In Treacherous Waters

by Richard V Frankland

  “Now, Penny and I are going to get some sleep while you, Anna-Maria, keep watch from the cockpit, anyone turning to come along towards us from the main pontoon I want to know about, all right.”

  “Okay, I’ll keep watch.”

  “Are you a good swimmer?”

  Anna-Maria looked at Vaughan a little puzzled. “David used to call me his mermaid,” she replied, wistfully, “Why do you ask?”

  “We may need to take a midnight dip.”

  “Oh.”

  Vaughan waited thinking that Anna-Maria would want to know more, or seek some assurance, but to his surprise she just poured herself another mug of tea and climbed up into the cockpit.

  ***

  As darkness fell, Heathcote cast off the yacht’s warps and, clambering back on board, went onto the foredeck to coil the warps then worked her way down the side deck untying the fenders while Vaughan steered and worked at stowing everything as Heathcote dropped it onto the cockpit sole. Pointing the yacht towards the harbour entrance, he looked up to check that the mast head tricolour light was working then concentrated on following the deep water channel outside the marina entrance.

  “I wonder if our watchers are still on duty,” said Vaughan, as Heathcote stepped down into the cockpit and settled herself comfortably against the cabin bulkhead. “I’ll hoist the main in a moment to make it look as if we’re really going to sea.”

  “While you were doing the passage plan below I saw several yachts leave, some with rig not too dissimilar to ours.”

  “Good, that should confuse them, or at least Graham. He didn’t show any knowledge of boats or sailing when Bowen and I were chatting about West Country sailing. Graham was a chess fanatic as far as I remember,” replied Vaughan. “We are going to go out to sea a bit then double back on a course that will take us almost directly into the bay. The entrance is a bit narrow and, according to this local chart I got from the marina office, the bottom is rocky but there is a sandy bottom right in the centre where the holding is good in calm weather like this.”

  As the yacht cleared the harbour Vaughan hoisted the mainsail whilst Heathcote steered, then with a clear course out to sea she brought the yacht off the wind and Vaughan unfurled the yankee, sheeting it in until it set, adding to the mainsail’s drive.

  “As we turn back I’ll drop the sails and we’ll go in under motor so will be showing a lower white stern light plus port and starboard ones and no masthead tricolour, from a distance we will look like a small motor boat showing only deck steaming lights.”

  “Nice move, let’s hope it works as I don’t really fancy a swim tonight.”

  “You all right steering?”

  “Yes, I’m fine.”

  “Good, because I want to prepare the kedge anchor.”

  Ten minutes later Vaughan had hauled his trusty Fishermans anchor from the locker, locked the stock through the shank and set the anchor with its ten metres of chain on the small stern deck. Taking the warp section through the pushpit and leading it back through the port hand fairlead flaking all thirty metres out along the yacht’s side deck and putting the loop in the bitter end over the port side genoa winch.

  An hour later Vaughan and Heathcote nervously watched the depth sounder as he nosed the yacht into the small cove.

  “Okay, Penny, lower the kedge into the water and let it pay out.”

  The regular clink of chain could be heard as Penny handed it out. “All the chain is away, Ian.”

  A slight scuffing noise was heard as the warp was slowly pulled along the side deck and out over the side following the chain down to the sea bottom.

  “The warp is getting towards the end of its scope, Ian.”

  “Okay, Penny,” replied Vaughan, pulling the throttle lever back to neutral as his eyes switched between the depth sounder and a white painted building on the slope above the centre of the cove.

  The yacht gave a very slight lurch as the kedge anchor bit, halting their gentle progress towards the shore. Vaughan hurried forward and let go the bow anchor until it hit the bottom then seating the chain into the anchor winch pawl he returned to the cockpit.

  “I’m going to winch in on the kedge anchor while you ease the brake on the bow anchor winch. Give me a shout when we have twenty metres out.”

  After Penny had called to him Vaughan put the yacht’s engine astern and gently opened the throttle.

  “It’s dug in, Ian!”

  Anchored now bow and stern, Vaughan switched off the engine and went below to check on Anna-Maria’s progress with the evening meal.

  CHAPTER 10

  They came shortly after one o’clock in the morning. Vaughan had anchored the yacht exactly in the centre of the cove where a gentle breeze from the northern shore kept the yacht on a perfect line to its anchors. After eating Anna-Maria’s excellent cottage pie, Vaughan had spent the rest of his time preparing for any unwelcome visitors. The first job was the defence ring around the side decks comprising of two strips of clear sticky tape with drawing pins pushed through, providing an unpleasant welcome for bare feet and a hindrance if embedded in the soles of shoes. Then came the three thousand candela trigger operated spot lamp designed to take out anyone’s night vision for several vital seconds, this being plugged into the fore deck twelve volt outlet. To provide a hiding place he removed the large yankee sail from its furler and laying it along the centre line of the deck in a similar way to a handed on sail, it provided a shadow in which they could hide. Finally, he folded down the spray hood to reduce the windage and remove the obstacle from line of fire. Then he told the women to change into their swimming costumes in case they needed to evacuate in a hurry.

  The light breeze from the shore had carried the sound of the car and trailer arriving, and the sound of the trailer’s wheels as it was pulled over the fine shingle along the high tide line meant that they would arrive by boat and not swim out. Aware that they would be concentrating on launching the dinghy, Vaughan, leaving the women nervously waiting in the forward cabin, slipped out through the forward hatch and crawling towards the bow lay down in the shadow of the yankee with the spot lamp in his left hand and pistol in his right. The half moon was giving sufficient light for him to clearly watch the two men as they paddled the small rib out, choosing to come alongside the shadowed starboard side of the yacht where their dinghy would be in darkness. A whisper or two were exchanged and a hand appeared over the gunnel, then the head of a man came into view. “La Mouette sur le Vent” had a high freeboard making boarding from a small inflatable something of a task requiring agility. The hand moved along to a guardrail stanchion then the man reached for the aft lower shroud and brought a foot and knee up to hook over the gunnel. He hauled himself on board causing the yacht to heel slightly.

  It was then that the fun started as the man pushed and pulled himself into a standing position and in stocking feet stepped over the guard rail. His right foot had obviously landed between two drawing pins but his left did not. Letting out an involuntary yelp, he lifted his left foot pulling the drawing pin out only to put it back down on another pin, the reaction to which caused him to lose his balance slightly and correct it by stepping slightly to his right with the other foot and finding another waiting drawing pin. Now he started a strange dance, like a slowly accelerating fandango as he lifted first one foot then the other at which point Vaughan, pointing the spotlight towards the man’s head, switched it on. The beam of light hit the man like a punch sending him toppling backwards over the guardrail and down into the dinghy, landing on top of his associate.

  Swiftly moving to the yacht’s side and taking care to avoid the drawing pin defence lines Vaughan trained the spotlight onto the two men.

  “The gun, drop it into the water. Now!” Vaughan shouted, using what little Spanish he had gleaned from a phrase book. The man hesitated and Vaughan fired a shot into the dinghy floor causing a small spout of water to spring up. There was a splash as the man dropped his pistol into the sea. “And your friend’s gun.�
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  The man now looked at his associate, who was lying apparently unconscious with his head over the dinghy’s transom at a strange angle. “The gun! Left hand and slowly,” said Vaughan.

  The man reached cautiously beneath his accomplice’s left armpit and pulling with just his thumb and forefinger extracted the gun, and after holding it up for Vaughan to see dropped it into the sea.

  “Your friend is dead. When you fell on him you broke his neck.”

  The man understanding what Vaughan had said gave his accomplice a shake in the hope that the diagnosis was wrong.

  “If you start rowing now you may make it to the shore before the dinghy sinks.”

  The man reached for a paddle but Vaughan noticed another movement that was not related to escape. Suspecting an ankle pistol Vaughan was already sighting up his target and the man had barely raised the weapon halfway before he died.

  Grabbing the boathook, Vaughan just managed to catch the spray hood of the dinghy and pull it back alongside. Next he fished the dinghy’s painter and secured it to the midship’s cleat.

  “Now let’s try and find out who our visitors were,” he said, looking back at Heathcote, as she cautiously peered around the edge of the spray hood.

  The hip pocket of the man with the broken neck contained a wallet in which a driving licence revealed him to be Alberto Sousa from Porto, his partner wearing a fair length of sticky tape around his feet had no identification on him. Taking the driving licence and a set of car keys Vaughan climbed back on board the yacht.

  “It’s time for them to go I think,” said Vaughan, casting the dinghy adrift. He watched it drift further away out into the cove blown by the breeze and taken by the falling tide, and was pleased to see it clear the rocks and drift further out into the ria.

  Vaughan’s mistake was then to put the main cabin light on to see how Penny and Anna-Maria were. His action confirmed that he had survived the attack.

  “Are you two okay?”

  “Not really,” said Penny, “But we are alive, and thank God, so are you.”

  “Hopefully that will be the end of it for tonight, you both go forward and try and get some more rest.”

  He smiled as he watched the two women turn like a pair of dismissed school girls and without question make their way forward, Penny in her sensible midnight blue one-piece swimsuit, and Anna-Maria in a skimpy red bikini. Both would turn men’s heads on any beach but Anna-Maria would be the one that would make them sit up.

  Turning the cabin light out again, Vaughan went on deck and started to remove his drawing pin defence ring. Twice he stopped wondering whether he was doing the right thing, something at the back of his mind was telling him that it was not over yet. He saw the dark shadow approaching the entrance to the bay as he was just finishing balling up the last remnants of tape.

  “Bugger, the back-up has arrived, and probably in force. This will take more than sticky tape and drawing pins.”

  Hurrying below he reached for the grab bags then went straight into the forward cabin. “More unwelcome visitors I’m afraid, and this time I suspect in larger numbers. When I have opened this fore hatch fully I want you both to go out through it and keeping as low as possible lie down close to the sail that is laid out along the deck, one either side.”

  “What then?” asked Heathcote.

  “Get ready to slip over the side and swim underwater as far as your lungs will allow to the shore and hide amongst the rocks,” replied Vaughan, pushing the hatch fully open. “There you are, it’s open, now go, but keep your heads down.”

  Returning to the main cabin Vaughan, looking over the yacht’s stern, checked on the progress of the power boat. It was being handled very cautiously and he could only just hear the sound of its engine. In the moonlight he saw three men make their way onto the starboard side deck, their stance that of men holding automatic weapons.

  “Prepare for full broadside, Vaughan, these guys really mean business.”

  Vaughan had hoped that there would be a challenge and that the boat was official but no challenge came and when it was only ten metres away the powerboat executed a sharp turn and Vaughan, standing just forward of the galley, grab bag over his shoulder and pistol raised, saw one of the men raise his gun. Squeezing the trigger of his Glock, Vaughan caught a glimpse of the man turn and fall as he himself turned and ran forward, scrambling out of the fore hatch as bullets tore into “La Mouette sur le Vent’s” main cabin.

  As the clatter of gunfire started both Heathcote and Anna-Maria had slipped over the yacht’s bow. Once on the fore deck Vaughan was considering a response in order to keep the gunmen’s focus on the yacht when he heard the sound of something hard land inside the main cabin and rattle along the cabin floor, then another.

  “Grenades, bloody hell.”

  He scrambled forward towards and through the large opening in the pulpit railing, “One, two, three, four, five, six.”

  The first explosion caught him just before he hit the water and as he went down into the cool depths the second came followed by an orange glow surrounding him. The two bulkheads between the main cabin and the bow section of the yacht had protected him from potential injury caused by a pressure wave.

  “Anchor chain pull myself down on the anchor chain, hope Penny and Anna-Maria are all right.”

  In the glow he saw the chain rear up and grabbed at it as he momentarily broke the surface again before pulling himself under and making his way along the chain towards the anchor until his lungs were empty and he was forced to surface. Taking in a lungful of air he looked back then dived again, swimming this time along the same line, the image of his once beautiful yacht sinking beneath the waters of the cove, her mast falling sideways like a felled tree, etched in his mind. Near the shore Vaughan used the rocky bottom to pull himself to a point where a line of rock ran up past the end of the white sandy beach. Still lying in water he peered around a rock and watched the powerboat circle the spot where his yacht had sunk, a spotlight playing on the water littered with debris. In the light of the beam two men gave each other high fives and shouted something to the helmsman. In response the helmsman opened the throttles and turned the boat seawards.

  Leaving the water, Vaughan ejected the Glock’s magazine and sitting on a rock flicked the bullets out and shook the case to remove any droplets of water. Shaking water out of the barrel he then reloaded the magazine and inserted it back into the handgrip. Hoisting his grab bag back onto his shoulder Vaughan crept up the beach then ran along the narrow road to the car in which their first attackers had arrived, it was empty.

  The sound of the powerboat, now safely through the cove entrance, powering up and charging straight toward Muxia stopped Vaughan from opening the vehicle’s door. Should any of the crew on the powerboat be looking back to admire their work they would be bound to see the indicators flicker as the door was unlocked.

  “Lights, there were no lights on in the house up the road earlier, surely the noise would have woken anyone inside.”

  Looking up the hill Vaughan could just make out the dark shape of the house against the backdrop of trees, all was in darkness.

  “Now let’s find those two women.” “Penny, Anna-Maria, it’s me Ian, make your way to the car above the beach,” Vaughan shouted.

  There was no response so he shouted again moving away from the car, now fearing the worst. Reaching the beach he walked down to the water’s edge and started making his way along it in the opposite direction from where he had left the water. He looked out across the cove, he could see bits of wreckage floating and small fires from the burning fuel dotting the surface. Had they been caught by the shock wave or a stray bullet, the firing was wild enough. Had the men doing the high fives seen bodies floating amongst the bits of flotsam?

  Vaughan had reached the rocks on the eastern side of the beach, “Penny, Anna-Maria, are you there? It’s me, Ian, Ian Vaughan,” he said, speaking normally now, not shouting.

  A few seconds passed then a
head rose from behind a rock.

  ***

  The vibrating mobile phone rattling on the top of the bedside table woke Alice Morgan. “Lenny, wake up, it’s your phone. Lenny, phone!”

  “Oh, right,” replied a half asleep Staunton, as he rolled over and fumbled for the mobile, catching it just before it fell onto the bedroom floor. “Yes?”

  “Leonardo?” asked the caller in a voice with a strong Portuguese accent.

  “Sim.”

  “O trabalho está feito.”

  “Obrigado,” replied Staunton, now wide awake with a satisfied grin on his face. “So the job is done, smart arse Vaughan’s out of the game, permanently,” he said quietly then, putting the phone down, Staunton turned to Alice.

  “Is everything all right, Lenny?” she asked nervously.

  “Oh yes, sweetie, everything is just fine,” replied Staunton, rolling on top of her and pushing his knees between her legs.

  “Oh, Lenny darling, no, I’ve got to be at work soon, you know I’m on earlies… Lenny, oh Lenny.”

  The previous evening Staunton’s second cosy supper in a row had been interrupted by Graham’s call advising him that Vaughan had set sail earlier, putting out to sea. Instructing Graham to return to Lagos and learn what he could about a police raid on an apartment there three days previously, Staunton had turned his thoughts to Vaughan and his night-time departure, concluding that it was possibly a blind. Immediately he had contacted Alberto Sousa, who he had directed to Muxia earlier in the day, and learnt that Vaughan had indeed doubled back towards the northern shore of the ria. Then there had followed strict instructions to Carlinhos’s cousin, Alberto, ordering the attack and instilling the need for a good back-up. After the evening meal, while Alice had washed up and taken a shower, Staunton had been plotting how he could use the death of Vaughan to further his interests and his status in the eyes of Sir Andrew Averrille. Now with confirmation that Vaughan was dead, Staunton looked smilingly down at the naked body of Alice Morgan and wondered how much longer would she be of use to him. Their affair would no longer be convenient once he had secured Campbell’s position, and just ending it would risk her taking revenge in some way. The last thing he wanted was her telling anyone that he had got her to pass him information.