He moved off to the side, making way for the first drum roller as it trundled down the helicopter ramp and turned toward the camp. A shallow trail of densely compacted snow and ice marked its passage across the tundra. Pleased by this first evidence of the construction equipment’s effectiveness, he knelt and pushed at the trail with his gloves. It felt solid, unyielding to the touch.

Voronin got back to his feet. “That should do the trick,” he commented.

“No doubt,” Bondarovich said. “Once you give us the go-ahead to start full-scale operations, we’ll start clearing the valley floor of any obstructions and compacting the snow layer to the required depth.”

“How long will you need?”

Bondarovich pulled at his chin. “Three days at a minimum,” he said. “But more likely four. Or even possibly five. We’re down to only about seven and a half hours of sunlight already, and we lose more than nine minutes every day. If we rig lights to keep working after it gets dark, we could easily blow our cover here.”

Voronin nodded his understanding. There were no other settled places anywhere near this valley. Lights glowing here at night, in what should otherwise be unbroken darkness, would stand out like a sore thumb to any passing aircraft, triggering any number of inconvenient questions. Currently, the local Canadian authorities in the little town of Fort McPherson believed the heavy-lift Vertol 234 helicopter’s job was ferrying supplies north to an environmental group that was supposed to be studying the effects of climate change on the Beaufort Sea coast. Nothing could be allowed to shake that conviction, especially with Grishin and Petrov’s high-risk, high-reward plan moving rapidly to fruition.

A low warning whistle from the edge of the camouflaged encampment interrupted his thoughts. He looked up in surprise and saw a lone figure with what looked like a hunting rifle slung over one shoulder slowly hiking down a snow-covered slope at the western edge of the valley.

“Ah,” Bondarovich said with a wry grin. “It seems our unwanted guest has decided to show himself at last.”

“What unwanted guest?” Voronin demanded.

“An American. A hermit fur trapper working this part of the refuge,” the ex-Spetsnaz major said calmly. “We’ve been aware that he’s had us under observation for the past couple of days.”

Voronin’s mouth tightened in exasperation. “And you let him do this? Knowing the stakes involved?”

Bondarovich shrugged. “The American knows this territory like the back of his own hand, and he’s wary of strangers. I saw no point in spooking him unnecessarily.”

“Do you have any more information about him?” Voronin snapped.

The other man nodded. “I had Makeviĉ check him out,” he confirmed. Besides being an experienced bush pilot, Felix Makeviĉ had worked as a deep-cover GRU agent in Canada for years before switching his employment and loyalty to Grishin and North Star Capital. “His name is Jensen. Trig Jensen. And his only contact with the outside world is through bush pilots who fly into his isolated camp from time to time. Not more often than every three or four months, if that.”