The Sky Fisherman (24 page)

"Three of us can drag hoses up those ladders to the catwalk on top, then tie them off. Billyum said he'd help out."

"Bullshit," Billyum said. "I'm allergic to explosions."

"I'm going up," Jake said. "And Mullins here has got to look good so people don't blame him for letting this thing get so wild. You reservation guys forgot to bring any trucks." Jake paused. "Maybe you're chickenshit."

Billyum seemed angry. "Goddamn right. You'd be too if your brain wasn't between your legs."

Jake jerked his thumb at me. "I'll take Culver if I need to, and you candy-asses can draw straws for third man."

I couldn't believe how Jake was goading them or that he'd volunteered me. I knew it was just a bluff, or hoped it was. The thought of going on those tanks made my stomach cramp.

Mullins had clenched his fists and took a step toward Jake. Billyum looked like he wanted to slug somebody, too. Jake stood his ground.

Punches might have been thrown, but a loud horrible belching stopped everybody, and we stared as a balloon of fire rose slowly from the tank top.

"She's blowing, Uncle Jake!"

The firefighters screamed and raced for cover. We all took shelter behind the pickup, but the tank didn't explode. As we stared from behind the shield, the fiery balloon rose in the air, burned with a loud hissing, then flamed out.

"It's venting," Jake said finally after he'd figured awhile. "Tank's got a pressure valve on top. The gases popped the valve and something sparked. Kind of like lighting a giant fart."

"I knew that," Billyum said, coming out from behind the pickup. "Still, I was scared."

Jake pointed at his crotch. "Your pants won't catch fire now, the way you pissed them up."

Billyum threw a slow roundhouse at Jake and grinned. "I didn't want to roast my weenie. Not without a nice warm bun."

"Jesus!" Mullins said. "What next?"

Half of the firefighters slowly returned to their hoses and corrugated tin shields. Some remained behind cover. A few straggled away. I saw Sniffy put on his helmet.

"Get those men back on the hoses," Jake said. "If the tank blows, the shrapnel will burst the other tanks. Gateway will be one big fireball. He turned to Mullins. "No choice. We got to climb those tanks."

"All right," Mullins said. "You son of a bitch."

"Get me some fire clothes, too," Billyum said. "I'm not letting this asshole get to be a hero all by himself."

Jake's grin was as wide as his face. "You don't want to miss the fun. This is a night you can tell your grandkids about."

Billyum glanced at the fuel tanks. "If that vents when we're on top, I won't have any grandkids."

"Don't worry," Jake said. "If it gets you, I'll tell them about it." He looked around. "I need to use a phone."

"They're still working inside the old depot," Mullins said. "Who the hell you gonna call?"

"What do you want on your pizza?" Jake yelled over his shoulder.

Ten minutes later, Jake, Billyum, and Mullins had on asbestos coats, thick rubber boots, gloves, and helmets. I knew they could use a fourth man to drag the hose up the ladder but no one was volunteering, including me. To tell the truth, seeing that huge fire balloon ignite and rise off the tank had taken a lot of starch out of people. Even if I had wanted to go, I knew Jake wouldn't let me, so that made me feel a little better. The tank vented again, a smaller fire balloon.

"We better move," Mullins said. "Lot of people below are praying these tanks hold."

Billyum chewed his lower lip and studied the tank. "Do you think it's best to rush over right after one of those fireballs or wait?"

"Ask Mullins. He's got the manual." Jake gazed into the smoky night sky like he was watching for a sign from God.

After a while I heard a faint humming, the way a mosquito sounds in a tent, barely audible but getting closer. At first I thought it was just another noise from the fire, the updraft whistling or damp logs singing as they burned.

"Is that damn tank making new noises?" Mullins couldn't take his eyes off it.

"Right there!" Jake pointed, and after a minute I could make out a little yellow biplane sliding past the tall grain elevators behind the co-op.

"It's a plane; it's a bird; it's superduster!" Jake waved at the plane. "My man Buzzy."

"What the shit?" Billyum seemed disgusted. "Is he sightseeing or what?"

At first I thought the little Stearman was just flying over to observe the disaster. But Buzzy flew dangerously close to the burning. The fierce updraft shot cinders toward the plane like tracer bullets. Some bounced off the fabric wings as the Stearman kept coming toward us, lined up with the railroad tracks and heading for the Shell tank. Buzzy flew so low I feared he'd hit the telephone wires, but he cleared them by inches, then aimed for the tank.

I remembered how Jake had bragged about Buzzy's crop dusting, claiming he flew so close to the ground he hiccupped to clear barbed-wire fences around fields of potatoes and peppermint.

Now he appeared to be landing the Stearman on the tank top, but as he skimmed past, Buzzy pulled the lever to the hopper, drenching the tank top and side with a reddish liquid.

"Bingo!" Jake turned to Billyum. "Extra tomato sauce for our pizza."

"Borate," Mullins said. "Where the hell did he get that?"

"Keeps it stocked now. He thinks these hardheaded Indians will hire him to fly fire patrol and put out lightning strikes on the rez."

Billyum put on his helmet. "Don't look at me. Take it up with tribal council."

"Okay," Jake said. "Let's act like we know what we're doing."

"How do you want to work it?" Mullins asked.

"We'll give Buzzy time for two more borate runs. Make sure the damn tank quits venting. I'm not keen about having my cookies toasted up there."

Buzzy made two more drops on the tank while Jake and the others checked their gear and dragged the fire hose into position. The Gateway airstrip was close by, and Buzzy had someone back there mixing borate, so a round trip took him only eight minutes. Since Buzzy had dropped the first load, the tank hadn't vented, but we were all holding our breaths. Reddish borate covered the tank top, oozing down the side in a thick red paste. With a little imagination, it did resemble pizza.

Jake gave instructions to the firefighters who had been hosing off the tanks. "Train your hoses on the ladders now. Cool off those rungs."

The firefighters crouched behind their tin shields, and I could only imagine how hot the ladders were.

"Watch it when we head up the side. Don't knock us off the goddamn ladders."

"Don't worry, Jake. They call me Deadeye Dick," one of the firefighters said.

"Your wife doesn't," Jake said. "And I've seen you piss all over your shoes down at the Elks."

The man laughed. "That was when I first got there. After a few drinks, I get steady."

"Let's hope you're blotto now," Jake said.

As the three started up the ladder dragging the hose, I crossed my fingers, prayed, cursed, made all sorts of bargains with God. They inched along—Jake packing the nozzle, Billyum lugging most of the weight, Mullins playing out hose and shouting directions to the firemen below. Each rung seemed a struggle.

As they crawled up the tank side, I considered the circumstances that brought them to that exact moment. How terrible, I thought, to have escaped drowning with my father only to be blown kingdom come by a fuel tank overlooking Gateway. If it happened, I didn't know how I could describe the scene to my mother. In high school, the gloomy shop
teacher had lectured about various industrial accidents, embellishing his stories of reckless victims who ignored safety procedures only to wind up in Mason jars or other unlikely burial vessels. Out here in this emergency, I realized Jake had no rules to follow.

Finally, Jake and Billyum made it to the catwalk above the tank and began inching along. Mullins stayed on the ladder, keeping the hose unsnagged. I understood the plan. Tie the hose and open the nozzle to provide a steady flow of cooling water over the tank and down the sides. This, in combination with the streams from below, should prevent the tank from blowing until the cold deck was stopped or burned out. Thanks to the millpond and the farmers' irrigation ditches, water was available in spite of the general drought.

Behind me I heard someone remark, "That Jake would ride into hell with a bucket of water." I recognized Sniffy's voice, and at that moment I was terribly proud of my uncle. Billyum, too. And I prayed all the harder for their safekeeping. In spite of the water and borate, the tank could have exploded during the climb, but now that they were crawling along the catwalk, where the hot gases had vented, igniting into the fiery balloon, the danger seemed doubled.

I don't believe it took them over three or four minutes to secure the hose and nozzle, but during that time I don't remember breathing. Finally, they had it secured, and Jake waved for the men below to put water in the hose. A couple firemen started up the pumper and you could see the hose bulge and straighten all the way up the tank. Mullins had tied it to the ladder in a couple places, and it stiffened against those restraints.

As the water gushed from the nozzle, spreading across the tank top and washing the reddish borate down the sides, the men below cheered and whooped. A couple tossed their helmets into the air. Water and borate continued running freely down the sides of the tank now, giving the reflections of the cold deck flames eerie undulations. Jake and Billyum grabbed each other's shoulders and danced a funny little dance on the catwalk. With no room to move their feet and wearing the heavy boots, they bent and swayed like crazy men dancing on top of the reflected flames from the cold deck.

Everyone on the ground was watching the two act like firewalkers when I saw a flash of yellow. Turning away from the primitive spectacle of the dancers, I realized Buzzy and the Stearman were leveling off for another run. The plane had suddenly emerged from a dense cloud of smoke and now headed for the Shell tank.

"Christ, he's too close to see them," Sniffy said, and I knew it was
true. The Stearman's front seat had been converted to the hopper that held the fluids, and the pilot sat in the rear seat, making it impossible to see the blind spot directly beyond the plane's nose.

"That prop will chop their heads off," Sniffy screamed.

Horrified, I watched the Stearman bear down on Billyum and Jake, imagining the fatal carnage of the 450-horsepower radial engine. In that instant while the fire roared, sirens screamed, and the men cried out, time hesitated and all sound ceased.

Jake's arms were still draped over Billyum's shoulders in the style of close dancing, and he forced the bigger man to his knees, pushing him out of harm's way.

Jake dropped a split second later, but not in time to avoid the plane except for the tiny hop that slipped it clear of both men and beyond the Shell tank. Jake and Billyum lay tangled on the catwalk, propwash fluttering their fire coats. Jake's helmet came loose, tumbling slowly toward the ground.

Fearful the helmet contained Jake's head, I followed its path to the cement skirt below the tank, listening for the high empty clang as it bounced high and away.

Jake and Billyum struggled to get untangled and regain their footing.

Buzzy dropped his borate on the Union 76 tank, then flew over them again, waggling his wings as he cleared the Shell tank by a good fifty feet. Billyum heaved his helmet at the plane underbelly and Jake flipped him both birds. Then the Stearman was out of sight, lost in the pall of smoke enveloping the co-op.

When Billyum and Jake made it to the ground, so many people lined up to thump their backs and pump their arms, I hung back. Someone gave each of them a beer, and they drank, heads thrown back, foam dribbling down their chins.

Sniffy pounded Jake on the shoulder. "Thought you'd fit in a short casket. Buzzy couldn't have missed you by a foot."

Jake rubbed his jaw. "Nothing shaves close as a blade. That sonofabitch Buzzy farted just in time or we'd be dead."

I
DON'T BELIEVE
I had ever been so proud of anyone as I was of my uncle Jake. A twinge of regret came over me, too, because I wanted to be a part of it, even though I realized I couldn't have climbed that tank for love or money. Dying was one thing, but being incinerated in a fiery explosion ... that terrified me. Maybe it terrified Jake, too, but he wouldn't drop his brave disguise. I could tell Billyum and Mullins had been reluctant to drag the hose up the tank but had bent to Jake's goading.

Buzzy continued making runs with his Stearman, bombing the Union 76 and Chevron tanks. Mullins had managed to get several other volunteers to climb them and tie off nozzles. They hadn't vented fiery gases like the Shell tank, and because the first three climbers had lived, more of the young breaknecks stepped forward. Their eager faces flushed with the excitement of fighting fire, and they laughed and joked with one another as they buckled their equipment.

Older men and those with families stayed below to man the hoses and shields. Faces set, their eyes betrayed worry behind the dancing flames' reflections. Some had worked over twenty years at the plant and perhaps now suspected they were facing an uncertain future.

Mullins went from group to group patting backs and offering encouragement. "You boys will be getting medals for this," he said. "Damn right. We'll pass out boxes of medals. The price of silver's going up."

They grinned and shot smart remarks back, but no one was interested in medals. Somehow I realized that I was witnessing the best of Gateway, the best of small towns, where neighbors dropped their everyday
grudges and risked their lives for the spirit of the community. Except for the professional firemen from Central, no one was getting paid for helping out. Years later, over drinks and memories, the volunteers would treasure the slaps on the backs above medals or money.

Jake and Billyum had been quietly drinking beers and studying the burning cold deck. Half the stacked logs were involved now, and the heat along the fire line was so intense that the railroad ties were twisting from the expansion.