"The Ice Limit" - читать интересную книгу автора (Preston Douglas)

"Isle Desolaciуn is not a hospitable place. It is barren, windswept, mostly volcanic with some Tertiary sedimentary basins. The island is bisected by a large snowfield, and there is an old volcanic plug toward the north end. The tides range from thirty to thirty-five vertical feet, and a reversing sixknot current sweeps the island group."
"Lovely conditions for a picnic," Garza muttered.
"The closest human settlement is on Navarino Island, in the Beagle Channel, about forty miles north of the Cape Horn islands. It is a Chilean naval base called Puerto Williams, with a small mestizo Indian shantytown attached to it."
"Puerto Williams?" Garza said. "I thought this was Chile we were talking about."
"The entire area was originally mapped by Englishmen." Glinn placed the notes on the table. "Dr. McFarlane, I understand you've been in Chile."
McFarlane nodded.
"What can you tell us about their navy?"
"Charming fellows."
There was a silence. Rochefort, the engineer, began tapping his pencil on the table in an irritated tattoo. The door opened, and a waiter began serving sandwiches and coffee.
"They belligerently patrol the coastal waters," McFarlane went on, "especially in the south, along the border with Argentina. The two countries have a long-running border dispute, as you probably know."
"Can you add anything to what I've said about the climate?"
"I once spent time in Punta Arenas in late fall. Blizzards, sleet storms, and fog are common. Not to mention williwaws."
"Williwaws?" Rochefort asked in a tremulous, reed-thin voice.
"Basically a microburst of wind. It lasts only a minute or two, but it can peak at about a hundred and fifty knots."
"What about decent anchorages?" Garza asked.
"I've been told there are no decent anchorages. In fact, from what I've heard, there's no good holding ground for a ship anywhere in the Cape Horn islands."
"We like a challenge," said Garza.
Glinn collected the papers, folded them carefully, and returned them to his jacket pocket. Somehow, McFarlane felt the man had already known the answers to his own questions.
"Clearly," Glinn said, "we have a complex problem, even without considering the meteorite. But let's consider it now. Rachel, I believe you have some questions about the data?"
"I have a comment about the data." Amira's eyes glanced at a folder before her, then hovered on McFarlane with faint amusement. She had a superior attitude that McFarlane found annoying.
"Yes?" said McFarlane.
"I don't believe a word of it."
"What exactly don't you believe?"
She waved her hand over his portfolio. "You're the meteorite expert, right? Then you know why no one has ever found a meteorite larger than sixty tons. Any larger, and the force of impact causes the meteorite to shatter. Above two hundred tons, meteorites vaporize from the impact. So how could a monster like this still be intact?"
"I can't — " McFarlane began.
But Amira interrupted. "The second thing is that iron meteorites rust. It only takes about five thousand years to rust even the biggest one into a pile of scale. So if it somehow did survive the impact, why is it still there? How do you explain this geological report that says it fell thirty million years ago, was buried in sediment, and is only now being exposed through erosion?"
McFarlane settled back in his chair. She waited, raising her eyebrows quizzically.
"Have you ever read Sherlock Holmes?" McFarlane asked with a smile of his own.
Amira rolled her eyes. "You're not going to quote that old saw about how once you've eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth — are you?"
McFarlane shot a surprised glance at her. "Well, isn't it true?"
Amira smirked her triumph, while Rochefort shook his head.
"So, Dr. McFarlane," Amira said brightly, "is that your source of scientific authority? Sir Arthur Conan Doyle?"
McFarlane exhaled slowly. "Someone else collected the base data. I can't vouch for it. All I can say is, if that data's accurate, there's no other explanation: it's a meteorite."
There was a silence. "Someone else's data," Amira said, cracking another shell and popping the nuts into her mouth. "Would that be a Dr. Masangkay, by chance?"
"Yes."
"You knew each other, I believe?"
"We were partners."
"Ah." Amira nodded, as if hearing this for the first time. "And so, if Dr. Masangkay collected this data, you have a high degree of confidence in it? You trust him?"
"Absolutely."
"I wonder if he'd say the same about you," Rochefort said in his quiet, high, clipped voice.
McFarlane turned his head and looked steadily at the engineer.
"Let's proceed," Glinn said.
McFarlane looked away from Rochefort and tapped his portfolio with the back of one hand. "There's an enormous circular deposit of shocked and fused coesite on that island. Right in the center is a dense mass of ferromagnetic material."
"A natural deposit of iron ore," said Rochefort.
"The flyover indicates a reversal of the sedimentary strata around the site."
Amira looked puzzled. "A what?"
"Flipped sedimentary layers."
Rochefort sighed heavily. "Signifying... ?"
"When a large meteorite strikes sedimentary layers, the layers get reversed."
Rochefort continued tapping his pencil. "How? By magic?"