Eric Ambler: The Levanter

I went to Captain Touzani.

Because he had half-turned when he tried to draw the revolver, Ghaled’s bullet had smashed through his left arm and into his side. The blood was spreading on his shirt but more of it seemed to be coming from his arm. With the uninjured one he was still trying to get the revolver out of his pocket.

I got it out for him, but kept hold of it.

He began swearing and tried to sit up. I told him to save his breath and lie still.

Then I went along the alleyway to Ghaled’s cabin.

He had the Serinette out of its case and was setting it up on the desk The tape antenna was already extended by the open porthole.

He heard me and turned.

“I told you to go up to the bridge.”

“Comrade Salah,” I said, “nobody can go up to the bridge.”

And then I fired at the Serinette.

I fired three shots from the revolver.

All were aimed at the music box, the Serinette.

I then went back to the saloon.

There, for a moment, I didn’t quite know what had happened. When they had gone out to attack the bridge, the front-fighters had left the saloon door wide open. Now there was a blinding blue-white light blazing through it. It was the approaching patrol boat’s searchlight, but when I realized that I paid it no more attention. Touzani was still swearing away. I told him again to save his breath. I heard the engine room telegraph and felt the vibration cease. We were stopping. I went to the walkie-talkie and pressed the transmit button.

“Hadaya, this is Howell. Do you hear me?”

“Yes. Is that a patrol boat attacking you?”

“I don’t know, but we are stopping. I have orders from Comrade Salah. The operation is cancelled You understand? The operation is cancelled. You are to jettison your deck cargo and return to base. You hear?”

“Why doesn’t Comrade Salah himself speak?”

“He is wounded. But those are his orders. Obey them immediately. You hear?”

“I hear. Is he badly wounded?”

I switched off the set without answering.

If the Jeble 5 had then headed straight for Tel Aviv she might still have been able to launch a few rockets before she herself came under fire from the patrol boat. Though I didn’t for a moment think that Hadaya was the type to go in for suicide attacks, it was possible that the front-fighters in charge of the rocket-launchers were.

It was better, I thought, for them to believe that they were still answerable to Comrade Salah.

The lieutenant who commanded the Israeli patrol boat was a sharp-eyed, thin-lipped young man with sandy hair and freckles. I met him and his boarding party on the after well-deck. He gave me a formal salute and was very stiff at first. He had been briefed.

“Captain Touzani?”

“Captain Touzani is wounded. My name is Howell.”

“Ah yes, the owner.” His English was correct and only slightly accented. “I must ask you if you have requested assistance from the navy of Israel.”

“Yes, I have.”

“Why, please?”

“We were being hijacked by four passengers. One, the one who shot at and wounded the captain, is dead. Another was himself wounded by the first mate. That man has a gun but I think that he has now fired off all his ammunition. The other two hijackers are still loose but they have no firearms.”

He seemed to relax. “You call them hijackers, sir. Did these passengers attempt to take over the vessel by force?”

They did.”

“And intimidate the captain, compelling him to steer a certain course?”

“Yes, though they didn’t succeed.”

“Whether they succeeded or not is immaterial. By committing these offenses on the open sea these men are pirates, Mr. Howell.”

“Whatever they are I’m glad to see you, Lieutenant.”

But he had already begun snapping out orders in Hebrew.

It took only a few minutes to round up the unwounded front-fighters. Though they had managed to break the padlock on the special compartment door, they were still wrestling with the clip. They submitted sullenly. Meanwhile a trained first-aid man from the patrol boat had been attending to the wounded.

When he had made his report, Patsalides and I conferred with the lieutenant on the bridge.

“The Faysal man’s wound is not serious,” he said. “However, Captain Touzani has a broken arm and at least one broken rib. The bullet is still in him. He should not be moved until we have proper medical assistance. I suggest that you put into Ashdod, where it can be waiting for him.”

“What about the prisoners?”

“A vessel of amy nation arresting pirates on the open sea, Mr. Howell, is entitled to bring them to trial in the courts of her own country.” He was reciting a learned lesson. “As they have been arrested by an Israeli ship they will go for trial in Israel.”

“Very well.”

“There is one matter about which I was to consult you, Mr. Howell, that of a second ship. We saw what looked like a fishing schooner about a mile away from you and under power, but no second ship.”

“I doubt if it’s of much interest to you now, Lieutenant. The schooner was the second ship, and I’m sure you could easily catch her if you wanted to. But she won’t ask for assistance. You’ll have to stop her and ask for her papers. She’s Syrian, but they’ll be in order. There’ll be no incriminating evidence. That’s overboard by now. I’ll tell your people all about it when I see them. By the way, you had better take the dead man with the live prisoners.”

“Very well, if you wish.”

“He’s down in the ship’s papers as Yassin, but his real name is Salah Ghaled. I’d like him off the ship.”

“Oh.” He looked nonplussed. His briefing hadn’t covered everything; but he recovered quickly and with a grin. “I think the sooner we are in Ashdod the better for everyone, Mr. Howell.”

I could not but agree.

Lewis Prescott

August

Michael Howell should have had better luck.

The crime of piracy on the open sea occupies a special place in international law. It is the one “international” crime that has been precisely defined and that all nations have joined in condemning. Although the penalties for those convicted of it may vary from state to state, the laws on this subject have been accepted by all. Difficulties of interpretation have been rare and usually of a technical nature.

The district court in Ashdod had no difficulty in dealing with the Amalia Howell case. The accused were charged only with piracy, and politics were kept out of it. The chief prosecution witnesses were Captain Touzani and First Mate Patsalides. Neither of them in their evidence referred to the PAF; and the defence, whose line was that the prime offender was dead, was naturally careful not to mention it. During the course of the trial one of the defendants, Aziz Faysal, alleged that Mr. Howell had murdered Salah Ghaled, but no evidence was produced to support the allegation. The court concluded that Ghaled had been killed in a general exchange of shots between the crew and the pirates when the latter attempted to take over the vessel.

Mr. Howell himself issued no formal denial of the charge. In the circumstances this was not surprising. By the time the trial took place, so many other, and wilder, charges had been hurled at his head that issuing denials had become for him a somewhat pointless exercise.

Before sailing from Latakia on board the Amalia Howell he had been told by Ghaled that a supply of PAF detonators had been lost in Israel. The loss had been described at the time as a “minor mishap”, and, from Ghaled’s point of view, perhaps that was all it was. But for Mr. Howell it was a catastrophe.