The Passenger (The Passenger, #1)(65)

He went up the corridor and opened the metal door and looked out into the howling. He shut the door again and went back and sat on the bunk. A long time till daylight.

They could just walk down the hall with a cheap infrared detector. Stop at the room that contained a warm body.

Make you walk to the shower? To minimize the clean-up?

Make you take your clothes off?

He sat listening. Watching the thin strip of light under the door.

Would he knock?

For what?

Would he wait for the light to go off?

You could bring in food and water and then barricade the door.

Two more days? Maybe.

He knew he would do nothing.



* * *





The crew came back midmorning of the following day. Coming down the companionway in their socks headed for the galley. By the time he got the bunks squared away the corridor was empty. He went up to the jackhouse and pushed open the door and stepped out onto the deck. The wind was still blowing and the dark seas lapped heavily but the storm had mostly passed. Down on the drillingfloor dead seabirds lay everywhere.

He ate lunch with the crew. They were a good bunch, unsurprised to see him there. He went back to his room and waited for the diveboat to come but the diveboat didnt come. He went up to the drilling office but the driller didnt know anything about unstacking any rigs. Someone had collected the dead birds and thrown them overboard and he watched the rig slowly swing into action. The big yellow traveling block rocked in the rigging and the drill was back on line by midafternoon and the drilling began again which would continue on into the night and every day and every night. He lay in his bunk listening to the voice of the driller over the squawkbox. The voice of the mudlogger. He’d left the light on over the desk. Men passed up and back outside the door going to and from the mess. The voices were like a balm to him. To be a part of some enterprise. A community of men. A thing all but unknown to him for the greater part of his life. He drifted in and out of sleep. The voices went on all night. We’re running at a hundred rpm’s. Two mp’s are up to seven hundred.

You want to run up there about a hundred and twenty. You get around there too fast it’s wobblin and all it’s goin to do is just hang up on the wall. I dont give a fuck what you do in the hole.

Well what can we put in there?

More iron I guess.

You there?

Yeah.

Three to four. Maybe five.

I think it’s goin to be eighty-two. Eighty-two. Keep drillin though.

Yeah. Pick up a single.

How many stands is that out?

Thirty. Thirty-one now.

About five stands of drillpipe left.

What joint is that you got hangin?

Ninety-nine.

Ninety-nine. What’s that mud weight?

Ten-five.

Need to be certified.

He slept and woke. Four o four. Quiet outside. The speaker squawked softly. We got a little formation change. We’re gettin into some dolomite. About four o seven. Eleven ninety-seven. It’s close to bein limestone. Not much difference in it anyway. Sort of changed color a little bit. Just a little more crystalline than limestone. But you pick up one piece and you can see right through the middle of it. Half of it dolomite and half of it limestone. I thought it was shale to start with.

Seems to be drillin better. Bigger pieces. You can see teethmarks on it where that bit’s been gettin hold of it. I guarantee you it’s got a good appetite.

At five he got up and went down to the mess and ate a dish of ice cream and talked to two of the roughnecks sitting there drinking coffee. Where’s your guys at? they said.

Coming tomorrow. I hope.

They nodded. You get paid for however long you’re out here though. Right?

Right.

Good on you.

He went back to his bunk and lay in the sweet darkness. The storm had passed. The deep throb of the prime mover walked the bowl slowly across the table. Below them the drillbit turning a mile deep in the unimaginable blackness of the earth.

Bit man says his bit’s quit.

Let’s hold up on makin a bit up. We may change bits on it.

Pick up Mudlogger.

Mudlogger here.

Pick up on the drill floor. Where you at?

We’re back here at the kellystand. I’ll be right out there.

He lay with the rough blanket over him. News from another world.

Different formation. Shale one, maybe. I rezeroed the stroke counter. That’s midway shale. Selma chalk.

What was that last survey depth?

Sixty-seven seventy-one. One degree.

What’s the next kelly down to it?

Seventy-four thirty-three.

Is that one and two more? Or three more?

Three more.

When he woke again it was almost morning. The squawkbox was quiet. Then the driller came on. It’s not drillin all that damn good. Forty, fifty feet a hour? Let’s circulate there about fifteen minutes. Shut down and watch it. Make sure it aint flowin or nothin. It’s all good we’ll go ahead and put our slug in it.

He dozed.

Crane operator? What’s them seas look like out there?

Five or six.

No fill on the bottom, said the mudlogger.

Make me some hole.



* * *





When he walked into the bar Janice looked up and waved one finger in a circle and motioned toward the end of the bar. He followed her down and set his bag in the floor.