“Hello,” Mr. Smith said, shaking Wade’s hand. “I admire many of the things Senator Chase has done.”
Sylvia nodded, as if to say Of course. “Wade, this is Mr. Smith. He has shown up here in McMurdo by sea, unannounced.”
“I came privately,” Mr. Smith explained. “I’m from Smith, Jones and Robinson, environmental law.”
“I see,” Wade said.
“Wade has been out in the field, and I believe he has witnessed the impact of your clients’ actions. Is that right, Wade?”
Wade nodded. “We survived,” he said.
Mr. Smith was dressed in standard trekker’s garb, which meant he was too warm in the Chalet. In spite of the prisming blue photovoltaic suit he looked innocuous, like a small-town lawyer; he had so well practiced the semiotics of the nonconfrontational that he had become nearly invisible. A puppet only, his appearance said; a spokesman for his clients and that was all; no views of his own, no thinking, nothing but a medium of transmission, like a walking telephone, or a microwave signal repeater.
Of course that had to be a front, and a front Wade was quite familiar with; in fact it was a popular style in Washington these days, usually practiced by very sharp lawyers indeed. He said, “How do you communicate with your clients?”
“I’m not at liberty to say. I can say I have never met any of them in person.”
“So some of them might be down here among us, and you wouldn’t know.”
“That’s correct.”
“I might be one of them, and you wouldn’t know.”
“That’s correct.”
The bland little man looked closely at Wade for the first time, as if trying to ascertain whether this were the case.
Wade thought it over. He said to Sylvia, “Senator Chase has suggested to me that since we have all the players involved in the recent events here at hand, you might consider meeting to discuss the issues involved openly, with the idea of making a report to the investigators who no doubt are on their way to join us, or are already here.”
“Most of them will get here tomorrow, weather permitting,” Sylvia said. “The storms have held them up in Christchurch.”
“The senator wonders if we could even make some recommendations for future policy which would help to avoid any repetitions of incidents like this one. And I think Mr. Smith’s presence here means this meeting could have even wider representation than Senator Chase imagined. I could also invite some friends into town to participate as well—the people who helped us get back here.”
“Ferals?” Sylvia asked sharply.
“Why yes,” Wade said. “So you do know about them.”
She met his gaze calmly. “I’ve heard rumors. I’d be interested to hear what they had to say. I’ve tried to make contact with them before. But never any reply.”
“No. But now they may be willing to come in. Given what has happened.”
Sylvia nodded, thinking it over.
“If anything positive is to come out of all this,” Wade said, “it will have to happen here, I think. Up north it will sink into the mass of everything else.”
“Possibly,” Sylvia said. “Although SCAR, and the Treaty negotiating committee, and now it looks like a UN committee, will all be considering the matter, along with our Congress and other governments.”
“No doubt. But the fuller our report, the more they’ll have to work with.”
“My clients would welcome such a meeting,” Mr. Smith said.
“How do you know?” Wade and Sylvia said together.
Mr. Smith returned their stares blandly. The role of the spokesperson was an ambiguous one, as Wade very well knew, having just put words into Phil Chase’s mouth. Walking telephone or mastermind? There was no way to tell.
“Have you gotten all stranded parties back to safety?” Wade asked Sylvia. “I mean, is it appropriate to start holding such a meeting?”
Sylvia nodded. “S-375 have been heloed back from the Dry Valleys, and I’ve just heard from Palmer and Pioneer Hills that all the affected oil personnel have been recovered. Everyone’s in.”
“Nobody was hurt by my clients’ actions,” Mr. Smith noted.
“That was luck,” Wade said. “That was sheer luck, I can tell you that personally. If it weren’t for the help of people your clients don’t even know about, a good number of us would have died. Destroying life support systems on the polar cap is very, very dangerous. Reckless endangerment at the very least.”
“Nevertheless,” Mr. Smith said. “The fact remains.”
“Let’s not get into that now,” Sylvia said. “The fact is that Mr. Smith’s clients committed serious criminal acts, very dangerous to people down here, and that will be taken into account I’m sure.” She looked at the man. “I hope you’re prepared to answer for what these clients of yours have done, Mr. Smith. It could come to contempt of court and more, I imagine, if you choose to shield them from the law.”
“I’ve never been cited for contempt, and don’t plan to be now,” Mr. Smith said. “Of course I’m prepared for anything. I brought my toothbrush.”
Sylvia and Wade looked at each other.
“I have to get cleaned up,” Wade said. “Get some food, and see if I can contact the ferals. And talk to the senator.” Or not. He too was a spokesperson. You’re the senator, as they kept saying at the Pole. Or wherever it had been.
Sylvia said, “I’ll talk to some of the others. Let’s meet again after dinner with whomever is available, for starters. As you say, there’s no time to lose.”
Val kicked the muddy snow off her boots and stomped up the stairs of dorm 308, then dragged down the hall to her room on the top floor. She opened the door and went inside, and sat down heavily on the bed. Everything in its place, same as always. A functional little space, like a ship’s cabin. It appeared that Georgia, her roommate for the season, was out on a trip of her own; her bags were gone, her closet doors shut. They had barely even met.
She felt utterly drained. Hollow. McMurdo looked terrible. Her trekking group had dispersed with barely a word, off to dorm or hotel, no plans for a final dinner together that night, nothing. She had got them all home after losing the sledge in the crevasse, but it hadn’t really been her doing. If it weren’t for the ferals Jack very possibly would have died on Shackleton Glacier, and none of them could be sure they would have survived that storm; weather said it was still going strong out there. Besides, back home without anyone dead wasn’t exactly how you wanted to characterize a trip, given that it had been an expedition undertaken for pleasure. There needed to be more than “Got home alive.”
Better luck next time, she always said to herself after the bad trips. There were bad ones and good ones. There had been good trips too. And there would be more of them in the future. No doubt about it.
Still she couldn’t shake the low feeling. Postexpedition blues, sleep deprivation, polar T-3 syndrome, whatever; she felt bad. Right on the edge of tears. It was a mood she hated. Whenever she saw it coming she fought it tooth and claw, she would not allow it. The antidote was action. She stood up and left the room, which at this moment seemed a black trap. She pulled on her parka and stumped back down the metal stairs at the end of the dorm, went back outside into the bitter wind.
Funky old Mac Town. There was nowhere to go. She was weary to the bone, her muscles stiff and sore—a feeling she usually liked, but not now. It had gone beyond that. She was hungry but the galley was closed. She went by the Chalet but it was after hours, and Sylvia and Wade had already left. There would be friends to talk to at the BFC, although they would no doubt still be busy sorting out the mess caused by the ecoteurs.