Pitt was likewise staring at the mess but with a different reaction. His eyes suddenly turned bright, and a sly grin spread across his lips.

“A fortuitous disaster,” he said to the manager, who looked back at him blankly. “Thanks for your assistance. I need to make a couple of phone calls, then I’ll be right aboard.”

When he crossed the tarmac a few minutes later, Pitt had a spry step to his aching bones and the gash to his head had ceased hurting. Across his face, the sly grin was still firmly embedded in place.

Chapter 39

39

MINISTER JAMESON, I HAVE MITCHELL GOYETTE on line one,” the gray-haired secretary said, poking her head into Jameson’s office like a gopher.

Jameson nodded from his desk, then waited until his secretary closed the door on her way out before hesitantly picking up the phone.

“Arthur, how are things in our lovely capital city?” Goyette greeted with mock friendship.

“Ottawa is enjoying a warm spring, to accompany the hot jingoistic climate in Parliament.”

“It’s high time we retained Canada’s resources for Canadians.” Goyette snorted.

“Yes, so that we can sell them to the Chinese,” the minister replied drily.

Goyette promptly turned serious. “ There’s a small pile of rocks in the Arctic southeast of Victoria Island called the Royal Geographical Society Islands. I’ll be needing the mineral rights to the entire landmass,” he said, as if asking for a cup of coffee.

“Let me take a look,” Jameson replied, pulling a bundle of maps from his desk drawer. Finding a map marked Victoria Strait, which was overlaid with numbered grid lines, he moved to a desktop computer. Inputting the grid numbers, he accessed the ministry’s records of exploration and extraction licenses issued by the government. Within a few minutes, he had an answer for Goyette.

“I’m afraid we already have a production license in place, which covers about thirty percent of the islands, primarily the southern portion of West Island. It’s a ten-year license, but they are only entering their second year of operations. The license is held by Kingfisher Holdings, a subsidiary of the Mid-America Mining Company out of Butte, Montana. They have built a small mining facility and are currently extracting small quantities of zinc, apparently just in the summer months.”

“An American firm holds the license?”

“Yes, but through a Canadian shell company. There’s technically no law against it, providing they post the required security bond and meet the other provisions of the license agreement.”

“I want the license rescinded and reissued to one of my entities,” Goyette said matter-of- factly.

Jameson shook his head at Goyette’s presumption. “There would have to be a violation of the license, such as environmental polluting or shortchanging the royalty payments. It can’t be done unilaterally, Mitchell, without setting the government up for a major lawsuit.”

“Then how do I obtain the rights?” he huffed.