The Doomed Oasis (20 page)

I nodded.

“Well, what does she say about it? He must have talked to her.”

“She'd like to think he's still alive.”

“What, in this country—and the truck lying there on that dune for almost two months?”

“She's never been into the desert.”

“No, of course not.” He asked me again what she had said about him, and whilst I was telling him the desert below gradually changed, the dunes altering shape until they were long ridges like waves with gravel flats in the troughs.

I was just telling him about the last visit David had made to his sister when the plane gave a lurch, the port wing tipped down, and over Gorde's shoulder I caught a glimpse of tire marks running straight, like the line of a railway, along the length of a flat stretch between two dunes. A pile of rusted tins, the black trace of a fire, the remains of a dug latrine—they were there for an instant and then the plane straightened up and we flew on, following the tire marks that had scored a straight line wherever the sand was soft.

Gorde got up then and I followed him forward. Indications of another camp came up at us, swept by beneath the plane. We were flying very low, the line of the dunes on either side closing us in. And then, straight ahead, the black shadow of a truck. It was stationary and we came up on it fast, belly to the gravel flat, roaring over it so close that I could read the black lettering on its side—G-O-D-C-O—and could see the drill at its rear turning.

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 right, 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 brow-beaten. “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 stuck 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 attaché 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 anti-clines in the report. I've done a check on the most southeasterly—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 on Entwhistle's face.

“Results to be sent direct to me. And now take Grant to your truck and show him how it works. Meanwhile, I'll write a letter for you to Sheikh Makhmud, just in case. I don't doubt he knows you're here.” He stood back from the door. “Ten minutes,” he said to me. “All right? And then I want to find Charles Whitaker's rig; find out why he isn't, drilling here if his son was so damn sure.”

I nodded. I didn't even hesitate. I was being given the opportunity of ten minutes alone with Entwhistle. I jumped out of the plane and it was like jumping into the full glare of an open-hearth furnace. Entwhistle remained a moment talking to Gorde, and when he joined me in the Land Rover he glanced at me curiously, so that I wondered what Gorde had told him about me. Stones rattled against the rusted mudguards as we batted over the gravel towards the truck, which seemed to be standing in a pool of water. The mirage only lifted when we were within a hundred yards of it.

I was more interested in Entwhistle than in the mechanics of his seismological equipment, and as soon as we were in the shade of the truck's interior I asked him what he thought had happened to David. “I suppose there's no chance that he's still alive?”

It didn't seem to surprise him that I'd made the suggestion. “Did you see my personal report to Erkhard, or was it some sort of a composite thing rehashed by the Bahrain office?” he asked.

“It was a general report,” I told him.

“Aye, I thought so. They'll be letting the dust collect on mine in some pigeonhole. Can't blame them. I made it pretty plain what I thought.” He hesitated, rubbing his hand across the ginger stubble on his chin. “A rum do, and no mistake. There was that truck half buried in sand and about forty miles from the nearest water hole. And nothing wrong with the damned thing but lack of petrol. Even the spare jerry cans were empty.

“What are you suggesting?” I asked.

He hesitated. “I don't rightly know,” he muttered, eying me cautiously. “But I know this,” he added with sudden violence; “a chap like David doesn't drive into waterless desert with empty fuel cans. And to run out of juice just there … Except for the centre of the Empty Quarter, he couldn't have picked a spot that was much further from water.” He stared at me and I think we were both thinking the same thing, for he said: “I'd like to know what his father thinks about it. In fact, when I've finished here I intend to drive over to Saraifa and see if the old Bedou knows …” He stopped and cocked his head on one side, listening. Faint through the noise of the drill came the distant sound of an engine. I didn't understand at first, but then it grew louder, overtopping the noise of the drill, and in a sudden panic of realization I dived for the door, just in time to see the plane become airborne.

It passed so low over the top of the truck that I instinctively ducked, and as I straightened up I was cursing myself for a fool. I should have known. I should have realized Gorde might want to get me out of the way. I turned furiously on Entwhistle, who was standing in the doorway of the truck looking slightly uncomfortable. “You knew about this?”

“Aye, he told me.” He smiled a little doubtfully. “He asked me to give you his apologies for any inconvenience.”

“God rot the old man!” I muttered savagely. To be caught like that, to be fooled into thinking he was just trying to be helpful, and all the time …

I stared at the plane, which was rapidly dwindling to a speck, feeling suddenly helpless, isolated out here in an oven-hot world that I didn't understand.

“A day or two, he said,” Entwhistle murmured apologetically. “That's all. I'll try and make it as pleasant as possible.”

The plane had altered course. I saw it circle once and then it was heading back towards us, and for a wild moment I thought perhaps he'd changed his mind. It came in low, flying slowly with the flaps down. But the undercarriage remained up. As it bumbled close over our heads something white fluttered down from the pilot's window. And then it turned and disappeared low over the dunes, and the sound of it was lost again in the noise of the drill.

Entwhistle was already running to retrieve the object they had dropped to us. He came back with a cigarette packet and a crumpled sheet of paper. “All right. You can stop drilling,” he shouted. He repeated the order in Arabic, and as the drill slowed to an abrupt silence he handed me the paper. On it was written in pencil:
Stop drilling and proceed at once to Saraifa. Concentration of armed tribesmen camped in the dunes two miles north of you. Warn Sheikh Makhmud and give him my salaams. Philip Gorde
. A chill feeling crept up my spine as I read that message, and Entwhistle's comment did nothing to restore my morale. “Bit of luck, the Old Man flying down here.” He flipped the coin that Otto had used to weight the packet. “Mightn't have seen the sun rise tomorrow otherwise.”