Icebound

about?”

“I'm not sure,” Harry said. “Something happened to him in China when he was a child, very young. It must've been in the last days of Chiang's rule, something traumatic. He seems to connect Brian to that, because of his family's politics.”

“And the pressure we've been under these past nine hours might have snapped him.”

“I suppose it's possible.”

“But it doesn't feel right.”

“Not quite.”

They thought about it.

Pete Johnson started walking in place to keep his feet from getting chilled. Harry followed suit, stepping smartly up and down, going nowhere.

After a minute or so, still exercising, Pete said, “What about Franz Fischer?”

“What about him?”

“He's cool toward you. And toward Rita. Not cool toward her exactly… but there's sure something odd in the way he looks at her.”

“You're observant.”

“Maybe it's professional jealousy because of all these science awards the two of you have piled up the last few years.”

“He's not that petty.”

“What then?” When Harry hesitated, Pete said, “None of my business?”

“He knew her when.”

“Before she married you?”

“Yes. They were lovers.”

“So he is jealous, but not because of the awards.”

“Apparently, yeah.”

“She's a terrific lady,” Pete said. “Anybody who lost her to you would not be likely to think you're such a great guy. You ever think maybe that should have been a reason not to bring Franz onto this team?”

“If Rita and I could put that part of the past behind us, why couldn't he?”

“Because he's not you and Rita, man. He's a self-involved science nerd, for one thing. He may be good- looking and smart and sophisticated in some ways, but he's basically insecure. Probably accepted the invitation to join the expedition just so Rita would have a chance to compare him and you under extreme conditions. He probably thought you'd stumble around like a dweeb here on the ice, while he'd be Nanook of the North, larger than life, a macho man by comparison. From day one, of course, he must have realized it wasn't going to work out that way, which explains why he's been so bitchy.”

“Doesn't make sense.”

“Does to me.”

Harry stopped exercising, afraid of working up a chilling sweat. “Franz might hate me and perhaps even Rita, but how do his feelings toward us translate into an attack on Brian?”

After a dozen more steps, Pete also quit walking in place. “Who knows how a psychopath's mind works?”

Harry shook his head. “It might be Franz. But not because he's jealous of me.”

“Breskin?”

“He's a cipher.”

“He strikes me as too self-contained.”

“We always tend to suspect the longer,” Harry said, “the quiet man who keeps to himself. But that's no more logical than suspecting Franz merely because he had a relationship with Rita years ago.”

“Why did Breskin emigrate to Canada from the U.S.?”

“I don't recall. Maybe he never said.”

“Could have been for political reasons,” Pete suggested.

“Yeah, maybe. But Canada and the U.S. have basically similar politics. I mean, if a man leaves his homeland and takes citizenship in a new country, you'd expect him to go somewhere that was radically different, a whole other system of government, economics.” Harry sniffed as he felt his nose beginning to run. “Besides, Roger had a chance to kill the kid early this afternoon. When Brian was dangling over the cliff, trying to reach George, Roger could have cut the rope. Who would have been the wiser?”

“Maybe he doesn't want to kill anyone but Brian. Maybe that's his only obsession. If he had cut the rope, he wouldn't have been able to save Lin all by himself.”

“He could have cut it after Lin was brought up.”

“But then George would have been a witness.”

“What psychopath has that degree of self-control? Besides, I'm not sure that George was in any condition to be a witness, little more than half conscious at that point.”

“But like you said, Roger's a cipher.”

“We're going in circles.”

As they breathed, the vapor they expelled crystallized between them. The cloud had become so thick that they could not see each other clearly, though they were no more than two feet apart.

Waving the fog out of their way and far enough from the sheltering ridge wall for a draft to catch it, Pete said, “We're left with Claude.”

“He seems the least likely of the lot.”

“How long have you known him?”

“Fifteen years. Sixteen. Thereabouts.”

“You've been on the ice with him before?”

“Several times,” Harry said. “He's a wonderful man.”

“He often talks about his late wife. Colette. He still gets teary about it, shaky. When did she die?”

“Three years ago this month. Claude was on the ice, his first expedition in two and a half years, when she was murdered.”

“Murdered?”

“She'd flown from Paris to London to a holiday. She was in England just three days. The IRA had planted a bomb in a restaurant where she went for lunch. She was one of the eight killed in the blast.”

“Good God!”

“They caught one of the men involved. He's still in prison.”

Pete said, “And Claude took it very hard.”

“Oh, yes. Colette was great. You'd have liked her. She and Claude were as close as Rita and I.”

For a moment neither of them spoke.

At the top of the ridge, the wind moaned like a revenant trapped between this world and the next. Again, the ice reminded Harry of a graveyard. He shuddered.

Pete said, “If a man is deeply in love with a woman, and she's taken from him, blown to pieces by a bomb — he might be twisted by the loss.”

“Not Claude. Broken, yes. Depressed, yes. But not twisted. He's the kindest—”

“His wife was killed by Irishmen.”

“So?”

“Dougherty is Irish.”

“That's a stretch, Pete. Irish-American, actually. And third generation.”

“You said one of these bombers was apprehended?”

“Yeah. They never nailed any of the others.”

“Do you remember his name?”

“No.”

“Was it Dougherty, anything like Dougherty?”

Harry grimaced and waved one hand dismissively. “Come on now, Pete. You've stretched it to the breaking point.”