Sam paused, immediately on edge. What have I said? What’s the problem with Jim Dutton?
She pressed on.
‘Do you know Jim?’
The Russian, seemingly unable to reconcile her question, ignored Sam and stared straight ahead.
What the…? Sam bit her lip.
The minibus was at the front gates of the rig a couple of minutes later. There was a perimeter fence and a gate guard; their bus was waved straight through.
I’m in.
The minibus stopped outside what looked like an administration building. Sam was first out. She was clueless when it came to oilfields, but recognised a tall Eiffel Tower-like construction which she assumed was built on top of the well. There were countless pipes and gantries, a good number of large, towering cylindrical constructions and 20 or 30 shipping containers lying about in an orderly fashion. One or two looked like they might be offices or accommodation.
The admin building had a short step up, a single metal door and an official sign: ExtraOil Rig Number 7, Yamal Oilfields. Site Manager and Chief Engineer: D C Berezon MSc BEng.
The men had all headed off to various locations on the site, carrying their oversized bags. The minibus drove into the depths of the oilfield. Sam was left feeling a bit nervy; all alone. It was just her. On an oilfield. In northern Russia.
She turned to face the entrance to the admin building. She shook her head, as if to say, ‘What have I got to lose?’, took the single step and opened the door. She was immediately met by a small cubicle and a second door. An air lock. To keep the heat in. Makes sense. She opened the second door.
Inside was an unremarkable, open-plan office with assorted desks, only one of which was occupied – by a woman; she was sitting in the corner of the office, her workspace decorated with tens of photos of the soap opera, Lyubov Kak Lyubov, a Russian favourite. To the left, a doorless corridor led away; to Sam’s right was a glass partition and another door. Behind the glass was a more ornate desk and a TV on the wall. She guessed it was the chief’s office.
‘Hello, can I help you?’ The woman had stood and was making her way over. In the heat of the office, Sam was beginning to feel overdressed; she took off her hat and stuck it in the pocket of her softie.
‘Yes please.’
The woman was much like Sam; the same sort of age. Mid-height and build, but with mousy hair which she had managed to streak purple. She wore heavy cotton cream trousers, a simple white blouse with a strange brooch (which Sam couldn’t make out), and a green cardigan. The similarities stopped when it came to body piercing. Sam had had her ears done when she was a kid. The woman, who wasn’t unattractive, had decided to pierce her nose (twice) and her bottom lip. On reflection, Sam thought it sort of went with the purple hair.
She smiled at Sam, a simple smile, as though having a strange woman arrive in the northernmost extremities of Russia was an everyday occurrence.
‘I’m a cousin of Jim Dutton’s, who I think is the QA here – on the rig?’
The pierced woman, who had almost made it to where Sam was standing, stopped dead in her tracks. Like the large Russian in the minibus, her face also changed colour. Hers turned completely white – a mirror of the snow outside.
‘Ehh, OK. Umm…’
Something’s definitely not right.
‘Would you like a coffee?’ It was a blurt rather than a sentence. Words to cover an embarrassment – or something else?
‘Yes, maybe in a while. Is there a problem with my cousin?’
The woman then visibly collapsed, somehow managing to remain on her feet by placing her hand on a nearby desk. Sam spotted tears forming.
‘I guess you haven’t heard. I am so, so sorry.’
‘What?’ Sam immediately checked herself. She felt rising anger, but knew that grief would be the emotion of choice when the bad news came. Bad news that was due at any moment.
Sam put out a hand and placed it on the woman’s elbow.
‘Please tell me.’
The woman, who had been staring at the floor, now looked up at Sam. A hint of makeup was being degraded by a steady flow of tears.
‘Jim is dead. I’m so sorry.’ The word ‘dead’ flicked a switch in the woman’s demeanour; she broke down, sobbing and sobbing. All of a sudden she looked very young; pathetically immature.
‘I haven’t cried since the accident. I’m so sorry,’ she blubbered some more. ‘You must be more upset than me.’
Sam was upset. That was definitely an emotion she was experiencing. Upset – yes. But anger was a stronger feeling. And really ‘effing’ frustrated. She searched for anxiety – even fear. She found neither. Just now she was furious. That was two people dead – and the professor on his way to a modern gulag.
She wanted answers. And she wanted them now.
Calm.
She gently brought the woman to her and held her; a sisterly hug.
‘How did he die?’
The woman stayed in Sam’s arms, her shoulders gently rocking.
‘It was an accident on the site. He fell from a gantry when he was checking some equipment. It’s all very odd. He was such a careful man.’ She sobbed some more. ‘Such a nice man; so generous.’
Sam wanted to squash the woman. To hold her so tight, she’d struggle to breathe. To release some of her own tension.
Somehow, she resisted.
‘I see.’ She took a deep breath and then, squeezing her eyes closed as tight as she could, she found some tears for effect. Sam gently pushed the woman away from her. She looked a mess.
You look a mess.
At this distance Sam could make out the brooch. It was more of a badge: I am a Member of the Lyubov Kak Lyubov Fan Club.
Oh dear.
‘You were a friend of Jim’s?’
The woman snuffled, using the sleeve of her cardigan to wipe her eyes.
‘Uh-huh. He was most people’s friend. But we were close. No one here believes that he’s dead.’
I do.
You were close? How close?
‘Are you sure it was an accident?’
The woman sniffed and looked at Sam as though she’d asked the most stupid question in the world.
‘Yes? Of course!’
OK.
‘Where’s Jim body?’
‘The undertaker came from Salekhard yesterday by train. They took the body away yesterday evening. I understand that his family have asked for a local cremation? That’s what the chief had said.’ She sniffed again and then added, ‘I’m so sorry you didn’t know. What a wasted journey for you.’
Indeed – much more than you could imagine.
‘Look, is there any way that I could see his room, maybe his personal effects? I could take something home with me?’
The woman stuttered, still overwrought.
‘I think his belongings have all gone – they were immediately boxed up and dispatched. I’m not sure where to, though…’
How convenient.
Sam was rushing through all the possibilities. How could she rescue something from this disaster?
‘Could you take me to his room anyway?’ She made a further attempt to look grief-stricken. ‘So, I could get a feel for his last few days?’ She sniffed. She was a rubbish actor.
‘Yes, yes. Of course. I’ll get my things. First, I’ll just phone the chief and tell him that I’ll be out of the office. He likes me here first thing so I can make him his special coffee.’
Bless him.
As the secretary did what she needed to do, Sam had a look round the office, trying to find something that might help piece the jigsaw together. But it was in ‘oil-speak’: indecipherable charts and instructions. It was completely lost on her.
The secretary, who seemed less upset having now thrown on a thick woollen coat and a knitted hat, led Sam back out into the cold. She carried a set of keys.
Three minutes later they were outside a silver and white shipping container; it was the third one along, on the bottom le
vel of an identical block of ten containers – two high and five long. There was a metalled mesh walkway joining the entrances to the top five containers, with a set of steps which rose from the far end. Jim Dutton lived on the bottom floor. Sam wondered if that was a privilege.
The secretary, who had introduced herself as Lucya on the short walk across from the admin building, opened the door and motioned for Sam to go in.
She couldn’t. She froze. It wasn’t that she was entering the room of a dead man. That wasn’t it. It was that the last time she was in a shipping container, she was being held captive by terrorists; two days in a freezing cold, blacked-out metal box. Two days that very nearly killed her. The experience had left a permanent mark on her subconscious: shipping containers were to be avoided. At all costs. To Sam they stank of fear and death.
The wind picked up as Sam prevaricated. But the temperature didn’t stop a bead of sweat dribbling down Sam’s back.
Sam bristled. She knew she had to go in. To see if she could find a clue. Some ammunition that she could use to unpick what was happening. To help stop the death.
‘Give me the key.’ Sam was beyond trying to display grief. And had run out of pleasantries. She had to have the key. No matter how irrational. She had to have control of the door. Of the lock.
Lucya gave her the key, but accompanied the exchange with a withering look.
Sam offered Lucya into the room. Her second precaution. She wasn’t going to leave anyone outside who might close the door; to lock her in. In the metal prison.
Sam followed her and, just as Lucya was about to close the door, said, ‘Leave the door open. Please.’ The ‘please’ an afterthought.
She took a deep breath and steadied herself.
At first glance, there was nothing of Jim left in the room. A single window, a bed, fitted with a mattress, a bedside table, a larger table and two chairs, a wooden wardrobe and a tall metal locker with a tiny key in it. And a door leading through to a small en suite.
It took Sam five minutes to check out what she could. Everything was empty. Everything was clean. The place had been professionally exorcised of Jim Dutton. It was an empty shell. There was nothing. Nothing.
Shit.
She stood in the middle of the room, her mind short of answers; full of futility. Frustration welled up inside her. She was lost. Five hundred miles from the safety of her office – if it were safe; 5,000 miles from her home country – not that she had much to call home.
What the friggin’ hell am I doing? What am I up against?
Sam knew the red mist was coming. She knew that, when it came, she could go one of two ways. Either she’d become an automaton, like yesterday in the taxi. Reflexes would take over. Adrenalin would replace the blood coursing through her veins.
Or, she’d lose it. And then nothing was safe. Everything was a weapon. Anyone was a target.
Shit, no.
But it was too late. Her brain chose option two. The closest object to her was the metal locker, which she’d just inspected. The closest weapon was her foot.
Smack! She kicked it with all her might.
Shit, that hurt… Her bruised thigh joined her foot in the ‘don’t do that again’ club.
Lucya instinctively drew back, her arms hugging her shoulders, her head bowed in self-defence.
Smack!
Sam kicked the door again, a size five dent now very evident in the locker door. She was snorting, blood in her ears amplifying the sound. She didn’t care.
Fuck you!
Sam changed tack. She slammed the top of the door with her fist, it rocked backward an inch until it hit the wall, and then fell back to its original place. In defiance to Sam’s assault.
Clunk.
A soft sound of something falling inside the locker. Something different from the rage-induced noises coming from Sam’s efforts to do damage.
She was panting. She had no idea where Lucya was. Nothing in her peripheral vision registered.
A clunk? What was that? What the fuck was that?
Sam slowed her breathing. She un-tensed her fists, her hands dropping loosely by her side. She started to regain control. The mist cleared – a little.
She focused on the lock in the door. Unlock it – now. She did as she instructed herself. After an effort to prise it open (it had been bent during the assault), Sam peered in.
Nothing.
Shit.
Hang on.
She looked in the bottom compartment, where, she guessed, cousin Jim used to keep his work boots.
And there it was.
A small notebook, A5 size. Hardcover. With masking tape on its underside.
Stuck to the roof of the compartment. Hidden.
Clever Jim.
She reached for it, and suddenly remembered that Lucya was in the room.
Sam furtively looked inside the notebook. She felt Lucya moving to her side, but she was too late. Sam had a photographic memory. She had seen what was written on the first page and had reconciled the detail already. Sam snapped the book shut.
She had seen the first page; therefore, she had read the first page. She was that quick. She could remember it word for word. If subsequent pages contained the same sort of information, she now knew why Jim had had an ‘accident’. He knew too much.
Far too much.
‘It’s a notebook, erm, full of love letters.’ Sam grimaced a smile. She was back to herself now. The adrenalin was pretty much spent. ‘It’s personal. We… ehh, we had a relationship. Which is not great between cousins. I didn’t love him. It was a fling.’ She was lying again now. It was a rubbish lie. She ploughed on.
‘That’s why I came to see him. You see, I’m pregnant.’ Sam pointed at her stomach. Idiot. ‘And I couldn’t, ehh, tell him on the phone. I had to tell him face to face. You understand?’
Lucya was shaking her head and nodding at the same time – her piercings a silver blur against a canvas of white flesh. She looked dazed. Sam guessed these situations came up all the time in Lyubov Kak Lyubov. But when it happened to you…
‘Look, I’m sorry for the damage.’ She raised the notebook to Lucya. ‘I’m glad I’ve found his notebook. I can leave now. Content.’ Sam was showing Lucya to the door. She gave Sam a wide berth.
Sam’s mind was in overdrive. The book was dynamite. She needed to find space to read it from cover to cover. In private. Where? When?
Her thought process was interrupted by the sound of an ExtraOil Mi-8 helicopter landing about 500 metres away off to her right.
As Lucya locked the container door, Sam watched two men get out of the passenger door of the helicopter. They hadn’t waited for the blades to stop spinning. They were in a rush.
Shit. It was impossible to be sure at this distance, but Sam was pretty certain that the one of the two men walking across the pad was the one she remembered from the Merc. They were headed for the administration building.
It all made sense. They had come here for one reason only.
Think.
‘Lucya, you and Jim were close?’
Lucya nodded, sheepishly.
‘Look, I don’t have a problem with that. He was easily loveable. But, for his sake I need you to do me a favour.’ Sam looked back across to the two men. They were 300 metres from the administration building and closing.
Lucya nodded again.
‘I need time to read this – in peace.’ Sam raised the notebook for effect. ‘I need maybe a day. You see, I came into the country illegally,’ How long can I keep this drivel up for? ‘and the police are after me. I fear prison, which I probably deserve. But I need time to come to terms with Jim’s death. Do you understand?’
Would anyone believe that?
Lucya nodded again.
‘Can this be our secret – two of Jim’s lovers?’
Lucya paused for a second and then nodded slowly. Her world of Russian soaps was probably now a little too close for comfort. Or maybe she was thrilled with the drama of it all? Sam
couldn’t tell, nor did she care. She just needed to buy some time.
‘Yes, of course.’
‘And, is it okay if I have a quick wander around the site?’ Sam waved an arm about. ‘To get a feel of where Jim spent his last days?’
Sam glanced back toward the two men. They were being met outside the admin building by a third man. She didn’t wait for an answer from Lucya and moved off, leaving the secretary with her pierced mouth hung slightly ajar, as if expecting to be fed.
Sam headed away from the administration building. She walked around the back of the accommodation block and immediately saw what she wanted. Beyond multiple pipes, but with a clear path between the entrance and the back of the site, was a vehicle yard. She jogged the hundred metres or so to an ungated internal compound, where there were two Toyota Hiluxes and a Nissan Navara. All three were decorated with ExtraOil livery, and all three were in good nick. She looked into the cabs. No keys. Off to one side was another container. The ExtraOil notice displayed ‘Transport Pool’.
Sam tried the door. It was open. Obviously up here nobody stole anything – there was nowhere to take it to. The office was unoccupied. The digital clock on the wall read 7.47am. Sam guessed work would start pretty soon. She needed to get a move on.
There was a key rack hanging on the wall, next to clipboards full of schedules. She picked out the one with a Nissan fob, and then turned to leave.
Ahh!
On the back of the door was an ExtraOil waterproof coat and a safety helmet, decorated with the company’s logo. The coat was far too big for her, but it would do. As she left the container she checked in the jacket’s pockets. A small bottle of vodka. Oh well.
Now wearing a jacket and hat, and every bit an ExtraOil worker – albeit shorter than most, Sam jumped into the Nissan. She adjusted the seat and fired her up. Three-quarters of a tank. Perfect.
She drove slowly, but purposefully, out of the oil field – past the security guard who waved at her. On the way out she got within 20 metres of the administration building. The two men from the helicopter were having an animated conversation with the third man.
Tick. Tick.
She had both faces. Indelibly etched.
Behind them was Lucya, who had stopped on the entrance steps and watched as the Nissan left. Through the rear-view mirror Sam thought she saw her shake her head in disbelief.
The Innocence of Trust Page 12