Athabasca - Alistair MacLean Page 0,3

know. Hard to believe." He smiled again, gestured at his clothing. "Most people think I've been riding the rods. You know, hobo on the boxcars. God knows why. Nearest railroad track's a long, long way from Prudhoe Bay. Like Tahiti and grass skirts. You know, gone native. Too many years on the North Slope." His oddly staccato manner of speech was indeed suggestive of a person whose contact with civilization was, at best, intermittent. "Sorry I couldn't make it. Meet you, I mean. Deadhorse."

Mackenzie said, "Deadhorse?"

"Airstrip. A little trouble at one of the gathering centers. Happens all the time. Sub-zero temperatures play hell with the molecular structure of steel. Being well taken care of, I hope?"

"No complaints." Dermott smiled. "Not that we require much care. There the food counter, here Mackenzie. The wateringhole and the camel." Dermott checked himself. He was beginning to talk like Finlayson. "Well, one little complaint, perhaps. Too many items on the lunch menu, too large a helping of any item. My colleague's waistline -- "

"Your colleague's waistline can take care of itself," Mackenzie said comfortably. "But I do have a complaint, Mr. Finlayson."

"I can imagine." Another momentary flash of teeth, and Finlayson was on his feet. "Let's hear it in my office. Just a few steps." He walked across the dining hall, stopped outside a door and indicated another door to the left. "Master Operations Control Center. The heart of Prudhoe Bay -- or the western half of it, at least. All the computerized process control facilities for the supervision of the field's operations."

Dermott said, "An enterprising lad with a satchelful of grenades could have himself quite a time in there."

"Five seconds and he could close down the entire oil field. Come all the way from Houston just to cheer me up? This way."

He led them through the outer door, then through an inner one to a small office. Desks, chairs and filing cabinets, all in metal, all in battleship gray. He gestured them to sit and smiled at Mackenzie. "As the French say, a meal without wine is like a day without sunshine."

"It's this Texas dust," Mackenzie said. "Sticks in the gullet like no other dust. Laughs at water."

Finlayson made a sweeping motion with his hand. "Some big rigs out there. Damned expensive and damned difficult to handle. It's pitch dark, say, forty below and you're tired -- you're always tired up here. Don't forget we work twelve hours a day, seven days a week. A couple of scotches on top of all that, and you've written off a million dollars' worth of equipment. Or you damage the pipeline. Or you kill yourself. Or, worst of all, you kill some of your mates. Comparatively, they had it easy in the old prohibition days -- bulk smuggling from Canada, bathtub gin, illicit stills by the thousand. Rather different on the North Slope here -- get caught smuggling in a teaspoonful of liquor, and that's it. No argument, no court of appeal. Out. But there's no problem -- no one is going to risk eight hundred dollars a week for ten cents' worth of bourbon."

Mackenzie said, "When's the next flight out to Anchorage?"

Finlayson smiled. "All is not lost, Mr. Mackenzie." He unlocked a filing cabinet, produced a bottle of scotch and two glasses and poured with a generous hand. "Welcome to the North Slope, gentlemen."

"I was having visions," said Mackenzie, "of travelers stranded in an Alpine blizzard and a St. Bernard lolloping toward them with the usual restorative. You're not a drinking man?"

"Certainly. One week in five when I rejoin my family in Anchorage. This is strictly for visiting VIPs. One would assume you qualify under that heading?" Thoughtfully, he mopped melting ice from his beard. "Though frankly, I never heard of your organization until a couple of days ago."

"Think of us as desert roses," Mackenzie said. "Born to blush and bloom unseen. I think I've got that wrong, but the desert bit is appropriate enough. That's where we seem to spend most of our time." He nodded toward the window. "A desert doesn't have to be made of sand. I suppose this qualifies as an Arctic desert."

"I think of it that way myself. But what do you do in those deserts? Your function, I mean."

"Our function?" Dermott considered. "Oddly enough, I'd say our function is to reduce our worthy employer, Jim Brady, to a state of bankruptcy."

"Jim Brady? I thought his initial was A."

"His mother was English. She christened him Algernon. Wouldn't you object? He's