Stephen Coonts - Pirate Alley

He pulled a radio control device from his pocket and tossed it on the carpet on which he had been sitting.

Jake Grafton didn’t seem impressed. “We’ll want the Sultan, too,” he said. “A team of sailors will arrive tomorrow by boat after the money is paid. They will go aboard, start the engines, raise the anchor and sail her away.”

Yousef wanted more money. Grafton stood his ground. He had made a deal with Ragnar. There was no more money.

“Two hundred million for the people, another hundred million for the ship,” Noon reported.

After thinking it over, taking his time, Grafton said, “We will sell him the ship for a hundred million. We will give him a hundred million for the people and he can keep the ship. Maybe start up a cruise ship line. Eyl to Rome, via Suez and Athens.”

It was an argument for show. Yousef played to his followers, with much back-and-forth with them that wasn’t translated.

After a while Yousef caved. “Two hundred million, and you can have the people and the ship.”

Grafton merely nodded. He looked a question at Noon. “You taking Rosen back to the ship?”

Noon nodded.

Grafton turned toward Rosen and said, “Put it on the Internet.” He turned on his headset, arranged it on his head and had a short conversation with Admiral Tarkington. Then he turned it off to save the battery.

Yousef issued orders, and Grafton’s escorts led him to the stairs and down. They ended up in a room on the third floor. Still some trash about. Grafton looked out the shattered window and the one that still had glass, then sat down. He paid no attention to the guards.

* * *

High Noon accompanied Mike Rosen back to the ship. They waded out from the beach and managed to heave themselves into the boat without tipping it over, and the boatman started the little one-cylinder engine. Away they putted.

When they were back aboard the Sultan of the Seas and climbing stairs to the e-com center, Rosen asked, “What happened to Ragnar?”

“He is no longer with us.”

“And the rest of the pirates?”

“The same, I am afraid. Yousef el-Din and his men did their level best to kill them all. Oh, no doubt a few of them are hiding in the brush, but only a few.”

“That e-mail I sent?”

“Oh, yes. It stimulated them vigorously.”

“And whose idea was it to send that?”

Noon grinned and didn’t answer.

When Rosen’s computer was online, over a hundred e-mails vomited forth.

“We will send the Shabab’s communique first,” Noon said, “then the substance of the conversation between Yousef el-Din and Mr. Grafton.” He extracted a grimy sheet of paper from a pocket. “Send them to your radio station. Your colleagues will, I assume, put them on the Net where the world can read them.”

He handed the paper to Rosen, who spread it out on the desk and read it carefully. It merely stated unequivocally that unless the two hundred million dollars was paid by noon tomorrow Eyl time, the Shabab would kill all the prisoners. A couple of sentences of boilerplate followed, exhorting the faithful to jihad.

“Apparently Allah’s soldiers have inherited the pirates’ business,” Rosen muttered.

“Their assets and their debts,” Noon said, uncorking his gin bottle. “Start typing.”

* * *

It was close to noon when I heard trucks coming up the hill toward the fort. A man would have had to be deaf not to hear them, since none of them had a working muffler. Sounded like a NASCAR race.

I figured the guards were going to change, so trotted over to the other side of the fort. Sure enough, the holy warriors were walking around the fort. For just a moment, there was no one on the eastern side. I didn’t waste a second; just vaulted over the side into the loose dirt twelve or so feet below. Then I shot off down the hill toward the beach. Went about fifty yards and then flopped onto my belly.

Waited a minute or so for shouts, or shots, or someone running after me. Nothing. I started crawling. My leg hurt every time I moved it.

After I had done about a mile on my stomach around the north side of that rock pile and was thoroughly fagged out, with cactus stickers in my hands and knees, I decided to get on the net. Got my headset on and turned on the transmitter/receiver and keyed the mike. “Control, this is Tommy. Where is the admiral?”

“He’s in Ragnar’s lair.”

“E.D.? Travis?”

“Yo.”

“Where are you? We need to talk.”

* * *

Julie Penney was standing at a gun port looking at the sea when Tommy Carmellini landed in the dirt in front of her, picked himself up and galloped into the brush.

She recognized him, even though she didn’t see his face. Big, rangy, athletic, lean … Grafton’s assistant, the man who brought Nora back from Ragnar’s hellhole.

Marjorie was there and came over to the porthole. She had gotten a glimpse of the falling body, but hadn’t seen who it was.

“Tomorrow’s the deadline,” Marjorie reminded the captain’s wife. “One more night.”

Suzanne Ranta heard that remark and joined the conversation. “Out of here tomorrow. Or we’ll be dead.”

“Arch says the ransom will be paid,” Julie Penney reminded them. “Let’s keep our chins up.”

“Stiff upper lip,” Irene mocked, as British as she could.

Julie Penney wandered off to check on other passengers. She had had a little talk with her husband in the wee hours of the morning, after the shooting died down, and he had said, “It’ll be tonight.” She asked why, and was told, “The locals can’t see in the dark. The Americans prefer it. If there is going to be trouble, it will be tonight.”

Tonight. Conceivably, this could be the last day of life for a great many people.

So … if you knew this might be your last day, how would you spend it? Almost by instinct Julie Penney chose to spend it trying to buck up her husband’s passengers.

* * *

It was nearly four o’clock when I reached the rendezvous, what with crawling and sneaking along. The Shabab had patrols out, and they kept showing up at inopportune times. Sometimes I am lucky that way.

Our rendezvous was a big pile of rock overlooking Eyl West. It was just below the rim, a pile of hard rock that had resisted the rain and wind through the ages. I wouldn’t have been surprised if hundreds of thousands of years ago Homo erectus hadn’t huddled on random nights on the very spot where Travis had built a tiny, smokeless fire to brew coffee and warm up MREs. In Africa, you think about things like that.

It wasn’t just Travis and E.D., either. It was my whole snatch team. Harry, Doc, Willis, Buck, Wilbur … all of them.

“This is like a high school reunion,” I said. “Who brought the beer?”

“Jesus, Tommy, you look bad! What did you do, crawl the whole way?”

“Damn near. Where’s Orville?”

“Up on top of the rock. We have a drone up keeping watch.”

“I’ll recommend a Christmas bonus for all you guys.”

“Want a beer?” Buck asked.

“You are a prince among men. Wanna meet my sister? I’ll fix you up.”

E.D. handed me the satellite phone. “The navy wanted to talk to you as soon as you showed up.”

“I kinda thought so.”

“They weren’t expecting Admiral Grafton to get himself into a hostage situation. I think they want you to take care of that.”

“Did you guys get all those radio detonators?” Willis asked me.

“If you hear a really big bang, the answer is no.” I opened a can of beer and looked at E.D. “Anything else they want to ask me?”

“Now, Tommy, no one knew if you were going to get out of that fort before dark. We were Plan B.”

“I see.”