Monster: Tale Loch Ness

by Jeffrey Konvitz

  The office was luxurious, bordered by a huge picture window and furnished with opulent couches, lamps, rugs, a conference table, and a magnificent antique desk. It was neat, clean, almost too perfect.

  "Impressed?" Foster asked.

  Scotty surveyed the room. "I think Mr. Whittenfeld has a keen sense of what he likes."

  Several minutes later, Whittenfeld returned and excitedly closed the office door. "Peter Bruce!" he cried, his deceptively slim body held posture perfect. "Welcome to Scotland." He took off his blazer and draped it carefully over a chair. "And Christ, I'm embarrassed. You get here and I'm nowhere to be found. Problems always seem to pop up when you want them the least. Forgive me. The interruption was unavoidable." He glanced at Foster. "Fortunately, you had Jerry Foster with you, so I know you weren't left flopping about. Foster can make time hustle like the wind."

  "It's my job," Foster said.

  "Can I call you Scotty?" Whittenfeld asked, shaking Scotty's hand.

  "Of course," Scotty replied.

  "And you call me Bill, or 'hey' if the occasion demands." He laughed, very self-assured. "Foster get you settled?"

  "He couldn't have been more conscientious. The house is perfect."

  "Did he also give you the grand VIP tour of the base?"

  "We didn't have a chance," Foster advised. "We came right up."

  Whittenfeld smiled. "Precision timing."

  Foster nodded graciously. "I'll be in my office, Scotty. If you need anything, you just let me know." He inched toward the door. "It was a pleasure."

  Foster disappeared. Whittenfeld offered Scotty a cigar, which Scotty accepted.

  "Scotty!" Whittenfeld declared, his manner of speech, narrow Nordic features and graying temples amtuating a visible air of authority. "It's a goddamn thrill to have you here. Really a thrill. Though, of course, we all miss Jim Barrett." He paused, thinking. "Barrett was one hell of an engineer, a gentleman, too."

  "So I've heard."

  "And he was an integral component in the inception of the project."

  "From day one?"

  "Day two. I supervised the initial exploratory work alone. I brought in Barrett after the ball had started to roll, and I couldn't have chosen a better man. Hell, he deserved to be here. Deserved to receive the proper credit, to see results. Damn heart attack! He is as responsible as anyone for our progress. Not only did he design the drilling program, but without him we wouldn't have been able to get the Columbus into the loch."

  "You barged the ship through the Caledonian Canal, didn't you?'

  "Yes, but that was no easy exercise. The old locks were falling apart, and the chamber's beams were too narrow. We would have had to chop the Columbus into a million pieces. I asked Barrett to get us off the hook, so his team lengthened the lock chambers and widened the beams. In order to keep commercial navigation alive, they built the new system right over the old and then tore out the inner structure." He smiled thoughtfully, winding his Piaget watch, everything about him reeking elegance. "The entire region came out to watch the Columbus, split in thirds, in transit. It was a social and media event, the biggest noise heard around here since St. Columba announced the presence of a monster."

  "I've seen the canal sections in miniature. They have the mockup in London."

  Whittenfeld nodded. "A monument to Barrett's inventiveness and our perseverance." He had just passed fifty, the lines on his face appropriate for the age. "When Barrett went down, there was panic in New York and London. Fortunately, Bob Reddington recommended you. And after I had researched your background, I bought the recommendation too. I flew to the States and told them to stop jerking off. Get me a good man. Get me Scotty Bruce. Of course, I wasn't too sure they'd be able to lure you, but when the home office told me you'd expressed interest in abandoning private consultancy, I nearly jumped up to the top of Carn a Bhodaich across the loch."

  "I appreciate the sentiment," Scotty said, puffing his cigar.

  Whittenfeld walked to the window, staring at the finger of water stretching into the distance. "There it is! Loch Ness. The big prize. Sitting and waiting. Waiting to get angry. I know it looks like a docile child, but that's just a perverted little game it plays. Beneath the child is a vile little bitch with a nasty temper. Like a sorcerer, it can invoke the wrath of hell, and when it does, it is none too pleasant. The wind funnels between the mountains. The water surface waves to enormous proportions. The sky hangs heavy, black, brooding. I've seen it from here, and I've witnessed it aboard the Columbus. And I've seen the fear it instills."

  Scotty listened, watched, fascinated.

  "But what intrigues me most," Whittenfeld continued, "is what lies beneath. A colossal anomaly. A freak of nature. A renegade oil field." He held up several maps. "Look at these seismics and isopachs. Every day the project starts to look better. And every day the company's opponents look more and more like babbling fools." He laughed. "Mr. Bruce, the world is very illogical, its population almost devoured by its own stupidity and ignorance. Fortunately, there are enlightened men determined to see the battle through against onerous odds!"

  Scotty just stared. "If I'm to get started tomorrow," he suddenly said, "I'd like to get a feel of the place, walk around, meet the staff."

  Whittenfeld laughed. "The profile is accurate. Scotty Bruce: a man of action, few words. That's good. Your impatience with profundity will dewind me!" He walked to a free wall and pulled down a chart. "This is base personnel. I'm at the top. You're underneath. You have a chief district engineer, his staff, a district geologist, and the normal administrative personnel." He pointed at another graphic. "Here's the operational profile for the Columbus. Below is security. That's about it. You're familiar with general organizational procedures. Now you just need to meet the faces."

  Scotty stood. "It's a big staff for an exploratory base."

  Whittenfeld shook his head. "The company is very optimistic. We're sure there's plenty of oil here." He put on his jacket. "Shall we?" he asked, indicating the door.

  They walked out into the secretarial area. Pierre Lefebre was waiting for them.

  "I was told Mr. Bruce had arrived," Lefebre said in an appealing but heavy French accent. "So I came up to meet him."

  "I'm glad you did," Whittenfeld declared, introducing the two men.

  "It's a pleasure," Lefebre announced with a flourish. "I've heard a lot about you, Monsieur Bruce."

  "I hope not all bad," Scotty said.

  "All good!"

  Impossible, Scotty thought, allowing a touch of realism to invade opening-day pleasantries. "Thanks" he said.

  Lefebre was slim, scarred, blandly complected. At first glance, he looked the type of man who would rarely smile. But he was smiling effusively, almost overdoing it.

  "So good," Lefebre continued as he buttoned the bottom button of his tightly tailored, epauletted Eisenhower jacket. "I'm anxious to discover if the man lives up to the legend."

  "Don't believe all the propaganda," Scotty declared. Was the Frenchman referring to his football and engineering careers or his infamous reputation for corporate radicalism, his addiction to anticorruption crusades and causes?

  "Propaganda or not, I look forward to working with you."

  "Thanks. The feeling is mutual." They entered the hall.

  Whittenfeld turned to Lefebre. "What are you up to?"

  "A security check."

  "Can it wait?"

  "Sure."

  Whittenfeld pointed to the elevators. "Good. Come along and help me introduce Scotty to the base."

  Shortly after two o'clock, Scotty, Whittenfeld, and Lefebre returned to Whittenfeld's suite.

  They were joined moments later by Tony Spinelli, the senior district engineer, whom Scotty had akeady met downstairs.

  "I made the arrangements," Spinelli said, spanking out a precise English accent. He was Italian by race, British by birth. "They're preparing the Black Isle hole. We'll give them a sendoff next week. We'll also copter over to Beauly Highpoint, wh
ich is near depth. Then we'll check Highland B, which is about a third of the way along."

  "Sounds good," Scotty declared. "Though I want to make sure I spend as much time as I need on the Columbus first."

  "No problem."

  Whittenfeld interceded. "A dignitary named Farquharson arrives tomorrow. He's a Scottish Office undersecretary. He has considerable clout in energy matters, though he's never been near a rig in his life. I want the Columbus team to give him a thorough indoctrination. Since you'll be going out today, prep Reddington and the crew."

  Scotty bit off the end of a new cigar. "It's as good as done."

  "I also want you to be on board in the morning."

  "I'd intended to stay out overnight, anyway."

  "Good. And I want you to act as Farquharson's tutor. Teach him something. It will be a good way to orient yourself, make yourself at home."

  "I'll do my best."

  Whittenfeld gestured to Lefebre. "I want you there as well."

  "Of course," Lefebre said.

  Whittenfeld turned to Scotty again. "Why don't you join me for lunch?"

  "I'd rather have a raincheck," Scotty declared. "I'd like to get out to the ship."

  "Right to work," Whittenfeld said with a smile. "That's what I love to see. Raincheck given."

  The helicopter hovered momentarily over the Geminii complex, then pitched southeastward.

  "Look at those thunderheads," Scotty said, pointing toward the northeast.

  The chopper pilot shook his head. "Just window dressing. I spoke to flight service this morning. The prevailing winds will take them due south through the North Sea sector."

  Scotty looked at the surrounding countryside. Damn beautiful, he thought. High mountains. Acres of green pasture land. Bare granite pinnacles. Fingers of firths and inlets along the rugged west coast.

  The pilot gestured. "There! The peak. It's Ben Nevis, the highest in Scotland. The city just beyond is Fort William, right at the west end of the Great Glen."

  Scotty glanced out the side window. Below them was one of the company's seismic vessels, trailing its long hydrophone cable, picking up echoes for geophysical interpretation.

  "We're home!" the pilot announced a short time later.

  Scotty looked ahead. The Columbus was less than a half mile away, perched just beyond the mouth of Urquhart Bay. She looked magnificent, her huge derrick and drilling assemblage sticking high into the air above the moon pool, the midship access hole down through the hull to the water.

  The pilot maneuvered the chopper over the forward helipad and set the bird down. Scotty opened the side door and stepped out. Bob Reddington rushed up and embraced him.

  "You old grizzled son of a bitch!" Reddington said, laughlng.

  "Me? Old?" Scotty pulled away. "Why, you big jerk. I ought to heave you into the moon pool!"

  Reddington suddenly lay down on the side of the helipad, bracing his elbow and raising a massive forearm. "Ready?" he asked.

  Scotty dropped down, too, grabbing Reddington's extended palm. "You bet your ass. This one's for a case of beer!"

  "Why not two?"

  "Two? You'd think I'd never beaten you before."

  "You haven't!"

  Scotty gritted his teeth. "Well, I've been practicing."

  Several crew members gathered. The chopper pilot lifted off but hovered nearby to watch the outcome. The arm wrestling match was over in seconds.

  "All right," Scotty said, rising. "I owe you two cases."

  Reddington could not stop laughing. "You've been practicing?"

  They climbed down from the helipad and walked toward ship center, passing several roustabouts who were unloading one of the Columbus's supply tugs.

  "That's one hell of a way to greet your best friend," Scotty said. "And your boss!"

  "What do you want from me?" Reddington asked coyly. "You named the price and took the challenge. It's not my fault you're a schmuck!"

  Scotty put his arm on Reddington's shoulder. "I took this job because of you. But now I'm having second thoughts."

  "Here comes the bullshit," Reddington said, still laughing.

  Climbing on to the drilling platform, Reddington introduced Scotty to the members of the current shift who were pulling the drill pipe out of the well.

  "Why the trip?" Scotty asked, referring to the maneuver. "We lose a bit?"

  "No," Reddington explained. "We hit some hard chert-silica strata, and we need a real chomper down there or we'll be here forever."

  Scotty watched the movement, listening. He loved the noises, the smells, the chatter.

  "I saw the kids before I left," he said.

  "You did?" Reddington asked, beaming. "How'd they look?"

  "Great. I've got the two handsomest godchildren in the world."

  "Did they tell you I'm bringing them over in July?"

  "Sure did. They also asked me to ask you if you'd bring over mama, too."

  Reddington frowned. "That's some thought. I've got the divorce papers back in the apartment and a slew of letters from Margaret's lawyers as well as a couple of nasty ones from Margaret herself." He shook his head, leaned against a deck crane, which was offloading a supply tug, then looked out toward Drumnadrochit, a small village nestled in the crook of Urquhart Bay. "You should have married her yourself. She was your friend." He shook his head again, as if to clear it. "All right, what's done is done. So let's forget the bullshit. You're here, you bastard. Right here. I told you one day we'd work together. I told you I'd make it happen." He punched Scotty in the arm, a habit retained from the days he was fourth-string defensive end at USC, a pincushion for weekly simulation drills. "So let's go. Into the valley of death. I've got a load of executives waiting on pins and needles for your appearance. They think some godlike football hero is going to walk into the room."

  They climbed down from the drilling platform, entered the executive quarters beneath the forward helipad, and walked through the dining, rec, and radio rooms. Reddington introduced Scotty to the staffs, then accompanied Scotty into the superintendent's office, where Bill Nunn and Mike Grabowski were waiting.

  "These are the slaves," Reddington announced as he slid his way into a chair. "Bill Nunn, our well-site geologist. Mike Grabowski, our engineer." He pointed to Scotty. "The hero. Scotty Bruce." He laughed as the three men shook hands, exchanging quips. "Careful, Scotty. Don't make the standard operating error. Don't mistake Grabowski for a rabbi. I know he looks it, especially with the beard, but he's not. Though his parents never got over the fact that he didn't become one like the rest of his brothers. Grabowski will tell you. His parents nearly croaked when he burned his yarmulke and announced he was going to spend his life drilling holes."

  "Is that so?" Scotty asked, stern faced, positioning himself at a work table, which was covered with the drill ship's mud and bit records, the morning and daily drilling reports, and the team's most recent blowout-prevention calculations.

  "Red has a way of exaggerating," Grabowski said.

  "The hell!" Reddington declared, looking at Scotty for support.

  "Grabowski's parents made life so miserable for him in the States, he had to pack his bags and transfer here to Inverness. In fact, he arrived just in time to watch Bill Nunn confront the Free Church."

  Nunn cringed. "Oh, Christ, must you," he said. "I'd almost forgotten the damn incident."

  "Bull," Reddington snapped. "Scotty, Nunn may be a geologist, but once he reaches shore, he Dr. Jekylls into a regular A. J. Foyt, equipped with a suped-up motorcycle and black crash suit. He plays the trumpet, too, though we had to prohibit the thing from the Columbus because the men started to complain." Nunn shook his head in mock disbelief. "Anyway," Reddington continued, "Nunn got drunk one Sunday and rode his cycle into town, taking the trumpet, too. Now that might be okay in some places, but this is Inverness. The Church of Scotland is bad, but the Free Church is comatose, and they control Inverness with an iron fist. They hate tourists. They hate noise. They're even against heavy
breathing." He laughed. "Well, Nunn slurped a couple of beers, roared the motorcycle up to the gathering hole of the Free Churchers, and blasted the 'Star Spangled Banner' on the horn. The parishioners stormed out like rabid dogs. Undeterred, Nunn drove the motorcycle through the church. Well, there was some uproar. Whittenfeld's as religious as Karl Marx, but after the Free Church threatened to boot every oil worker out of the region, Whittenfeld gathered the entire company and gave a fire-and-brimstone speech. You should have seen his face! I nearly laughed my balls off. But Nunn didn't. Whittenfeld almost guillotined him."

  "I see you survived," Scotty said, patting Nunn on the back.

  "Barely," Nunn observed.

  "Where's the trumpet now?" Scotty asked.

  "Locked in my closet. I may be dumb, but I'm not stupid."

  "And you, Grabowski? You none the worse for wear?"

  "I'm breathing."

  Scotty smiled. He'd expected Reddington to bombard him with a story or two; Reddington had always had a penchant for whacko tales.

  He picked up the drilling reports, mentioned Farquharson's impending visit, his own lack of familiarity with the drill ship's progress, Whittenfeld's concern for precision and preparation, and then pointed toward the work table.

  Reddington glanced at Nunn and Grabowski. "Recess is over, gentlemen," he said.

  The sun had just dipped below the horizon. The dark, majestic mountains surrounding the loch looked stern against the colored sky. The temperature had dropped suddenly. Scotty raised his collar and buttoned his jacket. He was dressed in his habitual jeans and boots. Hell, even back in the days when he'd roamed the clubs with the other football players, he'd been most comfortable in Western garb.

  He smiled, examining the last trace of his reflection on the polished bulkhead wall. There were few streaks of gray in his hair and only several lines under his eyes. Not bad. Even nearing forty, he still looked young.

  He turned, staring first toward the east, then the west. Loch Ness was one of the most magnificent places he'd ever seen. It was a sanctuary, and the sound of drilling, the movement of men, made him very aware they were intruders.