“Tomorrow,” Murphy repeated, leaning on the back of his desk chair. “The supply plane’s coming tomorrow, at eight in the morning,” and he ran one hand nervously through his hair again. The other hand clutched a red marker, with which he had just circled the next day’s date on the whiteboard mounted on the wall behind his desk. “And you’re going back on it,” he said to Michael.
“What are you talking about?” Michael protested. “My NSF pass is good until the end of the month.”
“We’ve got another massive low-pressure system moving in, and by the time it’s passed, the crevassing will be even worse out there than it is already. The plane won’t be able to land.”
“Then I’ll take the next one out.”
“Where the hell do you think you are?” Murphy said. “There’s not gonna be a next plane out, not till maybe February.”
Michael’s mind was reeling. How could he possibly leave the next day? He’d made a promise to Eleanor, and he was not about to break it. He looked over at Darryl, sitting beside him, but all Darryl could do was return a sympathetic glance.
“What are you planning to do with Eleanor—and now Sinclair?” Michael said. “I’m the one who found them in the first place.”
“And don’t I wish you hadn’t. Don’t I wish I was rid of them both.”
“No one has their confidence the way I do.”
“Oh really?” Murphy replied. “Last time you visited Sinclair, I seem to recall you calling for reinforcements. What happened? Your trust break down?”
Michael still regretted that, but as Darryl jumped in to explain about some promising blood work he’d been doing in his lab, his thoughts kept racing ahead. Was this the time to broach his idea? When would he have another chance? Interrupting Darryl’s monologue, he blurted out, “Then they should both go back with me.”
Darryl stopped talking and turned toward him, while Murphy shook his head in exasperation. “And how do you suggest we arrange that?” he said, throwing up his hands. “This ain’t the bus station in Paducah. The plane doesn’t land—at pole, for Christ’s sake—and pick up three passengers when the manifest calls for just one.”
“I know that,” Michael said, “but bear with me.” He was fitting the pieces of the plan together even as he sat there. “Danzig’s wife knows he died, but she doesn’t know when to expect the body to be returned. Right?”
“Right. Somehow I never got around to calling her back to tell her that he’d turned into a zombie and was floating around somewhere under the polar ice cap. Kind of a hard call to make, don’t you think?”
“And what about Ackerley?” Michael persisted. “Does his mother know when his body is supposed to be returned to the States?”
“I’m not sure she knows it will be,” Murphy said, starting to sound intrigued. “I told you, she was pretty out of it.”
“Let me think,” Michael said, putting his head down and concentrating with all his might. “Let me think.” It was outlandish, but it was all coming together in his head. And it could, conceivably, work. “Danzig’s wife—”
“Maria,” Murphy supplied. “Maria Ramirez.”
“She works for the county coroner’s office in Miami Beach.”
“Yeah, that’s where she met Erik. He was driving a hearse in those days. In fact, he once told me—”
“Tell Maria that I’m accompanying her husband’s body, and Ackerley’s, to Miami Beach.”
“But you’re not,” Darryl said, perplexed. “Danzig’s never going to turn up again, except maybe in my nightmares.”
“And frankly, she didn’t want him to,” Michael replied. “Remember, she said that he was never happier than when he was down here? And that, if he’d had his way, that’s where he’d have wanted to be buried?”
“Yeah, but I told her Antarctic burials are prohibited by law,” Murphy said.
“But what about Ackerley? You’re going to dispose of his remains right here, aren’t you?” Michael persisted. “Or were you planning to send back a corpse with a bullet in its head?” Murphy squirmed in his chair, and that’s when Michael knew he had him. “A bullet from your gun, no less?”
Darryl frowned quizzically at that, and asked Murphy, “Now that it’s come up, what did you do with Ackerley’s remains? I know he asked to be cremated, but that would have been a contravention of the Antarctic protocols.”
“That’s right, it would have been,” Murphy said, staring Darryl straight in the eye and holding it. “Officially, Ackerley went down a crevasse while doing his fieldwork.”
Michael was relieved to hear it. “That’s perfect.”
“I’m still not following,” Murphy said.
“Don’t you see? If we want to, we can put two body bags on that plane, both of them fully accounted for. But the bodies inside don’t have to be the same ones as the names on the tags.”