Only, with Bond, the two halves were not yet dead. Bond was like a cut worm, the two halves of which continue to jerk forward although life has gone and been replaced by the mock life of nervous impulses. It moved alongside his body, or floated above it, keeping enough contact to pull the strings that made the puppet work. The thinking, feeling apparatus of Bond was no longer part of his body. The stinking, bleeding, black scarecrow moved its arms and legs quite automatically. Apart from aiming the canvas mouth of the conveyor, there was nothing else for anyone to do.īond let his whole body slip down the ladder of wire and lunged through and down with all his force. On the other side of the mountain men would be working, feeding the guano to the conveyor-belt that rumbled away through the bowels of the rock, but on this side no one was allowed and no one was necessary. There was no other sound, no other movement, no other life apart from the watch at the ship's wheel, the trusty working at the crane, and Doctor No, seeing that all went well.
The morning breeze feathered the deep-water anchorage, still half in shadow beneath the towering cliffs, the' conveyor-belt thudded quietly on its rollers, the crane's engine chuffed rhythmically. He tore it out, got it between his two hands and wrenched the doubled wire almost straight. Nowīond thrust his knife between his teeth and his hand dived for the crook of the wire spear. A voice called out, startlingly close, "Okay to go?" There was a distant answer: "Okay." The crane engine accelerated. Bond crept softly forward, watching his footholds for loose stones. Round the bead, the track filtered through a maze of giant, tumbled boulders. From out of the mouth of the sock, in a solid downward jet, the scrambled-egg-coloured guano dust was pouring into the hold of the tanker at a rate of tons a minute.īond, leaving drops of blood behind him, picked his way carefully down the track and along the bottom of the shadowed cliff. The purpose of the crane was to lift the wireframed mouth of the sock so that it hung directly over the hold of the tanker and to move it to right or left to give even distribution. Its mouth ended in a huge canvas sock, perhaps six feet in diameter. It was carried on high stanchions above the jetty and stopped just short of the hold of the tanker. From just to the right of the crane, an overhead conveyor-belt in a corrugated-iron housing ran out from the cliff-face.
The rest of the crew would be below, battened away from the guano dust. There was no sign of life On board except one figure lolling at the wheel in the enclosed bridge.
The tanker was called Blanche, and the Ant of Antwerp showed at her stern. It stood well out of the water, its deck perhaps twelve feet above the quay. An aged tanker of around ten thousand tons deadweight was secured alongside the top of the T. In front of him the jetty ran twenty yards out into the sea and ended in a T.
#Living off grid in alaska driver
It was the Chinese Negro boss, the driver of the marsh buggy. Round the corner, not more than ten yards away, was the crane.
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