I had closed in to watch how it was done, the crane head rising again and Bowstring pouring a white froth from her stern as the winch roared, the pennant dragging at the 15-ton anchor till the big shackle at the top of its stock came clear of the water, held hard against the fat round barrel of the stern-roller. The heavy clamp, secured by a strop to the bulwarks, was snapped on, the men on deck shackling on the long pennant wire attached to one of the three-ton anchor buoys and a winch drum high up on the corner of the rig paying out cable as the tow began, out to the pinprick light of the anchor position marker rising and falling in the swell.
It took almost an hour to lay that one anchor, the men on the supply ship never still, moving so nimbly as their flat craft wallowed with its load that they looked like ballet dancers on the lit stage of the after deck. By midnight the second anchor was down and Rattler, released from her tow, had joined Bowstring, the crane in almost constant motion as it fed pennants and buoys to the two of them. And all the time we lay hove-to and rolling just clear of the anchor cable lines, our radio tuned to the walkie-talkie talk. There was only one hitch, and that was towards dawn.
'North Star to Duchess… close in to No. 5 — ve haf No. 5 anchor jammed and are zending divers down.'
Two divers in wet suits, with aqualungs on their backs, were lowered by crane in a steel cage, their torches shining like sea luminosity as they swam around the column housing of No. 5. The pennant wire had wrapped itself round one of the anchor flukes and we lay there, with the rig towering above us, while the pennant was cleared and dropped and a new pennant shackled on, the anchor hoisted clear by an auxiliary winch on the rig's deck.
It was daylight by the time that last anchor was laid and the rig held by all eight winches under correct tension. Bowstring was already over the horizon, Rattler hull-down, both on their way back to Aberdeen. The Decca ship had gone during the night. Only ourselves left now, a lone trawler keeping watch around the rig. It was 06.28 and I handed over to Johan and turned in.
I had hardly closed my eyes, it seemed, before a hand was shaking me and Henrik's voice said, 'The rig has sent a boat for you.' It was an inflatable rescue boat with one of the divers at the outboard motor, an Italian with dark curly hair and thin olive features. 'Issa Mr Villiers. 'E wanta speak wiz you.'
It was a bumpy ride, and the boat driven at speed and the northerly breeze kicking up small waves, only snatches of talk possible. His name was Alfredo and he was one of the divers who had been down clearing the anchor. 'Issa very cold, si… Where is my 'ome? It is Milano. But not in a long time, I mean.' He had been in the North Sea for two years now, before that in Nigeria. 'Si, I have a wife and two bambini. Those-a boys, they are growing with a Scotch accent.' White teeth flashing with laughter and the bows dropping as we swept in under the giant pier-shadow of the rig. The slop of waves against the columns, the swirl of the tide running, and then the rusty iron of an endless stairway embracing a column and rising to the distant glint of sky high above. 'You go to toolpusher's office. They tella you where is Mr Villiers. Okay?'
Even though the ballast tanks had been blown and the torpedo-shaped pontoons sunk from the towing to the drilling depth of almost sixty feet, I reckoned it was well over fifty feet from sea level to the helicopter deck. I came out just beside the monstrous drum of No. 4 winch. The toolpusher's office was a steel shack, the entrance leading off the helicopter deck, and behind it was the pipe deck piled high with pipe, steel casing, drill bits, all the ironmongery of drilling, some 2,000 tons of it. Beyond the pipe deck was the steel skid for lifting pipe to the derrick floor, and reared above it, like an enormous pylon, the derrick tower itself.
I pushed open the door of the toolpusher's office and a leathery-faced man wearing a bright red peaked cap looked up from the girlie picture mag he was reading. Behind him was a complicated diagram with the emergency indicators for blow-out prevention. Of course, they would have precautions, and that diagram, so detailed, so comprehensive — I stood there for a moment staring up at it. Pipe rams, blind shear — I can't remember all of them, but four or five fail-safes, each with a red warning light to beam out its danger signals once action had been taken. With all those safety measures there did not seem much danger of a dragging anchor causing oil pollution.
'You looking for somebody?' The man in the peaked cap was regarding me suspiciously.
'Mr Villiers,' I said. More than anything else the sight of that diagram brought home to me the nature of this colossal machine, the complications of operating deep under water and deeper still into layers of rock below the seabed.
Offhandedly he directed me to the barge engineer's office. This was one deck down into the crew's quarters, right opposite the ballast control room. I caught a glimpse of an engineer seated at an enormous console full of pressure gauges and the whole wall facing him taken up by a diagram panel with red and green lights, flanked by ballast indicators that looked like giant temperature gauges. Then I was into the office and two men were standing at a table in the corner, poring over a large design sheet, their white safety helmets perched on a pile of books. They turned as I entered and one of them, a short bulky man with hair that stood up like a brush and very blue eyes in a crinkled sun-worn face, folded the design, leaning on it with his hands. He wore a faded anorak over a grubby T-shirt. The other was dressed in a sky-blue sweater, with the clean collar of a white shirt showing above it, and neatly creased, immaculate trousers. He was taller, thinner, with livelier features. 'You the skipper of that trawler?' he asked. I nodded and he held out his hand. 'Vic Villiers.' His grip was firm, his eyes on my face, summing me up. 'A long night, eh?'
'I had just turned in,' I said.
'Sorry about that. How would you like to be running one of those supply ships?'
'I think I might have a nervous breakdown.'
He laughed. 'You've never seen a rig laying anchors before?'
'No.'
'Nor had I. Fascinating!' There was an undercurrent of excitement in his voice. 'This is Pieter van Dam.' He turned to the man beside him. 'God knows how many times he's done it, eh, Pieter? And not an ulcer in his belly.'
The Dutchman's stolid face broke into a smile as he made an exaggerated effort to pull in his protruding stomach. 'The ulcers only come ven you begin losing lifes, is it?'
'Well, you're not losing any here.' There was a subtle change in Villiers's manner, the smile gone and the moment of humour with it. 'You're off on the first flight, aren't you? I'll see you before you go.' He gave a brief nod of dismissal and turned to me. 'Sit down.' He waved me to one of the chairs drawn up round a low table littered with empty coffee cups and oil industry magazines. The door closed behind the Dutchman and we were alone. The room was stuffy, full of stale cigarette and cigar smoke, the glare of fluorescent lighting. I was nervous and suddenly very tired, the all-pervading hum of machinery a soporific.
'You wanted to see me,' I murmured. He was standing there, staring at me, and I wondered whether he suspected anything. 'Is it about the work permits?' If it wasn't about the work permits…
'We had a report, of course. Putting to sea like that was a little high-handed, the sort of thing that upsets the locals.' But he was smiling as he sat down opposite me. 'I've had Fuller open an office in Scalloway now. He'll fix it for you. In any case, you don't have to worry about work permits here.' He stretched out his legs, leaning back, the light on the dark stubble of his jaw. 'What did you think of Fuller by the way?'