Хэммонд Иннес - Nothing to Lose [= Campbell’s Kingdom]

“No,” I said. “Not for a moment.” I lifted the receiver again and placed it reluctantly to my ear. But the line was dead. Neither the man up at the camp nor the guard had apparently dared to ring back. As the minutes passed, I began to feel easier. I glanced at my watch. Eleven-twenty-three. The guard should be well up the road by now. I reached into my pack, pulled out a pair of pliers and cut both wires close by my clips. The clips sprang free and I packed the telephone away and climbed down.

“Got rid of the guard?” Boy asked.

“I think so,” I said. “If Bill isn’t here in the next five minutes, we’ll know for sure.”

We waited in silence after that. It was very dark. The snow made a gentle, murmuring sound as it fell and the wind stirred the tops of the firs. Every now and then I glanced at my watch, and as the minute hand crept slowly to the half hour my nervousness increased.

Suddenly Boy’s hand gripped my arm. I heard a steady, distant murmur like the rattle of tanks in a parallel valley. The sound steadily grew and then a beam of light glowed yellow through the curtain of the snow. The light increased steadily till the black shape of a Diesel truck showed in the murk and panted to a stop. I glanced at my watch. It was eleven-thirty exactly.

“That you, Garry?” Boy called.

“Sure and it’s me! Who’d you think it was?” Garry leaned out of the cab. “What now, Bruce?”

I signaled Boy to clamber on and swung myself up onto the step. “All your trucks behind you?” I asked.

“Yeah. I checked about five miles back. What do we do now? What’s the plan, eh?”

“Get going as far as we can,” I said.

The driver leaned forward to thrust in his gear, but Garry stopped him. “Before we go ahead I want to know just what sort of trouble I’m headed for.”

“For heaven’s sake,” I said.

“I’m not budging till I know your plan, Bruce. There’s six vehicles here and a man to each vehicle. I’m responsible for them. I got to know what I’m heading into.”

“We’ll talk as we go,” I said.

“No. Now.”

“Don’t be a fool!” I shouted at him angrily. “The guard is off the gate. Every second you delay—” I took a deep breath and got control of myself. “Get going,” I said. “My plan works on split-second timing over this section.” I glanced at my watch. “You’re half a minute behind schedule now. If you can’t make up that half minute you might just as well not have run over from Hundred-and-Fifty-Mile House. And if you miss it this time, there won’t be another chance. All your effort will have been wasted. I can only do this once.”

I had taken the law into my own hands. In the next few hours I would either get my oil-drilling rig up to Campbell’s Kingdom, high in the Canadian Rockies, or get killed.

My name is Bruce Campbell Wetheral. On the day my physician told me I had only a few months left to live, I learned I had inherited the Kingdom from my grandfather, Stuart Campbell. My grandfather had spent his life trying to prove there was oil in the Rockies, and his last request to me was to prove him right.

My partner, Boy Bladen, found a driller named Garry Keogh, who was willing to gamble his equipment on our project for two months. Our problem was to get Keogh’s six trucks up to the Kingdom.

A dam was being built just below my land. It would be finished in a few months, and then my land would be flooded.

Peter Trevedian owned the hoist that went up the mountain, but he was working exclusively for the dam, and he refused to haul my trucks up or even let me use the public road that went through his property.

Without taking anyone into my confidence, I made preparations. Garry’s trucks were to meet me at 11:30 P.M. I tapped into Trevedian’s telephone line and, posing as Trevedian, ordered the valley guard off his post.

Garry’s trucks arrived. Before he went farther he insisted on knowing what arrangements I had made. I lost my temper. “Get going!” I shouted. “My plan works on split-second timing! You’re a half minute behind schedule now... if you miss it this time, there won’t be another chance!”

Garry hesitated, but I think the earnestness of my voice convinced him as much as my words. He motioned to the driver, and the heavy rig truck gathered speed.

“I see you cut the telephone wires.” Garry’s voice was barely audible above the roar of the engine.

“That’s why I can’t do it again,” I said. “All we’ve got to do is rely on confusion. I’m tapping the telephone wires and issuing orders in the name of Trevedian. That enough for you to go on with?”

He hesitated. Then he suddenly nodded and squeezed my arm. “All right,” he said. “You got something up your sleeve, I know that. But if the guard is off the gate up here, I’ll agree you’ve been smart and leave it at that for the moment.”

As we rounded the bend where the guard was posted I saw that the gate was swung open and I caught a glimpse of the deserted guard but as we passed, and then we were climbing.

I glanced at my watch. Eleven-thirty-six. The guard should be on the short cut now. A figure loomed suddenly in the headlights — a figure on horseback, ghostly in his mantle of white.

At a gesture from me the driver checked. “Bruce?” Bill called. And then, as he saw me leaning out toward him, he shouted, “It’s okay! He’s on the trail now!”

“Fine! See you at the Kingdom!”

His “Good luck!” came faintly as we swung away to the first of the hairpins.

That first bend had me in a panic. If we got stuck on the hairpins— But we didn’t get stuck. The driver knew his stuff and we scraped round with inches to spare. And then we were over the top and running out to the cliff where the overhang was.

“Now listen, Garry!” I shouted. “I’m dropping off in a minute. You’ll go on till you get to an area of swamp ground. Just beyond that you’ll find a place where you can turn off to the right into the brush. Get all the vehicles parked in under the trees and all facing outwards, ready to go at a moment’s notice. All lights out. No smoking. No talking. I’ll bring the last truck in myself a little later. Okay?”

He nodded. “Another phone call to make?” He grinned.

“That’s right,” I said. Slowly the big truck rounded the bend under the overhang and then dipped her nose for the long straight run down to the swamp ground. I dropped to the ground.

One by one the trucks passed me... three... four... five... and then I was Hogging down the last truck, jumping for the running board. “I’m Bruce Wetheral!” I shouted to the driver. “Pull up a moment, will you?”

“Okay.” The engine died and the big tanker pulled up with a jerk. “What now?”

“We’re acting as rear guard.” I told him, unslinging my pack. “They’ll be waiting for us about a mile farther on.” I pulled out the box containing batteries and detonating plunger, slung the coil of wires over my shoulder and flicked on my torch. “I’ll be about five minutes,” I said.

I found the cliff wall and felt my way along it, probing with the torch for the branch with which I had marked the shot holes. The branch was still there, white with snow. I found the wires without difficulty, connected up with them and walked back, trailing the battery wires out behind me. At the limit of the wires connected the batteries, checked my connections carefully and then grasped the handle and plunged it down.

There was a terrifying roar, that went on and on, scattering debris in the trees, shaking the snow from them, stripping their branches. A chip of rock as big as my head thudded into the ground at my feet. And then quite suddenly there was silence.