Read Online Frozen Solid: A Novel by James Tabor - Free Book Online

arrived in the chief scientist’s office, the question had been blinking in her mind.
Should I tell her?
    There was something else. With each new encounter, it was getting harder
not
to tell. The secret wanted out. More properly, something in her wanted it released. It felt like a tumor, ugly, foreign, and dangerous. A friend with cancer had told her, “Once you know that thing is in there, you just want it
out
.” Hallie understood that much better now.
    “I’m so glad you’re here.” Merritt brought her back. “Fido will be overjoyed. He’s just been, oh, what’s the word … distraught since Emily’s death.”
    “I hope I can help,” she said. “I was sent in a huge rush. Emily and he were researching an extremophile found in a subglacial lake, or so I was told. I didn’t know there were any lakes at the Pole.”
    “There weren’t supposed to be. It was a huge surprise. Russians found the closest one hundreds of miles away, called Vostok. Bigger than Lake Ontario. Ours is tiny by comparison—about a thousand feet in diameter.”
    “How deep?”
    “Two miles, give or take.”
    Hallie thought she might not have heard right. “Two
miles
?”
    “Yes.”
    “And Emily was diving this lake, right?”
    “It’s called a cryopeg. Yes, she was. Poor Emily.” Merritt lookedaway for a few moments, appeared to compose herself. “She found the extremophile colony only a hundred feet down and retrieved a biosample. They had it in the lab, but it went moribund in three days.”
    “So that’s the reason you needed another ice diver.”
    “Not
just
a diver. One who knew extremophiles and could function in the Pole environment.
And
who could get here fast, because of winterover. If we can’t take more biomatter out of the cryopeg in the next few days, it’ll be nine months before we can put anyone down there again. Who knows what will be left, now that we’ve breached the ice capsule?”
    “What makes this thing so special?”
    “I’m just a garden-variety epidemiologist, Hallie. Fido can explain it better. When were you thinking of diving?”
    “That depends. Is there a recompression chamber here?”
    “Oh dear, no. There was never any need for one until now.”
    “Not good. The water is twenty-two degrees, right?”
    Merritt nodded.
    “That’s brutal. Did Emily mark a route?”
    “Yes.”
    “How much ice do you have to pass through to reach the water?”
    “It’s a thirty-foot shaft, flooded to surface level.”
    “This is going to be very dangerous. Without a recompression chamber, there’s no margin for error. I’m tired, dehydrated, feeling the altitude. It’s all a recipe for decompression sickness.”
    “The bends.”
    “Yes. Let’s shoot for later this afternoon. Might even need to wait until tomorrow.”
    “Oh, either will be fine. Need you healthy, after all.” Merritt seemed not at all disappointed by the possible delay, which surprised Hallie, given the urgency to get her down here. Then Merritt asked, “Have you seen Doc yet?”
    “No.”
    Merritt sat back, her smile fading for the first time. “Please do thatas soon as possible.” Also for the first time, she sounded more like a boss than a kindly aunt.
    “I’m not sick. A cold, maybe, but nothing serious,” Hallie said.
    “It’s not about being sick. It’s to start your Pole medical file.”
    “My medical file should have been sent down.”
    “Might have been.”
    “Then why—?”
    “Studying people at Pole is critical. In a way, the biggest experiment here is us. So everybody gets an incoming physical. Creates a research baseline.”
    “I’m leaving in four days, though. Why bother?”
    Merritt shrugged. “The rules come down from on high, and we follow them. Would appreciate your doing the same.”
    “All right.”
    Merritt looked ready to finish, but Hallie was not. “Can we talk about Emily? Graeter said you knew the details of her death.”
    “What did he tell you?”
    “Nothing. He told me to see