Limnoir
This
was it, my big chance to really find out what was going on. "Well,"
I cleared my throat. "We might be able to arrange something."
"I mean seriously," Jill went
on. "We're in the middle of a desert here. Very low precipitation.
The glacial meltwater streams are essentially the only source of water
and nutrients to the lakes. They figure hugely in the lakes' water and
nutrient budgets. And you guys are, well, the 'Stream Team' - the team
for streams. I mean you have all that data and, well, we need it."
She leaned in even closer. "We want it."
"Oh," I said slightly taken
aback by this turn in the conversation.
"We're all part of this Long-Term
Ecological Research project, right. We're supposed to work together,
look at this place like an ecosystem you know," she continued.
This was not proceeding at all as I had
anticipated. My efforts to find out the truth were failing. I needed
to take an extreme act. I needed to play my trump card. I needed to
let them know what else I knew. "What about the hot finger???"
I spitted out in a highly accusatory tone.
At this point Krafty Meistress was sweeping
dangerously close to us. I had observed her using this technique on
previous occasions. Her underhanded sweeping allowed her to move about
the hut in a sublimely inconspicuous manner. It allowed her to "accidentally"
overhear people's conversations. It was her favorite "chore."
Krafty had obviously eavesdropped on
us. She jumped right into our conversation. Of course I had almost shouted
my question - but still. "Oh the hot finger," she said. "Well,
we make either a four-inch or a ten-inch hole in the lake ice cover
with the Jiffy Drill. Then we use the hot finger to melt out the hole,
make it bigger so we can get our sampling equipment into it. The hotsy
heats the hot finger." It was starting to sound complicated.
"It's tough work that drilling,"
she went on. "Sometimes the drill gets stuck or frozen in even,
and the whole process can take several hours. Since the ice is so thick,
some 10-15 feet, we have to keep adding flights to the top of the drill
as we go down. That makes the drill real heavy. Getting it out - oh
man. It can take four or five people using all their strength to pull
that thing up." Several hours and five people! Didn't sound like
a "jiffy" drill to me.
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