Исай Лукодьянов - The Black Pillar

"Exactly what we're doing," replied Will.

They looked each other in the eye.

"Shall we lower the cutter down the string?" asked Kravtsov.

"We shan't have time. The speed's accelerating all the time. Anyway, we couldn't manage it alone. We'll have to break the pipes."

Decisions like that are only taken in emergencies. But this was an emergency indeed. They would be unable to cope with both strings of pipes, whose speed continued to accelerate. This was certainly the only course open to them: to pull at the string until it broke somewhere deep down, and then pull up the broken section as quickly as possible and cut it up with the automatic cutter. Then they would have the casing to cope with.

Once again Will's fingers touched the keys of the controls. The main engine whined, the gears droned, and the cables screeched eerily as they tightened under the terrific load. The wind blowing in guests through the taut ropes, whistled a pirate song. The pointer on the load indicator crept trembling toward the red danger line, as the engineers silently watched it. Suddenly they heard a faint click, coming up the long string of pipes from far down. The pointer jerked to the left: now only nine thousand three hundred metres of pipe hung on the hook.

"We've broken it!" yelled Kravtsov happily. "Switch on the cutter!''

The hook continued to pull the broken section of the string up from the well. Will adjusted the speed of the cutter to their ascent: the cross bar of the bracket rose with the string, and the blue plasma flame surrounded the pipe. While the upper machine removed the severed "candle", the cutter descended and again pressed against the pipe, and so they cut it candle by candle, and the cutter glided up and down, up and down.

It was already broad daylight; it had been pouring but now the rain had stopped, and the wind was driving a pile of storm clouds low above the ocean.

The casing had risen so high that it became impossible to cut the drill pipes, and they now had to turn their attention to this. Kravtsov removed the plasma cutter from the automatic bracket and, holding it by hand, set to work ripping at the rough barnacle-covered casing until he succeeded in cutting it at the root. Then once more the automatic bracket glided up and down.

The hours passed imperceptibly and evening fell.

At long last they finished this devilish job and the whole severed string of pipes had been pulled up, separated, and stacked in the racks.

Kravtsov dragged himself off to make coffee.

When he came out of the galley with the tray Will was writhing in a deckchair pressing his heart.

"Nitro-glycerine," he gasped. "In the wall-cupboard, top shelf… on the left…"

Kravtsov dashed to Will's cabin and snatched up the glass tube. Will put two white tablets under his tongue.

"Do you feel any better?" Kravtsov asked anxiously. Will nodded.

Kravtsov gave him a cup of coffee and hurried to the radio cabin. It was past ten before he was able to contact the Centre.

"Yes, yes! Urgently!" he yelled. "Two crews at least! And a doctor! What? Yes, a doctor- McPherson's had a heart attack…"

Will snatched the microphone from his hand.

"There's no need for a doctor," he said in a calm voice. "Four emergency crews-the whole lot-as quick as you can."

It was drizzling and a heavy sea was running.

Kravtsov noticed nothing. All night he had been cutting the casing and did not observe the grey morning dawn. He had stopped work twice just to see how Will was getting on. The Scotsman lay sleepless in his cabin.

"What's the speed?" he asked in a barely audible voice.

"Four metres a minute," answered Kravtsov, looking uneasily at him. "Well, how are you? Any better?"

"The cutter," whispered Will. "Is the cutter all right?"

"Yes, it's all right." Kravtsov shrugged his shoulders. "Well, try to get some sleep, Will. I'm off."

There was nothing wrong with the plasma cutter, but his arms were aching from its weight. The pipes were rising faster and faster from the hole, and Kravtsov barely had time to hitch the ends of the sections to the hook of the auxiliary hoist. Now the argon had run out and he had to dash to the storehouse and load a truck with new cylinders. That took him a good half hour and when he got back to the borehole, though he had raced the trolley along the rails, the casing had nearly reached the crown-block.

Kravtsov switched the controls from the main panel to the lift panel and went up aloft. With difficulty he managed to replace the eight-inch spider with a twenty-inch one. Then, while it glided down to the pipe and, clanking grabbed its upper end tightly, Kravtsov adjusted its speed of elevation, came back down, and switched on the cutter.

He cut through the pipe-with an oblique incision-and, pulling it to one side with the auxiliary hoist, pushed the trolley under it. A few cautious manipulations and the one hundred and twenty metre section fell on the gangway on the other side of the derrick.

Now, a three-metre length of pipe like the stump of a felled tree, rose from the mouth of the well. It would be a little time before it reached the top.

He must give Will his tea.

Bent double, and scarcely able to drag his legs, Kravtsov crawled to the Scotsman's cabin. He pulled off his gloves and wiped his face, which was dripping with perspiration and rain. He was slightly giddy with fatigue, and also perhaps, because he had eaten practically nothing for a whole day.

Will was not in his cabin.

The galley-door was wide open. Kravtsov dashed there and found Will, of course, standing by the stove and stirring something in a saucepan.

"What the devil are you doing here?" he yelled, beside himself with rage. "Get back to bed at once!"

"Buckwheat porridge," said Will in a low voice. "I never imagined it took so long to get soft."

Kravtsov said nothing as he looked at the blue rings under the Scotsman's eyes.

I get back to bed," he repeated. "I'll finish it."

"You ought to have been a prison warder and not a mining engineer," grumbled Will and went out on the verandah.

Kravtsov took the kettle off the stove and made Will and himself a cup of tea. He took a few sips and put the cup on the table. From the verandah he could see the casing rising inside the derrick at a noticeably greater speed.

Kravtsov ran to the derrick. But when he switched on the cutter, instead of the sharp blue tongue of the high-temperature plasma, a broad, sluggish, smoky flame came out.

Swearing to himself he took the cutter back under the lights to see what had happened. He had hardly taken five steps when it ejected a perfectly normal plasma flame.

What was all this?

He rushed back to the pipe, switched on the cutter, and the plasma once again became an ordinary flame. Kravtsov nervously turned the valves, jerked the feed hoses-without result.

"I've been expecting this," said a voice behind him.

"Look here, Will, if you don't go to bed at once…"

"Switch off the cutter-it won't work." "Why not?"

"The rate of ascent is accelerating, and the magnetic field of the string has increased. The ionizer of the cutter won't act close to the well. Neutralization, understand?"

"What are we to do?" Kravtsov switched off the cutter and flung it on the deck.

"There are gas burners in the storeroom."

"Old stuff," muttered Kravtsov.

"There's no other way. We've got to go on cutting."

They got on the trolley and drove to the storeroom. The gas cylinders had to be dug out of a far corner cluttered up with all sorts of junk. Will suddenly gave a low moan, and sank down on a box. Kravtsov dropped a cylinder and ran over to the Scotsman.

"It's all right… Just a minute…" With trembling hand Will took a glass tube out of his pocket and put two tablets under his tongue. "It'll pass soon. You go on…"