White Death (NUMA Files 4)

Toonook?

"That's right."

Gleason gave him a wary look. "You're serious?"

"Very. I'd like to meet the gentleman."

Gleason replied with a strange half smile and made a sound be- tween a chortle and a snicker. Unable to contain himself, he burst forth with a loud guffaw. "Sorry," he said, "but I'd hardly call Toonook a gentleman. Toonook is the Inuit name of an evil spirit. He's considered to be the creator and destroyer."

"You're saying Toonook is a mythological name?"

"That's right. The Inuit say he's in the sea, the earth and the air. Every time there's an unexpected noise, like the ice cracking under- foot, it's Toonook, looking for a victim. When the wind howls like a pack of hungry wolves, it's Toonook."

Austin was confused. Toonook was the name Therri had given him as the head of Oceanus. "I can see why my question made you laugh," Austin said, with an embarrassed smile. "I must have mis- understood."

"There's no misunderstanding as far as the Inuit are concerned," Gleason said. "When they travel alone, they keep an eye out for Toonook. They carry a bone knife and wave it around to keep Toonook at bay."

Austin's eye drifted past Gleason's shoulder. "Something like the little pig sticker in that display case?"

Gleason tapped the glass in front of the ornately carved white blade. "That's a very rare and unusual item."

"In what way?" "Most Inuit knives were tools mainly used for skinning. That

knife was made with one purpose: to kill other human beings." "Odd," Austin said, "I had always heard that the Eskimos were a peaceful and good-natured people."

"Very true. They live in close quarters in a harsh and demanding environment where tempers could easily flare into violence. They know cooperation is vital to survival, and so they've evolved a whole set of rituals and customs to diffuse aggression." "That knife looks about as aggressive as it gets." Gleason nodded in agreement. "The Inuit are subject to the same dark passions as the rest of humankind. The people who made that weapon were from a tribe that broke the peaceful mold. We think they came from Siberia in prehistoric times and settled in northern Quebec. They tended toward rape, pillage, human sacrifice… very nasty. The other communities banded together many years ago and drove them off. They named them 'Kiolya.' "

"Doesn't ring a bell."

"It's the Inuit name for the aurora borealis, which the Arctic peo- ple regard as the manifestation of evil. The real name of the tribe, no one knows."

"What happened to the Kiolya?"

"They scattered around Canada. Many of them ended up in the cities, where their descendants formed criminal enterprises. Murder for hire and extortion, mainly. Some of them retained their old tribal customs, such as the vertical tattoos over the cheekbones, until they found that it identified them easily to the police."

"I'm curious. How is an exhibition like this pulled together?"

"In many different ways. With this one, a public relations firm from Oceanus approached the museum and asked if we would be in- terested in placing the show. They said the sponsors had a strong in- terest in educating the public on Inuit culture, and they would organize the exhibition and pay all costs. Well, we couldn't resist. It's a fascinating show, don't you think?"

Austin stared at the Kiolya knife, which was identical to the weapon that had slashed his chest open at the Faroe Islands fish farm. He was thinking about the vertical tattoos on the face of the man who'd wielded the knife. "Yes, fascinating," he said.

"Since I can't introduce you to Toonook, perhaps you'd like to meet the representative from Oceanus."

"He's here?"

"I just spoke to him a few minutes ago in the diorama room. Fol- low me."

The lights in the diorama room had been dimmed to simulate the Arctic night. Lasers projected a moving display of the northern lights on the ceiling. Standing alone in front of a life-sized diorama show- ing a seal hunt was a tall, well-built man with a shaved head. Dark sunglasses covered his eyes.

Gleason approached the man and said, "Dr. Barker, I'd like you to meet Kurt Austin. Mr. Austin is with the National Underwater and Marine Agency. You must know of it."

"I would have to come from another planet not to know NUMA."

They shook hands. Austin felt like his fingers were clutching a frozen side of beef.

"I hope you don't mind if I share our little joke," Gleason said to Kurt. "Mr. Austin thought that the head of Oceanus was named Toonook."

"Mr. Gleason explained that Toonook was not a man, but an evil spirit," Austin said.