The Code

by Nick Elliott

  ‘If he is sick he should stay away from the fags and the booze,’ I said. ‘He’ll soon feel better.’

  And although Joseph Conrad had called the canal a ‘dismal but profitable ditch’, which was true, Port Said itself, with its old turn of the century houses and their impressive wooden balconies several storeys high, the chaotic street markets and their noisy, cheerful vendors, all gave the city a kind of shabby charm – if you didn’t have to live there.

  We’d been moored to a buoy in one of the basins adjacent to the main channel. The wind was still blowing hard from the north-west. The waters were choppy and I watched as two of the mooring gang crouched on the buoy preparing to unshackle us, their little boat bobbing up and down in the swell a few yards away. I’d seen a similar situation in Hong Kong a year or so before when the Marine Department had ordered us to leave the harbour as a typhoon approached. Now the same thing was happening. The ship’s weight was taken up by the chain cable and was pulling the whole assembly taut so they couldn’t get the shackle pin out. It was stuck fast. In the absence of any deck officers, I called the bridge and they ordered the engineroom to give the engine a brief kick to dead slow and slacken off the chain. It solved the problem and we were on our way.

  All this was on top of a long and frustrating voyage. Loading had been held up in Vietnam waiting for heavy monsoon rains to abate. Then halfway across the Indian Ocean the crankcase luboil pump had failed – a potentially catastrophic event if the crankshaft itself had become starved of oil. Crankcase explosions from this cause were not uncommon but fortunately our engineroom crew had acted in time to avoid a disaster. But it had meant three days drifting while they carried out temporary repairs, then a further delay installing a new pump in Port Said. Coupled with the heat, these events had caused stress and frayed tempers on what was normally a happy ship. The Electra M’s senior officers were Greek – old hands who’d been with the company for years. The junior officers were a mix of Croats and Poles with a couple of young Greek cadets. My ratings were a motley bunch of Filipinos, Tamils and Goanese. Motley, but one of the hardest-working crews I’d worked with.

  Eventually we cleared Port Said, heading out into the Mediterranean shortly before 0700, some three weeks after departing from our load port in Vietnam. After the sweltering sand-laden heat of the Red Sea and the Suez Canal, it was a relief to feel the cool westerly breeze off our port bow. We’d loaded rice at Hai Phong, a trial shipment bound for the Baltic port of Riga. Fourteen days steaming, including a transit through the Straits of Gibraltar with its strong currents and high-density traffic, then out into the Atlantic swell where the ship began to dip and heave and the spring storms beckoned from Biscay; all this to look forward to before the heavy grey skies of the Baltic. It became much cooler now, with the crew donning sweaters and foul-weather jackets when working on deck. Seabirds circled, following us north on their summer migrations. Why not just stay south for the warmth, I wondered.

  This would be my fourteenth month on the Electra M, meaning my leave was now overdue by five months. But I’d been sailing with Mavritis Maritime for three years and got on well with the owner, Christos Mavritis. He would come on board, often without prior notice and in unlikely places as we tramped our way from port to port finding whatever cargoes were available at attractive enough rates, a business at which Mavritis, like most Greek owners, was skilled.

  I’d been bumped up from Able Seaman to Bosun, a kind of non-commissioned officer, after three months on my ship previous Mavritis ship, a promotion which meant more money but, as I was soon to find out, a whole lot of trouble too. One of these days, I told myself, I’d swallow the anchor and settle ashore. Plan A was to find work in Piraeus.

  Apart from an Atlantic storm off the Portuguese coast it was an uneventful passage and, having welcomed the pilot on board, we eased through Riga’s breakwater and, with a little help from a harbour tug and the river’s current, came round neatly alongside the grain terminal, finished with engines at 0430 on a cold March morning.

  The chief mate, an elderly Greek who’d been passed over for promotion to Master more times than anyone could remember, was worried how the cargo had fared with such extreme changes in temperature and humidity on the voyage north. So was I, and at first light, since the mate was no longer agile enough, I took a couple of ABs into each hold to carry out a thorough inspection, checking for signs of condensation. The Latvian government surveyor would be coming on board before discharge commenced and I didn’t want any unpleasant surprises, such as having to condemn half the cargo due to wet damage. In the event there was damage to a dozen or so bags, but we’d not expected to get away without some wetting. So with surveyors and the chief mate all happy, discharge commenced using shore cranes. It was a slow process due to delays in the trucks arriving alongside and after a week our laytime had expired and we came onto demurrage, payable as compensation by the charterer to the owner on failure to discharge the cargo within the time agreed.

  At length the holds were empty and we’d received instructions from our owners to proceed to an anchorage off Antwerp for further orders. That was at 1800 hours, the time when things began to go badly wrong – for me if not for anyone else.

  ‘Captain wants to see you, Bosun,’ called the chief mate. I walked back along the deck from the bosun’s store beneath the forecastle where I’d been returning some tools and tackle we’d used during the cargo discharge, knocked on the door of the captain’s day room and went in.

  ‘Sit yourself down, Angus.’ Captain Andreas Kynigos addressed me by my first name in a gesture of familiarity he didn’t use for everyone. Communication with the officers was more formal to protect the necessary hierarchy that went with shipboard protocol. Also, it was Kynigos who’d recommended my promotion from AB to Bosun on our last ship. I didn’t take his familiarity for granted. He was still the skipper. Ships’ captains live an isolated life between sea and sky and for the most part are removed from everyday trivialities. It is this that helps command the respect of both their shipmates and those ashore.

  ‘Young Petros, the cadet, hasn’t returned from shore leave and we’re due to sail in an hour. I want you to find him and bring him back – fidee, fidee!’ Kynigos was as Greek as Aristotle but, like me, had sailed with Chinese crews and occasionally we’d exchange simple Cantonese phrases we’d picked up over the years.

  ‘When did he go ashore?’

  ‘Last night, 1900 I understand.’

  ‘On his own?’

  ‘Apparently. My best guess is there’s a woman involved. Chief mate says he’s been behaving love-struck for the last week or two. I’ve talked with some of the other officers who’ve seen him in the Blue Lady Bar in the Old Town. Best you go alone. If a whole gang of sailors turn up it might start trouble. You’re okay with that aren’t you?’

  ‘Sure,’ I said without feeling at all sure. The cadet was a young Greek signed on a few months back and to date had not struck me as being of much use.

  ‘You know who he is?’ I nodded. The missing cadet was also Christos Mavritis’ nephew.

  I’d been in the Blue Lady Bar myself a few days before with some shipmates. It was a hangout for hookers, pimps and a clientele comprising mostly dock workers and sailors of many nationalities. It smelled of beer and cheap perfume. I ordered an Aldaris beer and looked around as my eyes adjusted to the dim lighting. It didn’t take me long to spot young Mavritis and his girl. They were seated in a cosy little alcove towards the back. I walked over slowly and sat down beside them with my beer, nice and friendly.

  ‘Hi,’ I said, addressing the girl. ‘I’m Angus.’ She looked at me. I was intruding on their space and it showed in her expression. She was wearing a blue sequined dress which barely hid her ample charms. And she was pretty. I could see why Petros had chosen her.

  ‘I’m afraid our ship’s due to sail, so Petros and I have to get back onboard now.’

  ‘I’m staying here, man,’ he announced. ‘Not goin’ anywhere.�
� His voice was slurred. He drew closer to the girl, putting his arm round her shoulder.

  I didn’t waste time trying to reason with him. I just reminded him that the captain as well as his uncle and his father would expect him to do his duty. He was a cadet officer and should set an example to his shipmates too. And failure to report back from shore leave was a serious offence. But I wasn’t getting through to him.

  ‘Tell him, will you?’ I said to the girl. She just laughed so I got up, went round to his side of the table and put my hand on his shoulder.

  ‘Have you paid for the drinks?’

  ‘No, he hasn’t,’ said the girl.

  ‘Okay, this should cover it,’ I said and placed a fifty-dollar note on the table. She grabbed it and I pulled Petros up by his collar. He didn’t offer much resistance and I managed to drag him out onto the street without too much of a disturbance in the bar.

  It didn’t last. We’d got less than a hundred yards down the road when a man came up from behind us, out of the shadows, quick and silent. I had my arm round Petros’s shoulder. The man moved round, positioning himself in our path, a knife in his hand flashing with silver light. I stopped and stepped between Petros and the new arrival.

  ‘Hi, what’s the problem?’ I was watching him closely, his body language and the knife.

  ‘He’s not paid for my girl. He’s been with her and he’s not paid.’

  ‘Is that right, Petros?’ But Petros was out of it. He mumbled something so I stepped back and shook him. He came to, a bit. ‘I paid her already,’ he shouted belligerently.

  ‘How much does he owe you?’ I asked, trying to calm things down. ‘I gave her fifty bucks just now and Petros here says he’s paid her too.’

  ‘She’s my girl. A grand. US!’ he shouted. He was a tall, skinny guy, hopped-up, edgy, not behaving like he wanted to talk the matter through.

  ‘We don’t have that kind of money,’ I said. ‘Petro, how much have you got on you?’

  Petros muttered something.

  ‘What?’ I shouted.

  ‘Nothing! I got nothing left!’

  I pulled out my remaining fifty-dollar note and handed it to the pimp. ‘Here, take this. It’s all I’ve got.’

  ‘Fuck off! I said a grand. What else you got? Show me your watch.’ He gave me an intense, fevered stare.

  ‘Get lost will you?’ I said, feeling the anger rising. ‘Take the fifty and fuck off yourself.’

  I’d wound him up more than I’d intended. It was a direct confrontation now, and I realised he was high as a kite, on cocaine I suspected. He’d taken a stance, leaning forward, his arms spread, the knife, a long-bladed stiletto, in his right hand.

  ‘Come! Come!’ He shouted. He drew closer. I could smell his cheap aftershave mingled with his sweat.

  ‘Petro, get back to the ship! Go, now!’

  ‘Not leaving you here, man,’ he said, his voice still slurred.

  ‘Just go! Tell the skipper what’s happening. I can handle this. Go now!’ Probably a mistake, I thought. But events were moving fast. The adrenalin was pumping and raw instinct was taking over from rational thought. I did believe I could handle it.

  Petros began lurching down the street. Then he stopped and looked back. ‘Just go!’ I shouted and he turned and staggered on back towards the docks. He’d be more hindrance than help in a fight anyway, I figured.

  The pimp used this diversion to lunge at me with the knife. I raised my forearm as a shield and the blade sliced through my sleeve. He slashed again, this time at my face. I pulled back and tried to grab the knife but the blade sliced the palm of my right hand, blood streaming from the cut. I was reacting, and it wasn’t working. I needed to gain an advantage. I moved back until my back was against the wall. This time when he came at me I raised my foot and struck out, landing it hard against his knee. He screamed and backed away, off-balance for a moment. I moved in then and punched him in the solar plexus with my left. He reeled back, gasping for air. I waited until he’d pulled himself up, then aimed another blow at his jaw but connecting this time with his throat. He went backwards, clutching at his neck. Stumbling over the kerb, he lost his footing and fell heavily into the road. I heard his head crack as it hit the cobbles. Then he lay still.

  I leaned back against the wall, catching my breath and trying to make sense of what had just happened. Then I moved to where he lay and crouched down beside him, only to see his dead eyes staring straight back at me. I’d killed him.

  A crowd had gathered, as they do in these situations. The fight had erupted and ended in no more than a couple of minutes yet there must have been twenty people gathered around me as I looked up. Now they were shouting – at me, at each other. I couldn’t tell. I decided to stay where I was. To run or to try and explain what had happened seemed pointless. There were witnesses and the man’s knife was still clutched in his hand with my blood on it.

  But when the police arrived minutes later, gathering evidence from a crime scene was the last thing on their minds. I didn’t understand a word of what was being said but the outcome was clear. I was handcuffed and placed under arrest. It was best this way, I told myself. Let justice take its course.

  Aye, right.

  Chapter 7

  Riga–Daugavpils, Latvia

  March 1999

  For the first three days I was held in a cell at Riga’s police headquarters. I was not ill-treated and an English-speaking policewoman was assigned to explain to me what was happening. The cut on my right hand was deep but had been cleaned, stitched and bandaged by a nurse they’d called in that first night. And I had been fed: borscht with a chunk of bread. Not bad under the circumstances, I thought. The policewoman said I’d be held until charges were brought against me. I didn’t sleep that first night. Mostly I just paced up and down the small cell wondering how it had happened, how it could have been avoided and what the hell was going to happen next. Had the Electra M sailed? Had Christos Mavritis been informed? What kind of account had Petros given of the incident? Above it all hovered my fear that I’d be charged with murder.

  On the fourth morning I was led to a grimy bathroom with a shower cubicle. The shower rattled while dispensing an intermittent spray of cold, brown water. I didn’t linger. I asked about breakfast and was presented with a cup of hot, weak and strange-tasting coffee, but no food. I was then handcuffed again and taken to a room with a table and chairs. Like everything else in the police station, the walls, floor and furniture were old and dilapidated.

  An investigating judge appeared accompanied by his clerk and two police officers, the woman from the night before and an inspector. It was explained to me that the judge would perform an examining role and would be actively involved in the conduct of the investigation. I would be assigned a defence lawyer who would represent me, but not be responsible for investigating the case himself. That was the judge’s role. Finally, the British embassy would be informed of my arrest. When I said I wanted my employers, the shipowner to be informed, they said that would be up to the embassy. Meanwhile I would be remanded without bail while charges were prepared.

  And so it began. I was transferred in a police van stinking of sweat and urine to a prison many miles from Riga to await the outcome of the judge’s investigation. I had no idea where it was, other than that it was inland, away from the port. This made me even more uncomfortable. Conditions here were much worse than at the police station. I quickly learned that it was known as White Swan, a romantic-sounding name for a prison that, as I also soon learned, was notorious for its often gratuitous maltreatment of prisoners, its gang culture among the inmates and its reputation for being impregnable. It was a once-white building dating back to the 1800s, and it looked like it hadn’t been whitewashed since. There was a weathervane on the roof more or less in the shape of a swan. Eventually I was told the prison was located on the outskirts of a city called Daugavpils. But if the place itself looked grim from the outside, this was only a soothing introduction to what the inside wa
s like.

  On arrival I was taken to a room and strip-searched by two prison officers who must have weighed three hundred kilos between them. They stank of sweat too, but then by this time, so did I. Their uniforms were ill-fitting and didn’t look particularly clean. They took my clothes and left me in the holding cell, which had nothing in it – nothing. I sat down in a corner, naked, shivering and wondering how much worse it was going to get.

  Eventually, one of them brought me a pile of prison overalls. He waited while I dressed then handcuffed my hands, this time behind my back, and marched me down a corridor with cells either side from which emanated a disturbing range of shouts, cries and roars. I sensed some of the noise was directed at me, though I had no idea what was being said. We arrived at a cell into which I was pushed. The guard removed the handcuffs and left. The cell had two narrow beds separated by an aisle no more than three feet wide. A man was lying on one of them.

  ‘Hi,’ I said.

  ‘What’s your name?’ the man asked, swinging his feet off the bed and standing up.

  ‘Angus,’ I said. ‘Yours?’

  ‘I am Maksims. You are English. I don’t like English and I don’t speak English language,’ he said in passable English.

  ‘Sorry about that. I’m Scottish.’ I didn’t think that would make any difference, and it didn’t.

  ‘Same thing.’

  We left it like that. The cell, like the rest of the place, was filthy. The walls were peeling and covered with green mould. It smelled of mould, sweat and urine. I would never get used to these smells, however they were blended. The noise coming from outside continued: shouting and banging, the occasional scream. I lay down on the thin grubby mattress and tried to stop myself thinking – of anything.