Eric Ambler: The Levanter

“You mean they won’t be going to sleep tonight?” The brown eyes were watching me intently.

“I mean that I expect the situation to change in our favour, Captain.”

There was a long silence before he said: “I do hope you know what you’re doing, Mr. Howell.”

“I think I do, Captain.”

When we made the first course change the sun was low in the sky. As soon as we were on the new heading I went down to the saloon and reported the fact to Ghaled. He didn’t seem very interested. He must have gone on drinking steadily after I had left him. I sat down next to Aziz and forced myself to eat. Kyprianou gave me disapproving looks; I was not conducting myself as an owner should. As soon as I reasonably could I left the saloon and went back to the bridge again.

Touzani had posted an extra man at the top of the companionway. Patsalides was on watch. They both had large revolvers stuck in their belts and were obviously self-conscious about them. They pretended not to see me.

Touzani was in his office. He carried his revolver in his right-hand trouser pocket. He had been staring out of the porthole when I came in, but now he turned.

He motioned toward the darkness with his hand, “There’s another ship out there,” he said. “She crossed astern of us a while back. Had the sunset behind her. A Syrian schooner motoring on her engine.”

I sat down but said nothing.

“She wouldn’t be the ship we’re going to rendezvous with, would she?”

“Why do you ask?”

“When we change next time we’ll be on convergent courses. I ask because she’s running without lights.”

“She can see our lights. I think you’ll find she'll stay clear.”

“No rendezvous?”

“Not with her.”

“Your orders are still the same, Mr. Howell?”

“My requests are, yes. Slow to six knots but stay ten miles offshore.”

“Very well.”

He left me and went to the wheelhouse. He was displeased with me and I didn’t blame him. I was displeased with myself. He was trusting me and I should have confided in him. But it was too late now. I had begun to watch the clock.

Nine o’clock came and went. Then it was nine fifteen. From the bridge I could hear the change being made. Patsalides rang down to the engine room for half ahead and then revolutions for six knots. The course change called for by Hadaya had been eleven degrees to starboard. Touzani ordered a change of fifteen. From that point on until he corrected again we would be moving away from the coast. After he had corrected we would be nowhere near territorial waters.

I had no idea what from a patrol boat interception would take. I presumed some form of flashing light signal — ”What ship is that?” — followed by an order to heave to. I didn’t know. I didn’t care. I just stood by the porthole with my eyes glued to the darkness outside waiting for something to happen. I waited and waited.

I was still waiting when Captain Touzani returned to the cabin. He had a radio message form in his hand and he was clearly furious.

“Mr. Howell, a radio message has just been received. It is in English and for you.” He thrust it under my nose.

It was addressed: M. V. AMALIA HOWELL FOR M. HOWELL,

It read: EMERGENCY PROCEDURE. STEER 170 DEGREES REPEAT 170. YOU ARE CLEARED FOR ASHDOD.

It was signed: COAST GUARD HADERA

At least they hadn’t forgotten me. I looked up into the angry brown eyes of Captain Touzani.

“It may be addressed to you, Mr. Howell,” he said deliberately, “but I want to know what it means. I demand an explanation.”

What it meant was that the radio warnings that I had sent earlier had not been fully understood, but I could scarcely tell him that.

“May we look at the chart, Captain?”

“All right. But I still want an explanation. I still want to know why, in my ship, you are getting navigational instructions from an Israeli coast guard station, and why we are cleared for an Israeli port for which we are not bound.”

“Show me this course on the chart, please.”

We went through to the wheelhouse and he laid a ruler across the chart to show me.

“There’s one-seven-oh.”

“On that course what would be our distance from Tel Aviv when we passed it?”

“Six miles about.”

“What is our present course?”

“One-nine-two.”

“Will you please radio back to Hadera? Say, please, in my name, that we are not, repeat not , able to carry out this emergency procedure, and that we are compelled, use that word, to maintain course one-nine-two.”

“First, I want that explanation.”

“We are trying to keep out of trouble, and keep a lot of other people out of trouble as well. That’s all the explaining I can do now, Captain. Kindly send the message and mark it Urgent For Action.”

He started to argue but I cut him short.

“This is an order, Captain Touzani, and I can assure you that it is a proper order from an owner to a captain.”

“I’d like to be the judge of that.”

“You will be, but just now you’ll have to let me be the judge. Send the message please.”

I left him before he could say any more. I had to think. The coast guard message could only have been dictated by Barlev’s people in Tel Aviv and therefore was intended to have a special meaning for me. Since they had not understood my references to a second ship they were now saying one of two things. The first was that they were still unwilling to intercept the Amalia far outside territorial waters and still asking me to make things easier for them. The second. .

But I never really had time to think that one through. Something else distracted me.

The saloon door that gave on to the deck was held ajar by a catch, so that I was halfway down the companionway when I first heard it; a scratching noise and then, suddenly, very loudly, a voice.

I stopped and looked through the porthole.

Ghaled and the front-fighters were gathered around the walkie-talkie, and the voice coming out of it was Hadaya’s.

I admit that I do not like recalling what happened during the next hour, but so much has been said, left unsaid, or half-said, or insinuated, that I must.

The range of those walkie-talkie things varies. That one I would guess was effective up to just over a mile. As Hadaya was over two nautical miles away then, we could not hear him very plainly at first.

There was sudden fading and then bursts of sound like the one I had heard from outside.

But his meaning was plain enough even then, and became plainer as the distance between the two sets decreased.

Ghaled looked up angrily as I came in. “You heard that?” he demanded.

“Was that Hadaya’s voice, Comrade Salah?”

“It was. We are speaking to him on the Jeble 5. He says that we are off-course.”

You didn’t tell Ghaled he was talking nonsense, but I had the presence of mind to do the next best thing — make him suspect that he was.

“Comrade Salah, I have just come down from the bridge to tell you that the ship is now on course.”

“Now? Why not before?”

“In a car, when one takes a corner, one turns the wheel and then straightens up. It is the same at sea. But we are not in a car, or a rowboat. This is a ship and, at the moment, a slow-moving one. It takes time to turn and time to straighten up. Hadaya knows all this.”

“He also says that we are out of position.”

“With respect, Comrade Salah, that is not possible.”

There was another faint squawk from the walkie-talkie. Hadaya said something about taking bearings and getting fixes. Ghaled did not understand it and I was glad to ignore it.

“You admitted yourself,” he said accusingly, “that Hadaya is competent.”