wiggle just a minute ago.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
Cavanaugh Shows His Colors
Long before sunup, the screaming of a siren on the rig brought off-duty crewmen pouring out of their bunks in all stages of undress. When Sandy arrived at the brightly lighted well, the night foreman was already halfway through his report to Hall, Salmon and Donovan.
“She started rumblin’ an’ kickin’ at the drill-pipe just like she did yesterday.” The fat, oil-smeared man was puffing. “I stepped up the mud pressure an’ pulled the siren. She’s calmed down now, but the blowout preventers are having all they can do to hold her.”
“Good boy,” said Hall. “If you had pulled the siren and waited for orders we might have a gusher on our hands and pieces of derrick flying in all directions. How far down are we?”
“Little over 5,500 feet, last time I checked.”
“That’s the Gallup Pay.” Donovan was dancing with excitement. “I knew we’d hit it. Let’s take a sample and see what we’ve got.”
The big old diesel roared for a moment. It dragged a bar of iron called a “kelly” out of the square hole in the turntable until the top of the first section of drillpipe appeared.
After the pipe had been securely locked in the turntable so that it could neither fall back into the well nor shoot upward if the underground pressure increased suddenly, two floormen clamped their six-foot-long tongs, or monkey wrenches, around the kelly and unscrewed it from the pipe with great care.
They had eased it off only two or three turns when a frothy mixture with the foul odor of rotten eggs began to squirt from between kelly and pipe.
Donovan caught some of this in his cupped hands. He smelled it, rubbed it between his fingers and then tasted it.
“Beautiful!” the geologist crooned. “This is good, high-gravity oil. The sulphur content is high, as you can smell, but refiners know how to take that out. I’ll tell you more when I’ve run a full analysis, but it sure looks as if we’ve licked the law of averages. Two flowing wells in two tries is ’way above par.”
The crewmen, who had been holding their breaths for his verdict, let out wild rebel yells and spun their battered hats into the air. Jack Boyd and the night foreman hoisted Hall on their shoulders and marched him around the derrick in triumph.
“All right, fellows,” the oilman shouted to stop the riot. “You all get new hats, new shoes and bonuses!” As they started another cheer he mounted the drill platform and held up his hand for attention.
“But I’m going to ask you not to wear those hats and shoes, or bank your bonuses, for a few weeks yet. This has got to be a tight well.”
“Glory, Mr. Hall,” somebody called from the edge of the crowd. “No celebration? That’s a lot to ask.”
“I know it is, Bill. But look at it this way: With this well under my belt, I can get a big bank loan and hire several more rigs to work this property. That will take me at least a month. If news gets out about this strike in the meantime, what will happen?”
“Cavanaugh and the oil companies that hold adjoining leases will rush in and drill offset wells just outside your boundaries before you can get started,” Bill answered glumly. “They’ll drain most of the oil out from under your land, like they did up at Cortez last year.”
“Right!” said Hall. “I know things have been tough these last few months. I’ve had to hold up your pay several times, to make ends meet. But you all hold stock in our company. If you hang on a little longer, we’ll all be in clover. So I’m sure you’ll keep your mouths shut when the spies come prowling, as they will.”
A roar of agreement went up, but then someone said, “How about the kid? He don’t own no stock, does he?”
“I know Sandy, and I know his dad,” Hall answered. “Also, his bonus is going to be twenty shares of stock. I’ll vouch for him.” He slapped the surprised boy on the back and added, “All right, gang. Back to work. We’ll pull the string and get the well cemented and closed in. Then we’ll shut down here till I get that bank loan arranged. Some of you have vacations coming. Take them now. Don will put the rest of you to work running surveys and drilling test wells on our downriver lease. Tell any snoopers that John Hall ran out of cash—which is no lie. I closed out my balance at Farmington last week so I could meet the payroll!”
After the drillpipe was withdrawn and stacked, the combined crews spent the rest of the day mixing an untold number of bags of cement with water. This mixture was pumped down the well to replace the mud that had filled it to the brim.
Once, when they heard a plane approaching, most of the men faded into the trailers while the others tried to look as unbusy as possible. The ship was Cavanaugh’s Bonanza! It circled twice and roared away.
When Salmon estimated that the hole was full of cement, the diesel began pumping mud again. This forced the cement out of the well and up to the surface between the earth walls and the heavy steel casing inside which the drillpipe had rotated.
“How do you ever reach the oil again?” Sandy asked when the operation was completed.
“Easy.” Ralph yawned tiredly. “After the cement has hardened, we’ll pump out the mud. That will leave a cement plug twenty feet or so thick in the well bottom to keep the pressure under control. When we want to start producing, we just drill through the plug and away we go. Say, why don’t you go to bed instead of asking foolish questions? You look as if you had been dragged through a dustbin.”
“I was just thinking, Ralph. Since we’ll be having some time off, why don’t we visit Miss Gonzales’ school?”
“You go,” yawned the driller. “I’ve got to get this well capped good and tight tomorrow and then drive to Farmington and try to rent a portable test rig—on the cuff. I’m going to act so poor-boyish that it will break your heart. Casehardened drillers will weep in their beer when they hear my tale of woe.”
“Is that exactly honest?” Sandy tried to smooth down his cement-whitened cowlick, as he always did when he was thinking hard. “I mean—we have struck oil.”
“We’ll have struck it for somebody else’s benefit if we don’t play our cards close to our chests and keep a close guard over our well and our tongues.” Ralph looked at him shrewdly. “You’ll see what I mean in a day or two. And here’s some good advice: Watch your step, Sandy. There are some mighty curly wolves in this oil game. Don’t try playing Red Riding Hood with them.”
* * * *
Learning that Jack Boyd was one of the men assigned to guard the well from all intruders, Sandy borrowed the engine man’s car the next day and headed in the direction of Kitty’s school. The going was rough, as usual, but the machine was equipped with a heavy-duty transmission and rear axle, double shock absorbers, an oversized gasoline tank and other features which defied the chuckholes. He made good time and found the school trailer during the noon recess.
Twenty Navajo children of all ages were playing what looked like a fast game of baseball as he drove up. They flew into the trailer like a flock of frightened chickens, and came out trying to hide behind their teacher’s skirts.
Kitty greeted her visitor
