Chapter 51 — Gulf of Mexico
Rufus presages a change to the format of this podcast.
Followed by Chapter 51 —— Gulf of Mexico, in which Zeno investigates how Saskia knew about the DBG rig spill.
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Hello Friends,
Starting the new year often brings with it that feeling of “wait, where was I again? what was I doing?”
Of course, the new year is not the only time such feelings of dislocation arise. Karl, a friend of mine, described a while back how he was listening to this podcast while dealing with some house maintenance only to realize at some point that his focus had distracted and he had no idea of what I’d just said.
I, myself, have had the same experience, reading a page of text, only to get to the bottom and realize that my eyes had merely been scanning over the words; my mind was distracted by other thoughts altogether. Sometimes those thoughts are related to the book I’ve been reading, sometimes they are my own life intruding.
It all reminds me a bit of Kevin Klein’s character, Otto, in a Fish Called Wanda, a man prone to reading Nitzsche without a lick of comprehension. At some point in a conversation Otto asks simply: “What was the middle bit?”
Anyway, another friend of mine, Kylie, noted that for those of you out there who like to binge the episodes of The Curve of Time, it would be helpful to have the chapter first and the commentary second. Not that Kylie isn’t interested in my commentary, but this way she could simply skip to the next episode and stay with the story on her first run through. So, with that note in mind, as of next week, I’ll begin each episode with the next chapter of The Curve of Time, rather than my assorted random thoughts. And as a halfway measure, I’ll stop this week’s commentary here.
Until next week, be kind to someone and keep an eye out for the ripples of joy you’ve seeded.
Cheerio
Rufus
PS. If you think of someone who might enjoy joining us on this experiment, please forward them this email. And if you are one of those someone’s and you’d like to read more
And now, without further ado, here’s chapter fifty one, in which Zeno investigates how Saskia knew about the DBG rig spill.
— 51 —
Gulf of Mexico
It annoyed Zeno that Western Civilization was as ungrateful as it was about the benefits that oil and gas had bestowed upon it. So sanctimonious about the ills of fossil fuels. How quickly the world inclined towards casting aside the industry that single-handedly raised the global standards of living over the last century.
Still, an internal leak from staff on his team was even more galling; it amounted to being shivved in the stomach rather than merely stabbed in the back. If there was an internal leak, he would get to the bottom of it.
Zeno had flown south, but hadn’t bothered to make his way out to the rig itself. Instead, he limited his visit to the staging facility in Houma where he spoke with the incoming and outgoing crews. The muggy Louisiana summer was still a couple of months out and that made it easier to keep his cool in the face of the PR nightmare.
The crew were a tight knit team, and unlikely to rat on one another, but their quarters on the rig were close enough that it was impossible for one to slip anything by his fellow rig dogs. Zeno wondered which of them could possibly be connected with the woman who had shown up at his house. And how? Had they sought her out? Or she them? It seemed unlikely that she might have just guessed there was a problem, but . . .
Either way, her exact intention was——well, she’d hit her head before any of that became clear. She had been on his doorstep to force his hand——or had she actually been there to help somehow, as she’d indicated?
He listened to Mandelbaum, the rig manager. The surly man had no definitive suspicions about who might have revealed details of the issues they were having on the rig before the blowout, not beyond a couple of subordinates that he didn’t like. Lenny, the toolpusher, who supervised the drilling and crew, for one. Zeno didn’t say it, but personal grudges were not what he was looking for. In his experience, those committing corporate espionage or malfeasance were often among the most likeable employees; that certainly made their endeavor easier.
Somebody had said something, though. At some point. Even if Saskia had somehow gained unauthorized access, she’d have needed an expert to explain exactly how their struggles with maintaining a proper mud weight was a potential precursor to the blowout. And yet, there was still no sign of any connection between her and one of his men. Could she have been actively involved in the catastrophe? Orchestrated a sabotage? She had seemed innocent enough, but how do we know anyone?
Mandelbaum kept turning back to the immediate problems at hand. It was as if he didn’t see, or want to address, the underlying problem. Could he be prevaricating? In fairness, it was true that the oil was still gushing, but that was secondary.
∞
While waiting for his flight back to Dallas, Zeno called the hospital again. It unnerved him to discover that Saskia had come out of her coma and been discharged. He made a mental note to alert Mandelbaum to the possibility that she might still contact one of his crew, and that Mandelbaum should be cautious about tipping off any informants, lest they take precautions to conceal their contact enough as to make it undetectable.
Unfortunately, the man that Zeno was speaking to was stone-walling him with confidentiality blather.
“Calling the ambulance doesn’t change the privacy laws.”
Zeno considered offering a financial inducement for her contact details, but it was clear that with the media interest surrounding his own challenges the hospital had warned their staff about their HIPPA responsibilities. He curtly thanked the man and hung up.
Given that Saskia was now wandering free, it felt imperative to revisit scrutinizing her side of the leak. He’d tried searching for Saskia Pollock in the days after she had confronted him, but his Saskia had been overwhelmed by page after page of a B-list actress of the same name. Surprise, surprise, adding “Los Angeles”, hadn’t helped. Nor had including in his searches variations on phrases such as “investigative reporter” or “climate activist”, or excluding the word “actress” helped to return anything but the starlet.
Zeno kicked himself that he hadn’t gotten more info when Saskia’s mother had, like her daughter, shown up on his doorstep. He’d hewn closely to his emergency services story, and then engaged her in idle banter when she commented that EO seemed like a sweet cat.
He had ventured to ask Miranda if her daughter was wealthy, which had momentarily turned the tables on the older woman, who had looked briefly unnerved. But she revealed nothing, adhering to the conceit that she had no idea where the bundle of cash had come from. If it were true, then Saskia hadn’t been completely forthright with her mother either.
Still, with no other path to Saskia, Zeno decided it was worth calling her mother. He riffled through the bottom of his briefcase, into which he’d stashed the scarp of paper on which she’d written her phone number. He didn’t need to spend time talking with her——some BS pretext of wanting to send flowers ought to do the trick——but she would certainly know where her daughter was. Zeno retrieved the jotted note from the bottom of his briefcase. Then, as he dialed her number, he noticed something. Her name was Miranda Pollack. Pollack, not Pollock.
He opened the web browser on his phone and googled Saskia Pollack, and though the actress Saskia Pollock peppered his search results——he had to give it to her publicist——this time he found his Saskia too, Saskia Pollack. An images search confirmed it. Far from a journalist, it turned out that his Saskia was a machine learning specialist. Now that was interesting! Could it even be significant?
