Читать книгу The Sandy Steele Mystery MEGAPACK®: 6 Young Adult Novels (Complete Series) - Roger Barlow - Страница 16

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Serendipity

Pepper was black, blue, stiff and somewhat chastened when he ate breakfast with Ralph and Sandy the next morning. Also, he was disturbed by the fact that Cavanaugh’s plane had come over at dawn, circled the wrecked barge in the rapids for several minutes, and then scooted eastward without landing.

“He must have known I planned to run the river,” the blond boy admitted. “But why do you suppose he didn’t stop to ask whether you folks had seen me?”

“Probably was afraid to.” Ralph attacked a big plate of ham and scrambled eggs. “Figures he may be blamed for letting you drown, so he’s gone home to frame an alibi. Won’t he be surprised when you show up in one of our supply trucks!”

“Gee whiz! Do you really think he’s that bad, Mr. Salmon?”

“I think he’s worse. See here, kid. Why don’t you stop working for that heel and come over here? I’m sure John will give you a roustabout job.”

“No.” Pepper shook his head stubbornly. “I signed a contract and I can’t go back on my word. Besides, I haven’t seen him do anything really bad. I’ll admit that some of the things he does seem, well, sort of queer. But maybe you’re just too suspicious.”

“Maybe.” Ralph washed down a hunk of Ching Chao’s good apple pie with half a cup of steaming coffee. “Well, it’s your funeral.”

“I’ll keep my eyes open after this.” Pepper rose as a honk from the truck told him it was time to get going. “Thanks for everything. And I really do mean for everything.”

The Indian stood up and stretched like a lazy panther as he watched their visitor depart. “Crazy kid,” he said. “Well, it’s time for us to be getting back to the mines, Sandy. Don’s staying here for a few days to run some final tests. He has assigned our group to start surveying the other structure. So pick up your rock hammer and stadia rod. Hike!”

The new location proved to be several miles north of the river in a tumbled and desolate region of weathered buttes and washes that already were dry as bone.

“Geologists call those buttes ‘diatremes,’” Stack, the surveyor, explained to the crew as they unloaded equipment at a central spot. “They stick up like sore thumbs because they’re really vents from ancient volcanoes. The lava they’re made of doesn’t erode much although the surrounding sedimentary rocks have been worn away in the course of ages. There are at least 250 diatremes scattered through this Colorado Plateau area, and some of them are rich in minerals. So keep your eyes open while you’re prowling.”

“Prowling” was exactly the word for what the crew did, Sandy decided after a few days in the broiling sun. He had to admit that the territory was beautiful, in its wild way, but he decided that it was more fit for mountain goats than human beings. More and more, as he slowly worked his way from one rod location to another, measured the slope of exposed strata with his Brunton compass, or chipped rock samples for analysis back at camp, he began to dream of the soft green hills and winding streams near Valley View.

His homesickness grew worse when Hall brought him a letter from Quiz.

Dear Sandy,

I sure do envy you, out there in God’s country. Things are mighty dull around here, although I do get some time for swimming and tennis, now that Dad is able to hobble around in his cast and help out at the restaurant.

Last Sunday we had a picnic out by the lake. The fishing was swell. And there was a dance at the pavilion afterward. I’m not much for dancing, but I know you like to. Still, you must be having plenty of fun out at the well.

“Fun!” Sandy exploded as he reread that paragraph. He was bathing his blistered feet in the first spring he had found that day and batting at deer flies that seemed determined to eat him alive. Then he read on:

I haven’t forgotten about Cavanaugh. Dad says he’s a lone wolf and that nobody knows much about him. He came here about two years ago, flashed a lot of money around, and built his lab. Joined the Country Club, Rotary, and so on. Impressed a lot of people with his football talk. Makes good equipment and has several research contracts that take him to Washington quite frequently. His employees think he’s a stuffed shirt, too.

I tried to look up his sports record at the library, but the newspapers that should tell about his big game are missing from the files. When Dad gets better, he says I can take a day or two off and see what I can find in the San Francisco library. I’ll let you know. Funny about those newspapers, isn’t it?

Give my regards to the gang. I sure do wish I was there instead of here.

As ever,

Quiz

After he had finished reading Sandy sat for a long time with his chin in his hands, thinking. The survey wasn’t going well, he knew. Yesterday, Hall and Donovan had paid them a visit and shaken their heads at the map that Ralph and Stack were drawing.

“This isn’t an anticline, John,” the geologist had said. “What we have here is fault that has caused a stratigraphic trap. That is, layers of rock on one side of the fault line have been lifted above those on the other side of the crack by some old earthquake. The slip sealed off the upper end of what may be an oil-bearing layer with the edge of a layer of hard, impervious rock. If you drill here”—he pointed with his pipe stem—“you may hit a small pool. Nothing spectacular, you understand, but it ought to more than pay expenses.”

“I don’t know whether I should take the chance.” Hall had shaken his gray head. “I need something better than this to gamble on, the way things are. Tell you what, Don. There’s going to be a bid session at Window Rock next Monday. Keep the crew working here for a few days longer while I drive down and see if I can shake loose a better lease. Ralph, you’d better come along. I hear that the Navajo and Hopi Councils will have some sort of joint powwow at the Rock and I’ll want you to keep an eye on it. You come along too, Sandy, and bring the ‘ear.’ I have a hunch that a lot of things are about to pop.”

“Will we have room for Kitty?” Ralph asked. “I dropped over to see her after work yesterday and she told me the school is closing Monday and Tuesday because there’s going to be a big Squaw Dance in the neighborhood. She wants to go home and get her best clothes to wear to it. She could drive her own car, of course…”

“Kitty’s good company,” Hall had replied. “I’d be glad to have her along.”

A distant hail jerked Sandy out of his reverie. He put on his shoes, picked up his rod, hammer and compass, and started climbing over jagged rocks to the top of a crumbling low butte that was to be the next survey location. The going wasn’t too bad because one side of the cone had collapsed, thus providing a slope of debris up which he could clamber with fair speed.

When Stack’s transit came in sight, Sandy placed the stadia rod upright so that it could be seen against the skyline and started the slow business of moving it about in response to the surveyor’s hand signals.

Several times he stopped and listened intently. Off to his right, hidden in the underbrush that choked the crater, he thought he heard some large animal moving. A deer, probably, he tried to reassure himself, although he remembered that one of the other crewmen had had a nasty brush with a bobcat several days previously.

“That’s it, Sandy,” the surveyor in the valley bellowed through cupped hands at last. “Call it a day.”

The boy was beating a quiet retreat down the slope when a tired bleat stopped him in his tracks. The animal in there was either a sheep or a calf, and it seemed to be in trouble.

“Better take a look,” said Sandy. (He had got into the habit of talking to himself these last few lonely weeks. The noise seemed to keep the homesickness away.)

It was a calf, he found, when he had fought his way into the thicket. And it seemed to be sick. First it would nibble at some plants where it stood, then, lifting its feet high and putting them down gingerly, it would move slowly to another location and repeat the performance. Every so often it let out that piteous bleat.

“Poor thing,” Sandy murmured. “Maybe I ought to take it back to camp.”

He fished a length of cord out of his knapsack, looped it around the calf’s neck and tugged. The animal gave him a glassy stare and wobbled forward.

“Probably a Navajo stray,” he said. “Its owners will be looking for it.”

When he reached the temporary camp half an hour later, Ralph took one look at the calf and let out an astonished whoop.

“Loco,” he shouted. “Hey, gang! Come look what Sandy found.”

Men came running from all directions.

“Where did you find it?” Stack demanded.

“Up there. On top of that butte.” Sandy pointed.

“Was it eating anything at the time?” Ralph snapped.

“Yes. Some plants that looked sort of like ferns, only they had little bell-like blossoms hanging from stalks in their centers.

“Locoweed,” the Indian crowed. “Astragalus Pattersoni, Donovan calls it. Sandy, you may have found just what the doctor ordered to get John out of his pinch. I’ll get a Geiger counter. The rest of you round up some flashlights, sacks and spades. We’d better take a look at this right away.”

“What about my calf?” Sandy objected.

“Oh, stake it out somewhere and give it some water. It may recover. It’s just drugged. Indians used to chew locoweed when they went down in their kivas, you know. They said it made them see visions in which they talked to the spirits. Eat too much of the stuff, though, and you’re a goner.”

* * * *

Two hours later, after having dug up most of the crater, the men tramped wearily back to camp in the light of the rising moon. The sacks they carried on their backs bulged with loads of black earth mixed with yellow carnotite crystals that made the Geiger chatter madly.

Hall was just driving into camp as they arrived.

“We’ve found a rich uranium lode or lens, I think, John,” Ralph shouted to him. For once he had lost his Indian calm and was almost dancing with excitement.

“You don’t say,” yawned the producer as he dragged himself out of the car.

“Well!” Ralph stared, openmouthed, at this cool reception. “What’s the matter, boss? Don’t you care?”

“Where are we going to sell the ore?” Hall asked gently.

“Oh!” Ralph wilted. “I hadn’t thought of that. The government only buys from people who have mills.”

“Sure. A uranium strike these days is just like money in a safe for which you have lost the combination.”

“Excuse me, Mr. Hall,” Stack interrupted, “but doesn’t Midray own an interest in a uranium mill?”

“Oh, yes.” Hall smiled grimly at the surveyor. “Midray owns an interest in most everything. It will be delighted to help me develop the lode—in exchange for three-fourths of the profits.

“That’s better than nothing, though.” He straightened his shoulders. “A uranium strike will shorten the odds enough so I can take a chance on drilling a well here. Why, what am I grousing about? This could be a real stroke of luck. How did you happen to find it?”

When he had heard the story, Hall slapped Sandy on the back.

“That’s what’s called serendipity,” he said, chuckling. “You remember the three Princes of Serendip in the fairy story: on their travels they always found things they weren’t looking for. Congratulations, Sandy. You have the makings of a real wildcatter.”

But, as the boy went off to take care of his sick calf, he knew that his employer had been putting on an act. Serendipity or no, John Hall was still running a poor-boy outfit.