Winter Study

Feeling anxious but not knowing why till she realized she was half expecting another message to appear on the window glass in spectral words, A

The old pilot was as attached to Ridley as a father to a beloved son. Lately he had been watching Adam the way he’d watch a dog bitten by a rabid skunk. Jonah had no use whatsoever for Bob but didn’t appear to harbor the hatred of him Ridley did or the schizophrenic anger and obsequiousness Adam displayed toward the man.

A

Maybe.

Maybe the importance of the vials was in the fact that there weren’t more. Would Jonah have reason to tamper with vials of blood, then switch the doctored versions for the real samples when Katherine wasn’t paying attention?

“You’re reaching,” A

A

“Hey, Ridley.” A

When he turned, the renaissance artists’ vision of Jesus vanished. Rings of purple beneath his eyes had deepened since breakfast and his winter-white skin looked coarse and loose. “Hey,” he replied. Weariness flattened his voice. A

“‘You’ve got vision, and the rest of the world wears bifocals.’” A

Ridley’s eyes went hard, and it occurred to her he would have been five or six years old when the movie came out. Chances were good he’d never seen it. And he certainly hadn’t memorized the good parts, as a percentage of her generation had. As far as he was concerned, he’d offered her a glimpse of himself and she’d mocked him. A

“I need the key to the ranger station,” she said instead.

“Sure. The lights aren’t on. The generator serves only the housing area. What do you need?”

“A book,” A

“Not much of one,” Ridley said as he rummaged through the top drawer of his desk. It was full of pens, paper clips and other detritus that A

“I’ve finished the Newsweek,” she said drily.

Ridley laughed, and she was glad he chose not to carry a cross moment further than necessary. “The key is somewhere in this mess, but I don’t know where. Adam!” he hollered.

Looking like a man who’s been awaiting a call rather than someone roused from sleep, Adam appeared soundlessly in the doorway beside A

“Yeah?”

“Give A

“Already?” Adam cocked one eyebrow in a way that made A

“Speed-reader,” A

Adam reached into the front pocket of his jeans and took out a small ring of governmental-looking keys. It was Ridley’s turn to cock an eyebrow, but, not being gifted in that department, he managed a mere wrinkling of the forehead. Years in the wilderness or small isolated communities to inform her, A

In summer, with the exception no doubt of employee housing – NPS people were notoriously trusting – buildings would be locked at night against visitors with larceny or vandalism in their souls. The major thieves on the island in winter were the mice, and few locks deterred them.

Ignoring the skepticism, Adam removed a single key from the ring and handed it to A

For the length of time it took her to walk through the common room to her own room, A

Outside, the temperature was minus seventeen. With the windchill, it was closer to minus forty. A jaunt to the outhouse was scarcely bearable. Without gear, the quarter mile to the V.C. could prove deadly.

THERE WAS NO WINDCHILL. The wind had stopped, and the forest felt as if it were holding its breath, the island in stasis, waiting. Despite the fact she’d been steeping her brain in boogeymen and monsters of the id, the waiting didn’t feel threatening, merely a stillness through which A

This frozen idyll was ended when she heard a shuffling in the dark beyond her flashlight and, before the beam had rooted out the squirrelly culprit, her mind had shown her a slavering, long-toothed, red-eyed wog skulking in the night.

“Damn!” she whispered. Being frightened of being alone in the woods pissed her off. The woods, the wilderness, were where she hid from the monsters of the populated world. To become prey, even in her mind, was intolerable. Despite the prickling of her neck hairs and the cringing along her spine, she forced herself to walk slowly and deliberately down the trail.

By the time she stood on the wooden porch of the V.C., stomping the snow from her boots, she was cold to the bone. Clumsy in gloves, she inserted the key, turned it counterclockwise, and exerted the recommended brute force. The door came open so easily, she fell backward, stumbling over her big feet and landing on her rump with a grunt that would have done a wild boar proud. For a moment, she lay there, staring into the blank sky. It crossed her mind that this was the perfect opportunity to wave arms and legs feebly, experience the worldview of a topsy-turvy beetle. That insight into the insect mind might be the most enlightening experience she’d have on ISRO. Sloth, not an i