CHAPTER 136

CHAPTER 136

THE GIANT U.S. NAVY icebreaker Nebraska was slowly moving forward making a huge line on that paper-white surface.

The chief engineer, in charge of the engine room, looked at the instruments and noticed that the Nebraska was at the limit and could not go any further. The ice sheets were becoming thicker and thicker as the icebreaker approached the southern part.

For the ship to continue, it would require a huge consumption of fuel, which would make it impossible to return to the mainland.

For a moment, the chief engineer thought about that strange expedition, trying to imagine what mysterious secret there could be in that cold and bleak continent. The group that landed there was too heterogeneous: an American senator, a young history student, an Interpol agent and a detective from New York. The feeling of duty made the engineer wake up from his daydream and pick up the phone and then call the Detective.

The detective put the phone down and turned his attention to Senator James Hofma, who was examining the map on his desk.

— I have just been informed that Nebraska has reached its maximum limit. From now on we will have to proceed with the help of sleds.

— How long, Greg, do you estimate it will take us to reach the Queen's Ranges using sleds?

Greg approached the table, and with a pencil showed Hofma the position of Nebraska.

— We are right here: at latitude thirty-nine degrees east and longitude twenty-nine west of the Greenwich meridian, in the middle of the Ross ice floes, exactly eighty-three miles from Scott base, the American research center in Antarctica. I can say that if the weather allows, using sleds your expedition will take around two hours to reach the mountain range.

The engineer wanted to ask what exactly the Senator and his group were looking for on that forgotten continent, but he remembered the directives coming directly from Admiral Graham of the Pentagon: maximum cooperation and no questions asked.

What man would be that with so much influence, to the point of getting a ship from the American Navy, for the simple satisfaction of a whim?