Pirate Alley

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

I heard the radial engines murmuring gently.

“It’s coming,” I said into the handheld.

“Asleep North.”

“Asleep South.”

So there would be no witnesses awake to tell the sheikh that this Carmellini guy didn’t arrive with Jake Grafton.

I used the binoculars. Yep, the DC-3 was low to the south, coming straight in. I was across the runway from the terminal. I duck-walked back to the little draw that paralleled the west side of the runway and started trotting toward the northern end of the runway. Running, actually. I had a half mile to do, and in this heat it was a chore.

The wind was out of the west, hot and dry, right off the Sahara. It was pushed up and over the coastal mountains, so cooled a bit on being elevated; if there was any moisture to be squeezed out of that air the mountains got it. Still, here in their wind shadow it was a little bit cooler than it would have been without the mountains’ help.

I had been sweating anyway. I had bathed as best I could and shaved. Was now wearing a set of rumpled khakis and a button-up short-sleeve shirt from Sears. I was still in my desert boots. My backpack was packed with extra underwear and my toothbrush, plus the Kimber .45, the Ruger .22 with silencer and my knife. The pack bounced up and down as I ran because I didn’t have the straps tight enough.

Since I was about to join the diplomatic corps, I didn’t figure that the bad guys would search me. After all, there were fifty or a hundred of them and only one of me. If I got out of control they could always pop me. Even if they confiscated my weapons, I could always take a shooter from one of their warriors when I needed one.

Little puffs of dust rose from my footfalls as I booked it. The engines were plainly audible, even though throttled back. I kicked it into overdrive.

The plane was on the ground. I heard the engines pulled back to idle.

It went by me spewing choking dust, and I sprinted the last two hundred yards. I got there just as the tail kicked around and the guy goosed the outboard engine. The passenger door was already open, which was a good thing because the plane didn’t stop. Just completed its one-eighty and taxied toward the terminal.

As I hit the floor inside, Jake Grafton pulled the door shut and turned the handle.

He looked at me with a smile and said, “Nice run?”

His trouser leg was right there by my face, so I used it for a towel. His grin widened.

There were two other men in the passenger cabin. They were dark Middle Eastern types in ratty trousers, pullover shirts, and worn tennis shoes. They had AKs near at hand. Smallish men, less than a hundred and fifty pounds. They looked at me with dead eyes, expressionless faces. Except for us, the passenger cabin was empty. A single row of threadbare seats went up each side, so you got a window/aisle seat regardless of what you asked for.

Grafton introduced me as we taxied. Ben and Zahra. “They are on our side,” Grafton said, and the men extended hands. I shook them. Firm, muscular, calloused hands.

“They are on our side, but you don’t know them. Ignore them.”

“Sure.”

Grafton and I plopped into two seats near the rear door, with the aisle between us.

“Got a pistol on you?” the admiral asked over the rumble of the idling engines. With the engines at power this thing must reverberate like a kettledrum. I could see why. All the interior insulation was gone. Welcome to Africa.

“Yeah,” I admitted.

“Put it in your waistband where they can see it. That bag there”—he pointed at a duffel bag two seats forward of mine—“is yours to guard. Full of money. Don’t let them take it away from you unless I give the word. Put this in your backpack.” He handed me a small handheld radio transceiver.

Amazingly, the air in the interior of that aluminum airplane was even hotter than the air outside. My heart rate was getting back to normal, but sweat poured off me, soaking my shirt. I noticed Grafton looked a little travel-worn, too.

“Enough money for me to retire on?”

“Only if you want a shack in Somalia.” He must have thought that was droll, because he knew I was a Paris kind of guy.

I fished the Kimber out of the backpack and stuck it in my belt. Put the radio in the bag and zipped it up.

“How was your trip?” I asked.

“Long.”

Another minute, and our pilot cut the left engine. The plane rolled to a stop in front of the terminal. Grafton opened the door while I got the duffel bag and luggage—my backpack and his soft travel bag. I passed them out to him. The pilots never left the cockpit. Ben and Zahra followed us off the plane, their AKs in one hand and a little bag of personal possessions in the other, and wandered off.

As I stood on the dirt in front of the terminal, with the tower and machine-gun nest to our left, Grafton closed the door and made a vague wave at the pilot. We humped the stuff toward the terminal as the left engine made noises and spewed smoke while the prop began to turn.

Then dirt was flying and the plane was moving.

I tossed the duffel bag on my shoulder. I guessed it weighed at least eighty pounds. Grafton got our two bags and we strolled toward the half-dozen armed Somalis waiting for us.

“I’m Grafton. Anybody here speak English?”

“Aye, yes, sir,” came a voice from inside the tin terminal shack, and a white man appeared. Fat, balding, wearing a dirty button-up shirt, filthy slacks and sandals. “Welcome to Eyl. My name is Noon. I’m the airport manager.”

Grafton took a good look around, his first. “Who paved the runway?”

“The Chinese, in a fit of capital expenditure designed to capture our hearts and open Eyl to international development … by the Chinese. About twenty years ago, before the unpleasantness started.”

Grafton nodded and glanced over the armed men. “Who are these guys?’

“Your bodyguard. Ragnar wanted to extend every hospitality.”

“The customs of the country, I suppose.”

“Precisely. Every man of substance has an entourage.”

Grafton sighed. “You have a restroom?”

Noon smiled and gestured grandly. “All of Africa is your urinal, sir. If you have other ideas, you might try the brush behind the building. Other people have been there before you, so watch where you step.”

“Welcome to Somalia,” I muttered as I readjusted the duffel bag on my shoulder. I saw Noon glance at the pistol behind my belt.

Grafton said, “Mr. Carmellini, my aide.”

“Well, gentlemen, after you refresh yourself, we will depart for town and your interview with Sheikh Ragnar.”

Carrying that eighty-pound duffel bag full of folding green up six flights of nonventilated stairs in the desert heat was the mustard on the shit sandwich. Fortunately I was a studly young man in the pink. Even so, by the time we reached the top I would have traded the entire contents of the damned bag for a cold beer.

The room at the top was full of pirates—and one woman, a white woman, who sat in the corner. Her clothes were not the cleanest, and she wore no makeup. She eyed me coldly. I ignored her and concentrated on the men, standing around their leader, Ragnar. There was no doubt who he was. He was the tallest and fattest, and in absolute command. He radiated power.

I looked the entourage over while Noon mopped his brow with a mechanic’s rag and fought to catch his breath while giving Ragnar the lowdown on us, I suppose. Most of the guys to the right and left wore sidearms, and a few had AKs cradled in their arms.

When Noon ran down, Grafton introduced himself and me. Noon translated.

I lowered the bag to the floor and held it upright with my left hand. I could see some of the pirates eyeing that Kimber in my belt. I ignored them and watched Ragnar.

He introduced his sons and a couple of his lieutenants. Skinny, medium-sized guys, the Somali body type I had come to expect. None of these people got enough food when they were growing up, regardless of who their daddies were.

“I have come on behalf of the ship owners and insurers, and the governments involved, to negotiate a release of the ship Sultan of the Seas, and its passengers and crew.”

Ragnar set his jaw and jabbered awhile. Noon said, “Ragnar says the ransom amounts and time deadlines are nonnegotiable. If you have come to arrange payment, you are welcome. If you have come to try to save yourself some money, you waste everyone’s time.”

Grafton didn’t blink. “I have authorization to arrange to pay one hundred million. Nothing else. For the ship and crew and passengers. Before I pay that, I will have to talk to the captain, ensure everyone is well and in good health, treated with dignity and respect, given adequate food and water.”

Ragnar waved a sheet of paper and made a statement. Noon said, “He says he wants another million each for these eighty-five people. Unless you pay, they will stay behind when the others leave.”

Their positions staked out, they thrust and parried back and forth. After about five minutes, when Ragnar was obviously beginning to lose his temper, Jake Grafton suggested a change of course. “If you will let me visit the captain and his crew, and the passengers, I will communicate with my government and tell them of your demands. Perhaps they will change their minds.”

Ragnar was petulant. Negotiating was not one of his skill sets. He was accustomed to giving orders and watching people jump.

Jake Grafton was old Mr. Smooth. “As proof of my government’s serious purpose, and as a sign of respect for Sheikh Ragnar, I have brought with me a gift for him. Tommy?”

I picked up the bag with my left hand and took a step up beside him. One of Ragnar’s boys stepped forward eagerly as Noon talked, so I tossed the bag at him with my left hand. He put both hands up to catch it, and was unprepared for the weight. He lost his balance and fell. He gave me a murderous look while his pards beamed and Ragnar laughed. Grafton pulled a key from a pocket and passed it over.

The kid unlocked the padlock and spread the top of the bag. He reached in and pulled out bundles of money.

“I have brought the sheikh a gift from my government of one million American dollars as a sign of our good faith.”

Ragnar looked at the bills, dug out a handful for himself, smiled and gave orders. We were going to see the prisoners.

Noon led us out. I got a glimpse of the woman sitting in the corner. Her eyes followed me, but her face was expressionless.

Aboard the grounded Greek freighter, Lieutenant Bullet Bob Quinn and his men made an interesting discovery. The ship contained several demolition charges set to blow holes in her bottom, and to set her on fire. She still contained a reasonable quantity of fuel oil, perhaps eight hundred or so tons, and the charges were laid to breach the tanks and ignite the oil.

Quinn and his men quickly determined that the charges were radio controlled, and soon had disassembled the devices by removing the wires from the batteries to the fuses. The bombs were now inert. Quinn turned on his encrypted radio and reported his discoveries to Chosin Reservoir.

“Tonight,” the controller said in a few minutes, “could you and one or two of your men swim over to Sultan and board her? If that ship you are on is wired to go, Sultan might be, too.”

“At dark,” Quinn agreed.

He and his men sat on the bridge with binoculars and studied the Sultan. The pilot port was open, and the anchor chain looked inviting.

“When is the ball going to open?” Bullet Bob asked.

“Ahh … don’t know. We’ll pass that date and time along when we receive it.”

Quinn turned off the radio and looked at his team members. “Heavies are still cogitating,” he reported.

“They do that.”

“They are slow cogitators.”

“Old and decrepit.”

“Not young and virile and handsome, like us.”

“Amen.”

The news of our arrival spread quickly. Sophia Donatelli from Mediaset, her photographer and a reporter/photographer team from the BBC were waiting in the square. Grafton graciously granted an interview. Noon and I stood to one side watching.

The questions came thick and fast. Grafton was here on behalf of the ship owners, he said, and at the request of the British and American governments. He had begun negotiations with Sheikh Ragnar for the release of the ship Sultan, the crew and the passengers. When an agreement had been reached, he would hold a press conference and inform them of the terms.

Needless to say, Sophia Donatelli had my attention. She wasn’t a raving beauty, but she had presence. She glanced at me and I gave her a grin, and got a flash of one in return.

That warmed me right up, and I was beginning to feel better about this Somali gig when I happened to glance up. Ragnar was leaning over his balcony watching.

That did it for my bonhomie. I looked around, taking in the half-starved women and kids, the men with guns, the grungy boats on the beach, the brilliant sun, the empty sea, the hot wind off the desert, the derelict ships …

Maybe we are all coming to this, when there are too many people, not enough resources, people don’t care about decency or their fellow humans or … Or maybe I’m an idiot.

One thing for sure: The CIA doesn’t pay me to philosophize.

I made sure my pistol was riding properly, within easy reach, and concentrated on the interview. There were the usual questions trying to drag specifics from him, but Grafton deflected them all, smiling at everyone. As he made his escape, he nodded his head so I would know to follow. Noon was waiting to escort us up the hill.

We walked to the fortress. Noon was willing to drive, but Grafton refused. He said he had been sitting too much the last few days. Through the square, through a neighborhood of shacks and outdoor restaurants—maybe they served liquor—and past a couple of shacks with partially clad women sitting out front. Looked like whorehouses to me, but I have led a sheltered life.

Up the hill. Grafton and Noon were in an earnest, quiet conversation. I wondered what that was all about but was too conventional to ask. When Grafton wants me to know something, he tells me. Got that habit in the navy, I guess, and his wife never broke him of it. As we approached, I could see a lot of people on the roof, trying to get a bit of fresh air and sun. Got glimpses of them through the gun cuts in the wall, which as I knew was about six feet thick.

So we walked into the fortress, which stank despite the desert wind coming through the door and flowing out the gun ports. People packed in there like it was a Japanese railway car. I thought I could smell diesel fuel, but maybe not. Sure got a good whiff of human excrement and unwashed bodies.

Noon introduced Grafton to the captain, I think. He was wearing what had once been a white uniform and had four stripes on his shoulder boards. He and Grafton had another quiet conversation. The captain did a lot of talking and Grafton listened. When the admiral spoke, the captain listened carefully.

Those two were still at it when some television guy who said his name was Ricardo came blasting in, talking loudly. “You’re with the American government,” he said to Grafton. “We’re the press, and that pirate has imprisoned us. You must get us out immediately.”

“All these people have the same problem,” Grafton said mildly. “Why don’t you go sit down and let me finish my conversation with Captain Penney?”

“But we’re the press,” he howled. “Television reporters.”

“And these people are consumers of your wonderful product. Sit down, please.”

The fellow looked as if he needed a more forceful argument to persuade him, so I latched onto the back of his neck with one hand and squeezed a little. Marched him into the next room and found a vacant spot to drop him. He spluttered all the way.

Two women buttonholed me before I could get back to Grafton. “You’re with the American government?”

I admitted it.

“They took a woman from here. Nora Neidlinger. She’s—”

“She sorta slim, brunette, short hair, tan, with a nice figure?”

“Why, yes.”

“I’ve seen her.”

“Is she okay?”

“She’s alive.”

“Her daughter is beside herself.”

“I see.”

Truly, I didn’t know what else to say. I went on, saw an Arab in there, Atom something, some Italians, Brits, Americans from all over. All of them were in bad shape. Most of them seemed to be suffering from dehydration. All of them were dirty … they told me of dysentery, of the people that had died the previous night.

By the time I got back to Grafton I was ready to strangle some pirates. Grafton must have seen it in my face. He led me outside to where Noon was waiting.

“Mr. Noon, we’ll be down the hill shortly. Would you meet us in the square?”

Noon set forth down the hill. Grafton looked around, then faced me. “I see the wires going up the building. You were right—those are antennas. We can’t dig the batteries and capacitors and detonators up, so we must find the radio controllers.”

“You know there are more than one.”

“Your job tonight is to find them. Start with Ragnar’s hotel. I’ll tell you when.”

“How are we going to know if we got all of them?”

“We’ll have to ask Ragnar, of course.”

He started walking. I caught up with him, matched him stride for stride. He walked with his head down, looking at the road, lost in thought.