The Hunt

78

The Nordhavn 64 trawler yacht didn’t look at all out of place on its berth at wharf number 47, in New York’s Chelsea Piers Marina.

Just three years old, and with its bright white superstructure gleaming from a fresh steam-clean, it spoke of understated wealth, plus a very businesslike and functional ocean-going luxury.

No gin palace this.

Owners of Nordhavn 64s were serious players in the yachting world – global-traveller types. Places to go, new horizons to see: that was what the Nordhavn was all about. With its 59-foot waterline hull length and a 3,000-mile cruise range at a steady nine knots, the vessel was all about eating up the sea miles.

It was 10.30 p.m. New York time – so 10.30 a.m. China time – when the two figures – a man and a woman in their late thirties – emerged from the bridge and closed up the vessel as if they were going out for a night’s partying. The Chelsea Piers Marina was a great location from which to do so: the Chelsea Market, the UCB Theatre, and many of New York’s finest bars, cafés and clubs were just a few blocks away.

The Sokolovs left the Nordhavn knowing that they were never going to return. A fisherman by profession, but one who had drifted into more nefarious business due to the vagaries of fate, Mr Sokolov had thrilled to the few weeks that he had skippered the vessel. He would never be able to afford such a fine boat himself, even though he had been very handsomely rewarded.

In return for undertaking a long ocean-going journey and following some simple instructions, enough money had been wired into his offshore account to start a new life wherever he and his wife might choose. Or they might simply buy a seaside dacha – a penthouse retreat – and retire to their native Russia.

For the Sokolovs, it was a dream come true.

Deep in the Nordhavn’s bilges lay an inspection pit for checking the state of the fibreglass fuel tanks. It had provided ample space to conceal the wooden crate with the simple console bolted onto it. Mr Sokolov guessed the package contained drugs. What else could it be? He presumed that now he had activated the console, as instructed, it would signal the drug gang’s pickup point, and they’d home in to wharf 47, to collect their cargo.

He’d heard about such things before: drugs runners even left bales of narcotics at sea, with a homing beacon attached. That way, trafficker and recipient never had to meet. Far safer. Far fewer risks. He didn’t doubt the switch he had flicked would trigger that kind of a pickup.

Even so, the call that he had received from Mr Kraft to trigger the console had come as something of a surprise: he’d not been expecting it for some days.

But his was not to reason why: he had executed the final stage of his contract.

Now to disappear.