A Cold-Blooded Business Read online

  "Kate! What the hell are you doing here?" She looked past Kate to Jerry.

  "The other guy's still in his room. Sam'll show you." She bent back over her patient.

  "Nice to see you, too," Kate said mildly.

  "Come on," the security guard standing to one side said, and double-timed it down a hallway, Jerry and Kate on his heels. They turned a corner and found another six guards and one man not in uniform standing outside a closed door.

  "Kate, this is the camp supervisor, Tom Parry. Tom, Kate, she's riding with me for the evening. He in there?" Jerry said, gesturing toward the door.

  "No," the camp supervisor, a dark, tense man with an unshaven Neanderthal jaw, said with asperity, "we're having a hall party. Of course he's in there, you silly bastard."

  Jerry gave him a long look and the other man shut up. "What's he on, anybody know?"

  "Just before he passed out his roommate said he's been doing a lot of coke," one of the guards volunteered.

  "Why didn't his roommate tell somebody before it went this far?" Jerry grumbled. It was recognized to be a rhetorical question and went unanswered. "Well, what's his name?"

  "Martin Shugak." "What!" Kate said.

  Jerry looked at her. "You related?"

  "If it's the same guy, he's my cousin."

  "Good," Jerry said, "we can use it." "Maybe," Kate said, recovering some of her poise. "We don't exactly get along."

  "Hard to believe," Jerry drawled. "Where's he work, Tom?"

  "He used to be a carpenter for Arctic Construction. He's been up for nineteen weeks straight, since October." The thought of Martin behind a band saw was enough to turn every hair on Kate's head white. She struggled not to show her distress.

  "Goddamnit!" Jerry was furious. "I've told those friggin' construction superintendents time and again not to let their people work back-to-back shifts. Fuckers never learn." He unclenched his fists and took a deep breath. His face smoothed into its usual, good-humored mask. Kate had never seen Jerry Mcisaac lose his temper with a patient, not even the time the drunken fisherman had run over Jerry's foot with a snow blower when Jerry insisted on treating the broken leg the fisherman had just given his six-year-old daughter. He signaled for silence and stepped forward to knock gently on the door.

  "Martin? Martin Shugak? This is Jerry Mcisaac, the medic over at the Hilton. Why don't you open up the door so we can talk?"

  From behind the door came a wild stream of hysterical profanity.

  Jerry winked at Kate. "Tone it down, Martin. We've got a lady present.

  Talk all you want, but watch the language, okay?"

  There was a brief pause. The door opened a fraction. The voice, less close to cracking, said, "You really got a woman out there?"

  With a sinking feeling Kate recognized his voice. It really was Martin.

  "It's Kate, Martin," she said when Jerry nodded at her. There was no immediate response and she added, "Remember, your cousin? From Niniltna?"

  The door opened wider. Through the crack Kate could barely make out Martin's face, but she could see all too clearly the queer blank look in his brown eyes. His voice sounded high and shaky. "What the hell are you doing here?"

  The question of the day. She hoped he was too out of it to draw any conclusions. "Same as you, making a buck, roustabouting for RPetco.

  Listen, Martin, it really is you, isn't it? I can't see your face too well."

  The door opened wider. The ring of security guards closed in behind Kate. Martin's eyes bulged. He jumped back and the door slammed shut.

  Another string of abuse poured out from behind it.

  Jerry glared around. "Who the fuck do you assholes think you are, the A-Team? Back off!" The guards looked at him with stubborn faces.

  Jerry shook his head angrily and nodded at Kate to continue.

  "Martin, it's Kate again. No one is going to hurt you out here, I promise. Why don't you open the door?"

  "I know what you're trying to do! I'm not stupid! You're talking nice to get me to come out! I'm not stupid!"

  She winced at the raw sound of his voice. "Listen, Martin, nobody out here thinks you're stupid." There was no sound. Kate saw the sweat on Jerry's forehead, saw the fanatical desire for rape, pillage and plunder in the eyes of seven frustrated wannabe rent-a-cops. Her shirt was sticking to her back. "Sure is hard, Martin," she said, "talking to a door. Maybe you could open it up just a crack. Maybe I could come in."

  Next to her Jerry shook his head violently. She ignored him. "Martin?

  How about it? Just me?"

  They waited. After a long time, during which Kate had nightmare visions of Martin cutting his wrists not five feet away with her powerless to stop him, her cousin spoke. That vulnerable quaver was back in his voice. "Get them goddam security guards farther back. You tell them I got a knife and I'll kill anybody who tries to mess with me!"

  "They know, Martin," Kate said, straightening. "We don't want anyone to get hurt. Come on now, open the door."

  The door opened abruptly and banged back against the wall. Everyone jumped. One guard took an involuntary step forward. Martin saw him and his face contorted and the eight-inch hunting knife whizzed between Jerry and Kate to stick, quivering, in the wall behind them.

  For a single, paralyzed moment none of them could move. Then one guard made a low diving tackle through the door for Martin's knees, another went for his shoulders and the rest of them followed like a net dropping from the ceiling, and from then on the sequence of events became increasingly confused. Martin shrugged off the first two guards and tossed a third out the window. Fortunately the camp had only one floor, but the pilings holding the camp up off the pad still made it at least a ten-foot drop, not to mention the cuts the glass caused when she went through it. In the melee Jerry's fist caught Kate on the side of the head and he got himself kicked in the stomach for his pains. He doubled over, clutching his belly and wheezing. Kate sat next to him on the floor, holding her head, which had already taken enough abuse for one day. She caught sight of a two-inch roll of duct tape sitting innocently on top of one nightstand. The all-purpose, superduper utility cure for every bush ailment, including holding the Trans Alaska Pipeline together. She touched Jerry's arm and pointed. He realized her intent immediately and nodded. She snagged the spool of tape with one hand and they launched themselves back into the fray.

  With one guard per arm and four others and the camp manager holding his legs and the seventh security guard climbing back in the window to sit on his chest, Kate and Jerry got Martin's wrists taped together. It wasn't a particularly neat job but it was an effective one, and from then on their task was relatively easy. They taped his legs together at the knee and ankle and then they let Martin lie in the middle of the floor while the Impossible Mission Force leaned up against the walls and each other, nursing their bruises and waiting for the shaking in their legs to quit. Both beds in the double room were broken, the door hung drunkenly from one hinge and snow was whirling in through the smashed window to form a small drift on the floor beneath. An interested crowd peered in from the hallway.

  "Look at that little prick," Jerry said resentfully, still puffing for air. "He can't weigh a hundred and twenty pounds wringing wet."

  "How you must love this job," Kate said, leaning her head against the wall and closing her eyes.

  "I'd bet my left nut he was scoring his coke with a speed chaser."

  "All grown-ups, and only hurting themselves, is what I think you said."

  "Bastard better not have handed any of that crap out to his friends."

  Jerry pushed himself to his feet and looked over at the guard who had gone out the window, now standing in a corner with blood trickling down her left temple. "You okay, Wedemeyer?"

  Wedemeyer managed a weak smile, slid slowly down the wall to the floor and passed out.

  "Well, shit," Jerry said, disgusted. His beeper went off again and the entire room, not excluding Martin, jumped a foot in the air. "Jerry Mcisaac, call the operator, Jerry Mcisaac , call the operator immediately."

  Jerry leaned his forehead in one shaking hand for a moment. "It's going to be one of those nights, isn't it?" he asked the floor.

  It was. There was another medical emergency, this one at Rig 63, and the operator advised the senior physician's assistant on staff to betake himself there at once. Jerry made arrangements for Martin to join his bunkie in Lil's ambulance and asked Kate, "You want me to drop you off at the Base Camp?" Kate looked at him as if he'd lost his mind. He shrugged. "It's your funeral." But as they climbed into the ambulance he gave her a sideways grin. "Just like old times, ain't it?"

  "Ain't it, though?" she agreed.

  They fought their way through the wind and snow across the field to H

  Pad. Where the access road turned off the Backbone they found a bright orange Chevy Suburban encrusted with years of drilling mud, though it didn't need to look its best since it wasn't going anywhere in the immediate future. Of the four tires, only one was still on the road, and from the looks of the front axle, it would be the only tire on the road for a while. Jerry got out and checked the cab.

  "Nobody inside." He climbed in and got on the radio. "RPetco Base, this is Medic One, we've just turned off on the H Pad access road and there's a Suburban off the road here. Looks like the rig reps. It's partially in the way of oncoming traffic, you'd better get Transportation out here."

  "Medic One, RPetco Base, we know about that, we have dispatched equipment."

  Jerry raised an eyebrow. "Okay, RPetco Base, Medic One out."

  A quarter of a mile farther on they came across a forklift, painted the same bright orange, "Naborhoff orange," Jerry said when Kate asked.

  "They paint all their equipment that color, the same way Brinker paint
s all theirs Brinker blue."

  "Why?"

  "Keeps ' from stealing each other's equipment. Hey, look. It's missing a fork."

  "It's also in the ditch," Kate said. "Upside down."

  "You noticed that, too?" Again Jerry got out to look, and again there were no discernible bodies, although it was hard to be sure someone hadn't staggered off into the howling storm. He climbed back in the ambulance and reached for the radio. "RPetco Base, this is Medic One again, yeah, Sue, about a quarter of a mile down the access road from that Suburban is a wrecked forklift. It isn't as much of a traffic hazard as the Suburban, but you'd better notify Transportation anyway.

  And maybe get the rig to run a nose count? I don't see anyone at the scene, but if the driver's wandered off somewhere we'd better find out."

  "Yeah, Jerry, actually we know about the forklift, too, and the drivers have already been, ah, found."

  This time both eyebrows went up. "Okay, RPetco Base, Medic One out."

  A half mile more and they were on the well pad. A row of well houses passed on their right, and something that Kate thought at first was another well house, but when they approached closer and the headlights picked it out of the blowing snow, it resolved itself into a jim-dandy of a helicopter, or what had been one. It was painted the same Naborhoff orange as the Suburban and the forklift and was in about the same shape.

  Canted heavily over on one side, one of the rotors was bent like a paper straw. The skin of the starboard pontoon had a large hole in it. The pilot's door was missing. The inside was already coated with a layer of fine, dry snow. It had missed coming down on the nearest well house by a scant twelve inches.

  Jerry rubbed his chin, regarding the helicopter musingly. After a while he reached for the mike. "RPetco Base, this is Medic One. I bet you already know about the chopper."

  "Roger that, Medic One." "Uh-huh," Jerry said. "Is it a full moon tonight, by any chance?"

  "I'll check."

  "Thanks, Sue, Medic One clear." He hung up the microphone and turned to Kate. "You remember Mclsaac's Three Laws?"

  Kate, mesmerized by the downed chopper, said woodenly, "Uh-huh."

  "Okay, what's the first law? Kate? What's the first law?"

  Kate roused herself from her absorption. "Mclsaac's first law is to look out for myself."

  "Okay, what's the second law?"

  "Second law is to look out for my partner."

  "The second and most important law," he corrected himself. "And the third?"

  "Third law is to look out for my patient."

  He gave her shoulder a rough thump. "That's my girl. I think tonight we'll make the second law the first law, though, okay? Let's go."

  Kate wasn't sure whether she wanted to or not, but she couldn't let Jerry face whatever lurked inside Rig 63 all by himself. She raised a square chin, squared heroic shoulders and marched up the stairs leading to the rig's camp. She wasn't, however, quite so foolish as to take the lead, and when Jerry opened the door she waited until he was well inside and no audible blows had been struck or shots fired before she followed.

  It was quiet inside. Too quiet. A tall, big-bellied man in striped gray overalls and an orange, duck-billed Naborhoff cap glared from beneath grizzled eyebrows. The subjects of his glare were seated back to back in the center of a room Kate identified as the rig camp's dining and recreation area. There was no one else in the room except for a white-clad kitchen helper, his back to them. He was scrubbing out the serving line as if his life depended on it. From the expression on the big-bellied man, Kate thought that it might.

  "Hey, Bear," Jerry said to the big-bellied man. He sounded cautious, not without cause. Rage radiated off the big-bellied man like heat.

  "Jerry," Bear said through his teeth.

  Still cautious, Jerry inquired, "What's going on?"

  Bear looked at him. Jerry didn't back up but only because pride wouldn't let him. Bear's gaze shifted to Kate, who received the distinct impression of being scorched. Lastly, Bear looked back at the two men in the center of the room, who weren't sitting still because they wanted to but because there were bound in place with enough rope to restrain King Kong. "Ask them," the big-bellied man replied, still between his teeth.

  Jerry got a penlight out of his bag and shined it in the two men's eyes.

  He looked at Kate. She reached for one man's wrist. His skin was cool and clammy to the touch, his pulse rapid and erratic. He was incapable of focusing on her upraised fingers, much less counting them.

  He sported several bruises about his face and neck. His arms and legs looked whole, but she wondered if she should check for broken ribs.

  Instead, she straightened and nodded in response to the question in Jerry's eyes.

  He straightened. "Coke?" The big-bellied man's red face became redder.

  He gave a curt nod. "On the floor?" Another nod. "And in the chopper?

  And the forklift? And the Suburban, too, I suppose?"

  Bear nodded again, although Kate couldn't see how he managed, so rigid with wrath was he.

  "Fuck ' if they can't take a joke," one of the men mumbled inopportunely behind them.

  The kitchen helper froze. In the next instant he began to sidle around the serving line. Next to Kate, Jerry sucked in an audible breath and with a show of amiable briskness inquired, "I suppose you'll be making their services available to the industry? Fine, good, I'll just call Security, get them taken off your hands." Without waiting for the other man's permission he pulled his radio out. "Security guards have been dispatched to the scene," Sue assured him, twice. Kate could tell he wanted to ask how many and how soon, but he managed to restrain himself.

  They waited until the security guards showed, whiling away the interim two hours by making one-sided conversation with Bear, whom Jerry introduced as Bear Honeysett, RPetco's rig representative on Naborhoff

  63. Those two hours, two of the longest in Kate's life, were just long enough for her to decide she was glad John King hadn't hired her through a drilling contractor. She might have had to pee in a bottle in front of a witness, but at least she was alive to tell the tale. If she and Jerry had left the two roughnecks alone with Bear Honey sett, she wasn't sure they would have been.

  Back in the ambulance she said, "Just so I've got the sequence of events straight--those two got higher than kites, got kicked off the rig floor and took off in the Suburban?"

  "Uh-huh."

  "And when they ran it off the road, they came back and took the forklift?"

  "Yup."

  "And when they wrecked the forklift, they came back for the helicopter!"

  He grinned at the windshield. "Looks like."

  Kate sat back in her seat. "Why are they still alive?" She wasn't talking about the damage the three separate vehicle crashes should have inflicted on the roughnecks' hapless bodies.

  Neither was Jerry when he replied, "Good question." Kate said, and it wasn't entirely part of her investigation when she did, "You people have a real problem with drugs."

  The engine caught and turned over. "Oh, hell, Kate," Jerry said easily,

  "you know if you had your way you'd bring back Prohibition.

  Looks like the weather's clearing a little."

  It was. During the next thirty minutes the snow ended and the wind died down, enough to see the commotion outside Construction Camp One as they drove by on the Backbone. "Now what's going on?" Jerry wondered when they caught sight of the crowd standing outside one of the modules.

  "A block party?" Kate guessed, but in her defense it must be said that by now it was the wrong side of two o'clock in the morning and she had never been a night person.

  They parked ten yards behind the crowd and, the evening's experiences beginning to have their effect, tiptoed up behind the gathering of men.

  Kate caught a whiff of deep-fried fat and identified the kitchen module, which indeed it proved to be, as attested to by the two enormous garbage Dumpsters flanking the double doors, as well as by the two not less enormous grizzly bears with their heads down in them.

  "Oh, shit," Jerry said, backing up. He was alone. Kate stood rooted in place, staring as the crowd of men, most of them in their T-shirts and clutching cameras to their chests, shouted and whistled and stamped, trying to get the bears' heads out of the Dumpsters long enough to snap their picture. Flashbulbs were going off like firecrackers. With what Kate thought was extraordinary self-control for a grizzly bear in March, the bears ignored them until one man crept up behind one and yanked his tail.