The world’s oceans are divided into sea lanes that were almost as clearly marked as interstate highways. With deadlines always tight and the price of keeping a vessel at sea running into the hundreds of thousands of dollars a day for supertankers, ships invariably followed the straightest line between destinations, rarely varying a mile or two. So while some parts of the ocean teemed with marine traffic, other regions never saw a single ship in a year. The charter boat was in such a dead zone—far enough from the coast to avoid regional freighters supplying Walvis Bay but well inside established routes used for rounding the Cape of Good Hope.
“There’s something else odd,” Sloane said. “There’s no smoke coming from her funnel. Do you think she’s a derelict? Maybe she was caught in a storm and the crew had to abandon her.”
Tony came up the ladder. Sloane was pondering the presence of the mystery ship and the fate of her crew and didn’t hear him so when he touched her shoulder she started.
“Sorry,” he said. “Look behind us. There’s another boat coming this way.”
Sloane whirled so fast that her hands on the wheel caused the boat to lurch to port. It was notoriously hard to judge distances at sea but she knew the boat driving hard for them could not be more than a couple of miles astern and for it to catch up to them it was running faster than the charter boat. She tossed the binoculars at the captain and eased the chrome throttle handles until they hit their stops.
“What’s going on?” Tony shouted, leaning forward as the boat picked up speed.
The captain had sensed Sloane’s fear and for the moment said nothing as he scoped the approaching craft with the binoculars.
“Do you recognize it?” Sloane asked him.
“Yes. She comes into Walvis every month or so. A yacht. Maybe fifty feet long. I do not know her name or her owner.”
“Can you see anyone?”
“There are men on the upper bridge. White men.”
“I demand to know what is going on!” Tony roared, his face flushing.
Again Sloane ignored him. Without having to see them, she knew who was in the boat behind them. She gently eased the wheel and started racing for the distant freighter, praying that her pursuers would back off if there were witnesses. Out on the open ocean she was sure they’d be killed, the fishing boat scuttled. She pressed more firmly on the throttles but the diesels were already giving her everything they had. Her lips worked as she silently prayed that she was wrong about the freighter being abandoned. If it was, they’d be dead as soon as the yacht caught up.
Tony grabbed her arm, his eyes blazing. “Damn it, Sloane, what is this all about? Who are those people?”
“I think they’re the same men who chased me back to the hotel last night.”
“Chased you? What do you mean, chased you?”
“What I said,” she snapped. “I was chased back to the hotel by two men. One of them had a gun. They warned me to leave the country.”
Tony’s anger turned into fury and even the captain looked at her with an unreadable expression. “And you didn’t see fit to tell me. Are you out of your mind? You get chased by men with guns and then lead us out here to the middle of nowhere? Good God, woman, what were you thinking?”
“I didn’t think they would follow us,” Sloane shouted back. “I messed up, all right! If we can get close enough to the freighter they won’t do anything.”
“What the hell would have happened if that freighter wasn’t here?” Spittle popped from Tony’s mouth with each word.
“Well, it is, so we’ll be fine.”
Tony turned to the ship’s owner. “Do you have a gun?”
He nodded slowly. “I use it on sharks if they come round.”
“Then I bloody well recommend you get it, mate, because we might just need it.”
The boat had been taking the waves on a gentle broadside but now that Sloane had altered their course they were cutting into them, the bow sawing up and down and sea foam exploding each time they plowed through a crest. The ride was rough and Sloane kept her knees bent to absorb each impact. The captain returned from below and wordlessly handed Sloane a worn twelve-gauge and a fistful of shells, intuitively knowing she possessed a strength Tony Reardon lacked. He retook his position at the helm and made subtle corrections as each wave passed under them so as not to lose speed. The luxury yacht had gained at least a mile while the freighter looked no closer.
She scanned the big cargo ship through the binoculars and her heart sank. The vessel was in poor repair. Her hull was painted in myriad dark shades and looked like it had been patched with steel plates a dozen times over. She saw no one walking the decks or manning the bridge and while it looked like foam creamed off her bows as if she were making way it couldn’t be possible because there was no smoke from her stack.
“Do you have a radio?” Sloane asked the captain.
“It is below,” he replied. “But doesn’t have enough range to reach Walvis if that’s what you’re thinking.”
Sloane pointed to the freighter over the bow. “I want to alert them what’s happening so they can lower a boarding ladder.”
The captain glanced over his shoulder at the fast-approaching yacht. “It will be close.”
Sloane slid down the steep steps using just her hands, and ran into the cabin. The radio was an old transceiver bolted to the low ceiling. She powered it up and worked the knob to channel 16, the international distress band.
“Mayday, mayday, mayday, this is the fishing vessel Pinguin calling the freighter en route to Walvis Bay. We are being chased by pirates, please respond.”
A burst of static filled the cabin.
Sloane adjusted the radio dial and thumbed the microphone. “This is the Pinguin calling unidentified freighter en route to Walvis. We need assistance. Please respond.”
Again she heard static, but thought she caught the ghost of a voice in the white noise. Despite the boat’s violent pitching, Sloane’s fingers were as delicate as a surgeon’s as she moved the dial in fractional increments.
A voice suddenly boomed from the speaker. “You should have listened to me last night and left Namibia.” Through the distortion Sloane was still able to recognize the voice from the previous night and her blood went cold.
Sloane mashed the microphone. “Leave us alone and we will return to shore,” she pleaded. “I will be on the first plane out. I promise.”
“That is no longer an option.”
She looked over the transom. The yacht had cut the distance to a couple hundred yards, close enough for her to see two of the men in the bridge holding rifles of some sort. The freighter was a mile or more away.
They weren’t going to make it.
“WHAT do you think, Chairman?” Hali Kasim asked from his seat at the communications station.
Cabrillo was leaning forward in his chair, an elbow on the arm of his chair, a hand cupping his unshaven chin. The forward display screen showed the view from the mast-mounted camera. The image from the gyro-stabilized video was rock solid and zoomed in on the two boats fast approaching the Oregon. The fishing boat was making a solid twenty knots while the motor yacht was easily closing in at thirty-five.
They’d been watching the two craft on radar for the better part of an hour and had given their presence a low priority since the waters off Namibia’s coast were known fishing grounds. It was only when the first boat, which they now knew was called Pinguin, German for penguin, altered course to intercept the Oregon that Cabrillo was called from his cabin where he was just about ready to hit the showers after an hour in the gym.
“I don’t have the foggiest idea,” Juan said at last. “Why would pirates use a million-dollar yacht to chase an old fishing boat a hundred and fifty miles offshore? Something’s hinky. Wepps, zoom in on that yacht. Let’s see who’s aboard her if you can.”
Mark Murphy wasn’t on duty, so the crewman manning the weapons station worked a joystick and trackball to bring up the image Cabrillo wanted. At such extr
eme zoom even the computer-assisted gyroscopes had a difficult time holding the picture steady. But it was good enough. Sunlight glinted off the expanse of sloping glass below the bridge but through the glare Juan could see four men on the sleek yacht’s bridge, and two of them held assault rifles. As they watched, one of them brought the weapon to his shoulder and fired a short burst.
Anticipating the coming order, the weapons officer panned back to show the fleeing Pinguin. It didn’t appear she had been hit but they could see a copper-haired woman crouched behind the flat transom cradling a shotgun.
“Wepps,” Cabrillo said sharply. “Spool up the Gatling but don’t lower the hull plate. Bring up a firing solution on that yacht and pop the starboard thirty calibers from their redoubts just in case.”
“Four men with automatic weapons against a woman with a shotgun,” Hali mused. “Won’t be much of a fight if we don’t do something.”
“I’m working on it,” Cabrillo said, then nodded to his communications specialist. “Patch me through to her.”
Kasim hit a button on one of his three keyboards. “You’re live.”
Cabrillo settled his lip mike. “Pinguin, Pinguin, Pinguin, this is the motor ship Oregon.” On the screen they could see the woman’s head whip around as she heard him over the radio.
She scrambled back inside the cabin and a moment later her breathless voice filled the operations center. “Oregon, oh, thank God. For a minute I thought you were a derelict ship.”
“Not far from the truth,” Linda Ross deadpanned. Though not on duty, Juan had asked the elfin Ross to join him in the op center on the off chance he would need her background in intelligence.
“Please state the nature of your emergency,” Juan requested, pretending they didn’t have a bird’s-eye view of what was happening. “You mentioned pirates.”
“Yes, and they just opened fire on us with machine guns. My name is Sloane Macintyre. We’re on a fishing charter and they just suddenly appeared.”
“Didn’t sound that way to me,” Linda said, sucking her lower lip. “The guy on the yacht said he’d already warned her about something once.”
“So she’s lying,” Juan agreed. “She was just fired at and she’s lying. Interesting, don’t you think?”
“She’s gotta be hiding something.”
“Oregon,” Sloane called, “are you still there?”
Juan keyed the mike. “We’re still here.” He sized up the situation with a quick glance at the screen, projecting where each craft would be in another minute and then their locations in two. The tactical picture was grim. But worse than that was the fact he’d be acting blind. For all he knew Sloane Macintyre was the biggest drug dealer in southern Africa and was about to be greased by a rival. She and the others on the Pinguin might be getting everything they deserved. On the other hand she could be totally innocent.
“Then why lie?” he whispered to himself.
If he was to preserve the Oregon’s secrets, the margin for action would be razor tight—in fact too tight. He thought through a dozen scenarios in the time it took to scratch his chin again and made his decision.
“Helm, bring us hard to starboard; we need to cut the distance between us and the Pinguin. Increase speed to twenty knots. Engineering, make sure the smudge boiler is online.” When alone at sea the Oregon produced no pollution, but when they encountered traffic a special smoke generator was switched on to create the illusion the remarkable ship was powered by conventional diesel engines.
“I fired it up a couple minutes ago,” the second engineer reported from the back of the op center. “Should have done it as soon as they reached visual range but I forgot.”
“No big deal. I doubt anyone noticed,” Juan said before activating his mike. “Sloane, this is the master of the Oregon.”
“Go ahead, Oregon.”
Juan marveled at how coolly she was handling herself and thought briefly of Tory Ballinger, an Englishwoman he’d rescued a few months back in the Sea of Japan. They had the same kind of mettle. “We have turned to intercept you. Tell the Pinguin’s captain to take us down the port side, but don’t let on that’s the way you’re going to go. I want to trick the yacht to pass us to starboard. Do you understand?”
“We are to pass you down your port side but only at the last minute.”
“That’s right. Don’t cut it too close, though. The yacht won’t be able to make tight turns at the speed she’s doing, so avoid our bow wave as best you can. I’m going to lower our boarding stairs but don’t approach them until I give you the word. Got it?”
“We won’t approach until you signal,” Sloane repeated.
“You’re going to be fine, Sloane,” Juan said, the confidence in his voice carrying over the crackling radio link. “These aren’t the first pirates me and my crew have come across.”
On screen he saw the gunmen try to rake the Pinguin again with their assault rifles but the range was still extreme from such an unstable firing platform. It didn’t look like any of the rounds came close to the charter boat, yet it firmed Juan’s resolve that they were doing the right thing in helping Sloane and her party.
“Hali, get some hands on deck to lower the boarding stairs and extend the ladder. Wepps, be prepared to fire the bow thirty caliber.”
“I have it locked on.”
The Pinguin was coming on gamely, now less than three hundred yards from the hulking freighter, with the yacht a scant hundred yards further back. Juan didn’t want to use the machine gun but he saw there wasn’t going to be any choice. The charter boat would be in range of the yacht before he could slip the Oregon between them. He was about to order the weapons officer to fire a short burst to slow the yacht when he noticed Sloane slithering out to the Pinguin’s stern. She raised her head and shoulders over the transom and let loose with the shotgun, firing the second barrel as soon as she regained her sight picture.
She had no chance of hitting the yacht but the unexpected volley forced the luxury craft to slow and make a more cautious approach. It bought her the seconds they needed to implement Cabrillo’s plan.
“What’s going on?” Max Hanley appeared at Cabrillo’s side smelling of pipe tobacco. “I’m trying to enjoy my day off while you’re up here playing chicken with what, an old fishing boat and a floating bordello?”
Juan had stopped wondering years ago how Hanley’s sixth sense brought him out of his cabin when trouble was brewing. “The guys on the yacht want the people on the fishing boat dead and it doesn’t look like they care if there are any witnesses.”
“And you want to spoil their fun, I see.”
Juan shot him a lopsided grin. “Have you ever known me to not stick my nose in other people’s business?”
“Offhand? No.” Max was looking at the view screen and cursed.
The yacht had put on a burst of speed and autofire raked the Pinguin, tearing chunks of wood from her thick stern and shattering the glass panel on the door to her belowdecks cabin. Sloane was protected by the transom, but the captain and another man on the bridge were horribly exposed.
Trading speed for protection, the Namibian skipper began to weave his boat as they careened toward the oncoming freighter, slewing it from side to side as he tried to throw off the gunmen’s aim. Sloane added her own contribution by firing both barrels again. The shots were so off target that she never saw the little geysers where they hit the sea.
A fresh burst from the yacht forced her down. From her vantage on the rough plank flooring of the aft deck she couldn’t see the freighter, but the boat behaved differently as it encountered waves that had been disrupted by her massive hull. Her shoulder aching from firing the gun, she knew it was now up to the Pinguin’s captain and the mysterious master of the Oregon. She lay against the transom, panting with fear tinged with exhilaration—the same sense of defiance that had put her in the predicament in the first place.
Back aboard the Oregon Juan and Max watched the two small craft coming closer. The Pinguin’
s skipper was keeping her on track to race down the starboard side with the yacht actually running a bit further to the right and fast approaching the range where the gunners would have their quarry dead to rights.
“Wait for it,” Max said to no one in particular. Had he been in charge of this situation he would have told Sloane to stand by the radio and given the order to turn himself. Then he realized Juan had been right to let the skipper make the call. He knew his boat’s capabilities and would know when to make the cut.
The Pinguin was thirty yards from the Oregon, so close that the mast camera could no longer track her. The weapons officer switched to the gun camera on the bow thirty caliber.
The little boat was raked with yet another burst of fire from the yacht and had they been further away Juan would have abandoned his plan and blown the luxury craft out of the water with either the thirty caliber or the Gatling gun that was still tracking the target even hidden behind her steel plating.
“Now,” he whispered.
Though Cabrillo hadn’t activated his microphone it was as if the Pinguin’s captain heard him. He cut the wheel hard to the left just fifteen yards from the knife-edge prow of the Oregon, riding up on the swell that curled away from her hull like a surfer catching a wave.
The helmsman on the yacht jerked the wheel as if to follow, then corrected his course when he realized they were going too fast to stay on the Pinguin’s tail. He’d pass the freighter down her starboard side and using his superior speed reach the stern abreast of his target.
“Helm,” Juan said calmly, “on my mark I want bow thrusters to starboard at full power and give me right full rudder. Increase speed to forty knots.” Juan clicked through camera angles until he caught a glimpse of the Pinguin. He had to make sure she didn’t get crushed as he made his turn. He expertly judged speeds and angles, knowing he was risking lives to preserve his ship’s secrets. The yacht was almost in position, the Pinguin almost out of danger, but time had run out.