Читать книгу The Devil's Whelp - Vin Hammond Jackson - Страница 6

There were no distinguishing features. There was nothing out there but sea, mile upon mile of it. Except for the sun and stars which might be just another illusion, there was nothing to indicate that a certain point had been encountered before. It was an ocean that appeared to span the entire earth. Only circumnavigation could confirm or refute the hypothesis, and who would dare attempt a voyage of such magnitude? Who would risk years, maybe decades, of loneliness in search of that which might not exist?

Some might, if they were desperate enough. Men sufficiently greedy, or reckless, perhaps. Proud men. In fact, they were already there, in the midst of desolation, not sailing on it in search of home, but fossicking beneath for a jewel far more precious than mere land.

They already had a country, and a home. They couldn't see either, not from the middle of that vast emptiness, but they knew all those comforts were there, just a chopper ride away, so they didn't worry about it. Worrying was for wimps, and oil men were hardly that.

They were smart enough to know that it wasn't all the same out there. It might look it - to a wimp - but they weren't just there by chance, and it wasn't just any old spot of ocean where they'd set up camp. It was a particular one.

So that they could recognise it and return to that exact spot, they'd marked it with a buoy which was really a ship. At least, it floated, although God only knew why it didn't capsize with that enormous steel tower sitting on its deck. It had a name, too - Olympian - because ships were personal things and if no two were called the same, you knew which was yours.

Most ships were built to sail and in this respect she was no different to her sister vessels, but for now, Olympian was going nowhere. Heavy, steel anchor chains saw to that. They held her, all 17,000 tonnes, to a section of the ocean floor 200 feet below.

This, too, had a name. They called it Scott Reef. Most people had never heard of it, didn't know it was there, but the oil men appreciated the reef for what it was. It was so special to them that they felt a need to mark it for posterity, and they did just that in their own inimitable way - they drilled holes in it.

They had drilled seven, to date, and were in the process of drilling another. This one, they thought - they hoped - could be the one. Scott Reef #8 could bring it in for them. There was something about the feel of it that made #8 different to its forerunners.

Jack Pierce thought so. #8 was different alright and he wished to God they'd never started it, they being the operative word. It was their responsibility, not his. He was merely the diving supervisor. Each time they messed up, he had to send his men down to find out why, and only hoped he could bring them back up again alive.

He always felt this way, never took the job, or his men, for granted. Not even when he was asleep or on a break. Always on the ball, always worrying. Apart from diving, it was what he did best. He was doing it now. Damn them and their wretched oil!

Leaning on the rail, he gazed out over the sea. It was relatively calm now, just a few whitecaps, but that was a dangerous misconception. The weather off the northwest coast was unpredictable. It would be smiling one minute, then the next it could turn on you with all the fury of a rabid beast.

Sometimes it gave warnings. Like that, he thought as he noticed a narrow trough of wind cutting its way across the surface towards him. It might be nothing. At the same time it could be a precursor, a harbinger of the doom to come. You had to watch for these signs. Any thinking man would.

Pierce turned. His grey, worried eyes scanned the decks. Any thinking man. He looked for one. From where he was standing, he could see fifteen or so workers, all going about their business, hauling pipes, greasing machinery, walking from A to B. Not one seemed concerned about the weather.

Surely, there was someone? There were eighty men on board, give or take. Surely to goodness there was one who cared more for his own safety than he did for his ego?

He sighed and turned to resume his vigil. Another gust streaked in from nowhere. He followed it as it thrashed across the bow, feathering whitecaps, frosting the mirrored blackness of the ocean. It seemed to pause in a flurry for a moment before darting away into the oblivion of the Timor Sea.

Under normal circumstances, Pierce might have watched it go as far as his eyes would see, but now wasn't normal, and something else had captivated his attention. It was below the surface, a faint glow, like a light of some kind. Then it had gone. Weird, he thought.

Just as the problems they'd struck with this latest hole were weird. The first day they'd lowered the bit and it had begun to chew its way into the reef, something had been wrong. Pierce had felt it, like a warning in the back of his mind, or an ache in his bones. He'd kept quiet, of course. No-one would have done anything, except perhaps poked fun at him for being the old woman they all considered him to be. For a few days he thought they might be right. Equipment did break down when it got tired. Incautious workers had accidents and it wasn't unknown for a freak storm to pop up out of nowhere once in a while, or two.

After a week he was already regarding the unusual number of incidents as a spate, and went back to trusting his own instincts. By the following Sunday the problems had reached glut proportions. At least, that was his opinion. To these worries, and others, he added one more - how to convince these blind, macho oil men that #8 was a jinx while at the same time reassuring his divers that it was not. He resolved the dilemma by concentrating on the second part and leaving the first to someone with a bit more influence.

#8 was in its twentieth day now and he had thought that sense might prevail. Some hopes. They were all edgy, snappy, but still they kept on, adding another section of pipe, driving the hole deeper into the ocean floor. It was down 1500 feet already and was turning into another bust, just like the first seven. But that was a defeatist attitude. If you quit when the going got a little shaky, you ought to get right out of the oil business. Some of them must be thinking along those lines. They must be. After all, beneath the grease and the hard hats, they were still human, but not one of them was prepared to admit his fears and pull the plug. So they all had to suffer.

From Jack's point of view, that meant eight long days, just over a week until he finished his 28 day stint and could catch the chopper that would take him off this crazy, floating time bomb. Maybe once he got home he would feel differently, perhaps be able to look back and realise that he'd over-reacted. It wasn't likely. The poison of Scott Reef #8 was already eating into his body and all he wanted to do was get right away from it and anything to do with oil. And he'd do it, he decided. He'd quit.

There - he'd said it. Not out loud, but it was the same thing. The decision was made, locked in. It couldn't be changed unless.... Jack stopped himself from inserting provisos into the formula, knowing full well that he might - probably would - resort to them in a moment of weakness. So, in eight days he would tender his resignation and that would be an end to it.

He felt a small surge of excitement. Like a tot of rum, it warmed his insides and supplied the boost needed to carry on. That was what he had to do - just take charge of the situation and do his job to the best of his ability. His men expected it of him. Right now they needed him, especially Eddie MacFarlane.

He looked around for the young Scot and found him outside the divers’ shack on the main deck. He was like something out of a child's toy box, a raggedy doll in a blue clown suit with a mop of flaming red hair - Jack's toy.

Does little Eddie want to go for a swim? Is that what he wants? Here we go, then, on with the nice hat. Yes, you do look a bit like a spaceman, don't you? And you want to fly to the moon, is that what you said? Tomorrow, Eddie. Tomorrow you can be a spaceman, but today you're a diver. Today Eddie's going for a swim. Here we go. No, don't struggle it won't hurt, not a bit. What was that? You're scared? There's nothing to be afraid of, trust me. I'm your Uncle Jack. Would I let you down?

Would I?

Eddie saw the diving super looking in his direction. Jack had been really funny lately, nervous. Everyone was, but Jack seemed to be taking it to extremes. As the man with the qualifications and the experience, you should have been able to rely on him for reassurance, but when the boss was worried and trying to make out that he wasn't, then you figured that maybe you ought to start worrying too.

He turned his eyes away from Jack and they fell on one of the derrick legs. His gaze travelled up, way up into the complex network of criss-crossed steel towering above him. It reminded him of a shrine, but one honouring the devil rather than any God. Only the devil could be responsible for what was happening, what they were all waiting for.

It all began two days ago, just a slight tremor at first, enough for all those on board who weren't asleep to stop and say: "What was that? Did you feel something?" Then they shrugged and carried on. When another hit an hour or so later, they said: "Peculiar," and still went about their business. Just after lunch the whole rig started trembling, not much, but enough to feel through the plating of the decks. And it didn't stop until they suspended drilling and raised the bit.

He'd overheard the driller talking with Doug Bromley, the toolpusher. They didn't seem over-concerned and were confident they could discover a remedy for the problem. They tried numerous things, including increasing and decreasing the revolutions of the drill, but instead of improving matters, the shaking got worse.

Someone with nothing better to do had timed the disturbances and discovered there was a pattern to them. They were spaced eighty-two minutes and fifteen seconds apart - exactly! When this small piece of trivia was brought to their attention, those in charge had mumbled: "Interesting." It hadn't stopped them drilling, but they were at least doing it with a deeper frown than the one they'd worn before.

That was early this morning, six-eleven, to be precise. Eddie knew because, like many others, he had taken to checking his watch, just casually, of course. At seven thirty-three, Olympian began vibrating so much that the derrick was humming like a giant tuning fork. They decided to stop drilling. At eight fifty-five it happened again, only this time the drill wasn't turning. It wasn't even in the hole! Shortly after the tremors ceased, a damage report was logged - a leak had been detected on the stack.

Jack and Eddie often talked about the oil men and how they liked to make out that they were so different to ordinary people. Jack maintained they were. "They don't even speak the same language," he'd said, and the pair of them had gone through a list of examples and laughed themselves sick. Well, here was yet another instance that caused a special kind of nausea. Here, they were talking about a stack, not the chimney sort that climbed into the sky and belched smoke. This stack sat on the ocean floor, over the hole they were drilling, performing its function quietly and inconspicuously. Take it away and what have you got? A hole, that's all.

But that wasn't all. Without the stack it was the muzzle of a cannon with a breech-load of powder and the fuse burning steadily. The un-nerving part was that it was right below you. "Right under your little pink ass," was the way Clem Berry explained it to one of the new roustabouts who was being extra-cocky. Clem was the sub-sea engineer and the blowout preventer - the stack - was his baby. He had enormous respect for it and he liked everyone else to. When they didn't and Clem found out, they usually got a lecture.

"When she goes, boy," he'd drawl in his lazy Texan accent, "You better hope you done all your prayin', 'cos sure as shootin', ain't gonna be no second chance."

Clem hadn't needed to lecture Eddie. The young Scot already cared a great deal for his little pink ass and if Clem's stack - or blowout preventer, or BOP, or whatever else they wanted to call it - was going to keep him wearing it, then that was cool. And if he had to go down ten times a day to check that it was doing its job, he'd do it. He wouldn't necessarily like it, but he'd do it.

Eddie gasped as something touched his shoulder. He spun to see Jack Pierce standing by him. Jack's frown deepened. "Are you okay?"

Eddie produced a long sigh through his nose and nodded. "I did nay see ye coming, that's all."

"You're sure?"

"D'ye ken, I'm fine, Jack. Is it time tay go?"

Pierce tried to glance casually at his watch, but the study was too long and nervous to be as indifferent as he would have liked it to appear. "We'll just wait until..." He stopped himself from saying that they'd wait until it was over, until the vibrations they all knew were coming had passed. "Until Clem's ready," he finished and was already searching for a topic of conversation which might take both their minds off the waiting. "You know what to look for?"

"A leak on the blue pod," replied Eddie, nodding.

Jack watched the red hair dance. The freckles on little Eddie's cheeks seemed to have multiplied since the last time Uncle Jack had looked. "It's probably nothing. Clem says he can still operate the valves, but he wants to make sure."

MacFarlane was fiddling with his rat-hat, passing it from one nervous hand to the other. "Have ye ever seen a blowout, Jack? I mean, from up close?"

Pierce tried a chuckle which died in his throat. He cleared it. "I'm standing here now, aren't I?" He shook his head, as if by doing so he could erase his poor attempt at a joke. "No, I haven't, and we're not going to see one. Everything's under control."