“The ice block was very diminished,” Darryl interjected. “It would have completely collapsed soon.”
Murphy paused, then plowed ahead. “Whatever you say. But then, whoever this is, he’s leaving the bodies and the dogs out there somewhere—the whaling station, the rookery, an ice cave that we don’t know about—and racing back here on the snowmobile, a snowmobile that nobody noticed was missing—”
“And that nobody heard either coming or going,” Michael threw in.
“Right,” Murphy said, wearily rubbing his graying hair again, “that, too. You see how none of this is adding up?”
Michael saw his point, clearly. That was actually the first chance he’d had even to try putting the pieces of the puzzle together, but it was no surprise that Murphy already looked exhausted and utterly stumped.
On Darryl’s face, Michael noted a look of just plain anger. His lab had been desecrated and his most prized specimen stolen. “I don’t think anyone could have done it alone,” he declared. “Getting those bodies out of the tank and into the sled, and in the very limited amount of time between the last time I’d been in the lab and when I found them missing?” He shook his head and said, “It had to be two people, at least, to carry this whole thing off.”
“So,” Murphy replied, “what are you saying? You got any candidates in mind?”
Darryl sipped the coffee, then said, “Betty and Tina? You sure you’ve accounted for them?”
“Why on earth would Betty and Tina do this?” Murphy asked.
“I don’t know,” Darryl said, in exasperation. “But maybe they wanted to do the work themselves. Maybe they thought I took it away from them. Maybe they have some other agenda altogether.” He sounded not only as if he was grasping at straws, but as if he knew it himself. He threw up his hands in disgust, then let them flop back onto his lap.
“I’ll follow up with them,” Murphy said, in an unconvincing tone.
“In the meantime, I want a lock for my lab,” Darryl insisted. “I’ve got my fish to look out for.”
“You honestly think somebody’s gonna come back for your fish, too?” Murphy replied. “Don’t sweat it—I’ll find you a lock.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
December 13, 10:30 p.m.
WHILE SINCLAIR WENT BACK and forth fetching provisions from the sled, Eleanor tried to make herself useful in the rectory. She unrolled the woolen blanket at the foot of the cot—it was stiff as a washboard—and found an old broom in the corner with which she tried to sweep some of the rodent leavings from the floor. She opened the grate of the cast-iron furnace and found a petrified rat inside, lying on a bed of splinters and straw. She lifted it out by its tail, tossed it through the window, then battened the shutters tight again. On the table, next to the stump of a candle and a ring of rusty keys, she found a packet of lucifers, and to her own amazement she was able to get one to light. She touched it to the tinder, and after a few seconds she had a small fire glowing in the furnace.
She thought Sinclair would be pleased, but after he had set down some books and bottles from the sled, he looked askance at the blaze. “The smoke from the chimney,” he said. “It will give us away.”
To whom? she thought. Was there another living soul for miles? Her heart sank at the idea of extinguishing the tiny, cheerful fire.
“But this storm will dissipate it,” he said, thinking aloud. “Go to it, my love.”