The Will
Page 18
“What is this?” Henry asked, watching Boyd. “Is it just this well, or wells in general? Or is he just having some kind of episode?”
They walked quickly toward the well, covering the distance in a few seconds. Boyd turned toward them, passion blazing in his face. When he spoke, his voice had become a hoarse, dangerous-sounding whisper. “This is what the Lord says,” he breathed. “Thoughts will come into your mind. You will devise an evil scheme.”
“My God,” Amanda said softly, “he’s completely insane.”
Henry watched Boyd’s face closely, drawn in as so often before with a sense of the overwhelming pain there. In his seminary days he had volunteered in the psychiatric ward of a hospital, and he had seen the truly lost there, the irreparable damage of brain chemistry gone permanently awry. Boyd seemed different, although he couldn’t place just why. “I don’t know,” he said slowly as he stared at Boyd. “I think something or someone has damaged him. I wish I knew the whole story. But this is pretty damn creepy.”
“Riding in the car, I thought he was crazy and sweet. But if there is somebody out there who hurt him, God help them if he ever gets hold of them.”
Henry nodded. “I’m just trying to figure out what to do now.” But even as they watched, Boyd began to calm; whether his rage was spent, or simply because his mind was unable to hold its passion for very long, he eventually slumped down, sitting like a child on the ground with his back to the well. He stared out into the vast expanse of Kansas, the anguish on his face slowly draining away.
“Ever see anything like that before?” Amanda asked.
“No,” Henry answered. “Nothing like that. I’ve seen his anger. But this is new.” He stared up at the well. “He genuinely seemed tortured by the sight of this thing. ‘Hailstones and burning sulfur,’ that I’ve heard. It’s a big part of the judgment theme. I never thought it meant anything.” He looked up at the well. “But oil burns.”
“And there’s always sulfur around wells. It’s the most dangerous thing about them, actually.”
Henry studied Boyd a moment. Boyd was mumbling to himself again, but quietly now, his voice a low, tremulous vibration. “Look, how long will this take?” Henry asked. “He’s calm now, but I don’t think this place is healthy for him, although I don’t know why.” Henry walked slowly over to him; Boyd looked up, the horror temporarily banished.
“Let your pain be washed in the sea of black, junior Henry,” Boyd said. Henry reached a hand down to him, but Boyd ignored it. Instead, he made a grandiose sign of the cross and said, “Fools and whores, I absolve thee.”
“That’s the second time he’s done that,” Henry said to Amanda. “It’s unnerving, to tell you the truth.”
“The sign of the cross?”
“When he plays priest like that. It’s like he’s forgiving me for something. I never did him any harm.”
“Absolution,” Amanda said. “You said that was the other theme.”
“Not for me, for God’s sake,” Henry said. He glanced back at Boyd, who was staring at him intently.
“Henry,” she said, “I think I can compress the whole test into thirty minutes or so. It’s obvious I’ll never get another chance. What do you think?”
Boyd was running his finger in the dirt, making circles and obscure, apparently meaningless figures. “Okay,” Henry said after a moment. “But if there’s another scene we’ll have to pack up immediately. Or I can take Boyd and leave you to finish.”
“Understood. Help me with this stuff for a second, and I’ll get through it as fast as I can.”
Henry picked up the packs and hauled them over to the well. Amanda began quickly organizing her tools, nodding for Henry to look after Boyd. Henry walked back over and squatted down about four feet away from him. It was enough, apparently, to be near; Boyd looked up at him with what could pass for gratitude. The minutes passed, Amanda rushing through her tests. After about twenty minutes, Henry heard Amanda call out.
“What’s up?” he said, turning toward her.
“Just something weird,” she said over her shoulder. “Can you get free for a second?”
Boyd was sitting quietly for the moment, his eyes closed. “All right,” he said. “Hang on.” He crossed over to the well and saw Amanda crouched down, adjusting a complicated instrument. “What’s that?”
“Gamma ray and microelectric sondes.” She smiled. But you knew that, of course.”
He liked her smile; it was warm, and he couldn’t find any hidden agenda behind it. “I despise women who are smarter than me,” he said. “What’s going on?”
“I just finished my neutron and gamma ray tests.”
“I was going to suggest those.”
“Listen, Henry, when I said weird I meant it. Unless I miss my guess, this well is . . . I was going to say unusual, but that kind of understates it.” She looked up at the steel fittings, wonder on her face. “I’d say it’s something of a geological miracle.”
Henry followed her gaze up the rusting metal. “What makes you say that?”
Amanda scanned her readings again, her expression serious. “I keep thinking there’s got to be some mistake. I must be doing something wrong, unless the laws of geology have been temporarily suspended.” She fiddled with the controls for a moment, then looked back up. “Nope,” she said, “the thing’s working, and I’ve checked the nominal settings twice.” She stood up from her cramped position and rubbed her neck. “Well,” she said, “I’m not a geologist. I just picked up bits and pieces in my research on this project. But I do know there shouldn’t be oil in extruded limestone, which this”—she pointed downward—“is.” She picked up the tester. “See?” she asked, pointing to a digital readout. “This thing detects rock type with gamma rays. And it says that the rock down there is almost exclusively limestone. There’s a little clay, but not enough of that to speak of. Anyway, you don’t find oil in either one of them.”
“Considering we’re standing in front of an oil well, I think you need new instruments.”
“The instruments are perfect. This kind of rock isn’t porous, which oil needs. The liquid hides in the porosity of the rock. If rock is sufficiently dense, like this, no oil.”
“I refer you once again to the well.”
Amanda shook her head. “Let me show you something,” she said. She led him five yards uphill to a small, elevated patch of earth covered with reddish-brown exposed rock. Reaching down, she smacked a piece of the rock smartly a few times with the palm of her hand. The formation split easily into several pieces. Picking up a handful, she crumbled it in her hand. “Chalk,” she said, looking up at Henry. “Extruded limestone, in other words. That’s what chalk is. So the bottom line is there’s no reason why oil was ever discovered here in the first place.”
“Some of these wells have been dead for some time. Would that make a difference?”
“Not unless they’ve been dead for about six million years.”
“I see.”
“The rock is the rock, Henry. But if by some miracle oil ever was found here, it couldn’t have amounted to anything. They might have found some freak, anomalous pool, but it would have gone bust quick. No legs.”
“Actually, I think that’s what happened. My understanding is that the income was pretty significant early on, but it’s dwindled in recent years.”
Amanda looked across the field at a slowly pumping well. “Look, I’ve been researching this area for more than two years, and state records say these wells are among the oldest producing sites in this part of the United States. They’re record setters, almost legends. That’s why I wanted to be here so badly, testing for long-term leakage. They’re perfect for my purposes. I had never heard of such a shallow well lasting ten years, much less more than twenty. But after this test I can’t picture a well here lasting six months.”
“Maybe this one burnt out early. Could the other wells be in a different kind of rock?”
“No,” Amanda said, “not at such clo
se range.” She waved out across the field. “This whole area was a sea bottom a few million years ago. That’s what gives it the gentle rolling, the hills. It was all underwater, shaped by tides.”
Henry looked across the sloping grassland; it was easy to imagine an ocean covering an expanse of earth so immense, so gently and enormously shaped.
“Mind if I think out loud a second?” Amanda asked. She was staring intently at a pumping well a hundred and fifty yards away. “Say somehow they did find oil.”
“They obviously did.”
“The real question is why anybody would drill here in the first place. No wildcatter worth his salt would ever have bet on this site. The risks are great enough even when everything looks perfect. But to drill extruded limestone . . .” She paused, considering. “I don’t suppose you know who the drilling company was, by any chance?”
Henry thought for a moment, then suddenly laughed out loud. “I do, actually. You’ll be so pleased.”
“Don’t tell me.”
“Yeah. It’s your old buddy Durand. He drilled a lot in the early days. Now the easy oil’s gone, and he’s shut that part of the business down. Can’t compete with the bigger companies, I guess.”
Amanda groaned. “Durand. You’ve got to be kidding.”
Henry shrugged. “I still don’t see where you are heading with this. Things were less sophisticated back then. Maybe they just got lucky.”
“Maybe,” Amanda answered slowly. Then she shook her head emphatically. “No, I’m not going down that road. Let’s get past the drilling itself for a second. I can’t tell you why anybody would do it, but I agree that it’s a moot question at this point. But the fact remains that there just isn’t twenty-five years of oil under our feet. It would be like going to the Mojave Desert and finding a lake. It’s simply impossible.”
“I don’t see how all this matters to your tests. I thought this was about decaying wells. Whatever happened, it was over twenty-five years ago. You may think the wells are a miracle, but they don’t produce much. About thirty-five thousand dollars a year altogether.”
“Then call it professional curiosity. I can feel there’s something wrong here.”
Henry nodded. “I believe in hunches. But I don’t follow them down blind alleys. You’re missing some piece of the puzzle. Oil wells don’t pump oil that doesn’t exist. Anyway, if you’re trying to imply some impropriety, thirty-five thousand a year isn’t much to scheme over.”
Amanda had stopped listening; she was staring out across the field. “You would have been just a kid when these wells were drilled,” she said quietly.
“That’s right. All that’s in a kind of childhood haze. I do remember one thing, though. A guy got killed during the drilling.”
Amanda looked up. “Really? What happened?”
Henry thought. “I don’t remember the details. It was a low-level guy, a roustabout, they called him. But it was big news at the time.”
“Someone was killed here,” she mused. “I didn’t know that. Look, I have to follow this up, if only to find out why I’m wrong.” She hesitated a moment, and moaned, “But why does it have to be Durand?”
“Is it that bad between you two?”
“I loathe him, whereas he merely detests me. He almost got me fired last week. So I can’t let my curiosity about this look like I’m trying to drag something up on him.” She paused, and her mouth crinkled into a demure smile. “On the other hand, it wouldn’t break my heart to nail him if there is something going on here. Is that wrong?”
Henry laughed. “Lawyers never blame people for wanting a little revenge. It’s the basis of our careers. Good luck, as far as I’m concerned. Unless it’s something else.”
“Something else?”
“Driving you. I’ve seen the symptoms before. This could be a Joan of Arc complex.”
“What’s that?”
“A destructive desire to die for a good cause.”
Her smile faded. “That’s the downside, I admit that.” She picked up her tools and began filling her knapsack. “The fact that Durand knows the oil business so well makes me wonder about this place even more,” she said. “Okay, I’m no fan of his, I admit that. But he knows the oil business inside and out. Nobody is going to tell me that he would drill in rock like this.”
“He did drill here,” Henry said. “That much we do know.” He took the heavy pack from her and hoisted it to his own shoulder. She gave him a reproachful look, and he muttered, “Sorry. Midwestern Protestant upbringing. Can’t help myself.”
“It’s okay. I don’t mind chivalry as long as it doesn’t ask me to make it coffee or wear short skirts.”
Henry nodded. “That shouldn’t be a problem.”
The two walked side by side toward Boyd. “You of all people should understand this,” she said. “You can’t tell me this is any stranger than Crandall leaving his money to our friend over there. And you’re pursuing that.”
Henry looked over at Boyd. “All right,” he said. “I didn’t want to say this, but the truth is your suspicions about the drilling make me wonder more about my own problem. It kind of fits the pattern of weirdness.” He kicked a small stone out of their way, and it scuttled away, rolling down a gradually sloping hill. “But let’s get practical. I can’t just have people digging around indiscriminately. Roger’s already about to blow. And Durand’s an old family friend of the Crandalls. So if Roger finds out you’re out here, Durand will know ten minutes later. I can easily see this thing blowing up in both our faces, and I don’t like that.”
Amanda nodded. “There’s some work I can do at the capitol, some discreet sniffing around into records. I don’t have to bring you or Crandall into that. This whole area has been geologically surveyed, and I want to make sure I have my facts right. If anything’s going to blow up, I want at least to know what I’m talking about. The last thing I need right now is more egg on my face.” She looked across the field toward the wells with a concerned expression. “But that’s only going to take me so far. Assuming everything checks out, ultimately I’m going to need to get back on the property, Henry. And I’ll have to bring someone with me, someone more experienced. A real geologist.”
Henry frowned. “Which means Boyd has to come back too, then.”
Amanda nodded. “If I’m going to do this, I can’t give Durand any excuses to have my head. I need Boyd.”
“I wish there were another way,” Henry said quietly. “Bringing him out here was hard enough to justify once. I don’t want to expose him to any more torture, which this place seems to be for him. It passed quickly, but next time we might not be so lucky.”
“So where do we go from here?”
Henry paused, thinking. “I should say forget it.”
“But you aren’t going to, are you?”
He looked at her, surprised that she could read him so well so quickly. “All right,” he said slowly. “Raymond’s reaction to this place makes me want to follow up for my own reasons. I hate how disconnected all these pieces seem right now—your hunch about the wells, the will itself, Boyd’s outburst. So many things look slightly wrong, you know, just wrong enough to make me wonder. And there’s Boyd’s condition—I’ve never accepted the idea that he just went crazy.”
“It happens.”
Henry looked out into the horizon. “You have your intuitions, I have mine.” He turned to her and said, “I’ve seen some crazy people. I’m not pretending to be an expert, but I think Boyd’s different. I think he was pushed. If somehow it’s all connected, maybe we could find the answer to his life along with everything else. That’s something I would be willing to take a risk to do.” He hesitated, looking over at the car. “He’s lost now, adrift in his own mind. But being here obviously disturbed him. That must mean something.” He turned to her. “So I guess I’m saying I have no objection to your digging in, as long as you keep me in the loop.”
They had reached the car. Boyd was quiet, obediently taking his place in th
e back seat. “Let’s go,” Henry said after a moment. “Let’s get the richest man in town back to his park bench.”
It was nearly two by the time they got back to Council Grove. Boyd returned to Custer’s Elm without incident, apparently none the worse for the trip. But the episode at the wells had left a mark on Henry; he had forgotten how agitated the man could become. Boyd had actually looked dangerous for a moment at the wells, flailing his arms about and crying to the sky.
Amanda headed off to Topeka, anxious to check into the geological surveys for the land. Henry was suddenly on his own, and his mind went to the Crandall place; if Roger was back from Topeka, giving him some kind of update couldn’t be reasonably delayed any longer. Amanda’s interest in the wells, however, he would keep to himself.
By the time Henry pulled into the U-shaped Crandall driveway the sun was just beginning to cast short shadows from behind the house, shooting light and dark across the eaves of the building into the front yard. Henry knocked on the door and Sarah answered it, dressed in black jeans and a pale yellow cotton blouse.
“Henry,” she said, “Roger’s out back. But come in for a second.” Sarah led him to a breakfast table that looked out through a window onto the back side of the Crandall property. Henry could see Roger some distance away on horseback, working cattle with several ranch hands. Sarah offered him a cup of coffee, then poured one of her own.
“It’s been a long time,” she said, taking the seat across the table from him.
“Seven years.”
“You don’t get back much, Henry.”
“I guess when I left it was final.” He tried the coffee; it was black and hot, and he took another sip. “I wasn’t the only one who shook the dust of this town off his feet. There’s hardly a soul left from our class.”
“It’s been hard to watch. People move to the jobs.”