Ice Station (53 page)

Schofield just smiled.

On June 23—two days after Schofield and
the Wasp docked at Pearl—the Washington Post
ran a front-page story containing a photo of Shane Schofield and
Andrew Trent holding a copy of the previous day's Post
between them. Beneath the photo were displayed copies of their
official United States Marine Corps death certificates.
Schofield's death certificate was several days old. Trent's
was over a year old. The headline read:

ACCORDING TO THE U.S. MILITARY, THESE TWO MEN ARE OFFICIALLY DEAD.

The accompanying story about the events that transpired at Wilkes Ice
Station—a feature that ran for three pages— was written by
Peter and Alison Cameron.

Later stories that ran about the events at Wilkes Ice Station told of
the ICG and the systematic infiltration by it of elite military units,
universities, and private corporations. Flashbulbs popped across the
country for the next six weeks as ICG moles were expunged from various
regiments, institutions, and companies and charged under various
statutes with espionage.

No mention, however, was made in any of the newspaper and TV
reports about the presence of French and British troops at Wilkes Ice
Station.

Rumors abounded in the tabloids about which other countries
had sent troops to Wilkes Ice Station. Iraq. China. Even Brazil had
rated a mention.

It was claimed in some quarters that the Washington Post knew
exactly who else had been down there. One rival newspaper even went so
far as to say that the President himself had paid a surprise visit to
Katharine Graham—the legendary owner of the
Post—and asked her, in the name of America's
diplomatic relations, not to publish the names of the countries that
had a presence at Wilkes Ice Station. This rumor was never confirmed.

The Post, however, never mentioned Britain or France.

It reported that a battle had taken place down in Antarctica, but it
steadfastly maintained that it did not know the identity of the
opposing force or forces. Every article that appeared in the
Post simply said that the conflict had been against
“enemies unknown,”

In any case, the Wilkes Ice Station story ran for six whole weeks
before it was forgotten.

A few days after the Wasp returned, the NATO conference in
Washington, D.C. concluded.

Every TV and newspaper article on the event showed the smiling faces
of the American, British, and French delegates standing on the steps
of the Capitol Building, shaking hands in front of their interwoven
flags, smiling for the cameras, and proclaiming that the NATO alliance
would continue for another twenty years.

The French representative, Monsieur Pierre Dufresne, was quoted as
saying, “This is the strongest treaty on earth.” When asked
where this strength emanated from, Dufresne said, “Our
genuine friendship is our bond.”

In a private room at the Naval Hospital at Pearl Harbor, Libby Gant
lay in a bed with her eyes closed. A soft beam of sunlight filtered in
through the room's window and draped itself across her bed. Gant
was still in a coma.

“Libby? Libby?” a woman's voice said, invading her
consciousness.

Slowly, Gant's eyes opened, and she saw her sister, Denise,
standing above her.

Denise smiled. “Well, hey there, sleepyhead.”

Gant struggled to open her eyes. When she did, she just said,
“Hey.”

Denise offered Gant a crooked smile. “You have a visitor.”

“What?” Gant said.

Denise cocked her head to the left. Gant looked over that way and saw
Schofield, slumped in the guest's chair by the window, fast
asleep.

He had a pair of silver Oakley sunglasses perched on top of his head.
His eyes—and the two scars that cut down across them—were
there for all the world to see.

Denise whispered, “He's been here ever since they fixed his
rib. Wouldn't leave until you woke up. He gave one interview to
the Washington Post and told the rest of them to come back
after you woke up.”

Gant just looked at Schofield, asleep under the window. And she
smiled.

EPILOGUE

Near Isla Santa Ines, Chile

30 November

It was a small island, one of the many hundreds
to the south of the Straits of Magellan, at the bottom of Chile, at
the bottom of South America, at the bottom of the world.

Barely five hundred miles south of the island lay the South Shetland
Islands and Antarctica. This small island was the closest one got to
Antarctica without actually being there.

The boy's name was José and he lived in a small
fishing village on the west coast of the island. The village lay on
the edge of the bay that the old women called La Bahia de la Aguila
Plata, “the Bay of the Silver Eagle.”

Local lore said that many years ago, a great big silver bird, with a
tail of fire trailing behind it, flew into the sea just outside the
bay. The bird, the women said, had offended God with its speed and its
beauty, and so God had set it alight and cast it into the sea.

José didn't
believe such stories. He was ten now, and he knew better. For
instance, he knew that the great silver bird that the women spoke of
was in all likelihood an airplane of some sort that had crashed into
the sea.

In any case, today was diving day and José planned to dive for oysters
and hopefully sell them to his father for pocket money.

The small boy dived into the sea and swam downward. At this time of
the afternoon, the ocean currents were coming in toward the island.
José hoped they
would bring the oysters with them.

He came to the bottom and quickly found his first oyster of the day,
but he also found something else.

A small piece of plastic.

Jose grabbed the piece of plastic and headed back up to the surface.
When he broke the surface, he peered at the strange object in his
hand. It was rectangular in shape and quite small. It was heavily
faded, but José
could read the name engraved on it:

NIEMEYER.

José frowned at the
name badge. Then he threw the worthless piece of plastic away and
resumed his search for oysters.