Read Online Antarctic Affair by Louise Rose-Innes - Free Book Online

boat,” she yelled, trying to stand up. Taj
grabbed her by her cashmere jersey and pulled her down roughly.
    “What are you trying to do, kill yourself?” he
shouted. “Leave them. You’ll never find them.”
    “But they were Dolce and Gabbana!” she sobbed.
    “I don’t care if they were given to you by the Queen
herself. They’re gone.”
    She pouted prettily, “Stupid wind.”
    “Actually it’s a bit like sailing,” he explained,
his voice heavy with sarcasm. “The bigger the sail, the more wind it catches.”
    She glared at him. “Thanks for the lesson, Captain.
I’ll try to remember that next time.”
    He shook his head and laughed. She was too much.
    As they scrambled out onto the beach a reception
committee of penguins greeted the group and escorted them down the beach. Taj
lagged behind and took a couple of shots. He was amused to see George sticking
close to Don while she glanced anxiously at the harmless birds. She really was such
a city girl.
    “Check out the elephant seal,” he told her as he
rejoined the group.
    “Oh my God, it’s huge!” she gasped, as the single
seal lay silently on guard. They were just passing the sleeping giant when
suddenly it opened its blood shot eyes and peered at them menacingly. Georgina
froze and gripped Taj’s arm.
    “Keep moving,” he whispered urgently and the group
moved forward until they were at a safe distance. The seal raised its massive
head and barked an order as if to say “Stay off my beach”.
    “Phew, that was scary,” Georgina commented once they
were out of harms way.
    Don nodded at her, “Yup, they have been known to
attack when they feel threatened. They may look ungainly, but they move really
fast.”
    “Marvellous,” Taj heard Georgina muttering to
herself as she traipsed across the ice and rocks towards the nearby hills.
    He laughed. “Be thankful you’re not a seal,” he told
her. “They have to fend off attacks on a daily basis.”
    “Poor things,” she looked distraught.
    “It’s part of nature’s grand plan,” he said. “It’s
hard to watch when you see an attack, harder still to photograph it, but we
can’t interfere.”
    “Moments of insanity?” asked Georgina suddenly, looking
at him from under her mascaraed lashes.
    His eyes widened in surprise. “Moments of insanity,”
he agreed softly.
    “So when last did this baby explode?” asked the
documentary maker, Max Copeland in his booming Texan drawl. “A thousand years
ago? Ten thousand years ago?”
    “Try ten years ago,” Taj offered with a grin,
thinking how much Max looked like J.R. Ewing from Dallas, complete with
broad-brimmed cowboy hat. All he needed to perfect the image was a big fat cigar.
Georgina stumbled and he instinctively gripped her arm to stabilise her, only
to instantly let go, remembering that he wasn’t supposed to be helping her.
    “Ten years?” she panted, trying to catch her breath.
For the last half hour they’d been hiking steadily uphill over what looked exactly
like a lunar landscape.  
    “It is an active volcano, yes,” a seismologist from
Vancouver informed them. “The most recent eruptions took place in
1991-1992.   Even today the seafloor
inside the caldera is rising rapidly in geological terms.”
    “What’s ‘rapidly’?” asked Georgina.
    “About thirty centimetres a year,” he replied. “It’s
classified as a restless caldera with a significant volcanic risk.”
    “Great!” both Georgina’s eyebrows shot up and she
glared at Taj. “And how come no one thought to mention this to me?”
    “Thought you knew,” said Taj with a shrug.
    “What if it decides to erupt right now? Then what do
we do?” She looked worried from Taj across to Don.
    “It’s not going…” Don began, but Taj cut him off.
    “It’s a risk you take when you climb an active
volcano,” he said vaguely. “But if it does come to that I’m afraid our chances
of survival are minimal. A sudden collapse of the caldera would