The Ice: A gripping thriller for our times from the Bailey’s shortlisted author of The Bees. Laline Paull
was he doing now, with the mineral water? Holding it up to the big mirror on the mantelpiece. He looked mad, speaking to the flowers.
‘Bottled at source in the Alps. Where the shrinking snowline means only the highest resorts still exist, and their prices make even the rich feel poor. And if they’re starting to think about climate change, you know we’re in the last-chance saloon.’ He turned and came back to them. ‘When that chunk of Venice collapsed into the lagoon, the dead included guests at the Cipriani, as well as refugees.’
He drank again.
‘So if you’re not worried, you’re not paying attention. And if you are, then it is your moral and civic and patriotic duty to either keep your property and be vigilant stewards of the Arctic, or, ensure that you only sell to a buyer who will use it to be a vigilant pain in the arse to any and everyone who is trying to make a killing up there. I don’t know, you might be those people yourselves. I don’t know you, but I do know this man.’ He pointed to Sean.
‘Arctic obsession started our friendship. We’ve gone our separate ways, but that’s still our bond. He might have become a capitalist pig – but he’ll never do anything to destroy the Arctic, in any way. I know that. He’s clever or crazy enough to invite me to be a board member, and if there’s one thing I’ve learned it’s that people hear you better if you’re in the room, not yelling through a loudhailer from the street. That’s why I’m in with Sean: he knows the very people I want to reach, the brokers between governments and mining companies, the shipping people, the people who make things happen, or make things disappear. I’ll be in the room with them on this.’
He laid down the bid proposal on the table. ‘How can people say what they really think at places like Davos? It’s about being seen to do good, and someone with a vested interest in the outcome is always playing the host. Sean’s plan takes that layer away. A luxurious private retreat in Arctic grandeur – who doesn’t want to go there?’
Sean had to admire him. He was such a showman. No – that wasn’t fair. Protecting the environment was Tom’s life’s work, he had the broken bones, scars and jail time to show for it – as well as the adulation of thousands of people. He’d put all his money into it too, though his family had tried to stop him; Sean remembered hearing that.
‘Enough with the bleeding-heart liberals crying over the polar bears. I want the greediest, ugliest-thinking, most short-sighted, ego-crazed politicians and plutocrats we can find to stay in the place Sean will build on the shore of Midgardfjorden. There’s a reason men have risked their lives again and again for the Arctic; it shows you your soul, even if you think you don’t have one.
‘I’m naïve: I still believe you can reach people through their hearts. But I’m battle-scarred: profit speaks louder. Sean’s plan combines both those things. So that’s why I say that my first position is still no more development in the Arctic. But as it is happening, from all sides, as the summer ice has gone – twenty years ahead of government projections, and as it is a free-for-all, no matter what people say, then let us be there, let us try to guide development to do the minimum harm, and protect the life of this fragile, sublime, vulnerable environment. You can only lose it once.’
Tom walked round behind Sean and put his hands on his shoulders. ‘I know my friend and I trust him.’ He took his seat again.
No one spoke for a long moment. The atmosphere had shifted. The lawyer and the accountant were staring at Tom with that star-struck look Sean had seen on people’s faces before. Mogens Hadbold’s laptop pinged, two, three, four times, breaking the spell. Hadbold looked across to the mantelpiece and waved. Only then did Sean spot the tiny camera in the flower arrangement.
‘Yes,’ said Mogens Hadbold. ‘I’m sorry that I did not tell you the meeting was streaming live. They wanted to be present, but discreetly.’
He turned his laptop to face Sean and Tom, and the quartered screen showed different Pedersens on Skype.
‘That was very impressive,’ a female voice said, out of the screen. ‘We will let you know. Tak, Mogens.’
He replied in a rapid burst of Norwegian, and closed the laptop.
‘Mr Harding is something of a hero to the younger generation, you know this. They are the ones making all the big noise about the right buyer. The older ones – well, you know how we are as we get old. We like security. And money! But the young have the power.’ He stood up, as did the lawyer and accountant. ‘Thank you very much for returning.’ The meeting was over. Sean stood too.
‘You don’t want to ask me anything?’ He looked from one to the other. Mogens Hadbold shook his head. ‘We have looked into your partners, Miss Martine Delaroche and Miss Radiance Young. We are satisfied of your financial commitment. And of course we know Mr Harding’s environmental work. And you know Midgardfjorden, so there is no more to say on that. Everyone is clear what is on the table.’
They were both silent in the lift going down. Only when they were out on the street did Sean explode.
‘You knew there was a camera!’
‘Yep. Want a drink?’ Tom grinned. ‘I’m gasping.’
They went into the first place that smelled of beer. It was the middle of the afternoon, a strange time to be in a pub, but everything was strange. Sean had taken Tom to the presentation as his mascot; Tom had taken control. Sean had said almost nothing. Tom put his arm round his shoulder.
‘I wasn’t so bad, was I?’
‘You were an utter, utter bastard. They loved you.’
‘Didn’t overdo it?’
‘You chewed the furniture – I wanted to throttle you.’
‘You’re very welcome.’ Tom ordered two pints without asking what Sean wanted. Sean wasn’t a pubbish sort any more, certainly not any old boozer on a midweek afternoon. Not that he was in any state to do business – he was fizzing with energy and outrage at Tom’s hijacking of his event.
‘You are the most egotistical fucker I have ever met, Tom, you know that?’
‘If I’d gone in there all mealy-mouthed, you’d be dead in the water.’ Their pints came. They clinked.
‘Bastard.’
‘Bastard.’
They drank hard and talked lightly of current affairs, excluding the one with Martine. Tom thanked Sean for the picture. They discussed the latest closure of the Suez Canal, the skinhead revival, and remembered a mutual friend from college, recently killed reporting from Ukraine.
‘We underestimated him,’ Tom agreed. ‘A hero in our midst.’
‘Like you,’ Sean said. ‘You’re a hero. I mean it. Your life counts.’
Tom drained his pint. ‘Sean, so does yours. You can move mountains. You’ve pulled yourself up by your bootstraps.’
Sean felt a glow that was more than the beer, and the afternoon sun coming in through the sand-etched windows. Putting the world to rights with Tom, boozing an afternoon away. What a rare pleasure. He was about to tell him that; he might even have been about to tell him how much he’d missed him, after ordering another pair of pints, when the door opened and a beautiful girl walked in.
She was about twenty-five, fresh-faced, casually dressed. Without realising, Sean pulled in his belly and sat up straighter. She looked across and walked over. Her smile was lovely. Perhaps she’d been in one of his clubs, and recognised him. He prepared himself. Tom put his arm round her. They kissed.
‘I’m ready,’ he said.
‘Then hello and goodbye.’ She smiled at Sean, playful and polite.
‘Christ,’ he said. ‘Tom, she’s the image of Ruth.’
‘Rubbish.’
‘Is