by Colin Forbes
'It worries me, too,' said Tweed.
44
The Dutch fishing vessel, Utrecht, which should have reached its home port, was stationary. A quarter of a mile astern of the stately floating glow-worm which was the Adenauer.
The huge liner was almost stationary on the dark sheen of the smooth sea, waiting for the lighters to come out with passengers. Two large dinghies with outboard motors slid across the water, midway between the Utrecht and the Adenauer. Painted black, they were invisible.
One dinghy was directly astern of the liner - less than four hundred yards away. The second dinghy, launched from the Utrecht earlier, was approximately a quarter-mile ahead of the liner, its motor turned off, drifting gently with the current.
Four scuba divers slipped over the side of the first dinghy, paddled water as two specially-constructed nets were handed down to them. Each net was grasped by two men who then went under the surface, hauling a net between them.
Each net contained two sea-mines with the switches tuned to a specific radio band. They swam on under water with ease - the contents of the nets were light in weight, shaped like large eggs, painted a dull metallic non-reflecting grey colour, with squat clamps like suckers protruding.
The first team reached the liner, swam deeper under the vast hull, and paddled on until they were just beyond amidships. Here they stopped paddling, bobbing up and down beneath the dark shape above them. With practised hands they opened the net, released the mines which floated upwards, attracted by the fumes inside the engine room.
The swimmers followed their cargo upwards, each man attending to one mine, swivelling it until the suckers contacted the hull. He pressed a switch. Metal legs shot out, thudded into the hull. The mines were attached. Immovable.
The second team swam in under the enormous twin propellers, performed the same actions at a point half way between the propellers and the location where the other mines had been attached.
Their mission completed, the two scuba divers swam on under the hull of the Adenauer. Clad in wet suits, face masks and feet flippers with oxygen cylinders strapped to their backs, they glided through the water, their deft movements almost balletic in their grace.
Emerging beyond the massive bow, the lead man checked the compass attached to his wrist, changing direction by a few degrees. Like his comrades ahead of him he was making for the second dinghy.
He surfaced briefly, looked swiftly round in the night. A pinpoint green light - visible only at sea-level - located the waiting dinghy. He dived under and swam on. Ten minutes later both teams had been hauled aboard the dinghy. They had left behind four sea-mines - armed with enough explosive power to destroy the 50,000-ton liner.
Once Klein pressed a certain button on his control box the four mines would detonate simultaneously. Most of the fifteen hundred souls aboard would die in the first tremendous blast wave - a thousand passengers and five hundred crew. The blast would rip open the hull, surge upwards through the engine room, the explosive wave continuing through the five decks above. Those who survived the blast would be immolated in a sheet of flame with a temperature of over one thousand degrees.
* *
On the curving bridge of the Adenauer Captain Brunner stood at the port side, surveying the drifting fishing vessel in his high-powered glasses. His First Officer was - as per his instructions - using a signalling lamp to convey Brunner's message to the Utrecht.
'What is wrong? You are too close to my ship. Please make way'. Reply immediately.'
Aboard the Utrecht its skipper, Captain Sailer, stood immobile on his own bridge. Behind him stood Grand-Pierre, a Uzi machine pistol aimed at the skipper's back. On the deck of the small bridge Sailer's wife, Ansje, a small slim woman with long dark hair, lay with her ankles and wrists trussed with rope. A man wearing a Balaclava helmet knelt beside her, holding a knife at her throat.
They had come aboard from the dinghies just after the nets had been hauled in, the catch stored. Grand-Pierre had shouted up in English that their engines had broken down. Wearing dark glasses and a polo-necked sweater pulled up over his chin, he had climbed up the dropped ladder, produced the Uzi.
When Sailer saw a second man come aboard, carrying his wife, he had almost grabbed for the Uzi in his fury. Then he had seen the knife held close to her throat. From then on he obeyed them.
The dinghies, containing four men in each, had been hauled up over the side. Grand-Pierre had then ordered Sailer to make for the Adenauer. Now he stood watching the flashing light of the signalling lamp.
'What do they say?' he asked a third man wearing a Balaclava helmet?
'They're asking what's wrong, saying we're too close to them, ordering us to move off.'
'Now listen to me, Sailer,' Grand-Pierre said, ramming the muzzle of his weapon hard into the skipper's back. This man is an ex-seaman, knows about signalling. Tell them you have broken down, engine trouble. That it's nearly repaired but you have a man overboard, that you're searching for him. Get on with it.'
The bit about man overboard covered the faint possibility that the two dinghies might be spotted. Sailer took the lamp from his First Mate and began signalling his reply.
Aboard the Adenauer Captain Brunner was annoyed. An intruder had just invaded his bridge. Cal Dexter, the chief of the American security team which had boarded at Hamburg to protect the Secretary of State. A tall, lanky, energetic man, Dexter was understandably worried.
'Captain, what is that Goddamn boat doing out there? It's too close.'
'That, Mr Dexter,' Brunner replied, switching to English, 'is what I am now finding out. Please to let me concentrate.'
'It's fishy.'
'Yes, Mr Dexter,' the captain replied with unexpected humour, 'it is a fishing boat. Ah, here we are. Boiler overheated. Repair work will be completed shortly. Also a man overboard. We hope to sail shortly. End of message.'
He lowered his glasses, walked to the front of the bridge as the American followed him. Dexter's tone was terse.
'And where is the Dutch cutter which was supposed to patrol us while we took the rest of the passengers aboard?'
'A technical hitch. It is unable to leave port at the moment. And now, Mr Dexter, please stay on the bridge but again allow me to concentrate. I want to watch that fishing vessel.'
A technical hitch. The cutter was indeed still in port. When it had started up its engines the propeller had turned several slow painful revolutions, making a terrible grinding sound. It had then stopped, refused to move again. Divers were now investigating the cause of the trouble.
In due course they would find a mixture of grit and waterproof grease had been applied to the bearings. No one had seen the scuba diver who had committed the sabotage. And it had been child's play for Klein to locate the vessel. A newspaper reporter had dug out the fact that this cutter would patrol the sea while the Adenauer stood offshore. The paper had printed the story because the Adenauer had become newsworthy the moment the US Secretary of State boarded the ship in Hamburg.
No other cutter was available to replace it. The Dutch Navy was occupied with a NATO sea exercise taking place off Iceland. Marine Control at Europort had just decided to request police launches be sent out to take its place.
The mining of the supertanker, Cayman Conqueror, lying offshore less than a mile from the Adenauer, proved to be a straightforward operation. The same technique was employed but five sea-mines were attached to the hull. The vessel was fifteen hundred feet in length from stem to stern.
The only moment of danger came when a seaman, trudging along the raised catwalk between the extensive piping systems located on the centre line of the tanker, thought he saw a small green lamp flashing to starboard. He stopped, rubbed his sore eyes, looked again. No green lamp.
He was fatigued, aching for bed, and about to come off duty. He put the light down to eye strain and continued his endless walk to food and sleep. The vague silhouette of a fishing vessel a quarter of a mile or more away meant nothing to the lo
okout. A boat crawling home to port . . .
On the bridge of the Easter Island Captain Williams took more interest in the lone fishing vessel which seemed stationary. His supertanker was waiting for entry permission from Marine Control, drifting a safe distance from the Conqueror.
From his position inside the navigating bridge at the stern and abaft the single squat funnel Williams swept the fishing boat with his night glasses. He could see its name clearly. Drenthe.
Williams was notorious for his caution, his curiosity about anything unusual. A fishing boat offshore well after dark was unusual. With the night-glasses screwed to his eyes he called out to his First Officer.
'Parker. Flash that vessel a signal . . .'
He asked very much the same questions which Captain Brunner had to the skipper of the Utrecht a few minutes earlier. Then he leant his elbows on a ledge and waited.
Inside the cramped wheelhouse of the Drenthe Hipper had taken on the role of Grand-Pierre. He held a Luger pistol rammed into the skipper's back. He wore pebble glasses and a handkerchief over the lower half of his face. Curled up on the floor lay the skipper's ten-year-old son, his feet and hands bound with rope, another Luxembourger bent over him with a knife at his throat.
'Signal back that we have a fire on board. That we are getting it under control. No help needed,' Hipper ordered in English. He added the same warning Grand-Pierre had issued.
As the skipper started flashing the reply Hipper took a walkie-talkie from his pocket, raised the antenna, and spoke to one of his men waiting at the stern.
'Mosar, start the fire now. Immediately.'
He spoke in Letzeburgesch, the strange Luxembourg patois which is a mixture of French and German - and understood by neither nation. Putting the walkie-talkie away, Hipper pulled the beret he was wearing further down over his forehead, concealing his hair.
The deck under Mosar's feet at the stern hardly moved, so calm was the sea under the moonless sky. A large man with mongrel features, wearing seaman's gear, he carried the bucket to where it would be visible from the supertanker - at least its contents would be shortly.
The large bucket was three-quarters-full of rags soaked in turpentine with a little petrol added. Stepping back behind the wheelhouse, Mosar picked up the rolled newspaper held with elastic bands, used his lighter to set the tip burning, dropped it inside the bucket and ran back.
There was a flare of flame, a dense cloud of black smoke which climbed into the windless night. The reply signal flashed to the tanker had just been received by Williams on his bridge. He saw the burst of flame, the coil of smoke.
'They have a problem,' he remarked to Parker. 'But they are expecting to deal with it. Better keep an eye on them - just in case it spreads.'
His attention fixed on the fire, Williams had no idea this was the moment when five sea-mines were attached to the underside of his huge vessel laden with oil. The unseen scuba divers - instructed by Klein who had studied the structure of this type of tanker - had avoided the coffer dam.
This was the space which separated the engine-room from the cargo tanks. The mines had carefully been attached beneath both tanks and engine-room. The scuba divers made their way underwater to the waiting dinghy lying astern of the Easter Island. They were not seen.
Aboard the Drenthe, Mosar fetched buckets of water already lined up on deck, doused the flames. He left the bucket which continued to send up clouds of black smoke and informed Hipper over his walkie-talkie his task was completed.
'Now we can move on,' Hipper informed the skipper. 'So start the engine. Next objective, the freighter, Otranto. She's not far away. After that, those three container ships. Then we can all go home,' he concluded in his soft, sibilant voice.
The Drenthe began moving, trailing a white wake, leaving behind the Easter Island, another floating death ship.
45
'We'd better get back to the city,' Van Gorp said as he swung the wheel. 'No sign of anything. No reports of unusual activity. No nothing.'
He sounded subdued. He'd received regular reports over his radio from the patrols scouring the city and the docks along the Maas. Tweed sat hunched up behind Paula, a glazed look in his eyes.
'Something's wrong,' said Paula. 'Very wrong. We've missed some key element. I don't think it is the docks.'
'Can't agree,' Van Gorp responded. 'Haber's body was found in that barge. Tweed said Haber transported the timer devices. This has to be the target.'
'What makes you so sure?' Paula argued.
'One point I forgot to mention. My men found a scuba diver's outfit near Haber's barge. That suggests the river . . .'
Tweed sat up straight. 'Where exactly was that outfit found?'
'On the deck of a barge next but one to Haber's. It had a large rip in it. Useless. So it was abandoned there. Proof scuba divers are interested in the Maas.'
'On the deck?' Tweed sounded incredulous. 'So you had no trouble finding it at all?'
'No. What's wrong with that?'
'Everything.' Tweed was vehement. 'Don't you see? Klein is meticulous in his planning. I've just realized that it's odd Haber's body was left exposed in that way. A few shovels of gravel would have covered the corpse. They'd also have hidden that ripped scuba diver outfit. So, it was left there deliberately. Klein is a past master at laying smokescreens.'
'I don't follow that,' Van Gorp objected,
'He wins either way. Case One. We don't get anywhere near Rotterdam. Haber's body discovered. Just another murder. Case Two. By some mischance we get on to him, track him to Rotterdam . . .'
"You did that,' Van Gorp pointed out. 'With very little to go on . . .'
'We trace him this far,' Tweed continued. 'We find Haber's corpse. Nearby a ripped scuba diver's suit is found. Obvious conclusion? Watch the Maas. Too obvious for my liking.'
'Have you checked the hotels?' Paula asked. 'Your men have copies of that Identikit of Klein.'
'A large team has been checking for hours. Showing the picture - especially to the concierges. Those are the chaps who notice things. Result? Complete blank. So what next?'
'Drive back to Euromast,' Tweed suggested. 'How far away are we?'
'Some distance yet.'
On the roof of the high-rise building Prussen, the Luxembourger hand-picked by Klein, stood staring through binoculars. He was alone on the flat rooftop which was rarely visited by tenants of the flats below except in high summer.
Prussen was watching the progress of a large laundry van along a straight street leading to the entrance to the Dutch marine barracks. The driver, delivering laundry to the barracks, was completely under Prussen's control. He was very fond of his mother, now in the hands of Klein's men. When given his instructions by Prussen he had been assured that if he failed to make the expected delivery look normal his mother's head would be severed.
Prussen, a squat, large-headed man, checked his watch. Timing was essential. The driver had synchronized his watch with the Luxembourger's. He had to arrive at the depot at exactly the right moment. Prussen felt in the pocket of his windcheater, took out the control box and waited, still holding the binoculars with one hand. A short time yet before he had to press the button. The extra cargo the driver had no idea he was carrying had been smuggled in among the laundry while Prussen had kept the driver talking at the front of the vehicle.
At Park Crescent Monica's phone rang. She lifted the receiver and immediately recognized the muffled voice. Like talking through a silk handkerchief this time. 'Yes, this is Monica . . .'
'Olympus speaking. It's Rotterdam. No doubt this time. Got it?'
'Quite clearly. I'll pass the message . . .'
There was a click. The caller had been in even more of the devil of a rush this time than during earlier calls. Again she'd no idea whether she'd been talking to a man or a woman. Had she detected a trace of foreign accent? Probably sheer imagination. She picked up the phone again, dialled Grand'Place.
'Police headquarters have a message for
you, Tweed,' Van Gorp informed him as he replaced the phone. 'Very urgent.'
Tweed hesitated. He wanted to reach Euromast as quickly as possible. But the message could tell him something vital. Van Gorp watched him in the mirror, waiting for his decision.
'It will only take an extra few minutes,' the Dutchman added.
'Police headquarters then . . .'
The two fishing vessels, Utrecht and Drenthe, were left drifting a short distance offshore. Under the supervision of Grand-Pierre and Hipper their crews were tied up, roped by their wrists and ankles.
Humanity played no part in Klein's earlier instructions to spare their lives. It would only be a matter of time before a Coastguard ship found them and the crews told their stories of what had happened. Thus providing the authorities with ironclad confirmation that the fleet waiting near the Maas mouth had been mined.
The outboard dinghies brought the assault teams ashore to a quiet part of the coast. Chabot was waiting with three four-wheel drive covered trucks. Within minutes the men were aboard, leaving behind the punctured dinghies to sink.
Chabot led the way, driving the first truck over the rough terrain of scrub and sand. He turned on to a main highway and pressed his foot down, heading for the centre of Rotterdam.
Klein drove past the Hilton and along the Kruisgade while Marler sat beside him. He slowed down and cruised as he stared ahead. A girl walking from the direction of the precinct was hurrying towards the entrance of the Hotel Central. She passed under a street light. Lara Seagrave.
Klein pulled in to the kerb, left the engine running, caught hold of her by the arm seconds before she went inside. She stared at his uniform, his tinted glasses without recognition. She was tugging her arm to free it when he spoke and she knew it was Klein.
'You were supposed to stay in the hotel. Where have you been?'
