Killer

“No, but . . .”

“You should have told me, Doc.”

Warren’s eyes hunted round for something to break the round of increasing hysteria. They lit on his tall, golden daughter: perfect.

“Simon, I want you to meet my daughter Katherine. Katherine, Simon Quick, my camp director. Simon, Katherine is going to be my assistant.”

Kate saw a man of middle height, fine-boned, almost birdlike, but giving off an aura of power and energy which verged on the frenetic. Even in practical jeans and anorak, he was neat, nearly dapper. His face was thin, precisely put together, almost beautiful, but marked now with white strain, black rings under the eyes, a blood-crusted bruise on the left cheek. The hand he held out was bandaged.

“Mr. Quick, how do you do?”

“Please call me Simon, Miss Warren. I am as you see me: battered but unbowed. In a spot of bother.” Another English accent. The voice was calmer now.

“You really need a bandage on that bruise, Simon,” she told him.

“First aid too? You will be a treasure. Yes. The doctor said I needed looking after. No, not your father; he doesn’t care if the whole world needs looking after as long as his floating flowers are OK.” He paused to shake his head, then grinned ruefully: “But of course, you’ll be the same! Here I am talking as though you’re a normal human being, and you’re really here to aid and abet this marine lunacy!”

“You disagree with my father’s theories?”

“Good heavens no! I don’t know anything about your father’s theories. Can’t tell a plankton from a poppy; but anything that has me out to sea in rubber boats fetching green goo in a milk bottle from out among the summer floes in a high wind, that’s lunacy.”

She shivered. “Is there always a high wind?”

He grinned again. “Not always, no. And we don’t really use a milk bottle.”

Her father’s hand came down on his shoulder. “Simon . . .”

The thin body stiffened, the laughter draining out of his eyes. Ross and Job came slowly across from the airport building. Quick remained calm, but he shook with the effort of doing so.

Ross held out his hand. “They didn’t tell me you were camp director, Simon.”

Quick waited until the hand dropped. “They didn’t tell me it would be you working on the winterisation,” he said, his voice shaking, full of loathing. He held out his hand to Job. “How are you, Job?”

“I’m fine, Simon. But you look terrible. Trouble up at the camp?”

“A little. That’s what I’m doing down here.”

There was silence.

Ross and Quick looked at each other like a couple of animals preparing to fight.

“Look,” said Warren, his voice suddenly commanding, “Can you two get on? Can you bury the past? Work together?” Silence.

“For Heaven’s sake.” He started again. “I’ve got almost no choice in this. I have my orders too, and they,” his hand made a vague gesture towards some far distant head office, “they want both of you on this project. In the field you’re each the best we’ve got. That’s all they know. They don’t care about personalities.” He paused again, took a deep breath. “Look.” His voice was hard, his tone absolute, “if you can work together we’ll forget this. I don’t want you to love each other, I want you to work together. If you can, OK. If not, I’ll have to get on to New York, and have one of you taken back.”

“I can . . .” said Ross.

“Simon? If anyone’s going back, it’ll be you. Colin has to get that camp set up fully for the winter work. If you can’t manage it, say now, and you needn’t come back up with us. Colin can be camp director until they send up a replacement.”

“No,” said Simon Quick. “I can do it.”

“Good. It’s time this thing was forgotten.”

Quick made a guttural noise in his throat. “I’ll never forget. Eleven men he killed.”

“Ten,” said Job.

It took the wind out of Quick for a moment. But his rage was too great to be controlled at that moment, even by the Eskimo’s massive calm. “You mean to tell me Jeremiah’s still alive, then?”

“Jeremiah’s dead, Simon, you know that; but Colin bears no guilt for it.”

“No guilt? He’s guilty all right. For all four of them. And for those seven poor bastards that had to go out and look for them and never came back. He’s guilty for all of them. And Charlie? What about Charlie? Not guilty again?” His white face worked, eyes blazing. “I’ll work with you Ross, but I won’t forgive you . . . That’s my whole family you killed. My whole damned family.”

He turned, and began to walk towards the plane. “Simon!” snapped Warren. “You will work together. Make up your mind to that now, or you go straight into Anchorage and wait for the next plane south.” Simon’s head nodded. He did not turn back. Ross watched him, his face a wilderness. Warren shrugged. He didn’t want to send Simon back because it would do untold damage to his career, but he really had no time for all this now. He decided to think the whole thing over. If Simon continued to carry on like this, he could always come back down when the plane returned from Barrow.

Kate turned to Job. “This Charlie,” she whispered, “was he another of Ross’s friends?”