THE INQUISITIVE STRANGER
EVERY MAN stood tense, eyes riveted on the valve.
Attached to the lower part of the capping mechanism was a pressure
gauge. As the valve closed, the needle of the gauge began creeping
steadily around the dial. When the valve was completely closed, the
pressure mounted steadily. Five hundred—six—seven hundred pounds to
the square inch, and still the needle moved around the dial. When it
finally came to rest, it indicated a confined or “rock” pressure in the
well of nine hundred and fifty pounds per square inch!
“Will she hold?” asked Ned anxiously.
“Five minutes will tell,” answered Tom.
Tom had designed his capping mechanism with a generous allowance for
overload, and he had no fear of failure, but to the others it seemed
incredible that anything could withstand such a tremendous pressure. But
as the first anxious moments of waiting passed and nothing happened,
their tense nerves relaxed and they ventured to draw long breaths again.
Tom and Ned and Mr. Damon shook hands solemnly, and then in turn shook
hands with the drilling boss and each member of the crew. Then, as every
man was almost exhausted with his strenuous efforts and the well was
safely brought in and capped, all work was discontinued for the time.
“Guess we’ll call it a day,” said Tom.
“And the best day’s work you’ve ever done!” exclaimed Ned.
“Bless my shower bath!” cried Mr. Damon. “We’re as black as coal
heavers. Better go and clean up. And these clothes of ours are done
for.”
“Guess we can afford to buy others now that we’re oil magnates,”
chuckled Tom happily.
The roar of the gusher had been heard for miles around, and in a few
hours people were coming from every direction to view the new “strike.”
Automobiles, wagons, and buggies came in a constant stream to the Goby
farmhouse, and thence to the scene of the drilling. Veteran oil men were
amazed to find the new well already capped, and had it not been for the
pools of petroleum and the dripping trees in the vicinity, they would
have doubted that oil had really been struck.
Usually when oil is struck a week or more 13 spent in designing and
making a capping device, while the oil runs to waste, or, at best, is
partially reclaimed by pumping it out of the hollows where it has
collected. Tom had steered clear of this folly, and when the emergency
came he was properly equipped to meet it.
The doubts of the visitors were soon dissipated, especially after they
viewed the pressure gauge, which now indicated nine hundred and
seventy-five pounds to the square inch.
“Can she stand it?” was the question on every lip.
Tom himself was somewhat worried over this mounting pressure, as he knew
that if it kept increasing indefinitely no mechanism could withstand its
force. But the pressure never went higher than nine hundred and
seventy-eight pounds, and when they later got the well to delivering oil
regularly, it dropped somewhat.
The news of the strike soon spread beyond the neighboring towns, got
into the papers, and became a subject of nation-wide interest.
Newspapers published front-page stories of the new gusher, and in a few
days there was a rush of speculators and “wildcatters” from all over the
country. There were also many representatives and buyers from big oil
companies, who were anxious to buy the Goby farm at almost any figure,
and also the adjoining land.
Tom, Mr. Damon and Ned, however, had not been idle in the days following
the strike, and they had quietly bought up large tracts of land, on most
of which they had had options before oil was discovered. They sold out a
few of the smaller of these holdings, and received enough from them to
pay all the cost of the drilling and leave a handsome sum besides.
One day a keen-eyed business man separated himself from the group of
people who were usually to be found about the well, drawn there by the
fascination that always attaches to an oil strike, and introduced
himself to Tom. The card he tendered showed that he was the Texas
representative of one of the biggest oil companies in the country.
“Struck it rich, I see,” he remarked, with a smile. “From the way that
well came in it promises to be one of the biggest gushers in this
section. Let’s see, how long have you been digging?”
Tom mentioned the date on which he and his companions had started work.
“Ah,” said the stranger, after a moment of mental figuring, “then I
gather that you must have dug down four or five hundred feet before you
struck oil.”
“More than that,” replied Tom. “Fourteen hundred feet is nearer the
figure.”
The newcomer looked bewildered.
“Then I must have misunderstood you as to the time you started
drilling,” he remarked.
“I guess not,” said Tom, repeating the same date as before.
“Oh,” said the man. “I suppose you must have worked in three shifts day
and night,” he added.
“No, Mr. Blythe,” replied Tom, with a glance at the card he held in his
hand. “We’ve had only the ordinary day crew.”
“Then,” returned Mr. Blythe, “you must have worked in softer soil than I
knew was to be found in this section of Texas. Perhaps you didn’t come
across rock of any account.”
“On the contrary,” replied Tom, with secret amusement, for he had
fathomed the cause of his interrogator’s perplexity, “my foreman tells
me that we had to bore through some of the most stubborn rock that he
has come across in his long experience. And the specimens we brought up
confirm this.”
Mr. Blythe threw up his hands in a gesture of amazement. Tom’s sincerity
was apparent, but what he said seemed incredible.
“I give it up!” he exclaimed. “According to all precedent in this oil
field, you couldn’t possibly have gone down more than five hundred feet
at the outside in the time and under the conditions you mention. What’s
the answer?”
“The answer is that in digging this well I’ve used a drill hitherto
unused—one of my own invention,” replied Tom.
In an instant Mr. Blythe was aflame with excitement.