused again, then looked up. "Are there any questions?"

A dozen hands shot up. Glinn nodded to the closest man, a burly oiler wearing greasy overalls.

"So what is this meteorite?" the man boomed. There was an immediate murmur of assent.

"It will probably be a mass of nickel-iron weighing some ten thousand tons. An inert lump of metal."

"What's so important about it?"

"We believe it to be the largest meteorite ever discovered by man."

More hands went up.

"What happens if we get caught?"

"What we are doing is one hundred percent legal," Glinn replied.

A man in a blue uniform stood up, one of the ship's electricians. "I don't like it," he said in a broad Yorkshire accent. He had a mass of red hair and an unruly beard.

Glinn waited politely.

"If the bloody Chileans catch us making off with their rock, anything could happen. If everything's one hundred percent legal, why not just buy the bloody stone from them?"

Glinn looked at the man, his pale gray eyes unwavering. "May I ask your name?"

"It's Lewis," came the reply.

"Because, Mr. Lewis, it would be politically impossible for the Chileans to sell it to us. On the other hand, they don't have the technological expertise to get it out of the ground and off the island, so it would just sit there, buried — probably forever. In America, it will be studied. It will be exhibited at a museum for all to see. It will be held in trust for mankind. This is not Chilean cultural patrimony. It could have fallen anywhere — even in Yorkshire."

There was a brief laugh from Lewis's mates. McFarlane was glad to see that Glinn seemed to be gaining their confidence with his straightforward talk.

"Sir," said one slight man, a junior ship's officer. "What about this dead man's switch?"

"The dead man's switch," Glinn said smoothly, his voice steady, almost mesmerizing, "is a distant precaution. In the unlikely event that the meteorite comes loose from its cradle — in a huge storm, say — it is merely a way for us to lighten our ballast by releasing it into the ocean. It's no different from the nineteenth-century mariners who had to throw their cargo overboard in severe weather. But the chances of having to jettison it are vanishingly small. The idea is to protect the ship and the crew above all, even at the expense of losing the meteorite."