“Is everything still in it?” Dick asked. “I worried about that flying up here. I mean, I don’t want this to be a wasted trip.”

“Have no fear,” Ron said. “Nothing’s been touched. That I can assure you.”

“Maybe there are more dwellings in the general area,” Dick suggested. “Who knows? It could be a village.”

Ron shrugged. “Maybe so. But no one wants to find out. If anybody from the state got wind of this they’d stop construction on our feeder pipeline to the new field. That would be one huge disaster, because we have to have the feeder line functional before winter, and winter starts in August around here.”

Ron began to slow down as he scanned the side of the road. Eventually he pulled to a stop abreast of a small cairn. Putting a hand on Dick’s arm to keep him in his seat, he turned to look back down the road. When he was convinced that no one was coming, he climbed from the Jeep and motioned for Dick to do the same.

Reaching back into the Jeep, he pulled out two old and soiled anoraks and work gloves. He handed a set to Dick. “You’ll need these,” he explained. “We’ll be down below the permafrost.” Then he reached back into the Jeep for a heavy-duty flashlight.

“All right,” Ron added nervously. “We can’t be here long. I don’t want anybody coming along the road and wondering what the hell is going on.”

Dick followed Ron as he headed north away from the road. A cloud of mosquitoes mystically materialized and attacked them mercilessly. Looking ahead, Dick could see a fog bank about a half mile away and guessed it marked the coast of the Arctic Ocean. In all other directions there was no relief from the monotony of the flat, windswept, featureless tundra that extended to the horizon. Overhead seabirds circled and cried raucously.

A dozen steps from the road, Ron stopped. After one last glance for approaching vehicles, he bent down and grabbed the edge of a sheet of plywood that had been painted to match the variegated colors of the surrounding tundra. He pulled the wood aside to reveal a hole four feet deep. In the north wall of the hole was the entrance to a small tunnel.

“It looks as if the hut was buried by ice,” Dick said.

Ron nodded. “We think that pack ice was blown up from the beach during one of the ferocious winter storms.”

“A natural tomb,” Dick said.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” Ron asked.

“Don’t be silly,” Dick said while he donned the parka and pulled on the gloves. “I’ve come thousands of miles. Let’s go.”

Ron climbed into the hole and then bent down on all fours. Lowering himself, he entered the tunnel. Dick followed at his heels.

As Dick crawled, he could see very little save for the eerie silhouette of Ron ahead of him. As he moved away from the entrance, the darkness closed in around him like a heavy, frigid blanket. In the failing light he noticed his breath crystallizing. He thanked God that he wasn’t claustrophobic.

After about six feet the walls of the tunnel fell away. The floor also slanted downward, giving them an additional foot of headroom. There were about three and a half feet of clearance. Ron moved to the side and Dick crawled up next to him.

“It’s colder than a witch’s tit down here,” Dick said.

Ron’s flashlight beam played into the corners to illuminate short vertical struts of beluga rib bones.

“The ice snapped those whalebones like they were toothpicks,” Ron said.

“Where are the inhabitants?” Dick asked.

Ron directed his flashlight beam ahead to a large, triangular piece of ice that had punched through the ceiling of the hut. “On the other side of that,” he said. He handed the flashlight to Dick.

Dick took the flashlight and started crawling forward. As much as he didn’t want to admit it, he was beginning to feel uncomfortable. “You’re sure this place is safe?” he questioned.

“I’m not sure of anything,” Ron said. “Just that it’s been like this for seventy-five years or so.”

It was a tight squeeze around the block of dirty ice in the center. When Dick was halfway around he shone the light into the space beyond.

Dick caught his breath while a little gasp issued from his mouth. Although he thought he’d been prepared, the image within the flashlight beam was more ghoulish than he’d expected. Staring back at him was the pale visage of a frozen, bearded Caucasian male dressed in furs. He was sitting upright. His eyes were open and ice blue, and they stared back at Dick defiantly. Around his mouth and nose was frozen pink froth.

“You see all three?” Ron called from the darkness.

Dick allowed the light to play around the room. The second body was supine, with its lower half completely encased in ice. The third body was positioned in a manner similar to the first, propped up against a wall in a half-sitting position. Both were Eskimos with characteristic features, dark hair, and dark eyes. Both also had frozen pink froth around their mouths and noses.

Dick shuddered through a sudden wave of nausea. He hadn’t expected such a reaction, but it passed quickly.

“You see the newspaper?” Ron called.

“Not yet,” Dick said as he trained his light on the floor. He saw all sorts of debris frozen together, including bird feathers and animal bones.

“It’s near the bearded guy,” Ron called.

Dick shone the light at the frozen Caucasian’s feet. He saw the Anchorage paper immediately. The headlines were about the war in Europe. Even from where he was he could see the date: April 17, 1918.

Dick wriggled back into the antechamber. His initial horror had passed. Now he was excited. “I think you were right,” he said. “It looks like all three died of pneumonia, and the date is right on.”

“I knew you’d find it interesting,” Ron said.

“It’s more than interesting,” Dick said. “It could be the chance of a lifetime. I’m going to need a saw.”

The blood drained from Ron’s face. “A saw,” he repeated with dismay. “You’ve got to be joking.”

“You think I’d pass up this chance?” Dick questioned. “Not on your life. I need some lung tissue.”

“Jesus H. Christ!” Ron murmured. “You’d better promise again not to say anything about this ever!”

“I promised already,” Dick said with exasperation. “If I find what I think I’m going to find, it will be for my own collection. Don’t worry. Nobody’s going to know.”

Ron shook his head. “Sometimes I think you’re one weird dude.”

“Let’s get the saw,” Dick said. He handed the flashlight to Ron and started for the entrance.

6:40 P.M.

O’HARE AIRPORT, CHICAGO

Marilyn Stapleton looked at her husband of twelve years and felt torn. She knew that the convulsive changes that had racked their family had impacted most on John, yet she still had to think about the children. She glanced at the two girls who were sitting in the departure lounge and nervously looking in her direction, sensing that their life as they knew it was in the balance. John wanted them to move to Chicago where he was starting a new residency in pathology.

Marilyn redirected her gaze to her husband’s pleading face. He’d changed over the last several years. The confident, reserved man she had married was now bitter and insecure. He had shed twenty-five pounds, and his once ruddy, full cheeks had hollowed, giving him a lean, haggard look consistent with his new personality.

Marilyn shook her head. It was hard to recall that just two years previously they had been the picture of the successful suburban family with his flourishing ophthalmology practice and her tenured position in English literature at the University of Illinois.

But then the huge health-care conglomerate AmeriCare had appeared on the horizon, sweeping through Champaign, Illinois, as well as numerous other towns, gobbling up practices and hospitals with bewildering speed. John had tried to hold out but ultimately lost his patient base. It was either surrender or flee, and John chose to flee. At first he’d looked for another ophthalmology position, but when it became clear there were too many ophthalmologists and that he’d be forced to work for AmeriCare or a similar organization, he’d made the decision to retrain in another medical specialty.