The Sons of Adam

by Harry Bingham

  Slowly Tom descended.

  The man arrived at the foot of the rig.

  ‘What in … ? What in hell’s name … ? Jesus Christ, boys, who gave you permission to drill here?’

  The man was panting and out of breath. He looked like he was about to have a heart attack. He sat down on a section of well-casing and tried to recover himself. There were now more than a hundred derricks on Signal Hill, and the air resounded with their noise, smoke and stink. The newcomer was clearly unused to it. It was almost as though he was waiting for the noise to stop before coming to the point.

  ‘This is my land,’ said Tom. ‘That’s to say, the drilling rights are mine. Signed it up with old Ma Hershey. You can take a look at the contract, if you don’t believe me.’

  ‘Hershey, the old witch! She doesn’t own this land no more. She doesn’t own doodley-squat. She doesn’t even own that little rathole she lives in.’

  ‘I saw the title deed. It was all in order.’

  ‘Order, yeah, but in order when? Hershey hasn’t owned this piece of land for fifteen years. Her old man used to run cattle here, or tried to, but he mortgaged the land to pay for his drink, and the drink ended up swallowing the land. Couple of Japs farm it now.’

  ‘And you’re who?’ Tom’s voice came over all aggressive – needlessly so, since aggression would get him nowhere. He swept an oil-stained hand through his oil-stained hair and did nothing at all to improve his appearance. He checked his voice and added more gently, ‘I mean, who do you represent?’

  ‘Pardon me – good girl, good girl –’ Pipsqueak had begun pulling angrily at the man’s laces and he tried to shake her off without hurting her. The man’s heart had slowed to a few hundred beats per minute, and he mopped his face with a huge white hanky as he stretched his leg out and surveyed the view. ‘Pardon me, I’m Walter P. Faries, down here from Bakersfield, Bakersfield Thrift Savings Bank … Damnation, is it always this rackety and hot? A man can’t hear himself talk, let alone talk himself think. No, no, I mean a man can’t think himself … Oh hell, you know what I mean.’ He blew out his lips in a long puff as he slowly recovered his breath.

  Tom’s face flickered with hope. ‘Of course, I can see you’re no oilman, Mr Faries. Just supposing you can prove title to the land, I’d be most happy just to switch around that contract. Address all those royalty cheques to you instead of Hershey.’

  ‘Lord, no, I’m no oilman, and don’t want to be one neither. It’s a wonder to me how you boys can stand all this.’

  ‘I’ve figured it all out. Where to site the wells, where to lay the pipelines, how to get it to the refinery cheap and easy. There’s a lot of pitfalls in this business. It’s not just finding the stuff.’

  ‘It’s a wonder this hill isn’t pumped dry already.’

  ‘Not really, Mr Faries. We’ve only just struck today, and we’re ahead of most of these drillers round here. Now we’ve got oil, we can begin to raise some real capital to get new wells sunk. In a town-lot scramble like this one, you need to drill fast and pump furious.’

  ‘Capital … that’ll be my side of things, I guess.’

  ‘That’s right, Mr Faries. An oilman and a banker, the ideal partnership, I reckon.’

  ‘I reckon so. That’s what I been figuring.’

  Faries took off his shoes and shook sand and gravel out onto the dirt. His sock was glued to his foot with sweat. He massaged his feet, wiggled his toes, and put his shoes back on with a sigh. A sudden bolt of wind brought the rough heat of a natural gas flare down the hill and a shower of forge-flung soot. He blinked.

  ‘If you want,’ said Tom, ‘we can go someplace quiet right now. Sort out the paperwork. Have a lawyer look over it. I’ll need to get your land title checked over at the county courthouse. All being well, we can switch the contracts round within a day or two.’

  Faries’ gaze had been locked into the middle distance, staring at nothing. Now, at last, he heard Tom speaking to him. His gaze changed, and he focused, blinking, on Tom.

  ‘No, no, no. I’m sorry. No. God, my brother would knock the hell out of me if I went and did anything like that. He’s an oilman, see? Been in the business thirty-five years, would you credit it? He’s going to drill here. Right here. Got it all figured out, so he says.’

  97

  It was a new look Alan Montague that presented himself at the immense black front door to 49 Berkeley Square.

  His blond hair had never recovered from the nearly three weeks it had spent beneath a thick shampoo of stinking crude. Reluctantly, he’d had his hair cut to within an eighth of an inch of his scalp at Abadan, and spent many vain moments in front of the mirror hoping that it would grow back fast enough not to embarrass him in time for his return. His moustache and beard he had shaved off, of course, and, though he’d expected to let the moustache grow back, he found that he preferred himself completely smooth-shaven. He’d also washed himself three times daily, until the shades of black had finally left his skin. He’d carved at his nails with a penknife until they looked almost clean and white. He’d bought a suit of clothes with borrowed money – everything was borrowed now – and hoped that European fashions hadn’t long passed him by.

  His efforts had been a passable success. He was certainly clean enough. His hair was very short, but it gave him a military appearance that made him look younger and not unattractive. His clothes were newish and reasonably well-fitting, though they’d never have passed muster at Savile Row. He raised his hand to the great brass knocker and brought it crashing down.

  He had never been so nervous in all his life.

  The door swung open. A butler, as tall and solemn as a column of marble, stood behind it.

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘I’m … My name is Alan Montague … I’m hear to see Miss –’

  Alan’s nervousness extended to his mouth. He actually found it difficult to find words, let alone say them. He felt as though he must be shaking like a leaf, though in fact he was doing nothing of the sort.

  ‘Alan Montague to see Miss Dunlop. Yes, sir. If you would like to follow –’

  The butler had turned and was beginning to lead Alan down the long cool hallway towards the drawing room when there was a minor explosion. Running feet, the fast light tapping of a woman’s shoes, a rushing of skirts. Alan turned towards the staircase leading from upstairs. It was Lottie. He hardly had time to see her face. She flung herself at him, arms around his neck, lips pressed hard against his.

  ‘Oh, Alan, darling, darling, dearest Alan, my love,’ she said, when their need for air finally forced them apart. ‘My darling, best, bravest, most favourite oilman.’

  ‘Lottie, dear, good Lord, how did you … ?’

  Slowly and deliciously, in the ponderous old drawing room, they began to reintroduce themselves.

  Alan spoke of Persia, the long months of exploration, the sale of his concession, the return to Persia, the first dry hole and a little of the agonies connected with the second. He said nothing of his cholera and nothing of the malaria that had followed.

  ‘Darling, you were so brave. And what was the climate like? Was it very beastly?’

  ‘No. Not at all. It was chilly in winter and a little too warm in summer, but not unpleasant. Spring was delightful.’

  ‘Oh, dearest, now I can’t believe a single word you’ve told me. Daddy is the best of chums with old Charlie Greenaway, who says the weather out there is perfectly frightful.’

  ‘Well, it was rather trying at times.’

  ‘Pig.’

  For the first ten minutes, Lottie seemed like an exotic bird of the jungle: very wonderful, but very strange. Her beauty was dazzling. Her hair had the colour of a Persian sunset: crimson and gold, seen through a smoky cloud of dust. She wore a simple green frock, but the skirt sat higher up the calf than Alan had ever seen worn by a decent girl. But it wasn’t long before the shock of her newness wore off. When she laughed, the end of her nose bent down as he always remembered it. There was a tiny s
car that drew a thin white line across her right-hand eyebrow. She was just the way he’d always remembered her: completely different and exactly the same.

  They discussed all the most important topics in turn. Alan’s hair (‘Horrible, darling. You look like a drill sergeant’); the loss of his moustache (‘Don’t even think of growing it back. It was like kissing a hairbrush’); his clothes (‘Those trousers are simply laughable, my dearest. Your legs are like two little pencils. We’ll get you some Oxford bags first thing in the morning’). And then, of course, there was Lottie’s life.

  ‘Parties, darling, mostly parties. Mummy and Daddy became terribly upset about me being a nurse. As you know, I adored it, but they just couldn’t see how I was ever going to get married if I was knee-deep in bandages all day long. Well, I wasn’t going to be bullied, of course, but then some of my dearest friends among the soldiers died or moved back home and I realised I wasn’t really needed any longer. So I came home. Daddy kept throwing whacking great parties for me, hoping that I was going to get married to one of his dreary City people. I couldn’t tell him that I wouldn’t even think of marrying a banker when I jolly well meant to marry a strapping great oilman.’

  Alan swallowed. ‘Lottie, my dear, may I ask you a question?’

  ‘What a silly thing to ask. Apart from anything else, you just did.’

  ‘That night we bumped into each other. In Piccadilly. You were with your friends. We said hello and you invited me to join you all for a drink.’

  ‘Yes?’

  Alan swallowed a second time and licked his lips. ‘Look, I thought about that meeting every single night in Persia. I couldn’t see … I couldn’t see that you could still have had any tenderness for me … You seemed so distant, so light. It was almost as if –’

  ‘You are a nitwit. What was I meant to have done? I didn’t know you were going to hit oil, did I? I had to think jolly quickly and I decided the best thing was to pretend I’d forgotten you. I thought that would give you the very best chance of getting over me. And personally, I think I did rather well at it. Pretending that is, not forgetting.’

  Alan smiled and stroked her arm. The hairs on her arm were auburn too. It would take a lifetime to get to know her properly, a lifetime he now hoped to have …

  ‘Oh, darling, I’ve been forgetting,’ she interrupted. ‘Daddy’s here, in his study. He’s raring to meet you. Oil’s in, apparently. All the rage in Leadenhall. Oh, and I think this might be a good moment to mention the fact that you’re dying to marry me.’

  The interview this time could hardly have been more different.

  ‘Montague, my dear fellow! Splendid! Splendid news! Many congratulations!’

  ‘Thank you, sir. I may take it then that you give your approval?’

  ‘My approval? I hardly think you need my approval.’

  ‘It’s just that last time, sir, you were … a little less enthusiastic.’

  ‘I don’t follow you. Oil comes out of the ground whether I approve of it or not. Probably just as well, eh?’

  ‘I see. Oil … Yes, I was actually speaking about another topic even more precious to me. Your daughter, sir, and I have loved each other for some time, and –’

  ‘Good golly, man, of course, of course. Couldn’t ask for a better husband. Of course you must marry her. Sooner the better.’ Egham Dunlop turned to some papers on his desk. The map of the world was still there on the wall behind him, though with slightly fewer pins in it than before. Dunlop was still a powerful man, but Alan noticed that he had aged a little since their last interview. They all had, even Lottie …

  ‘As a matter of fact,’ the banker interrupted Alan’s reverie, ‘I’ve been looking over some figures. How much d’you think you’ll need?’

  ‘Excuse me, sir?’

  ‘How much money? Will a million be enough or d’you need more?’

  Alan flushed. ‘I hadn’t thought … I didn’t intend to ask for a penny, sir. Though I may be a little short of funds at present, I have no doubt that, following my recent good fortune, I shall be able to keep your daughter in a manner –’

  ‘No, no, no! God’s sakes! You’ll damn well keep Lottie like a princess, but she’s hardly going to cost a million, is she? How much for the company, man, the company? Oil stocks are burning hot at the moment. If you want to raise money, now’s the time to strike. As I say, I can see you getting a million without much trouble. Two million might be pushing it, but I wouldn’t declare the thing impossible …’

  Back with Lottie immediately afterwards, Alan gave her the good news. By this stage, Alan was happy beyond happy. He’d arrived at the house not knowing if Lottie still remembered him, and he would leave it engaged and with her father’s blessing. He was in a kind of blissful delirium, as though the air was champagne. But even amidst the champagne, there was a question he needed to ask.

  ‘Lottie, darling, how did you know everything? I mean, I didn’t tell anyone about finding oil. I didn’t tell anyone I’d be coming here. Yet, you knew about the oil and everything seemed so … well, expected.’

  Lottie threw back her head and laughed. ‘“He bringeth forth grass for the cattle: and green herb for the service of man.”’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Don’t interrupt. I haven’t got there yet. He bringeth forth grass and all that, so that “man may bring out of the earth oil to give him a cheerful countenance”. Psalm a hundred and four, verse fifteen. And you’re an atheistical old goat for not knowing.’

  ‘Psalm one-oh-four … Reynolds! Reynolds sent you … You and he … The pair of you have been in league all along. I don’t believe it!’

  ‘Well, I was hardly going to let you stride off into the Persian desert with no way of knowing what was happening to you, was I? I asked Charlie Greenaway if he knew anyone who could keep an eye on you for me and he said that one of his best chaps had just gone off to work with you. He was rather cross about it, actually. So I met up with George. I thought he looked terribly ferocious to begin with, but he turned out to be a perfect sweetie. He sent letters to me every month, addressing them to a friend of mine so you wouldn’t suspect. He told me all about how you were getting on and all about how you – dear, dear man – wrote infinite letters to me that you never sent. Obviously I wanted to know the very first minute you’d struck oil, hence the telegram. Personally I don’t know why he didn’t choose psalm one hundred and fourteen, verses seven and eight: “Tremble, earth at the God of Jacob; who changeth the flint stone into a springing well.” Not that you’d have known either way, Mr Goat.’

  ‘He didn’t mention, I suppose … he didn’t say anything about …’

  ‘About your cholera? Yes he jolly well did. And your malaria. I told Charlie Greenaway that if his blasted doctors had let you keel over from some horrid little mosquito, I’d’ve come along and shot the lot of them. The doctors, I mean. I shouldn’t think I could hit the mosquitoes.’

  ‘Oh dear, my love! He shouldn’t have told you.’

  ‘No!’ Lottie’s tone changed abruptly. Her voice was suddenly forceful, even steely. ‘If we’re to be married, then we’re going to be damn well married. That means knowing everything, even the bad things. Especially the bad things.’ Her voice softened again and she put a hand on his arm. ‘I’m not very easily shocked, you know.’

  ‘No.’ Alan’s heart slid a little further in love. ‘You are a remarkable lady. I’m very lucky.’

  He kissed her.

  And on that evening of blissful delirium, there remained just one last important ritual. Lottie pointed out to Alan that, technically speaking, he had completely forgotten to ask her if she wanted to marry him and, ‘For all you know, I might say no. I do like to be consulted, you know.’

  Alan sank to one knee. He took her hand in his.

  ‘Dearest Lottie,’ he began, ‘will you make me the happiest man in the world … ?’

  98

  Lawyers did what lawyers do.

  They fought, they argued, they
dragged things out. Tom’s attorney told him he’d win for sure. He babbled about the irregularities in the mortgage documentation, about statutes of limitations, about protection of widow’s rights in the sunshine state, about ipsis dipsis and locus fatuus. Tom’s attorney promised victory and delivered defeat.

  Walt Faries struck a deal with Duster Larzelere and the others, and they all switched round to work for him. The Duster and the rest were sympathetic. They preferred Tom to Faries, but they had to go where the money was. They were apologetic but determined.

  Tom tried to recover something. He’d drilled the well, after all. The derrick and rig were his, even if he’d had to buy them with promises and prayers. But he lost. He lost everything. He ended up owing more than he possessed, and would have been declared bankrupt except that his creditors didn’t bother to hound him for money they knew he didn’t have.

  On the last stupid day of the last stupid hearing, Tom owned the clothes he wore, a small white loving mongrel with a soft spot for bacon, and two dollars fifty-five cents.

  He stumbled out into the sun, a pauper.

  There were more than four hundred wells on Signal Hill now, four hundred producing wells. America had seen oil booms before, but never anything like Signal Hill.

  Take the cemetery. Everyone had agreed that it would be quite wrong to drill beneath the cemetery: blasphemy and desecration. But there’s blasphemy and then again there’s the crime of unAmerican stupidity in the matter of money, and it didn’t seem like any way to honour the dead to leave them floating over a sea of perfectly saleable oil. So the next-of-kin all clubbed together and built oil wells round the holy yard, whipstocking their drill pipes sideways into the land beneath the graves. Tom had met a guy selling shares in his Auntie Flo. He said it was his auntie that lay dead up there, so it must be his oil, and if anyone wanted a piece of it they’d have to buy shares in Flo. It seemed like everyone in the whole world had made money out of Signal Hill.