It was the same sort of truck as the one we had seen abandoned a short while back, and as we turned and came down on it again, a figure in khaki shorts and an Australian bush hat waved to us. There were Arabs moving about by the drill and close by the truck was a Land-Rover with G-O-D-C-O painted across its bonnet.
Gorde swung round on me. ‘What the devil’s a seismological truck doing here? Did you know it was here?’
‘Of course not.’ For one wild moment I thought those three women might be right and I almost tore the glasses from Gorde’s hand. But the khaki figure was broad and thick-set, the round, brick-red face covered with ginger hair.
Gorde tapped Otto on the shoulder. ‘Can you land here?’ he demanded. ‘I want to talk to that man. Who is it? Do you know?’
‘Looks like Jack Entwhistle,’ Otto answered, and he swung the plane over again, circling back with the wing-tip almost scraping the top of the dunes. He was flying with his eyes glued to his side window, searching the ground. ‘Looks okay,’ he said. ‘No big stones, no wadis that I can see. I guess I can get down. Don’t know how it will be taking off again.’
Gorde didn’t even hesitate. ‘Then put her down,’ he said. His face had gone a sickly yellow. He was furious.
‘Hold tight then.’ The plane banked again, came in level over the flat gravel pan and I felt the drag as the flaps and undercarriage went down. He flew about half a mile with the ground so close that we might have been in a car, then he gave her full throttle, lifted her up and round in a turn that left my stomach behind me. We came back on to the line of the gravel, slow and dropping this time with the truck standing bang in our path. The wheels touched, bounced once on a rough patch, and next time we stayed down, bumping heavily over the rough surface, stones rattling against the outside of the fuselage, until the brakes came on and we slowed to a halt.
We were about three hundred yards from the truck and the man who had waved to us was already in the Land-Rover coming towards us. By the time the navigator had got the fuselage door open the Land-Rover was drawing up alongside. The air that came in through the open door was hot with the glare of sun on sand. There was no wind and the heat seemed trapped between the dunes. Gorde moved awkwardly down the fuselage, supporting himself with his hands on the backs of the seats. He looked tired and old and very grim as he faced the man who came in from the desert. ‘Entwhistle, isn’t it?’
‘That’s raight, Sir Philip.’ The man was North Country, square and stocky, the eyes grey in the red, dust-filmed face. He looked pleased. ‘It’s grand to see you out here again, sir. How are you?’ He wiped his hand on the seat of his shorts and held it out.
Gorde ignored the hand, ignored the warmth and friendliness of the other’s tone. ‘Who gave you orders to run a survey here?’
Entwhistle hesitated, dropped his hand. He looked momentarily off-balance, uncertain of himself.
‘Was it Erkhard?’
‘No, sir. To be honest, Sir Philip, nobody gave me orders.’
Then what the hell are you doing here? You’re a hundred miles from your survey area.’
‘Aye, I know that.’ He ran his hand a little nervously over his face. ‘It isn’t easy to explain. You see-’ He hesitated. ‘I was the chap who carried out the ground search for David Whitaker. You know about that, do you?’
Gorde nodded. ‘Go on,’ he said, his voice flat. ‘And make it short. I haven’t any time to waste.’
But Entwhistle wasn’t the sort of man to be browbeaten. ‘If it comes to that, Sir Philip, I don’t have any time to waste myself. I want to run this survey and get the hell out of here as fast as I can.’ His tone was obstinate. This isn’t what you’d call a healthy place. I got here two days ago and we hadn’t been camped twenty-four hours before we had a visit from a bunch of Bedou. They didn’t behave like nomads; more like the Emir’s men. Though we’re still in Saraifa here.’
The Saraifa concession was abandoned four years ago,’ Gorde said sharply. ‘You’ve no right here. None whatever.’
‘I’m well aware of that, Sir Philip.’
Then why are you here?’
Entwhistle hesitated, rubbing gently at a desert sore that showed red and ugly beneath the sweat stain of his right armpit. ‘You never met David Whitaker, did you, sir?’
‘What’s that got to do with it?’
‘Oh, well-’ He hesitated, and then, unable apparently to put it into words, he sought refuge in facts: ‘I couldn’t exactly say it in my report of the search. It would have put the Company on the spot, if you see what I mean. But there was something fishy about that truck there on a sand dune across the border into Saudi. There was nought wrong with it mechanically, you know. It was just out of fuel as though he’d driven it straight into the Empty Quarter until he’d no more petrol. And if you’d known David-’ Again the hesitation, and then a quick shrug. ‘He knew the desert — knew it a damn’ sight better than I’ll ever know it. What was he doing there, that’s what I’d like to know? If he’d been scared out of here by the Emir’s men, why didn’t he head for Saraifa?’
‘Come to the point,’ Gorde said impatiently. ‘I want to know why you’re here.’
‘Aye. Well, I went over every inch of that truck. I thought if there’d been foul play or anything like that, he’d have left some clue, something that a chap like myself, a fellow geophysicist, would understand. The only thing I found was an old attache case full of correspondence and copies of survey reports. One of those reports concerned this area.’
‘I don’t seem to remember reading that in the account you sent to Erkhard.’
‘No.’
‘You thought you’d keep it to yourself, eh? Thought you’d check on his findings on the quiet?’
Entwhistle scratched uncomfortably at the sore. ‘He was on loan to his father, you see. It didn’t concern the Company exactly. And he seemed so sure he’d-’
‘It never occurred to you, I suppose, that there’s a political factor?’
Entwhistle’s grey eyes stared at Gorde without flinching. ‘David Whitaker was a good bloke. I don’t know whether he sent a copy of that survey report to the Bahrain office or not; and I don’t care. Nobody had done anything about it. Not even his father. He was out on his own and he thought he was on to something. I spent the better part of a week searching the desert for his body, and it seemed to me if I couldn’t give him a headstone, I might at least see if he was right and we could name an oilfield after him. Maybe it sounds a little crazy to you, Sir Philip,’ he added almost belligerently, ‘but I just felt it was up to me to do something. I don’t like to see a good chap’s life thrown away for nothing. And if Erkhard kicks me off the Company’s payroll as a result, I shan’t cry my eyes out.’
Gorde didn’t say anything for a moment. He seemed lost in thought. ‘How far have you got with the check?’ he asked at length.
‘There are four locations given as probable anticlines in the report. I’ve done a check on the most south-easterly — Location D, he called it. Now I’ve just begun drilling the first shot-hole on Location C. If you care to come to the truck I can show you David Whitaker’s report. Or has Mr Erkhard already shown it to you?’
‘No, he hasn’t. Nevertheless,’ Gorde added, ‘I’ve seen a copy. Grant here was kind enough to show it to me.’ This on a note of irony, and he introduced me then. ‘A lawyer. Like you, he wants to know what young Whitaker was doing across the border into Saudi.’ He turned to me. ‘I don’t suppose you’ve ever seen a seismological truck, have you?’ And when I shook my head, he said, ‘Well, if you want to see the sort of work David Whitaker was engaged on, I’m sure Entwhistle would show you over his vehicle.’ He turned back to Entwhistle. ‘No point in stopping you in the middle of drilling a shot-hole. You can finish the check on your Location C. Then you’re to pull out. Understand?’
‘Yes, sir.’ Relief and something akin to affection showed for an instant in Entwhistle’s face.