“More likely he’s two miles away, mad as a rabid dingo.”
“I betcha he’s mad, Scrag. That hook’ll do him no good at all.” Both men searched the sea. Nothing. Then they noticed the rubber dinghy was listing by the bow and half submerged. Scragger bent down and carefully examined it, his eyes on the sea and under the raft.
“Look,” he said. There was a great rip in one of the air chambers. “The bugger must’ve done it when he came charging in.” The air was escaping fast. “No problem. We can make the shore in time. Let’s go.”
Willi looked at the raft, then at the sea. “You go, Scrag. Me I wait for the wood dinghy with someone up front with a machine gun.”
“There’s no problem, for God’s sake. C’me on.”
“Scrag,” Willi said sweetly, “I love you like a brother but I’m not moving. That beetch frightened me to death.” He sat down in the center of the raft and put his arms around his knees. “That motherless beetch’s lurking somewhere, bottoming. You want to go, okay, but me, I know the Book says when in doubt, duck. Order up the other boat on the walkie-talkie.” “I’ll bring her myself.” the dinghy squelched as Scragger stepped carefully into it, nearly capsized, and he scrambled back on the raft cursing, quicker than he wanted to. “Wot the hell’re you laughing about?”
“You got out of there like you got jellyfish on your bum.” Willi was still laughing. “Scrag, why don’t you swim home?”
“Get stuffed.” Scragger looked at the shore, heart pounding. Today it seemed far away when most days it was so close.
“You swim and you’re crazy,” Willi said, seriously now. “Don’t do it.” Scragger paid no attention to him. You know something? he was thinking. You’re scared fartless. That bugger was a small one and you hooked him and he got away and now he’s miles out in the Gulf. Yes, but where? He put a tentative toe in the water. Something below caught his eye. He knelt on the side of the raft and pulled up the cage. It was empty. The whole side was torn off. “Stone the crows!”
“I’ll call up the boat,” Willi said, reaching for the walkie-talkie. “With a machine gun.”
“No need for that, Willi,” Scragger said with a show of bravado. “Race you to the shore.”
“Not on your Nelly! Scrag, for God’s sake don’t…” Willi was appalled as Scragger dived over the side. He saw him surface and strike out strongly, then all at once turn back and scramble back onto the raft, spluttering and choking with laughter.
“Fooled you, huh? You’re right, me son, anyone who swims ashore’s crazy! Call up the boat, I’m fishing for more dinner.”
When the boat came, one of the mechanics was on the tiller with two excited Green Bands in the bow, others watching from the beach. They were halfway back to shore when the shark appeared out of nowhere and began circling. The Green Bands started firing and, in their excitement, one fell overboard. Scragger managed to grab his gun and opened up on the shark that raced for the petrified man now standing in the shallow water. The bullets went into the shark’s head and into the eyes and though the shark was dead it did not believe it, just rolled over thrashing, its jaws working and tail working, then went driving ahead for its prey. But without the guidance of scent or eyesight it missed the man and went on up the sloping bottom until it beached itself and thrashed around, half in and half out of the water. “Scrag,” Willi said, when he could talk, “you’ve the luck of the devil. If you’d swum in he’d’ve got you. You’ve the luck of the devil.”
Chapter 37
AT RIG ROSA - ZAGROS: 3:05 P.M. Tom Lochart got out of the 206 stiffly and shook hands with Mimmo Sera, the “company man” who greeted him warmly. With Lochart was the Schlumberger expert, Jesper Almqvist, a tall young Swede in his late twenties. He carried his special case with the necessary down-hole tools - all his other equipment already here, on site. “Buon giorno, Jesper, good to see you. She’s waiting for you.”
“Okay, Mr. Sera, I’ll go to work.” The young man walked off toward the rig. He had logged most of the wells in the field.
“Come inside for a moment, Tom.” Sera led the way through the snow to the office trailer. Inside it was warm and a pot of coffee was on the big-bellied, iron, wood-burning furnace near the far wall. “Coffee?” “Thanks, I’m bushed, the trip from Tehran was boring.” Sera handed him a cup. “What the hell’s going on?” “Thanks. I don’t know exactly - I just dropped off JeanLuc at the base, had a brief word with Scot, then thought it best to bring Jesper at once and come see you myself. Haven’t seen Nitchak Khan yet; I’ll do that soon as I get back but Scot was quite clear: Nitchak Khan told him the komiteh had given us forty-eight hours to leave. McI - ”
“But why? Mamma mia, if you leave we’ll have to close down the whole field completely.”
“I know. My God, the coffee’s good! Nitchak’s always been reasonable in the past - you heard this komiteh shot Nasiri and burned the schoolhouse?” “Yes, terrible. He was a fine fellow, though pro-Shah.”
“So were we all - when the Shah was in power,” Lochart said, thinking of Sharazad and Jared Bakravan and Emir Paknouri and HBC - always back to HBC, and Sharazad. At dawn he had left her, hating to leave her. She was still deep in sleep. He had thought about waking her but there was little to say. Zagros was his responsibility - and she looked so exhausted, the bruise on her face vivid. His note said: “Back in a couple of days. Any problem see Mac or Charlie. All my love.” He looked back at Sera. “McIver’s got an appointment this morning with a top official in the government, so with any luck he can straighten everything out. He said he’d get a message to us soon as he got back. Your radio’s working?”
Sera shrugged. “As usuaclass="underline" from time to time.”
“If I hear anything I’ll get word to you, either tonight or first thing. I hope it’s all a storm in a bucket of shit. But if we have to clear out, McIver told me temporarily to base out of Kowiss. There’s no way in hell we can service you from there. What do you think?”
“If you’re forced out, we’ll have to evacuate. You’ll have to ferry us to Shiraz. We’ve company HQ there; they can put us up or fly us out until we’re allowed back. Madonna, there would be eleven bases to close, double shifts.” “We could use both 212s, no sweat.”
“Plenty of sweat, Tom.” Sera was very worried. “There’s no way to close down and get the men out in forty-eight hours. No way at all.” “Maybe it won’t be necessary. Let’s hope, huh?” Lochart got up. “If we have to evacuate, most of the crew’ll cheer - we haven’t had a replacement in weeks and they’re all overdue leave.” Sera got up and glanced out of the window. They could just see the afternoon sun glinting off the crest over Rig Bellissima. “You heard what a fine job Scot did, with Pietro?”
“Yes. The lads call him Bomber Pietro now. Sorry about Mario Guineppa.” “Che sarŕ, sarŕ! Doctors’re all stronzi - he had a medical last month or so. It was perfect. Stronzo!” The Italian looked at him keenly. “What’s up, Tom?”
“Nothing.”
“How was Tehran?”
“Not good.”
“Did Scot tell you anything I don’t know?”
“A reason for the komiteh’s order? No. No, he didn’t. Maybe I can get something out of Nitchak Khan.” Lochart shook hands and went off. Once he was airborne, he thought of the story Scot had told him, JeanLuc, and Jesper about what happened in the village after the komiteh had sentenced Nitchak Khan to death: “The moment they marched Nitchak Khan out of the schoolhouse and I was alone, I slipped out the back window and sneaked into the forest as quietly as I could. A couple of minutes later I heard a lot of firing and rushed back to base as fast as possible - must admit I was scared fartless. It took me quite a time, bloody snow’s in ten-foot drifts in places. Not long after I got back old Nitchak Khan and the mullah and some of the villagers came up here - my God, I was so relieved! I thought for certain Nitchak and the mullah’d been shot and I guess they were just as relieved because they stared at me pop-eyed, thinking me dead too.”