Nat Dickstein went to New York to become a shipping tycoon. It took him all morning.
He looked in the Manhattan phone book and selected a lawyer with an address on the Lower East Side. Instead of calling on the phone he went there personally, and was satisfied when he saw that the lawyer's office was one room over a Chinese restaurant. The lawyer's name was Mr. Chung.
Dickstein and Chung took a cab to the Park Avenue offices of Liberian Corporation Services, Inc., a company set up to assist people who wanted to register a Liberian corporation but had no intention of ever going within three thousand miles of Liberia. Dickstein was not asked for references, and he did not have to establish that he was honest or solvent or sane. For a fee of five hundred dollars--which Dickstein paid in cash--they registered the Savile Shipping Corporation of Liberia. The fact that at this stage Dickstein did not own so much as a rowboat was of no interest to anyone.
The company's headquarters was listed as No. 80 Broad Street, Monrovia, Liberia; and its directors were P. Satia, E.K. Nugba and J.D. Boyd, all residents of Liberia. This was also the headquarters address of most Liberian corporations, and the address of the Liberian Trust Company. Satia, Nugba and Boyd were founding directors of many such corporations; indeed this was the way they made their living. They were also employees of the Liberian Trust Company.
Mr. Chung asked for fifty dollars and cab fare. Dickstein paid him in cash and told him to take the bus.
So, without so much as giving an address, Dickstein had created a fully legitimate shipping company which could not be traced back either to him or to the Mossad.
Satia, Nugba and Boyd resigned twenty-four hours later, as was the custom; and that same day the notary public of Montserrado County, Liberia, stamped an affidavit which said that total control of the Savile Shipping Corporation now lay in the hands of one Andre Papagopolous.
By that time Dickstein was riding the bus from Zurich airport into town, on his way to meet Papagopolous for lunch.
When he had time to reflect on it, even he was shaken by the complexity of his plan, the number of pieces that had to be made to fit into the jigsaw puzzle, the number of people who had to be persuaded, bribed or coerced into performing their parts. He had been successful so far, first with Stiffcollar and then with Al Cortone, not to mention Lloyd's of London and Liberian Corporation Services, Inc., but how long could it go on?
Papagopolous was in some ways the greatest challenge: a man as elusive, as powerful, and as free of weakness as Dickstein himself.
He had been born in 1912 in a village that during his boyhood was variously Turkish, Bulgarian and Greek. His father was a fisherman. In his teenage he graduated from fishing to other kinds of maritime work, mostly smuggling. After World War II he turned up in Ethiopia, buying for knock-down prices the piles of surplus military supplies which had suddenly become worthless when the war ended. He bought rifles, handguns, machine guns, antitank guns, and ammunition for all of these. He then contacted the Jewish Agency in Cairo and sold the arms at an enormous profit to the underground Israeli Army. He arranged shipping--and here his smuggling background was invaluable--and delivered the goods to Palestine. Then he asked if they wanted more.
This was how he had met Nat Dickstein.
He soon moved on, to Farouk's Cairo and then to Switzerland. His Israeli deals had marked a transition from totally illegal business to dealings which were at worst shady and at best pristine. Now he called himself a ship broker, and that was most, though by no means all, of his business.
He had no address. He could be reached via half a dozen telephone numbers all over the world, but he was never there--always, somebody took a message and Papagopolous called you back. Many people knew him and trusted him, especially in the shipping business, for he never let anyone down; but this trust was based on reputation, not personal contact. He lived well but quietly, and Nat Dickstein was one of the few people in the world who knew of his single vice, which was that he liked to go to bed with lots of girls--but lots: like, ten or twelve. He had no sense of humor.
Dickstein got off the bus at the railway station, where Papagopolous was waiting for him on the pavement. He was a big man, olive-skinned with thin dark hair combed over a growing bald patch. On a bright summer day in Zurich he wore a navy blue suit, pale blue shirt and dark blue striped tie. He had small dark eyes.
They shook hands. Dickstein said, "How's business?"
"Up and down." Papagopolous smiled. "Mostly up."
They walked through the clean, tidy streets, looking like a managing director and his accountant. Dickstein inhaled the cold air. "I like this town," he said.
"I've booked a table at the Veltliner Keller in the old city," Papagopolous said. "I know you don't care about food, but I do."
Dickstein said, "You've been to the Pelikanstrasse?"
"Yes."
"Good." The Zurich office of Liberian Corporation Services, Inc., was in the Pelikanstrasse. Dickstein had asked Papagopolous to go there to register himself as president and chief executive of Savile Shipping. For this he would receive ten thousand U.S. dollars, paid out of Mossad's account in a Swiss bank to Papagopolous's account in the same branch of the same bank--a transaction very difficult for anyone to uncover.
Papagopolous said, "But I didn't promise to do anything else. You may have wasted your money."
"I'm sure I didn't."
They reached the restaurant. Dickstein had expected that Papagopolous would be known there, but there was no sign of recognition from the headwaiter, and Dickstein thought: Of course, he's not known anywhere.
They ordered food and wine. Dickstein noted with regret that the domestic Swiss white wine was still better than the Israeli.
While they ate, Dickstein explained Papagopolous's duties as president of Savile Shipping.
"One: buy a small, fast ship, a thousand or fifteen hundred tons, small crew. Register her in Liberia." This would involve another visit to Pelikanstrasse and a fee of about a dollar per ton. "For the purchase, take your percentage as a broker. Do some business with the ship, and take your broker's percentage on that. I don't care what the ship does so long as she completes a voyage by docking in Haifa on or before October 7. Dismiss the crew at Haifa. Do you want to take notes?"
Papagopolous smiled. "I think not."
The implication was not lost on Dickstein. Papagopolous was listening, but he had not yet agreed to do the job. Dickstein continued. "Two: buy any one of the ships on this list." He handed over a single sheet of paper bearing the names of the four sister ships of the Coparelli, with their owners and last known locations--the information he had gotten from Lloyd's. "Offer whatever price is necessary: I must have one of them. Take your broker's percentage. Deliver her to Haifa by October 7. Dismiss the crew."
Papagopolous was eating chocolate mousse, his smooth face imperturbable. He put down his spoon and put on gold-rimmed glasses to read the list. He folded the sheet of paper in half and set it on the table without comment.
Dickstein handed him another sheet of paper. "Three: buy this ship--the Coparelli. But you must buy her at exactly the right time. She sails from Antwerp on Sunday, November 17. We must buy her after she sails but before she passes through the Strait of Gibraltar."
Papagopolous looked dubious. "Well . . ."
"Wait, let me give you the rest of it. Four: early in 1969 you sell ship No. 1, the little one, and ship No. 3, the Coparelli. You get from me a certificate showing that ship No. 2 has been sold for scrap. You send that certificate to Lloyd's. You wind up Savile Shipping." Dickstein smiled and sipped his coffee.
"What you want to do is make a ship disappear without a trace."
Dickstein nodded. Papagopolous was as sharp as a knife.
"As you must realize," Papagopolous went on, "all this is straightforward except for the purchase of the Coparelli while she is at sea. The normal procedure for the sale of a ship is as follows: negotiations take place, a price is agreed, and the documents are dra
wn up. The ship goes into dry dock for inspection. When she has been pronounced satisfactory the documents are signed, the money is paid and the new owner takes her out of dry dock. Buying a ship while she is sailing is most irregular."
"But not impossible."
"No, not impossible."
Dickstein watched him. He became thoughtful, his gaze distant: he was grappling with the problem. It was a good sign.
Papagopolous said, "We would have to open negotiations, agree on the price and have the inspection arranged for a date after her November voyage. Then, when she has sailed, we say that the purchaser needs to spend the money immediately, perhaps for tax reasons. The buyer would then take out insurance against any major repairs which might prove necessary after the inspection . . . but this is not the seller's concern. He is concerned about his reputation as a shipper. He will want cast-iron guarantees that his cargo will be delivered by the new owner of the Coparelli."
"Would he accept a guarantee based on your personal reputation?"
"Of course. But why would I give such a guarantee?"
Dickstein looked him in the eye. "I can promise you that the owner of the cargo will not complain."
Papagopolous made an open-handed gesture. "It is obvious that you are perpetrating some kind of a swindle here. You need me as a respectable front. That I can do. But you also want me to lay my reputation on the line and take your word that it will not suffer?"
"Yes. Listen. Let me ask you one thing. You trusted the Israelis once before, remember?"
"Of course."
"Did you ever regret it?"
Papagopolous smiled, remembering the old days. "It was the best decision I ever made."
"So, will you trust us again?" Dickstein held his breath.
"I had less to lose in those days. I was . . . thirty-five. We used to have a lot of fun. This is the most intriguing offer I've had in twenty years. What the hell, I'll do it."
Dickstein extended his hand across the restaurant table. Papagopolous shook it.
A waitress brought a little bowl of Swiss chocolates for them to eat with their coffee. Papagopolous took one, Dickstein refused.
"Details," Dickstein said. "Open an account for Savile Shipping at your bank here. The Embassy will put funds in as they are required. You report to me simply by leaving a written message at the bank. The note will be picked up by someone from the Embassy. If we need to meet and talk, we use the usual phone numbers."
"Agreed."
"I'm glad we're doing business together again."
Papagopolous was thoughtful. "Ship No. 2 is a sister ship of the Coparelli," he mused. "I think I can guess what you're up to. There's one thing I'd like to know, although I'm sure you won't tell me. What the hell kind of cargo will the Coparelli be carrying--uranium?"
Pyotr Tyrin looked gloomily at the Coparelli and said, "She's a grubby old ship."
Rostov did not reply. They were sitting in a rented Ford on a quay at Cardiff docks. The squirrels at Moscow Center had informed them that the Coparelli would make port there today, and they were now watching her tie up. She was to unload a cargo of Swedish timber and take on a mixture of small machinery and cotton goods: it would take her some days.
"At least the mess decks aren't in the fo'c'sle," Tyrin muttered, more or less to himself.
"She's not that old," Rostov said.
Tyrin was surprised Rostov knew what he was talking about. Rostov continually surprised him with odd bits of knowledge.
From the rear seat of the car Nik Bunin said, "Is that the front or the back of the boat?"
Rostov and Tyrin looked at one another and grinned at Nik's ignorance. "The back," Tyrin said. "We call it the stern."
It was raining. The Welsh rain was even more persistent and monotonous than the English, and colder. Pyotr Tyrin was unhappy. It so happened that he had done two years in the Soviet Navy. That, plus the fact that he was the radio and electronics expert, made him the obvious choice as the man to be planted aboard the Coparelli. He did not want to go back to sea. In truth, the main reason he had applied to join the KGB was to get out of the navy. He hated the damp and the cold and the food and the discipline. Besides, he had a warm, comfortable wife in an apartment in Moscow, and he missed her.
Of course, there was no question of his saying no to Rostov.
"We'll get you on as radio operator, but you must take your own equipment as a fallback," Rostov said.
Tyrin wondered how this was to be managed. His approach would have been to find the ship's radio man, knock him on the head, throw him in the water, and board the ship to say, "I hear you need a new radio operator." No doubt Rostov would be able to come up with something a little more subtle: that was why he was a colonel.
The activity on deck had died down, and the Coparelli's engines were quiet. Five or six sailors came across the gangplank in a bunch, laughing and shouting, and headed for the town. Rostov said, "See which pub they go to, Nik." Bunin got out of the car and followed the sailors.
Tyrin watched him go. He was depressed by the scene: the figures crossing the wet concrete quay with their raincoat collars turned up: the sounds of tugs hooting and men shouting nautical instructions and chains winding and unwinding; the stacks of pallets; the bare cranes like sentries: the smell of engine oil and the ship's ropes and salt spray. It all made him think of the Moscow flat, the chair in front of the paraffin heater, salt fish and black bread, beer and vodka in the refrigerator, and an evening of television.
He was unable to share Rostov's irrepressible cheerfulness about the way the operation was going. Once again they had no idea where Dickstein was--even though they had not exactly lost him, they had deliberately let him go. It had been Rostov's decision: he was afraid of getting too close to Dickstein, of scaring the man off. "We'll follow the Coparelli, and Dickstein will come to us," Rostov had said. Yasif Hassan had argued with him, but Rostov had won. Tyrin, who had no contribution to make to such strategic discussions, thought Rostov was correct, but also thought he had no reason to be so confident.
"Your first job is to befriend the crew," Rostov said, interrupting Tyrin's thoughts. "You're a radio operator. You suffered a minor accident aboard your last ship, the Christmas Rose--you broke your arm--and you were discharged here in Cardiff to convalesce. You got an excellent compensation payment from the owners. You are spending the money and having a good time while it lasts. You say vaguely that you'll look for another job when your money runs out. You must discover two things: the identity of the radio man, and the anticipated date and time of departure of the ship."
"Fine," said Tyrin, though it was far from fine. Just how was he to "befriend" these people? He was not much of an actor, in his view. Would he have to play the part of a hearty hail-fellow-well-met? Suppose the crew of this ship thought him a bore, a lonely man trying to attach himself to a jolly group? What if they just plain did not like him?
Unconsciously he squared his broad shoulders. Either he would do it, or there would be some reason why it could not be done. All he could promise was to try his best.
Bunin came back across the quay. Rostov said, "Get in the back, let Nik drive." Tyrin got out and held the door for Nik. The young man's face was streaming with rain. He started the car. Tyrin got in.
As the car pulled away Rostov turned around to speak to Tyrin in the back seat. "Here's a hundred pounds," he said, and handed over a roll of banknotes. "Don't spend it too carefully."
Bunin stopped the car opposite a small dockland pub on a corner. A sign outside, flapping gently in the wind, read, "Brains Beers." A smoky yellow light glowed behind the frosted-glass windows. There were worse places to be on a day like this, Tyrin thought.
"What nationality are the crew?" he said suddenly.
"Swedish," Bunin said.
Tyrin's false papers made him out to be Austrian. "What language should I use with them?"
"All Swedes speak English," Rostov told him. There was a moment of silence. Rostov said, "Any more
questions? I want to go back to Hassan before he gets up to any mischief."
"No more questions." Tyrin opened the car door.
Rostov said, "Speak to me when you get back to the hotel tonight--no matter how late."
"Sure."
"Good luck."
Tyrin slammed the car door and crossed the road to the pub. As he reached the entrance someone came out, and the warm smell of beer and tobacco engulfed Tyrin for a moment. He went inside.
It was a poky little place, with hard wooden benches around the walls and plastic tables nailed to the floor. Four of the sailors were playing darts in the corner and a fifth was at the bar calling out encouragement to them.
The barman nodded to Tyrin. "Good morning," Tyrin said. "A pint of lager, a large whiskey and a ham sandwich."
The sailor at the bar turned around and nodded pleasantly. Tyrin smiled. "Have you just made port?"
"Yes. The Coparelli," the sailor replied.
"Christmas Rose," Tyrin said. "She left me behind."
"You're lucky."
"I broke my arm."
"So?" said the Swedish sailor with a grin. "You can drink with the other one."
"I like that," Tyrin said. "Let me buy you a drink. What will it be?"
Two days later they were still drinking. There were changes in the composition of the group as some sailors went on duty and others came ashore; and there was a short period between four A.M. and opening time when there was nowhere in the city, legal or illegal, where one could buy a drink; but otherwise life was one long pub crawl. Tyrin had forgotten how sailors could drink. He was dreading the hangover. He was glad, however, that he had not got into a situation where he felt obliged to go with prostitutes: the Swedes were interested in women, but not in whores. Tyrin would never have been able to convince his wife that he had caught venereal disease in the service of Mother Russia. The Swedes' other vice was gambling. Tyrin had lost about fifty pounds of KGB money at poker. He was so well in with the crew of the Coparelli that the previous night he had been invited aboard at two A.M. He had fallen asleep on the mess deck and they had left him there until eight bells.
Tonight would not be like that. The Coparelli was to sail on the morning tide, and all officers and men had to be aboard by midnight. It was now ten past eleven. The landlord of the pub was moving about the room collecting glasses and emptying ashtrays. Tyrin was playing dominoes with Lars, the radio operator. They had abandoned the proper game and were now competing to see who could stand the most blocks in a line without knocking the lot down. Lars was very drunk, but Tyrin was pretending. He was also very frightened about what he had to do in a few minutes' time.