The Monkey Wrench Gang (17 page)

“We’re going to need a carload of H.E.,” says George Hayduke. “Not like them old wooden truss and trestle bridges over in ‘Nam.”

“Well, hell, who says we have to blow all three?” Smith says. “If we take out any one it will cut the road.”

“Symmetry,” says Hayduke. “A nice neat job on all three would be more appreciated. I don’t know. Let’s think about it. Do you see what I see?”

Leaning on the rail of the Dirty Devil bridge, they looked south
to Hite Marina, where a few cabin cruisers floated at their moorings, and at something more interesting closer by, the Hite airstrip, which appeared to be undergoing expansion. They saw a quarter mile of cleared land, a pickup truck, a wheeled loader, a dump truck and, coming to a halt, a Caterpillar D-7 bulldozer. The airstrip was laid out north and south on a flat bench of land below the road, above the reservoir; one edge of the airstrip was no more than fifty feet from the rim of the bench, with a vertical drop-off of 300 feet to the dark green waters of Lake Powell.

“I see it,” Smith said at last, reluctantly.

Even as they watched, the dozer operator was getting off the machine, getting into the pickup and driving down to the marina. Lunchtime again.

“Seldom,” says Hayduke, “that guy shut off the engine but he sure as hell didn’t remove anything.”

“No?”

“Absolutely not.”

“Well …”

“Seldom, I want you to give me a lesson in equipment operation.”

“Not here.”

“Right here.”

“Not in broad daylight.”

“Why not?”

Smith seeks an excuse. “Not with them motorboaters hangin’ around the marina.”

“They couldn’t care less. We’ll have our hard hats and your pickup truck, and people will think we’re construction workers.”

“You ain’t supposed to make a big wake near the boat docks.”

“It’ll make one fine helluva splash, won’t it?”

“We can’t do it.”

“It’s a matter of honor.”

Smith thinking, reflecting, meditating. Finally the deep creases shifted position, his leathery face relaxed into a smile.

“One thing first,” he says.

“What’s that?”

“We take the license plates off my truck.”

Done.

“Let’s go,” says Smith.

The road wound about the heads of side canyons, rose, descended, rose again to the mesa above the marina. They turned off and drove out on the airstrip. Nobody around. Down at the marina, half a mile away, a few tourists, anglers and boaters lounged in the shade. The Cat operator’s pickup stood parked in front of the café. Heat waves shimmered above the walls of red rock. Except for the purr of a motorboat far down the lake, the world was silent, drugged with heat.

Smith drove straight to the side of the bulldozer, a middle-aged dust-covered iron beast. He shut off his engine and stared at Hayduke.

“I’m ready,” says Hayduke.

They put on their hard hats and got out.

“First we start the starting engine, right?” Hayduke says. “To warm up the diesel engine, right?”

“Wrong. It’s warmed up for us already. First we check the controls to make sure the tractor is in correct starting position.”

Smith climbed into the operator’s seat, facing an array of levers and pedals. “This,” he said, “is the flywheel clutch lever. Disengage.” He pushed it forward. “This here is the speed selector lever. Put in neutral.”

Hayduke watched closely, memorizing each detail. “That’s the throttle,” he said.

“That’s right. This is the forward and reverse lever. It should be in neutral too. This is the governor control lever. Push forward all the way. Now we apply the right steering brake”—Smith stepped on the right pedal—“and we lock it in position.” He flipped forward a small lever on the floorboards. “Now—”

“So everything’s in neutral and the brake is locked and it can’t go anywhere?”

“That’s right. Now”—Smith got out of the seat and moved to
the port side of the engine—“now we start the starting engine. The new tractors are a lot simpler, they don’t need a starting engine, but you’ll find plenty of these old ones still around. These big tractors will last for fifty years if they’re taken good care of. Now this here little lever is called the transmission control lever. It goes in
HIGH SPEED
position for starting. This is the compression release lever; we put it in
START
position. Now we disengage the starting-engine clutch with this handle here.” He pushed the lever in toward the diesel block.

“Oh, Jesus,” mutters Hayduke.

“Yep, it’s a little complicated. Now … where was I? Now we open the fuel valve by unscrewing this little valve, right … here. Now we pull out the choke. Now we set the idling latch in position. Now we turn on the switch.”

“That’s the ignition switch for the starting engine?”

“Yep.” Smith turned on the switch. Sound of a positive click. Nothing else.

“Nothing happened,” Hayduke says.

“Oh, I reckon something happened,” Smith said. “We closed a circuit. Now if this was a fairly old-model tractor the next thing you’d have to do is get the crank and crank up the engine. But this model has an electric starter. Let’s see if she works.” Smith put his hand on a lever under the clutch handle and pushed it back. The engine growled, turned over, caught fire. Smith released the starter lever, adjusted the choke; the engine ran smoothly.

“That’s only the gasoline engine,” Hayduke said. “We still have to get the diesel started, right?”

“That’s right, George. Anybody coming?”

Hayduke climbed to the driver’s seat. “Nobody in sight.”

“All right.” The starting engine was warm; Smith closed the choke. The engine throbbed at a comfortable idling speed. “Okay, now we grab these two levers here.” Hayduke watching again, all attention. “This upper one is the pinion control and the lower one is the clutch control. Now we push the clutch lever all the way in”—toward the diesel engine block—“and pull the pinion lever all the way out. Now we move the idle latch to let the starting engine run at full
speed. Now we engage the starting-engine clutch.” He pulled the clutch lever out. The engine slowed, almost stalled, then picked up speed. He moved the compression release lever to
RUN
position. “Now the starting engine is cranking the diesel engine against compression,” Smith said, shouting above the roar of the meshing motors. “It’ll start right off.”

Hayduke nodded but was no longer sure he followed it all. The tractor was making a great noise; black smoke jetted up, making the hinged lid dance on top of the exhaust stack.

“Now the diesel is running,” Smith shouted, looking at the exhaust smoke with approval. He came back to the operator’s seat, beside Hayduke. “So now we give it more speed. Pull the governor back to half speed. Now we’re about ready to go,” he shouted. “So we shut off the starting engine.”

He moved forward again and disengaged the starting engine clutch, closed the fuel valve, shut off the ignition switch and returned to Hayduke. They sat side by side on the wide leather-covered operator’s seat.

“Now we’re ready to drive this thing,” he shouted, grinning at Hayduke. “You still interested or would you rather go drink a beer?”

“Let’s go,” Hayduke shouts back. He scanned the road and marina again for any sign of hostile activity. All seemed to be in order.

“Okay,” shouted Smith. He pulled a lever, lifting the hydraulic dozer blade a foot off the ground. “Now we select our operating speed. We have five speeds forward, four in reverse. Since you’re kind of a beginner and that cliff is only a hundred yards away we’ll stick to the slowest speed for right now.” The tractor faced toward the big drop-off. He shifted the speed selector from neutral into first, pulled the forward-and-reverse lever
back
to the
forward
position. Nothing happened.

“Nothing’s happening,” says Hayduke, nervous again.

“That’s right and ain’t supposed to neither,” says Smith. “Keep your shirt on. Now we rev up the engine a bit.” He pulled the throttle back to full speed. “Now we engage the flywheel clutch.” He pulled the clutch lever back; the great tractor started to tremble as the transmission
gears slid into meshing position. He pulled the clutch lever all the way back and snapped it over center. At once the tractor began to move—thirty-five tons of iron bearing east toward St. Louis, Mo., via Lake Powell and Narrow Canyon.

“I reckon I’ll get off now,” Smith said, standing up.

“Wait a minute,” Hayduke shouts. “How do you steer it?”

“Steering too, huh? Okay, you use these two levers in the middle. These are steering clutch levers, one for each track. Pull back on the right lever and you disengage the clutch on the right side.” He did as he said; the tractor began a ponderous turn to the right. “Pull back on the other for a left turn.” He released the right lever, pulled back on the left; the tractor began a ponderous turn to the left. “To make a sharper turn you apply the steering clutch brakes.” He stepped on first one then the other of the two steel pedals that rose from the floor panels. “You catch on?”

“I get it,” shouted Hayduke happily. “Let me do it.”

Smith got up, letting Hayduke take over. “You sure you understand the whole thing?” he said.

“Don’t bother me, I’m busy,” Hayduke shouted, big grin shining through his shaggy beard.

“All right.” Smith stepped from the fender to the drawbar of the slow-moving machine and jumped lightly to the ground. “You be careful now,” he shouted.

Hayduke didn’t hear him. Playing with clutch levers and clutch brakes he wove a crazy course toward the loading machine at the side of the airstrip. At the rate of two miles per hour the bulldozer smashed into the loader, a great mass of metal colliding with a lesser mass. The loader yielded, sliding sideways over the ground. Hayduke steered toward the edge of the runway and the plunge beyond, pushing the loader ahead. He grinned ferociously. Dust clouds billowed above the grind, the crunch, the squeal and groan of steel under stress.

Smith got into his pickup and started the motor, ready to take off at the first hint of danger. Despite the uproar there seemed to be no sign of alarm in any quarter. The yellow pickup remained at the café. Down at the marina a boater refueled his runabout. Two boys
fished for channel cat from the end of the dock. Tourists picked over trinkets in the curio shop. A pair of hawks soared high above the radiant cliffs. Peace….

Standing at the controls Hayduke saw, beyond the clouds of dust, the edge of the mesa coming toward him. Beyond that edge, far below, lay the waters of Lake Powell, the surface wrinkled by the wake of a passing boat.

He thought of one final point.

“Hey!” he shouted back at Smith. “How do you stop this thing?”

Smith, leaning against the door of his truck, cupped his ears and shouted back, “What’s that?”

“
How do you stop this thing?”
Hayduke bellowed.

“
What?”
bellowed Smith.

“HOW DO YOU STOP THIS THING?”

“CAN’T HEAR YOU….”

The loader, pushed by the dozer blade, arrived at the verge, wheeled over, vanished. The bulldozer followed steadily, chuffing black smoke from the burnt metal of the exhaust stack. The steel treads kept firm grip on the sandstone ledge, propelling the machine forward into space. Hayduke jumped off. As the tipover point approached the tractor attempted (so it seemed) to save itself: one tread being more advanced into the air than the other, the tractor made a lurching half-turn to the right, trying to cling to the rim of the mesa and somehow regain solid footing. Useless: there was no remedy; the bulldozer went over, making one somersault, and fell, at minimal trajectory, toward the flat hard metallic-lustered face of the reservoir. As it fell the tracks kept turning, and the engine howled.

Hayduke crawled to the edge in time to see, first, the blurred form of the loading machine sinking into the depths and, second, a few details of the tractor as it crashed into the lake. The thunder of the impact resounded from the canyon walls with shuddering effect, like a sonic boom. The bulldozer sank into the darkness of the cold subsurface waters, its dim shape of Caterpillar yellow obliterated, after a second, by the flare of an underwater explosion. A galaxy of bubbles
rose to the surface and popped. Sand and stone trickled for another minute from the cliff. That ceased; there was no further activity but the cautious advance of one motorboat across the dying ripples of the lake: some curious boatman drawn to the scene of calamity.

“Let’s get out of here!” Smith called, as he noticed finally, down at the marina, the pickup truck pulling away from the café.

Hayduke stood up dripping dust and jogged toward Smith, a great grim grin on his face.

“Come on!” yelled Smith. Hayduke ran.

They pulled away as the yellow truck ascended the switchbacks leading from marina to road. Smith headed back the way they’d come, across the bridge over the Dirty Devil and on toward the Colorado, but braked hard and turned abruptly before they reached the center bridge, taking the jeep road north around a bend which concealed them from direct view of anyone passing on the highway.

Or did it? Not entirely, for a cloud of dust, like a giant rooster tail hovering in the air, revealed their passage up the dirt road.

Aware of the rising dust, Smith stopped his truck as soon as they were behind the rocks. He left the engine idling in case it became necessary to move on quickly.

They waited.

They heard the whine of the pursuing truck, the vicious hiss of rubber on asphalt as it rushed past on toward the east. They listened to the diminishing noise of its wheels, the gradual return of peace and stillness, harmony and joy.

Laughing, Hayduke and Smith slapped each other on the shoulder
blades, hugged each other with delight, and opened up a fresh cold six-pack. Ah, that frosty glitter. Oh, that clean snap of the pop top.

“Hah!” roared Hayduke, feeling the first good rush course through his blood. “Goddamn but that was beautiful!” He jumped out of the truck and danced a sort of jig, a sort of tarantella, a kind of Hunkpapa Sioux peyote shuffle, in 2/4 time, around the truck. Smith started to follow but first, out of caution, climbed to the roof of the cab for another look-see. Who knew what the Enemy might be plotting at this very moment.