Whiteout!

Chapter 6

I was about to ask whether Smales knew, but there was no need. The door opened and Smales stalked in, grim-faced. He grabbed a radiation badge and pinned it on as he walked over to us and confronted Kelleher. 'Are you sure?'

'I'm sure, Barney.'

'You tried again?'

'Three times we tried it. Three samples. Whatever it is, it's small, but it's there.'

Smales said, 'Either the pipes or the well.'

'It's got to be.'

'Okay, we'll take stopcock samples right back to the well head, see if we can find where it gets in.'

Kelleher said, 'It could be the well, Barney.'

'I know it. But no man goes down there unless we absolutely have to do it. Can your guys take the samples?'

'Better if they do.'

'Right, let's go.' Smales turned to me and said, 'Talking about suspicions, how come you're always around bad news ?'

'Coincidence, I hope.'

'I hope so, too. Okay, let's move our asses.'

Uninvited, I went with Kelleher, and he made no objection. He carried a plastic pack with him, and when we reached the stopcock nearest to the reactor shed he turned it on so that water was flowing out fast, then broke open the pack and extracted a length of plastic tubing and a bottle. He pushed the end of the tube carefully into the mouth of the drain tap, waited until water flowed through the tube, then used it to fill the bottle. When that was done, he took a glass stopper from its plastic wrapping, sealed the bottle with it and wrapped it again in a plastic bag.

'Whole thing's clean sterile,' he said. 'No dust, nothing.' He put his hand in his parka pocket, fished out a pen, and marked the bottle label with a number. Then we went back to the reactor shed and he ran it through the electronic testing machinery. He said, 'There you are.' The scope flickered. One by one the technicians returned, each with one or two bottles. Every bottle was tested, and every time the scope indicated impurities. Smales stood watching, tight-lipped. Finally, Kelleher sighed and turned to him. 'Sorry, Barney. It's the well. It has to be the well. Something dropped down there.'

Smales said, 'That damn well trench is off limits!'

'I was taken in there,' I said.

'That was with my permission and under supervision. I'm damn sure Sergeant Vernon didn't let you drop something down there!'

'I didn't try.'

Smales said, 'Okay.' He crossed to a wall mike, switched it on and began to speak. We could hear his voice over the Tannoy: 'This is the Commander. I'm sorry to say we need a volunteer again, to go down the well. Any man who's willing, go to Main Street, to the entrance to the well trench, five minutes from now.'

Kelleher said, 'One day you're not gonna have a volunteer, Barney. It's a lot to ask and it's getting worse. Then what'll you do? Order some guy down.'

'No, I won't,' Smales said. 'I'll order no man down that hole. If it happens, I'll go myself.'

Four men stood waiting at the trench entrance, and Smales gave them a little nod of appreciation. I knew two of them, Sergeant Reilly from the tractor shed and Sergeant Vernon. The other two I'd not seen before. They were both privates, one only about eighteen. Smales looked from one man to the other.

'How d'you want to do it? Do I pick somebody, or do we draw straws?'

Reilly said, 'Me, I'd like to see it, sir.'

'Me, too, sir,' the youngster said quickly.

Vernon said quietly, 'I've been down there twice, Major. I know the way.'

Smales turned to the boy. 'How old are you, Kovacs ?'

'Eighteen, sir.'

'Get back to your work.'

'But, sir - ?'

'No reflection on you, son. But go back.'

The boy saluted and left, half-disappointed, half-relieved.

'You too, Jones,' Smales said. 'This is non-com or officer work.'

'Yes, sir.'

That left Reilly and Vernon, and Smales said, 'Reilly, how many men could take over from you in the motor shed ?'

'One, sir. Maybe two.'

'Not enough. You're too fat, anyway. You wouldn't get through the holes. Looks like you're it, Vernon. Sorry.'

Vernon nodded, his facial muscles tight.

'You don't want to back out?'

'Only half of me, sir.'

Smales said, 'When you go, the army's going to miss you, Vernon. Okay, let's get going.'

Captain Herschel came hurrying in, apologizing for being late. He'd been in the bath. Vernon tied his cap's earflaps under his chin, then lifted the bosun's chair down from the steel framework and strapped himself in. 'Ready, sir.' Herschel handed him a lamp and a water test pack.

'Right,' Smales said. 'Take it, Herschel.'

Captain Herschel moved a switch and the rope tightened, raising Vernon from the ground. He fended himself away from the corrugated steel barrier with his feet and then, when he was high enough, sat still in the swaying chair.

Smales and Herschel reached up to steady him, waiting until the chair stopped swinging. Then Herschel said, 'Real still now, Sergeant. You comfortable?'

'I'm okay, sir.'

The electric motor whined again and slowly the chair descended into the well-head, until only Vernon's head showed. 'At twenty feet we'll check the walkie-talkie,' Herschel said. 'Good luck.'

Vernon's head disappeared from sight and the steel cable paid out slowly from its reel. I noticed that it was marked at intervals of a yard, and began to count slowly to myself. The motor stopped again and Herschel spoke into a little radio handset, 'All okay?'

Vernon's voice came back. 'Lower away, sir,' and the cable began to move again. Smales stepped to the edge and looked over and Herschel said warningly, 'You'll watch that cable, Barney!'

'Like a snake.' It was obvious why. Vernon's safety depended upon the cable remaining vertical. If it began to swing, even a little, the swing would be wildly magnified down below, where Vernon would be at the end of the pendulum, and the giant icicles were less than three feet from him. 'He's doing okay,'

Smales said. 'Keep going.' He beckoned me over, repeated the warning about the rope, then said, 'Look down there.'

Already Vernon was far down in the shining whiteness. I'd counted twenty-five yards of cable, seventy-five feet, just over half-way down the first chamber.

Smales said, 'Down below there's another hole just like it, and below that, another yet. In case you miss the point, that's kind of a brave man down there.'

Vernon's voice crackled up through the walkie-talkie. 'Christ, I want to cough !'

'Suppress it,' Herschel snapped. 'Keep it under till you're in the neck of Chamber Two, then steady yourself.'

'That's what - ' Vernon's voice paused, and I could imagine the straining muscles seeking to control the cough reflex.

'You okay?'

'Okay, sir.' Vernon was nearly at the neck.

'Want me to stop it?' Herschel asked.

'No, sir. I got it. I'm okay now.' A few seconds later he disappeared into the black neck of the second chamber. Faintly I could see the gleam of his hand lamp. I looked up, watching the cable unroll. Herschel said, 'Two ten feet. What's it like down there?'

'They're bigger than ever, sir. Jesus! Must be sixty feet long, some of these things.'

'You clear of them?'

'In just a second . . , clear now, sir.' His sigh of relief came through. I could see nothing now; nothing except that steel cable running ruler-straight into the dead centre of that hole in the ice a hundred and fifty feet below.

'Coming up to three hundred,' Herschel said.

'I'm near the neck.'

'Want a rest there, Vernon? How's the cough?'

'Okay now. Keep lowering.'

'Three ten, three fifteen. You should be through any time now.'

'I'm through, sir.'

'See anything?'

'No, not yet.'

Smales said, 'Tell him not to go down to water level if he can help it.'

Herschel passed the instruction and Vernon's voice crackled back. 'Sure won't. But there's nothing to see, except a couple of icicles must have crashed down here. There's big hunks of ice floating.'

'Nothing else?'

'Not a thing. It all looks clear, too. Equipment's okay, so the icicles can't have hit it. Can't see how they missed, though.'

'Three fifty,' Herschel said. 'I'm calling a halt.'

'Can't see nothing down here, sir.'

'That lamp powerful enough ?'

'Lower me just a little more, sir. Twenty feet. No more than twenty-five.'

'Okay, It's your neck.'

I glanced at Barney Smales as he frowned into the depths, his jaw muscles standing out tautly. He said,

'Ask Vernon if he can see the bottom.'

The question was put.

'I'm looking over it now, sir. Slow scan with the lamp.'

We all waited, then Vernon's voice came again. 'Nothing in there. Water's clear and nothing shows.'

'Can you fill the bottle?'

'I'm trying, sir, right now. Damn thing won't go under. When I lower it, it floats. Hold on, I'll try again.'

The rope quivered as he moved, far below, in his seat, and Herschel said, 'You be careful there, Vernon.'

'Still floats, sir. Got to get lower, try and scoop it up from the seat. But lower slowly, sir.'

'I sure will.' Herschel switched on the motor again and allowed the rope to unwind a few inches at a time. 'How's it going?'

'Yard more, sir.'

The rope unrolled, then stopped.

'And again.'

Herschel controlled it with tremendous care. 'How's that?'

There was a grunt of strain from the handset. 'Maybe a foot more.'

'One foot. Okay?'

'Damn thing has too much . . , buoyancy,' Vernon said jerkily. 'Hold on, I'm trying - ' The taut line jerked suddenly and Herschel said, 'You okay?'

'Yup, okay, sir.' The strain was audible. Then Vernon said, 'Guess I'll have to get my feet wet.'

Smales snapped: 'No!'

'Commander says no, Vernon,' Herschel said. 'It's too risky. You'll freeze your feet. Try another time with the bottle.'

Again the rope quivered. Then Vernon reported. 'Got a few drops, I think. Yeah, just a little.'

Smales turned to Kelleher, who had stood grave and silent throughout. 'That enough?'

'Should be,' Kelleher said. 'Have to be, won't it?'

Smales nodded to Herschel.

'We're bringing you out of there, Vernon. Real still now!'

'No, sir. Let me try again.'

Smales shook his head.

'Commander says no. You got that?'

'Yes, sir.'

'Hold tight.' The motor whined and the line began to reel in over its spool. Smales turned to me. 'Okay. Step back.' He remained where he was, leaning over, staring down into the depths of the hole. Kelleher came and stood beside me. He said, ‘Coming up out of there's worse than going down. More tendency to swing the chair. 1 wouldn't be in that seat for a million. And all for a few drops of water!'

Vernon's voice came suddenly. 'Can you hold it, sir?'

'Something wrong?' Herschel demanded.

'Just cramped.'

“Where are you?'

'Under the neck of Chamber Three. Be okay in a second, sir.'

'Okay.'

Everybody waited. About a minute passed and the rope kept vibrating. Then Vernon said, 'Okay, sir.'

Herschel let the rope move again. It didn't stop this time until about two minutes later Vernon's head appeared suddenly over the top of the corrugated barrier. He was pale and obviously shaken and the precious bottle was clutched in his mittened hand. As Herschel stopped the motor, Kelleher stepped forward to take the bottle from him and hold it up to the light. There was about a quarter of an inch of water in the bottom.

Smales and I pulled the chair over, and as Vernon unstrapped himself, he said, 'Gee, I'm sorry, sir. I just couldn't make it sink. If I'd had something to force it down . ..'

Kelleher said, 'This'll just have to do it. You did a fine job there, Vernon.'

'You'll get a commendation from me,' Smales said. 'No use to you now, but you'll get it.'

Vernon thanked him, picked up his parka and put it on and Smales said, 'That's it. We're gonna have to sink another hole. Can't go on this way. How bad down there?'

Vernon turned to face him. He looked very drawn. 'It's kinda scary, sir. I have to say that.'

'I believe you. Thanks, Vernon. Go get drunk.'

Vernon managed a grin. 'I don't think so, sir.'

Smales said, 'It's an order, Sergeant.' Then he turned to me. 'What's the best Scotch we got in the officers' club?'

'Tomatin,' I said. 'Though it's a personal opinion.'

'Well, do me a favour, Bowes. Get a bottle of Tomatin and take it to Vernon's quarters. Then pour it down his goddam throat!'

I obeyed the first two instructions, but not the third. Vernon took the glass and sipped it, shuddered once, and said, 'If it's all the same to you, sir, what I'll do is sleep.'

It turned out that the water was pure.

I'd passed a lot of hours just waiting about, since my arrival at Camp Hundred, and 1 was passing another, reading in the library hut, when Lieutenant Foster came in. It was an hour or so before dinner. He smiled and said, 'Hi!'

I said, 'How are you feeling?'

'Okay, I suppose.' He sat down and started turning the pages of Newsweek, but he wasn't reading, I said, 'Tell me about your cousin,' thinking it might help if he talked. 'I thought I told you. They were coming back from the - '

'No,' I said. 'I meant what sort of a man was he?'

'Charlie? Oh, he was okay.' Foster paused and fumbled for a packet of cigarettes. His hand shook a little as he lit one. 'Had kind of a bad patch, but he was over it, I guess. Making good. And then . . .'

'Would you like to tell me?'

'You some kind of a head doctor?'

'No.' I smiled. 'Don't if you don't want to. But Newsweek's doing you no good. If you'd prefer a game of ping-pong or a drink at the club?'

'First one, then the other.'

'Right.'

We played for half an hour or so, neither of us particularly well, then put on our wrappings and went to the club. As we went inside, Barney Smales was taking the top off his Martini jug. Herschel was there too.

Smales poured four glasses, added olives to three and a silver onion to his own, and handed them round. He said, 'Well, at least these are pure. We'll drink to purity, gentlemen.' He was clearly angry but holding it back, overlaying it with an excessive bonhomie.

I said, 'The water?'

His eyes swivelled at me. 'The water,' he said, 'is contaminated in the reactor, contaminated in the pipes and clean in the well.'

'So it's somewhere in the pump,' I said, 'or the pipe between the bottom of the well and the top.'

'That's how I figure it, too.' His tone had an edge of sarcasm.

'And now you replace it?'

'That's right. Four hundred feet of neoprene pipe. Only we haven't got four hundred feet of neoprene pipe.'

Herschel said, 'Or any other kind.'

'Haul it up and wash it,' I said.

'With contaminated water?'

'Clean water,' I said. 'Melt some snow.'

Smales said, 'I thought of it. We could only trickle it through. Couldn't get a big enough pressure head. What it needs is steam-cleaning, but you can't shoot high-pressure steam through neoprene.' The heel of his hand was drumming on the bar top in frustration. 'I'd just like to know what the hell we got in that tube. This kind of thing, most places, it's a dead rat, or something like that. But we got no rats here. In any case, it's not blocked, water's getting through.'

They were still discussing it when I left them. The obvious answer, it seemed to me, was to start a new well and quickly, but there seemed to be an almost superstitious attachment to the old one. I'd actually heard Smales and Herschel agree on the need for a new well, but they seemed to avoid even mentioning it now, continuing to prowl round the problem of cleaning the pipes. Nor could I understand why Camp Hundred, lavishly equipped, should be short of a few hundred feet of piping, especially when several hundred men depended for their work, their comfort, and ultimately even for life itself, on a steady and large supply of fresh water. They were double and treble-banked on everything from generators to food. So why on earth was there only one water pipe? I decided to see if I could find some sort of answer, but knew it wouldn't be easy. One and all were getting a bit tired of my questions, however much they might say they weren't. But as it happened, I didn't get the chance to start asking until a good deal later, because not long afterwards a soldier knocked on my door, presented Major Smales's compliments, and the major would be glad if I could come to the command office right away. No, sir, he didn't know why. But Smales wasted no time in telling me. He'd decided to send a Polecat on a hundred-mile dash to Camp Belvoir to pick up replacement neoprene and thought it might be a good idea if I went along. I said,’ Why me?'

'Because you're out of your head with boredom, one; but the other reason, the good reason, is that you'll get some sense of terrain and operating conditions.'

'All right,' I agreed. 'Leaving when?'

He said, 'Twenty minutes. Herschel, you and a driver.'

I must have shown my surprise. He grinned. 'Yes, at night, Mr Bowes. Wintertime we operate at night, because it's night all the damn day. You get a good run, you'll be there in four hours.'

I nodded. 'Just one Polecat?'

'That's right,' he said cheerfully. He was rather enjoying himself, I thought, as he went on, 'Swing's somewhere between Mile Thirty and Mile Forty, and coming this way. Anything goes wrong there's a safety wanigan every three miles along the Trail and you can wait out till the Swing gets there. It's safe enough. You'll be okay. Anyway, be a change for you. You get there, sleep, and come right back. Pyjamas if you use them, toothbrush, razor. That's all you need. Okay?'

I said, 'It's that urgent?'

'I want that reactor back on line,' Smales said. 'And I want it fast.'

At the door I paused and asked the question: why no spare pipe? Smales laughed. 'I knew you were going to ask. And I'm not answering. Have a good trip.'

I went and slung a few items into an airline shoulder bag and went along to the tractor shed. The Polecat was there, warmed and waiting, and the driver sat inside. Herschel hadn't arrived yet, but Foster had. I said, 'You going too?' Smales had said only Herschel, the driver and me.

'Boss man thought the trip was a good idea,' he said. 'He's a good guy, the old Bear.'

Then Herschel arrived, and we all climbed aboard. Reilly swung over the lever that slid back the hangar-like doors of the tractor shed and the Polecat growled willingly as it was put into gear, and we went out into the snowblow.

Herschel and the driver sat on the front bench, with Foster and me on the seat behind. Herschel turned after a moment. 'It's a low phase two out there,' he explained for my benefit. 'Means winds around thirty-five to forty. Temperature's two below zero.

That combination gives a windchill factor of thirty-eight below, which ain't too bad if you think what's outside the window of any aircraft you ever flew in.'

'It sounds bad enough,' I said.

'Oh sure. A killer. Cold plus wind, it multiplies up.' He turned to face forward again and stared out through the windscreen, where orange flags on high bamboo poles whipped in the wind, one every five yards, the bright colour almost glowing in the Polecat's powerful headlamps. Then, to the driver, he said,

'What we'll do, we'll blast this thing along until we reach the Swing, two hours down the trail. We'll stop there and they can give us chow. After that, we go like smoke for Belvoir.'

A thought struck me. 'What happens if there's a white-out?'

Herschel turned. 'Well, let's see. First we pray we don't hit one. If we do, we hope it's right near a safety wanigan and we can see enough to find it. If its real bad, we sit tight and wait till it goes away. Though that can take a little time.'

'Long enough to die, by any chance?'

'Could be,' Herschel said. 'But it's heavy odds against. White-out's a still air phenomenon and we've strong winds.' He was filling his pipe, stuffing tobacco into the bowl with his thumb, and he glanced across at the driver cheerfully. 'What worries me is this guy, who holds all our lives in his sweaty hands, eh, Scotty?'

'Yes, sir," Scott said with relish.

'You seen any of those icecap mirages lately, Scott?'

'Tuesday, sir, I saw these two French broads. Monday I saw Verrazano Narrows bridge.'

Herschel said, 'Tell you what. Any broads you find on this trail, you can keep. That's a promise. Did you ever get confused ?'

'Not yet, sir.'

'By God, but I did,' Herschel said. 'First tour up here, I got snowblinded by the damn moonlight. Wearing dark glasses, too. I got half a mile off the Trail. God knows which crevasse I'd have been in if another guy hadn't seen it and come after me.' He turned and looked at me. 'You'll be interested. When you're driving that air cushion vehicle of yours, you're gonna have to find out if you're susceptible. There's two separate phenomena.

If you get snowblinded, sun or moon, doesn't matter which of the two does it, but if you get snowblinded, you swing off on a left-hand curve. Nobody can work out why.'

'Always to the left?'

'Always,' he said firmly. 'The other thing is icecap mirages. What happens is you start to see poles that ain't there. Lines of them, with flags on top. They always, and I mean always, lead off the other way. To the right. Driver heads straight off the Trail.'

The thought sent a little shudder down my back.

'Funny thing, though,' Herschel went no. 'First one, when you're snowblind, it happens to anyone, whether he's been here days or months. Even the Swing drivers, and they spend six months going backwards and forwards between Belvoir and Hundred; even these guys do the left-hand shuffle. But the other, the mirage, that one wears off when you have been driving a while. Milt Garrison, the Swing commander, reckons one full trip and the danger's over. What he does, he's got a new driver, he keeps him in the middle, between two other tractors with experienced guys.'

'And nobody knows why?'

'Nope.' He puffed contentedly on his pipe.

I glanced over the driver's shoulder at the speed. The Polecat was sliding easily over the snow at close to thirty miles an hour. It occurred to me that if I suddenly discovered I was snowblind or suffering mirages, my speed in the TK4 could easily be double that. I tapped Scott on the shoulder. 'Do me a favour?'

'If I can, sir.'

'Ride with me in the TK4. Keep me on the straight and narrow. And don't see any French girls.'

He laughed. 'Sure thing, sir!'

We must have done about twenty miles when Herschel opened his bag and brought out a big flask.

'Who wants coffee?'

Everybody wanted coffee. The highly-efficient heater in the speeding Polecat dried the mouth. Herschel half-filled cups, one at a time. He also had a bottle of scotch, and slopped a little into three of the cups.

'No scotch for you, son.'

Scott said, 'Considering my name, I reckon that's injustice.'

Herschel grinned. 'It's a hard world. That true, Mr Bowes?'

'Harry,' I said.

'Okay, Harry.'

'It's true.'

We found out how true just after the fiftieth of the mile markers - steel drums painted ice-orange and placed on raised snowbanks beside the trail - had gone by. Suddenly, and without warning, the engine began to run raggedly and then stopped, and the Polecat, still in gear, ground to a halt.