AllFreeNovel
Share Us
The roughnecks on the floor were slimy with mud, bent into their work at the wellhead with the concentration of men who know the result of a moment’s inattention on a rig, when the tongs or a whirling chain can pinch off your fingers or snap your bones like sticks.
A tool pusher put a hard hat on my head.
“Where’s Weldon?” I shouted at him.
“What?”
“Where’s Weldon Sonnier?” I shouted again over the engine’s roar.
He pointed up into the rig.
High up on the tower I saw Weldon in coveralls and hard hat, working with the derrick man on the monkey board. The derrick man was clipped to the tower with a safety belt. I couldn’t see one on Weldon. His face
was small and round against his yellow hat as he looked down at me.
A moment later he put one foot out on the hoist, grabbed the cable with one hand, and rode it down to the rig floor. There was a single smear of bright grease, like war paint, on one of his cheekbones.
“Coffee time,” he yelled at the floormen.
Somebody killed the drilling engine, and I opened and closed my mouth to clear my ears. Weldon pulled off his bradded gloves, unzipped his coveralls, and stepped out of them. He was wearing slacks and a polo shirt, and his armpits and the center of his chest were dark with sweat.
“Let’s go over here in the shade,” he said. “It must be ninety-five today.”
We walked to the far end of the platform and leaned against the railing under a canvas awning. The air was sour with natural gas.
“I thought you’d pretty well punched out this field,” I said.
“Anyplace there was an ocean, there’s oil. You just got to go deep enough to find it.”
I looked out at the wells pumping up and down in the distance and the long spans of silver pipe that sweated coldly from the natural gas running inside.
“With the low price of crude, a lot of outfits are shut down now,” I said.
“That’s them, not me. What are you out here for, Dave?”
“To deliver a message.”
“Oh?”
“Actually I’m just passing on an observation. Have you been up to see Drew today?”
“Yeah, a little while ago.”
“You know you’re going to end up testifying at Gouza’s trial, then?”
“So?”
“I get the feeling you think somebody’s going to wave a wand over your situation and you won’t ever have to explain your dealings with Gouza. He’s not copping a plea. He’s facing life in Angola. His defense attorneys are going to use a chain saw when they get you and Drew on the stand.”
“What am I supposed to do about it?”
“Give some thought to what Drew’s doing.”
He wiped at the grease on his face with a clean mechanic’s cloth.
“Tell Gouza he doesn’t want to make bond,” he said. “Believe me, he doesn’t want to see me unless he’s got some cops around him.”
“Then you buy it?”
