by Tony Park
Henri had ventured further ahead. The darting beam of the torch fixed under his rifle barrel announced his return. ‘Chef. The next hold is full of raw timber.’
‘Illegally felled hardwood, I’ll bet,’ Alex said.
‘So what do we do, boss?’ Novak said.
Mitch spoke first: ‘We take this boat and sell the loot, or ransom it back to its owners. There’s millions of dollars around us, Alex.’
‘Sink the fucking thing,’ Kevin said. ‘This is just wrong – trading in bloody misery.’
‘I agree,’ Kufa said.
‘We could take the most valuable items – the tusks and horns and the drugs,’ Henri ventured. ‘The crew haven’t noticed us yet. We could just leave.’
Alex’s father had hunted in Mozambique and, later, in Rhodesia when on leave from the army. He’d always imagined growing up that one day his father would take him out into the bush and teach him the skills of tracking and killing. Many times he’d heard his dad rail against the evils of poaching. Later in life he’d pondered the morals of shooting big game in Africa. White men paid to hunt for sport. Black men shot what they believed was theirs, in order to feed themselves and make money.
He knew profiting from the sale of ivory or rhino horn was morally wrong, but he had become a thief, a pirate. Were there degrees of wrongness?
His head told him to leave this foul-smelling hulk at once and go back to the island. His heart told him to do something to save the endangered animals and reptiles on board. The part of his conscience that told him repeatedly that as long as no one was hurt there was nothing truly wrong with stealing goods that were covered by insurance was trying to convince him right now that the proceeds of a few rhino horns and a crate of ivory would allow him to restore a floor of the hotel and finally open for business.
Alex was still weighing his options when he heard the deep rumble of a ship’s engines. It wasn’t the Peng Cheng’s idling diesels, but another vessel. Mitch opened his mouth, but Alex waved him to silence and pointed to the direction of the noise. ‘Move. Quietly. Let’s go topside. It sounds like this tub’s rendezvousing with someone else.’
Alex led his band back through the stinking hold to the metal stairs that led to clean air above. They collected Heinrich on the way and, once topside, Alex took a few deep breaths then replaced his gasmask to hide his identity in case they were spotted.
They stood at the stern of the Peng Cheng, hiding in the shadows as the largest freighter Alex had ever seen blocked their view of the horizon and starry night sky.
‘That’s the Penfold Son,’ Kevin whispered. ‘Seen a pic of her in a magazine. What a brute.’
Voices in Chinese echoed above them and the Peng Cheng’s engines stopped. There was the squawk of radio static and the voice above them turned to English.
‘This is Peng Cheng, Peng Cheng, out of Shanghai. We have no engine power. We are stranded. Can you assist, over?’
Alex motioned with an open palm for his men to stay put and started climbing the stairs to the bridge, to get closer. He heard the faint reply, in a Scottish-accented voice.
‘Peng Cheng this is the Penfold Son. We can’t offer a tow, but I can send my engineering officer down to take a quick look if you wish.’
‘Affirmative, Penfold Son, and very much appreciated.’
Jane was having trouble sleeping. She checked the digital clock-radio on her tiny bedside table. Two am.
She rolled over and tried to get comfortable, but to no avail. She’d been dreaming about pirates, and being forced to jump overboard at gunpoint from the stern rail of the Penfold Son – like being made to walk the plank. There were sharks in the water below.
It was stuffy in the cabin. The airconditioning had been too cold. It seemed to have been stuck on the highest setting so she’d turned it off. She swung her legs out of bed and swapped her pyjamas for a pair of cargo shorts and T-shirt. She slipped on her sandals. Strictly speaking, passengers were not supposed to be on the open deck at night-time, for safety reasons, but the first mate had seen her once before taking a stroll in the moonlight and had simply waved and smiled.
She passed the first of the cabins where Van Zyl and his men were quartered, two to a room. There was no noise from inside. If George’s hired guns really were supposed to be keeping his flagship safe from pirates, it appeared they were sleeping on the job.
Jane made her way to the hatch leading to the open deck and sighed with relief at the gush of fresh air that greeted her. She walked outside and saw the sky was clear. The full moon was starting its descent towards the western horizon and as its light waned more stars were appearing above. Somewhere out there was the coast of Africa – Mozambique. She thought again about her dream and the increasing incidence of maritime attacks. She shuddered and suddenly experienced the distinct impression that she was not alone. She looked over her shoulder.
There was no one there.
Leaning out over the railing she saw the lights of another ship ahead. She didn’t know about the intricacies of navigation at sea, but it looked like Captain MacGregor was heading right towards the other vessel.
‘I’ve been watching her for a while.’
Jane gave a start and turned again, and this time saw Piet van Zyl emerging from the shadows. He was dressed in black and wore a matching beanie over his white hair. ‘Jesus, you nearly gave me a heart attack.’
Van Zyl held an overly large pair of binoculars out to her. ‘Take a look.’
She held the glasses to her eyes and saw the lights of the other ship glare like bright green traffic lights against a luminous sea of lime. ‘Night vision?’
‘Yes. The button on top projects an infra-red beam, which provides more light. Try it out.’
Jane saw the ship’s bridge better with the additional invisible light source. She could even make out a man looking back at them. ‘Cool.’
The deck shuddered under their feet. ‘We’re slowing,’ Van Zyl said.
‘I wonder why. Perhaps they’re in trouble.’
Van Zyl reached for the binoculars and she handed them back. He studied the other vessel again, but didn’t reply. Instead, he took the portable radio clipped to his belt and said, ‘Tyrone, come topside. Bring my gear.’
‘Your gear? What’s going on, Piet, do you think they’re pirates?’
He turned to her. ‘I think it would be best for you to go below now, back to your cabin.’
‘No way. This is just getting interesting.’
‘Get back,’ Alex hissed at Mitch, swinging his arm out to force the American back into the shadows under the overhanging wing of the bridge. He’d taken the night-vision monocular from its pouch on his assault vest and removed his gasmask so he could slip the device’s strap over his head. He had scanned the looming bulk of the Penfold Son. ‘Someone up there’s also using a starlight scope and they just hit their infra-red.’
‘I never worked on a ship that had night vision,’ Kevin said. ‘What do we do now, boss?’
The infra-red spotlight was just one more oddity in a night that had been full of them. ‘There’ll be crew looking down. If we move on deck they’ll see us. We stay put and see what happens next.’
They didn’t have long to wait. The Penfold Son’s engines changed pitch again and the boat seemed to shudder to a near halt.
The larger freighter gleamed spotlessly white against the contrasting rust and garbage stains that camouflaged the Chinese trader.
A rigid-hulled inflatable boat was swung over the side of the Penfold Son and Alex could see three men on board as the ship’s rescue craft was lowered to the sea. Once on the water’s calm surface the crew started the outboard and cast off. It took them only seconds to bridge the gap between the two ships. A rope ladder was lowered by a Chinese crewman and one man clambered aboard. He wore overalls and carried a canvas hold-all.
‘This stinks more than all that animal shit down below,’ Heinrich said.
‘Y’all got that right,’ Mitc
h whispered.
‘We should go now,’ Henri said, ‘drift away while their attention is distracted. No one would see us.’
Alex shook his head. ‘Moon’s still too high. We wait.’
‘Give me the binoculars,’ Jane said. Van Zyl ignored her, so she said, ‘Do you know who that man is who just got out of the inflatable boat?’
‘No.’ The South African clearly hadn’t had the chance yet to meet all the crew. Reluctantly, he handed the glasses to her.
Jane felt her heart beat faster. Tyrone, the American, was beside her. The black plastic and metal rifle looked like a toy in his big gloved hand. Piet, too, was now armed. His weapon was slung over his shoulder and he’d strapped a pistol belt around his waist.
‘It’s Igor, the chief engineer,’ she said, handing back the binoculars.
As the company lawyer Jane knew the carriage of firearms and ammunition on board a merchant ship was against the law. She didn’t know whether to feel safe or terrified that George had arranged for Van Zyl and his men to smuggle their military-style weapons on board.
‘Has the captain stopped to assist any other vessels on this journey?’ Van Zyl asked.
‘No. I guess they’re having mechanical troubles and Igor’s gone aboard to try and help out. The Oslo Star was hijacked by pirates pretending to have engine trouble.’
‘I know,’ Piet said. ‘I think you should go below now.’
‘Bollocks. I’m going to the bridge. You can stay here and play soldiers.’
Fifteen minutes later the engineer emerged from below decks and walked back to the rope ladder with two Chinese men. One was the crewman who had helped him aboard. The other was an older man, dressed in shorts and a grubby white short-sleeved shirt. Alex thought it might be the captain. He shook hands with the European who, clutching his bag, swung over the rail and descended the ladder.
Once the inflatable boat was secured on board, the Penfold Son increased speed and pulled away from the poor excuse for a freighter. They felt the Peng Cheng start to move. She was turning towards shore and the other ship was fast disappearing to the south. ‘Listen in,’ Alex said, and all eyes turned to him as he gave his orders.
6
Alex sat on top of the wooden crate containing the captured leopard. The timbers vibrated beneath him from the noise of the big cat’s rasping cough. In front of him was the captain of the Peng Cheng, dressed only in a pair of holey underpants and sitting on a dining chair, his hands and ankles securely bound.
‘Last chance, Captain Wu.’ They’d succeeded in getting his name out of him, but not much else. Alex guessed that the man and his crew were more scared of their Triad masters than they were of anything the pirates could do to them. He was about to put that to the test.
Alex checked his watch. It was only a little more than thirty minutes since the Penfold Son had sailed away. He and his men had taken the Peng Cheng without a shot being fired, even though they had found AK-47s, pistols and even a crate of Chinese People’s Liberation Army hand grenades in the bridge’s well-stocked armoury. The captain had claimed the grenades were for fishing in coastal lagoons. Given the man’s dis regard for wildlife, Alex almost believed him.
‘It was a drop-off, wasn’t it? Either you gave the engineer from the Penfold Son something, or he gave you something. Which was it?’ Wu, whose English was basic, had stuck to his story that the Peng Cheng was experiencing engine trouble and an officer from the other ship had come aboard to rectify the problem.
They’d hit the bridge hard, just minutes after the exchange had been made, but they’d found nothing of particular value or significance. When Alex had threatened to blow the ship’s safe, Wu had opened it for him. Inside were ten thousand US dollars, the equivalent value in rand and the ship’s papers. It didn’t seem enough cash for a mid ocean criminal deal.
‘I was on board before you slowed down, Wu. I know you didn’t have a problem with your engines. Last chance.’ Alex wound the length of rope around his hand and started to heave upwards, raising the trap door that closed the crate by a few centimetres.
Captain Wu looked down at the gap and saw a white furred paw patterned with black rosettes reach out. Yellowed claws protruded and made an agonising screeching noise as they scratched the steel deck. The leopard snarled in anticipation and rocked the crate as it twitched its tail left and right and lowered itself to escape.
‘Barbarian,’ Wu said.
‘That’s rich coming from you. This animal deserves a crack at you after the way it and the others have been treated. Say hello to the nice kitty, Captain . . .’
‘OK. There was drop-off, but I not know what.’
Alex gripped the rope with his other hand and began to heave. ‘Last chance, Captain.’
A puddle appeared on the deck beneath Wu’s chair, but any odour was masked by the foulness of the other fluids and solids that sluiced around the deck. ‘I not know! Small package. It worth one million pounds, that all I know,’ the Chinese man squealed.
‘What?’
Wu swore in Mandarin. ‘One million. But small package. I not know. Diamonds maybe.’
Alex held the trapdoor in place. The leopard had withdrawn its paw, though its snarling snout was now just visible as it sniffed Wu’s fear with relish. ‘More information.’
‘My boss and Penfold Son’s boss, they trade sometime. They do business. Man come on board from other ship. I give him package. Not worth my life to check what in package.’
Alex looked into Wu’s eyes, trying to read him. ‘The man who came aboard, he gave you a million pounds?’
Wu shook his head vigorously. ‘No cash. That the truth. You pull this ship apart you not find any money other than what I keep in safe. My boss, his boss, they not operate like that. Money transferred to international bank account.’
Alex raised the trapdoor another few centimetres. Wu yelped. ‘Is truth!’
Alex believed him. ‘What about you? What do you get out of this?’
The captain shrugged. ‘I get my fee when I get back to China.’
Alex lowered the cage door. ‘If I didn’t care for all these animals and reptiles I’d scuttle this scow with you on board.’ He slid down from the top of the crate and, leaving Captain Wu to sit in his own filth, headed for topside and fresh air.
‘All the crew are tied up in the officers’ mess, boss. And a bloody mess it is too,’ Kevin said when Alex entered the bridge.
‘Can you steer this tub by yourself, Kev?’
‘Piece of piss,’ the Australian replied. He was the most experienced mariner in the group.
‘I’ll take that as a yes. The rest of you get ready to disembark. Back to the boats. Heinrich, call Jose and get the Fair Lady to meet us a-s-a-p. We’ve got work to do.’
‘What kind of work?’ Mitch asked.
Alex watched the looks of disappointment and fatigue vanish from their faces when he said, ‘Diamonds.’
Kobus van Vuuren owed Alex Tremain his life, which is why he had left the Swedish backpacker snoring in his bed in the coastal Mozambican town of Vilanculos and driven with a hangover that would have killed a lesser man to the airport where he kept his helicopter.
A year earlier his last machine – a Russian-made Mi-8 identical to the one he piloted low over the Indian Ocean now – had suffered engine failure. He’d been on his way back from taking some French wildlife researchers – female of course – whale spotting from the air. Kobus had auto-rotated but the landing had still been hard. He’d dragged one of the girls unconscious from the wreckage, while the other had struggled to inflate the emergency life raft. In keeping with the reliability of the rest of the machine, the raft’s gas bottle wouldn’t work.
As they trod water, the weight of the injured passenger sapping his strength by the minute, Kobus had replayed his life before his mind’s eye. There were the wars – South-West Africa and Angola with the South African Defence Force, and the Congo and Sierra Leone in the payment of others – the women �
�� many nationalities, many combinations, two wives – and his children – four that he knew of. It had been an interesting life, and he didn’t quite feel ready to wave it all goodbye yet.
A spot on the horizon was getting larger. He’d assumed it was a mirage and hadn’t even told the two Frenchwomen, but when he heard the rhythmic throb of the engines he’d started yelling. They had joined in, and been waving frantically when the luxurious motor cruiser pulled alongside.
Kobus had known from the moment strong, tattooed arms lifted him and the women aboard that the owner’s story was bullshit. Alex Tremain had claimed he was running fishing charters and the mixed bag of nationalities aboard were all tourists. For a start, Kobus noticed only two lightweight rods amidst the bulging green vinyl military dive bags on the deck. The men had the hardened bodies, cold eyes and erect bearing of soldiers. He’d been a military man and mercenary long enough to spot one in a crowd.
‘How can I thank you – repay you?’ he’d asked Alex Tremain over a cold Castle Lager on the bridge, marvelling at the array of computerised navigation systems. There were even cameras mounted around the boat and in the engine room, and their images flashed on a small screen in front of them. The galley was better appointed than his first wife’s mansion in Sandton. The sofas were leather, the bedrooms luxurious, and there was even a jacuzzi on the rear deck which the French girls expressed a desire to try out.
‘Think nothing of it,’ Alex had replied.
‘If you ever need to charter a helicopter for any business – and I mean any business – come see me. I owe you one.’
And here he was, hovering above the same sleek craft that had given him another chance at life. Tremain stood on the rear deck of the cruiser, dressed in a flight suit and festooned with weaponry. The call on his satellite phone had been short on detail. ‘I want to collect on that debt you owe me,’ Tremain had said. ‘Have you got a winch on your helo that you can operate from the cockpit?’
