Chapter 5

            Dan Keller parked his Patrol near Aramco’s core area and walked to the Tower Gate. A new promenade of palm trees and hibiscus plants had been installed on the way to the gate – evidence of the never-ending beautification program of the company’s landscaping crews. Employees in casual summer dress were flashing ID cards as they entered through revolving metal gates. Keller was recognized by the guards and waved through.

            His office was outside the core area, the complex where the scientists and engineers worked, where the administrators and corporate management held forth. He came here rarely. He was more comfortable at Ras Tanura Refinery, or Pump Station Number Six. He preferred to be in the field.

            He thought about the cell phone call at Buffling’s house. His problems were escalating, and threatening to careen out of control. He needed some perspective, to help figure things out.

            Keller crossed a broad pedestrian concourse of rose-colored granite on his way to EXPEC – the Exploration and Petroleum Engineering Center. To his right was the Tower Building – actually two towers – housing the oil company’s financial and IT operations. He turned left into a subsidiary concourse, between the Engineering Office Building and EXPEC. Close to EXPEC’s revolving doors was a silvery monument to the past: an intricate wellhead valve assembly – known in the industry as a “Christmas tree” – from the company’s first commercially producing well, old Number Seven. The monument always lifted Keller’s spirits. He smiled as he passed it. He wasn’t an oil man, but he owed his job to those geologists and drillers of the 1930s who had faith in their conviction that an ocean of oil lay beneath the sands of eastern Arabia. Well Number Seven – it was preceded by six frustrating dry holes, until that heaven-sent gusher finally exploded skyward in 1938.

            Keller’s appointment was in a cluttered geology office on the sixth floor. Ivan Salazar lifted a stack of papers off a chair and invited Keller to take a seat. The scientist was clearly distracted by his work of the day. He rolled up a large seismic printout on his desk and set it aside. Sitting down, he folded his hands and smiled at the security officer.

            “We don’t get your type in here often, Dan,” Salazar said.

            “I imagine not. Our professional worlds hardly ever intersect.”

            “But today they do?” The geologist smiled, somewhat nervously.

            “It looks like it. Ivan, I need your help.”

            Salazar sat back in his chair.  He looked like he was about to get a tax audit.

            “Well, what can I do for you? It’s about the deaths, isn’t it?”

            “Yes, it’s about the deaths. And there’s another problem…”

            Salazar’s eyes widened. “Something else? How much worse can it get? I didn’t know that engineer, Fraser, very well, but Tony Buffling was a colleague, a friend for God’s sake! We’ve been working together on Hima. Was it – suicide?”

            “I can’t say, Ivan. But things are getting complicated. I just got a call from Najran. You had a team out in the Rub’ yesterday.”

            “Yes…”

            “Art Vallentine and Dahoum Dossary?”

            “Dan – ”

            “They didn’t check in. They’re missing. We’ve sent a chopper out to look for them.”

            “Oh shit,” Salazar said. “Oh God… I’m sure they’ll find them, Dan. This happens all the time, you know that. A vehicle breaks down. You send out a chopper, and there they are, on top of a dune, waving their shirts like madmen…”

            “I know, Ivan. It happens all the time. Still, with these deaths, I’m a bit concerned. Tell me about Hima.”

            Salazar stood up, snared the empty mug from his desk and walked over to his coffeemaker. He poured himself a refill.

            “Coffee, Dan?”

            “No thanks.”

            He began pacing, sipping his coffee. Then he looked at Keller.

            “Hima’s going to be a great producer someday. Extra Light crude, bordering on Super Light. The field may rival Shaybah, flowing a half million barrels a day or more.”

            “You’ve had some problems, haven’t you, Ivan? You’re behind schedule in field development.”

            Salazar stared into his coffee mug.

            “Well, yes, but that’s not so unusual. These things happen. Our discovery well was gangbusters, but as we sought to delineate the contours of the field, we had some … difficulties.”

            “Such as?”

            “Primarily in the southwest corner of the field. There’s an anomaly above the oil-bearing strata. It’s caused us some drilling problems. But we’re working on it.”

            “Anomaly?”

            “Let’s just say a different type of rock. It’s harder to drill through. In fact, so far, it’s resisted all our bits. The anomaly is only about ten kilometers in diameter, so we may end up working around it, getting at the oil with horizontal.”

            “Horizontal?”

            “New technology, Dan. We'll drill straight down just beyond the edge of the anomaly, then when we get to the right depth, we'll tilt the borehole 90 degrees and drill horizontally. We’re doing a lot of that now, for various geological reasons.”

            “What were your men doing out there yesterday?”

            “Scouting new well sites, just beyond the anomaly.”

            “How deep is this anomaly?”

            “That’s the surprising thing. It’s only about a thousand feet down. Pretty unusual…”

            “What’s it made of, Ivan?”

            “We don’t know. The seismic is very hard to read. Very confusing readings. In fact, sometimes I think –”

            Salazar returned to his desk and sat down. He wrapped his hands around his mug and looked at Keller.

            “Sometimes you think what?” Keller asked.

            “Sometimes I think the anomaly is hollow.”
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