Campbell's Kingdom

by Hammond Innes

  ‘Nothing,’ I said.

  He didn’t say anything, but I noticed that his eyes kept straying now to the point where the roadway up to the camp plunged into darkness. Suppose Butler and his gang had smelt a rat. Or maybe he’d send a truck up for more equipment. They’d find the bridge down. It wouldn’t take them long to repair it. Any moment they might drive in, asking what the hell was going on. My hands gripped each other, my eyes alternating between the road and the big iron cable wheel. At last the wheel stopped and we waited for the phone call that would tell us they had unloaded. ‘They’re taking their time,’ Garry growled. His face looked tired and strained. I had started to tremble again. I tried to pretend it was the cold, but I knew it was nervous strain. At last the bell rang, the indicator fell and the engineer started the cage down. That ten minutes seemed like hours. And then at last the cage humped into the housing, the diesel slowed to a gentle rumble and we could hear the engine of the last tanker roaring as it drove on to the cage. We went out into the driving snow then and watched the securing ropes being made fast.

  It was ten to five and the faintest greyness was creeping into the darkness of the night as Garry and I climbed up beside the driver. I raised my hand, there was a shout, the cable ahead of us jerked tight and then we, too, were being slung out into the void.

  I don’t remember much about that trip up. I know I clutched at the seat, fighting back the overwhelming fear of last minute failure. I remember Garry voicing my thoughts: ‘I hope they don’t catch us now,’ he said. ‘We’d look pretty foolish swinging up here in space till morning.’

  ‘Shut up,’ I barked at him, my voice unrecognisable in its tenseness.

  He looked at me and then suddenly he grinned and his big hand squeezed my arm. ‘They don’t breed many of your type around this part of the world.’

  The minutes ticked slowly by. A shadow slipped past my window. The pylon at the top. We were over the lip. Two minutes later our progress slowed. There was a slight bump and then we were in the housing. Figures appeared. The lashings were unhitched, the engine roared and with our headlights blazing on to a wall of snow we crawled off the staging and floundered through a drift to stop above the dam.

  As we climbed out the cage lifted from the housing and disappeared abruptly. The ground seemed to move under my feet. I heard Boy’s voice say, ‘Well, that’s the lot, I guess. You’re in the Kingdom now, Garry—rig and all.’ Then my knees were giving under me and I blacked out.

  I came to in the firm belief that I was on board a ship. There was a reek of hot engine oil and the cabin swayed and dipped. And then I opened my eyes and found myself staring at the luminous dial of an oil gauge. Raising my eyes I saw a faint glimmering of grey through a windscreen. ‘You okay, Bruce?’ It was Boy’s voice. He was propping me up in the seat of a cab and we were grinding slowly through thick snow. ‘You’ll be all right soon. There’s hot food waiting for us at the ranch-house. We had to stop to fix chains. The snow is pretty deep in places.’

  I remember vaguely being spoon fed hot soup and men moving about, talking excitedly, laughing, pumping my hand. And then I was lying in a bed. But this time it was different. It wasn’t because I was ill. It was only because I was physically and nervously exhausted. And I was back in the Kingdom. The rig was here at last. We were going to drill now. And with that thought I went to sleep and stayed asleep for twelve hours.

  And when I woke up Boy was there beside me and he was grinning and saying that the rig would be up before nightfall. When I went down to the drilling site next morning I found the rig erected and the draw works being tightened down on to the steel plates of the platform. The travelling block was already suspended from the crown and the kelly was in its rat housing. They had already begun to dig a mud sump and there were several lengths of pipe ready in the rack.

  I stood there with Boy and Garry and stared across to the dam less than a mile away. The sun was shining and already the snow was beginning to melt. I was thinking it was time Trevedian came storming into our camp. But nobody seemed to be taking any notice of us. The hoist moved regularly in and out of the housing, the loads of cement were stacked under their tarpaulins, the mixers chattered noisily and every now and then there was the heavy roar of blasting and more stone was run down in the tip wagons or slung on the cable across to the centre of the dam. ‘We’ll have to mount a guard,’ I said.

  Boy wiped the sweat from his face. ‘I’m sleeping down here,’ he said. ‘And I’ve got that pistol of yours. There are four rifles on the site as well.’

  I nodded, still looking across to the dam. ‘The next move is with them,’ I murmured half to myself.

  Garry chuckled. ‘Mebbe he’s had enough. You sure fooled them.’

  I turned away. I didn’t like it. The natural thing would have been for Trevedian to come and raise hell. It wasn’t in the nature of the man to take it lying down. But he didn’t come that day, or the next, or the next. I didn’t feel up to heavy work so I took over the cooking again.

  On the morning of Tuesday, June 9th, just a week after the rig had rolled into Thunder Valley, Garry spudded in. I stood on the platform and watched the block come down and the bit lowered into the hole. The bushing was dropped into the table, gripping the grief stem, and then at a signal from Garry the platform trembled under my feet, the big diesel of the draw works roared and the table began to turn. We had started to drill Campbell Number Two.

  I walked slowly back to the ranch-house to the music of the drill, the noise of it drowning the irritating chatter of the mixers at the dam. Strangely I felt no elation. It was as though I had sailed out of a calm and felt the threatening presence of the approaching storm. I went into the kitchen and began peeling potatoes for the evening meal.

  Half an hour later I heard the patter of feet, the door was pushed open and a big brown collie fell upon me, barking and licking my hand and jumping up to get at my face. It was Moses. He was spattered with mud and his coat was as wet as if he’d just swum the Jordan. I went out into the grey murk of the morning and there, coming up beside the barn, was Jean riding a small pinto. She pulled up as she saw me and sat there, looking at me. Her hair was plastered down with the rain so that it clung to her scalp showing the shape of her head like a boy. Her face looked strained and almost sad. The pony drooped its head. She sat motionless. Only her eyes seemed alive. ‘Mac said you needed a cook?’ Her voice was toneless.

  ‘Yes,’ I said. And I just stared at her. I couldn’t think of anything to say. And yet there was a singing in my blood as though the sun were shining and the violets just opening.

  ‘Well, I hope I’ll do.’ She climbed stiffly down from the saddle, undid her pack and walked slowly towards me. She stopped when she reached the doorway. She had to, I suppose, because I was blocking it. We looked at each other for a moment.

  ‘Why did you come?’ I asked at length. My voice sounded hoarse.

  She lowered her gaze. ‘I don’t know,’ she said slowly. ‘I just had to, I guess. I brought you this.’ She handed me a bulky envelope. ‘Now I’d like to change please.’

  I stood aside and she went through into the bedroom. I turned the envelope over. It was postmarked London. Inside was a whole sheaf of typewritten pages, the newspaper report of my grandfather’s trial which I had asked a friend to copy for me. I stabled the pinto and then I sat down and read through the report. Stuart Campbell had himself gone into the witness box. His evidence was the story of his discovery of the seep, of the abortive drilling in 1913, of his sincere conviction that there was oil in the Kingdom. Most of it I now knew, but one section of it hit me like a blow between the eyes. It occurred during cross-examination by his own counsel:

  Counsel: This well you were drilling in 1931—why did you suddenly abandon it?

  Witness: We couldn’t go on.

  Counsel: Why not?

  Witness: We struck a sill of igneous rock. We were operating a cable-tool drill and it was too light for the job.

 
Counsel: At what depth was this?

  Witness: About five thousand six hundred feet. We had to have a heavier drill and that meant more capital.

  Counsel: And so you came to England?

  Witness: Not at once. I tried to raise money in Canada. Then the war came . . .

  I leaned back and closed my eyes. Five thousand six hundred! And our geophysical survey showed an anticline at five thousand five hundred. The anticline was nothing but the sill of igneous rock that my grandfather had struck in 1913. God, what a fool I’d been not to get hold of the account of this case before starting to drill. Why hadn’t my grandfather mentioned it in his progress report? Afraid of discouraging me, I suppose. I got to my feet and went over to the window and stood there staring across the alfalfa to the rig, wondering what the hell I was going to do. But there wasn’t anything I could do. It hadn’t stopped my grandfather from trying to drill another well.

  ‘I wish somebody from back home would write me nice long letters like that.’

  I swung round to find Jean standing beside me. ‘It’s just a business letter,’ I said quickly. I folded it up and put it back in the envelope. I couldn’t tell her that what she had brought me was the full account of Stuart Campbell’s trial.

  That night the stars shone and it was almost warm. The second shift was working and we strolled down to the rig where it blazed like a Christmas tree with lights rigged up as far as the derrick man’s platform. We were talking trivialities, carefully avoiding anything that could be regarded as personal. And then in a pause I said, ‘Didn’t you like it in Vancouver?’

  ‘Yes, I was having fun—dancing and sailing. But—’ She hesitated and then sighed. ‘Somehow it wasn’t real. I think I’ve lost the capacity to enjoy myself.’

  ‘So you came back to Come Lucky?’ She nodded. ‘To escape again?’

  ‘To escape?’ She looked up at me and there was a tired set to her mouth. ‘No. Because it was the only place I could call home. And then—’ She walked on in silence for a bit. Finally she said, ‘Did you have to slap Peter Trevedian in the face like that?’

  ‘I had to get the rig up here. It was the only way.’

  She didn’t say anything for a moment. Then she sighed. ‘Yes. I suppose so.’

  We came to the rig and climbed on to the platform and stood there watching the table turning and the block slowly inching down as the drill bit into the rock two hundred feet below us. Beneath us the screen shook and the rock chips sifted out of the mud as it returned to the sump. Bill was standing beside the driller. ‘What are you making now?’ I shouted to him.

  ‘About eight feet an hour.’

  Eight feet an hour. I did a quick calculation. Roughly two hundred a day. ‘Then twenty-five days—say a month—should see us down to the anticline?’

  He nodded. ‘If we can keep this rate of drilling up.’

  We stayed until they shut down at midnight. We were working two teams of four on ten-hour shifts and closing down from midnight to 4 a.m. It was the most the men could do and keep it up day after day. Boy and I were taking it in turns to stand guard on the rig, Moses acting as watch-dog.

  We were soon settled into a regular routine. One day followed another and each was the same, the monotony broken only by the variable nature of the weather. June dragged into July and each day two more lengths of pipe had been added to the length of the drill. The heat at midday became intense when the sun shone and the nights were less cold. Snow storms became less frequent, but whenever the sun shone throughout the morning thunder heads would build up over the mountains around midday and then there’d be rain and the thunder would rumble round the peaks and they would be assailed by jabbing streaks of lightning. And all the time the alfalfa grew and the Kingdom was carpeted with lupins and tiger lilies and a host of other flowers.

  And in all that time Trevedian had not once come near us. The work at the dam was going on night and day now. Once we rode over at night to have a look at it and where Campbell land stopped and Trevedian land began, the boundary was marked by a heavy barbed wire fence. There was a guard on the hoist and on the dam itself and they carried guns and had guard dogs.

  The sense of being cut off gradually overlaid all our other feelings. The drill might probe lower and lower, boring steadily nearer to the dome of the anticline, but in all our minds was that sense of being trapped, of not being able to get out. We were completely isolated in a world of our own, the radio our only contact with the outside world. And when that broke down the Kingdom closed in on us.

  I wouldn’t have minded for myself. If I’d been up there on my own I should have been happy. But my mood reacted inevitably to the mood of the others and all the time I had the uncanny feeling that we were all waiting for something to happen. Our isolation wasn’t natural. Fergus couldn’t ignore us indefinitely. He didn’t dare let us bring in a well. And there was Trevedian. That phrase of Jean’s—about slapping Trevedian in the face—stuck in my mind. The man was biding his time. I felt it. And so did Jean. Sometimes I’d find her standing, alone and solitary, her work forgotten, staring towards the dam.

  And then the blow fell. It was on July 4th. Boy had left that morning, taking core samples down to Winnick in Calgary. The weather was bad and when I came on watch at midnight it was blowing half a gale with the wind driving a murk of rain before it that was sometimes sleet, sometimes hail and occasionally snow. I was wearing practically everything I could muster for the wind was from the east and it was bitterly cold. As usual I had Moses with me and the Luger was strapped to my belt.

  The team on duty closed down the draw works and the drill clattered to a standstill. The rig stopped shaking and all was suddenly silent except for a queer howling sound made by the wind in the steel struts of the rig. As the big diesel of the draw works stopped the lights snapped off and blackness closed in. Torches flickered and then the boys called out goodnight and followed along the line of markers that led back to the ranch-house, four hunched figures against the flickering light of their torches. Then a curtain of sleet blotted them out and the dog and I were alone on the empty platform of the rig.

  The switch from noisy activity to utter blackness was, I remember, very sudden that night. The lights of the dam were completely blotted out and there was not even the ugly rattle of the mixers to keep me company since they were down-wind. I was alone in the solitude of the mountains.

  I made the usual round of the trucks which were drawn up at various points in the vicinity of the rig. It was a routine inspection and my torch did not probe very inquisitively. It was too cold. The dog, I remember, was restless, but whether because he smelt something or had a premonition or just because he didn’t like the weather I cannot say. I finished the round as quickly as possible and then climbed to the platform. For a time I paced up and down and at length I sought the comparative warmth of the little crew shelter, a wooden hut at the back of the platform fitted with a bench. I smoked cigarettes, occasionally opening the door and peering out.

  Time passed slowly that night. The dog kept moving about. I tried to make him settle, but every time he got himself curled up something made him get to his feet again.

  It was about two-thirty and I had just peered out to see it snowing hard. As I closed the door, Moses suddenly cocked his head on one side and gave a low growl. The next moment he leapt for the door. I opened it and he shot through. And at the same instant there was a great roar of flame, a whoof of hot air that seemed to fling back the snow and seared my eyeballs with the hot blast of it. It was followed almost instantly by two more explosions in close succession that shook the rig and sent great gobs of flaming fuel high into the night.

  In the lurid glare of one of these liquid torches I saw a figure running, a shapeless unrecognisable bundle of clothing heading for the dam. And behind him came Moses in great bounds. The figure checked, turned and as Moses leapt I saw the quick stab of a gun, though the sound of it was lost in the holocaust of flame that surrounded me. The dog checked in mi
d leap, twisted and fell.

  I had my gun out now and I began firing, emptying the magazine at the fleeing figure. Then suddenly the pool of flame that had illuminated him died out and he vanished into the red curtain of the driving snow.

  As suddenly as they had started the flames died down. For a moment I saw the skeletons of the two tankers, black and twisted against the lurid background. And then quite abruptly everything was dark again, except for a few bits of metal that showed a lingering tendency to remain red hot. I hurried down from the platform of the rig and at the bottom I met Moses, dragging himself painfully on three legs. In the light of the torch I saw a bullet had furrowed his shoulder. He was bleeding badly and his right front leg would support no weight. I tried to feel whether the blade of the shoulder had been broken, but he wouldn’t let me touch it.

  I made a quick round of the remaining vehicles to check that there was nothing smouldering. Wisps of smoke still came from the burnt-out tankers, but there was no danger of any more fire. They were already sizzling gently and steaming as the snow settled on their twisted metal frames. Then I hurried to the ranch-house with Moses following as best he could.

  Every moment I expected to meet the others running to the rig to find out what had happened. It seemed incredible to me that they couldn’t have seen the glare of that blaze. And yet when I reached the house it was in darkness. There was no sound. They were all fast asleep and blissfully ignorant of the disaster. For disaster it was; I knew that by the time I’d covered half the distance to the house. The attack had been made on the one thing that could stop us dead. Without fuel we could not drill. And like my blowing up of the road it would be a hard thing to prove in a court of law.

  The first person I woke was Jean and I gave Moses into her care, avoiding meeting her gaze as I told her briefly what had happened. I was scared of the reproach I knew must be in her eyes. She loved that dog. After that I woke Garry.

  I think that was one of the hardest things I ever had to do, to tell Garry that two of his trucks were gone and all his fuel. I knew what he’d think—that I had started the rough stuff, that I had invited this raid. He didn’t say anything when I had finished, but put on his clothes and strode out into the storm. I followed him.