Ira Levin - A Kiss Before Dying

"This," Mr. Otto said, pushing his voice over a roaring tide of sound, "is probably the most spectacular part of the entire smelting process."

"Jesus!"

"The converters," Mr. Otto said loudly.

The building was a vast steel shell, percussant with the sustained thunder of machines and men. A greenish haze obscured its far reaches, swimming around shafts of yellow-green sunlight that pillared down through crane tracks and catwalks from windows in the peaked roof dim and high above.

At the near end of the building, on either side, lay six massive dark cylindroid vessels, end to end, like giant steel barrels on their sides, dwarfing the workmen on railed platforms between them. Each vessel had an opening in its upper-most surface. Flames burst forth from these mouths; yellow, orange, red, blue; roaring up into funnel-like hoods overhead that swallowed and bore them away.

One of the converters was turned forward on the cogged rollers that supported it, so that its round mouth, scabrous with coagulated metal, was at the side; liquid fire rushed from the radiant throat, pouring down into an immense crucible on the floor. The molten flow, heavy and smoking, filled the steel container. The converter rolled back groaningly, its mouth dripping. The yoke of the crucible lifted, caught by a great blunt hook from whose block a dozen cables rose in unwavering ascension, rose higher than the converters, higher than the central spine of catwalk, up to the underbelly of a grimy cab that hung from a single-railed track below the dimness of the roof. The cables contracted; the crucible lifted in slow, weightless levitation. It rose until it was higher than the converters, some twenty-five feet above the ground, and then cab, cables and crucible began to draw away, retreating towards the cuprous haze at the northern end of the building.

The center of it all! The heart of the heart! With rapt eyes Bud followed the heat-shimmering column of air over the departing crucible.

"Slag," Mr. Otto said. They stood on an island of railed platform against the south wall, a few feet above the floor and midway between the two banks of converters. Mr. Otto touched his handkerchief to his forehead. "The molten matte from the reverberatory furnaces is poured into these converters. Silica is added, and then compressed air is blown in through pipes at the back. The impurities are oxidized; slag forms and is poured off, as you just saw. More matte is added, more slag forms, and so on. The copper keeps getting richer and richer until, after about five hours, if s ninety-nine per cent pure. Then it's poured out in the same way as the slag."

"Will they be pouring copper soon?" Mr. Otto nodded. "The converters are operated on a stagger system, so that there's a continuous output."

"I'd like to see them pour the copper," Bud said. He watched one of the converters on the right pouring off slag. "Why are the flames different colors?" he asked.

"The color changes as the process advances. That's how the operators tell what's going on inside."

Behind them a door closed. Bud turned. Leo was standing beside Marion, Dettweiler leaned against a ladder that climbed the wall beside the door. "Are you enjoying the tour?" Leo asked over the thunder.

"It's wonderful, Leo! Overpowering!"

"They're going to pour copper over there," Mr. Otto said loudly.

Before one of the converters on the left, a crane had lowered a steel vat, larger than the crucible into which the slag had been poured. Its steep sides were a three inch thickness of dull gray metal, as high as a man. Its rim was seven feet across.

The mammoth cylinder of the converter began to turn, rumbling, rolling forward in its place. A wraith of blue flame flickered over its clotted mouth. It turned further; a volcanic radiance blasted from its interior, veils of white smoke arose, and then a flood of racing incandescence came bursting out. It spilled forward and fell gleamingly into the giant bowl. The steady molten flow seemed motionless, a solid, shining shaft between the converter and the depths of the vat. The converter turned further; new ribs twisted fluidly down the shaft, and again it was motionless. Within the vat the surface of the liquid appeared, slowly rising, clouded by whorls of smoke. The bitter smell of copper singed the air. The streaming shaft thinned, twisting, as the converter began rolling back. The thin stream petered out, its last few drops rolling over the swell of the cylinder and sparkling to the cement floor.

The smoke above the vat dissolved to vaporous wisps. The surface of the molten copper, a few inches below the vessel's rim, was an oblique disc of glistening oceanic green.

"It's green," Bud said, surprised.

"When it cools it regains its usual color," Mr. Otto said.

Bud stared at the restless pool. Blisters formed, swelled, and popped glutinously on its surface. "What's the matter, Marion?" he heard Leo ask. The heated air above the vat trembled as though sheets of cellophane were being shaken. "Matter?" Marion said. Leo said, "You look pale."

Bud turned around. Marion seemed no paler than usual. "I'm all right," she was saying.

"But you're pale," Leo insisted, and Dettweiler nodded agreement.

"It must be the heat or something," Marion said.

"The fumes," Leo said. "Some people can't stand the fumes. Mr. Otto, why don't you take my daughter back to the administration building. We'll be along in a few minutes."

"Honestly, Dad," she said tiredly, "I feel-"

"No nonsense," Leo smiled stiffly. "Well be with you in a few minutes."

"But..." She hesitated a moment, looking annoyed, and then shrugged and turned to the door. Dettweiler opened it for her.

Mr. Otto followed after Marion. He paused in the doorway and turned back to Leo. "I hope you're going to show Mr. Corliss how we mold the anodes." He turned to Bud. "Very impressive," he said, and went out. Dettweiler closed the door. "Anodes?" Bud said.

"The slabs they were loading on the train outside," Leo said. Bud noticed an odd mechanical quality in his voice, as though he were thinking of something else. "They're shipped to the refinery in New Jersey. Electrolytic refining."

"My God," Bud said, "it's some involved process." He turned back to the converters on the left. The vat of copper, its angular handle hooked by the crane overhead, was about to be raised. The dozen cables tensed, vibrating, and then rigidified sharply. The vat lifted from the floor.

Behind him Leo said, "Did Mr. Otto take you up on the catwalk?"

"No," Bud said. "You get a much better view," Leo said. "Would you like to go up?"

Bud turned. "Do we have the time?"

"Yes," Leo said.

Dettweiler, his back against the ladder, stepped aside. "After you," he smiled.

Bud went to the ladder. He grasped one of the metal rungs and looked upwards. The rungs, like oversize staples, ran narrowingly up the brown wall. They focused at a trap in the floor of the catwalk, which projected perpendicularly from the wall some fifty feet above.

"Bottleneck," Dettweiler murmured beside him.

He began to climb. The rungs were warm, their upper surfaces polished smooth. He climbed in a steady rhythm, keeping his eyes on the descending wall before him. He heard Dettweiler and Leo following after him. He tried to visualize the sight the catwalk would offer. To look down on that scene of industrial power...

He climbed the ladder up through the trap and stepped off onto the ridged metal floor of the catwalk. The thunder of the machines was diminished up here, but the air was hotter and the smell of copper stronger. The narrow runway, railed by heavy chain between iron stanchions, extended in a straight line down the spine of the building. It ended halfway down the building's length, where it was cut off by a broad strip of steel partition wall that hung from roof to floor, some twelve feet wider than the catwalk. Overhead, on either side, crane tracks paralleled the runway. They passed clear of the partition, that ended the catwalk and continued into the northern half of the building.