Hammond Innes - The Black Tide

Saltley passed up an aerosol foghorn and Mark gave three blasts as we sheered away, back on to our original course. The tanker remained silent, the same little knot of watchers now transferred to the port bridge wing. Through the glasses I could see one of them gesticulating. Then, when we were almost a mile away, the Shah Mohammed suddenly emitted two deep long-drawn-out belches from its siren as though expressing relief at our departure.

The question now was, did we head for the nearest port with the evidence we had or wait for the Aurora B to show up? I wanted to get away now. I hadn’t liked the look of the little group on the bridge wing. All the original crew must be locked up in her somewhere and the sooner she was arrested the more chance there was that they’d be got out alive. But Saltley was adamant that we must wait. ‘Who do you suppose is going to arrest her?’

‘Surely the Navy—’

‘In international waters? Didn’t you see the flag she was flying, the colours they’d painted her in? Black, white and green, with red and two stars on the hoist, those are the Iraqi colours. I think Lloyd’s List will show the Shah Mohammed to be properly registered as an Iraqi vessel. They’re sure to have made it legal, to that extent, and if they have, then the Navy couldn’t possibly act without government authority, and you can just imagine the British government authorizing the seizure of a ship belonging to Iraq. It could upset the Arab world, spark off a major international row.’

I thought his twisted legal mind was splitting straws. ‘And if we wait,’ I said, ‘until we have evidence of the two ships meeting — what difference will that make?’

He shrugged. ‘Not a lot, I admit. But two ships meeting at a lonely group of islands does suggest a purpose. At least it’s something I can argue.’

‘But you’ve got the proof already,’ Mark insisted. ‘That’s the Howdo Stranger out there. No doubt of it. Repainted. Renamed. But it’s still the same ship, the one Dad insured and the owners claim has disappeared. It’s there. And you’ve got photographs to prove it.’

‘Given time and a court of law.’ Saltley nodded. ‘Yes, I think we probably could prove it. But I’ve got

to persuade top-level civil servants at the Foreign Office to advise the Secretary of State he’s justified in authorizing what amounts to a flagrant breach of international law. I’ve got to convince them there’s no risk to them or to the country, that what they find on board will prove absolutely the hostile and deadly nature of the operation.’ He was standing in the hatch and he leaned forward, his hands on the teak decking. ‘If you can tell me what that operation is…’ He paused, his eyes staring at me, very blue under the dark peaked cap. ‘But you don’t know, do you? You don’t know what it’s all about and you never thought to question Choffel about it.’ His eyes shifted to the stationary tanker. ‘So we wait for the Aurora B. Agreed?’ He stared at us for a moment, then, when nobody answered him, he turned abruptly and went down into the saloon.

A moment later he was back with glasses and a bottle of gin, a conciliatory gesture, for I don’t think he liked it any more than I did. We drank in moody silence, none of us doubting now that the Aurora B would appear in due course, but all wondering how long it would be before we were released from our lonely vigil.

The rest of the day proved fine and bright. We lay hove-to off the western coast of Selvagem Grande till nightfall, then shifted our station two miles to the north with the light bearing 145°. There was no sign of the tanker. I was certain she was still there, lying hove-to without lights. Saltley was certain, too, but when the moon rose and still no sign of her, he had the

sail hoisted and we back-tracked towards the position where we had originally found her.

I didn’t like it and I said so. I was certain our metal mast would show up as a clear blip on their radar screen. After a while we turned southwest towards Selvagem Pequena, reducing sail until we were moving at little more than three knots. We heard the swell breaking on the rocks before we could see the island, and then suddenly there was our tanker lying just to the south of Fora.

We turned then, heading north, back towards Selvagem Grande. ‘I think she’s seen us.’ Mark was watching through the glasses. ‘She’s under way and heading towards us.’

We hoisted the genoa again and seemed to hold

our own for a while, then she came up on us very fast,

steaming at full ahead and pushing a mountain of water ahead of her broad deep-laden bows. We altered course to starb’d as though making for the landing place on Selvagem Grande. The tanker also altered course, so that the bows were less than a cable’s length away as she steamed up abreast of us. A searchlight stabbed the night from high up on her superstructure,

Doding the water round us until it picked up the e of our sails and fixed on us, blindingly, as

be long black hull went thumping past. The stink of diesel fumes enveloped us seconds before we were picked up by the massive bow wave and flung sideways nto the suck and break of such a massive bulk being driven through the water at about fifteen knots.

For a moment all hell seemed to break loose. Toni

Bartello was flung against me so that I ended up half-bent over one of the sheet winches with a sharp pain in the lower part of my rib cage. Pamela was on her knees clinging to the guardrail and down below the crash of crockery and other loose objects flying about the saloon was almost as loud as the slatting of sails and boom. And all the time the searchlight remained fixed on us.

Then suddenly we were out of the wash, everything preternaturally quiet. Blackness closed over us as the searchlight went out. It took a little while for my eyes to become accustomed to the darkness. Somebody said, ‘She had her nav lights on.’ I could see the broad back of her now, the stern light showing white and the Iraqi flag picked out by the steaming light on her after-mast. Moonlight gradually revealed the surface of the sea. Was this her final departure? Had the Aurora B arrived in the darkness? We searched the horizon, but no sign of another tanker, and shortly after 03.00 we lost sight of the Shah Mohammed behind the dark outline of Selvagem Grande.

When dawn broke the sea was empty and no vessel in sight.

We were north of the island ourselves then, all of us very tired and arguing wearily about what we should do. In the end, we turned downwind with the intention of checking that the tanker hadn’t returned to her old position south of Fora. Shortly after noon I heard Toni Bartello wake Saltley to tell him he had sighted the smaller islands and a tanker lying to the south of them.

We were all up then, putting about and changing sail so that we lay hove-to with the tanker just in sight like a sheer rock on the edge of visibility. We kept it in sight all afternoon, lying drowsily on deck, stripped to the waist and warm in the sun.

Towards evening the wind began to back, the air thickening till we could no longer see the tanker. A small boat came out from under the lee of Pequena, its bows lifted and moving fast. It was an inflatable with three men in it. We could hear the sound of its outboard clear and strident above the growing rumble of the reef surf as it made straight towards us. Only when it was a few yards off did the man at the wheel cut the engine and swing it broadside to us. One of the three stood up, clasping the top of the windshield to steady himself. ‘Who is Captain here?’ His face was narrow with a high-bridged nose and a little black moustache, and his accent was similar to Sadeq’s.

Saltley stepped into the cockpit, leaning forward and gripping hold of the guardrail. ‘I’m the captain,’ he said. ‘Who are you?’