“Miller’s taxi service is always open. I have a mining site inspection in the morning but can run you back down in the afternoon.”

“That would be fine. Thanks, Trevor. Perhaps next time we should work a little closer together,” Summer said with a beguiling smile.

Trevor’s eyes twinkled at her words.

“I wouldn’t want it any other way.”

Chapter 22

22

SCATTERED CHUNKS OF ICE DOTTED THE ROLLING waters of Lancaster Strait, appearing in the dusk like jagged marshmallows floating in a sea of hot chocolate. Against the dim background of Devon Island, a black behemoth crept along the horizon billowing a trail of dark smoke.

“Range twelve kilometers, sir. She’s beating a path right across our bow.” The helmsman, a red-haired ensign with jug ears, peered from a radarscope to the ship’s captain and waited for a response.

Captain Dick Weber lowered a pair of binoculars without taking his gaze off the distant vessel.

“Keep us on intersect, at least until we obtain an identification,” he replied without turning.

The helmsman twisted the ship’s wheel a half turn, then resumed studying the radar screen. The eighty-foot Canadian Coast Guard patrol vessel plowed slowly through the dark Arctic waters toward the path of the oncoming vessel. Assigned to interdiction duty along the eastern approaches to the Northwest Passage, the Harp had been on station just a few days. Though the winter ice had continued the trend of breaking up early, this was the first commercial vessel the patrol craft had seen in the frosty waters this season. In another month or two, there would be a steady stream of massive tankers and containerships making the northerly transit accompanied by icebreakers.

Just a few years prior, the thought of policing traffic through the Northwest Passage would have been laughable. Since man’s earliest forays into the Arctic, major sections of the annual winter pack ice remained frozen solid for all but a few summer days. Only a few hardy explorers and the occasional icebreaker dared fight their way through the blocked passage. But global warming had changed everything, and now the passage was navigable for months out of the year.

Scientists estimate that over forty thousand square miles of Arctic ice have receded in just the past thirty years. Much of the blame for the rapid melt off is due to the ice albedo-feedback effect. In its frozen state, Arctic ice will reflect up to ninety percent of incoming solar radiation. When melted, the resulting seawater will conversely absorb an equal amount of radiation, reflecting only about ten percent. This warming loop has accounted for the fact that Arctic temperatures are climbing at double the global rate.