Pirate

by Duncan Falconer

  Then the truck’s engine gunned loudly and its headlights came back on. Stratton and the girl were caught directly in the main beams. And the log ran aground at the crossing point.

  It was a ford.

  Stratton saw the line of tall sticks in the water that indicated its path.

  The truck began to move forward into the river. Stratton cursed himself for relying so much on chance. All he had to do was come to a stop well before the crossing point and wait and see what they would do. But no. He had to be impatient, tempt fate. He recognised the arrogance on his part, the same petty disregard for caution that had resulted in Hopper’s death.

  Having been caught in the lights, they had no choice but to push on. If the men saw them, better to be going forwards than backwards. At least they would be running in the right direction.

  ‘Leave the log!’ he shouted.

  Stratton crawled up the side of the ford and waded across it. The girl followed. They would be out of the way of the truck long before it reached them. Stratton could only hope the rain greatly reduced visibility and that the Somalis were looking elsewhere. Almost a dozen Somalis stood on the bank with only a couple of flashlights between them. The chance that none of them would be looking across the river, and into a light that naturally drew the eye, was a small one.

  It was the driver who first spotted them as they hurried across the shallows. He pointed and shouted to the fighters.

  The girl ran across the ford to catch up with Stratton. They managed to move out of the direct beams of the headlights and plunged into the deeper water once more. But the Somalis caught them in the flashlights. Stratton braced himself for what he knew would follow as he pushed on as fast as he could. He heard the Somalis shouting, the hard-sounding guttural intonation. The sound of the pelting rain went on. Then came the staccato thunder of rifle fire, bullets strafing the water around them. The riverbed continued to fall away beneath their feet and they dived under the surface. They swam hard in the blackness in a desperate effort to put as much distance between them and the enemy.

  The single shots became bursts as the Somalis let rip into the night. Stratton and the girl surfaced just long enough to take a breath. The Somalis caught them in the beams and the rounds quickly followed. But an AK-47 on full automatic is a difficult weapon to hold on to a pinpoint target, even at a short distance. The weapon had always struggled to fire high and to the right, no matter how strongly you held it. And in the undisciplined hands of poorly trained militia, the inaccuracy multiplied. A few rounds struck close but the rest flew into the far bank and the sky. He and the girl dived again. Then they came up again and he looked back and saw the log. It had followed them over the ford thanks to its momentum. The Somali guys must have thought they were hiding behind it because the fire all seemed to be aimed at the tree.

  Stratton broke into a firm breaststroke, pushing himself beneath the water as much as he could. The girl elected to continue duck diving although she didn’t have the breath to stay below the surface for longer than a few seconds at a time. When she realised the bullets were no longer striking close by and that Stratton was getting ahead of her, she switched to a crawl to catch up with him.

  The gunfire petered out behind them and the sound of the rain hitting the water rose up again. They could hear shouts and the truck engine revving again. The alarm would be raised and the enemy would be alerted to the fact they were heading for the coast.

  Stratton swam to the bank and clambered out of the water, his clothes hanging heavily from his body. The girl followed and staggered tiredly in pursuit.

  ‘Time for a change,’ he said, breathing heavily, as he dropped on to his knees to catch his breath and look back in the direction of the lights. She dropped to the ground beside him, breathing hard but at the same time thankful.

  The gunfire became sporadic as the Somalis realised the log they been shooting at was unmanned. They started taking pot shots at anything that might be a person in the water or on the distant bank.

  ‘We’ll go on by land,’ Stratton said.‘If we meet an obstacle, we’ll still have the water as an option.’

  She nodded in agreement. She would follow Stratton anywhere at that moment in time.

  He set off. She adjusted her cloth sandals and padded after him. The rain had eased off by the time they had covered another kilometre. The river had also become much wider. Stratton thought he could hear waves crashing on a distant beach. The sound heightened their expectations, although these were tempered by the fear that the enemy was waiting for them.

  They came across a small rise and Stratton climbed it to survey the scene despite the risk of being silhouetted. The smouldering clouds still hung low in the sky. It was dark in every direction except for a distant glow to the west.

  ‘The town,’ he said after studying it for a moment.

  She joined him to take a look. ‘Do you think they’d expect us to try for the ship?’ she asked.

  He had considered the same thing. But only the enemy knew when the ship would sail. That was under their control. Stratton had arrived at that thought from a different direction. She probably thought that the pirates and jihadists would prevent them from getting on board the ship if they thought it was the pair’s intention. Stratton thought the Oasis would make a perfect trap and therefore the enemy would make climbing aboard as inviting as possible. ‘We are assuming the ship will be leaving soon. It could stay here for weeks,’ he said.

  She hadn’t considered that.

  Stratton would make his decision when they had studied the ship and the activity around it. They would learn a lot from just watching for a while.

  He stepped off the mound and walked along the bank at a brisk pace.

  The ground had changed, become sandier, but the rain had hardened it and although the going was a little slower than on the compacted earth, the girl was thankful for it. They made good progress despite Stratton’s insistence on halting every few hundred metres to listen. The closer they got to the town and the ships, he reasoned, the greater the chance they had of being seen.

  The rain had reduced to a drizzle and the sound made by the waves hitting the beach dominated. By the time they could see the white surf folding on to the sand, the rain had ceased. They had lost a good source of cover but the clouds still remained to shut out the stars and reduce the light. Something at least, thought Stratton.

  He faced the west and the distant glow from the town, now much brighter. They walked along the ocean side of the sand dam that held the river back. When they reached the end of it, Stratton halted to check around once again.

  ‘We should move away from the beach,’ he said. ‘It’s a natural line for a patrol to follow.’ He looked towards the water as a heavy wave dropped on to the beach with a thunderous boom. Ideally, they should leave the land completely and cover the rest of the distance by swimming. ‘You up for a swim?’

  ‘I’d rather drown trying than stay in this land another day,’ she said.

  He believed her, but he also worried that she would soon get into trouble out there and he would end up having to help her. Which would be dangerous for both of them. He set off away from the water.

  She followed.

  They watched the ground ahead and towards the shore constantly. The glow from the town grew brighter with every step. When it separated to become two distinct sources of light, he slowed to an easy walk. The brighter glow to the right was coming from the ships.

  The hazy radiance soon became distinct lights, the town sprinkled with white and orange, the vessels a tight collection of stark lights on top of large, dark masses. Electric lights had been placed on the beach in front of the carriers, a new addition since the night before. They had probably run cables ashore from the ships’ generators. But that only worked in his favour. A well-lit beach would make it even more difficult to spot swimmers, especially beyond the ships.

  Stratton kept staring at the vessels, aware of the girl’s presence only by the light cr
unch of her feet in the sand behind him. He was constantly gauging when they should head into the surf. He had chosen to ignore the threat that there could be a trap waiting for them if they climbed on board. He decided it was too sophisticated for the Somalis. Which was a lot to chance on the Somalis’ part because there were many places on board a ship large enough for a person to hide in.

  He estimated they should begin the swim at four to five hundred metres from the ships so that they could get well out to sea. But the closer he got, the more he reduced that estimate. The lights around the bulkers would be more distracting to the guards on board and those on the beach.

  As he looked at them, he saw something wrong with the picture of the vessels. From the angle of approach the ships were in a line and appeared as a single object. But as they drew closer, and the angle widened, he could pick out the individual ships. He could see three bulkers. Not four. He kept walking, his eyes fixed on the boats, hoping that one had been moved, tucked behind one of the others, or that it wasn’t the Oasis that was missing. The girl had also been staring at the ships and came alongside him, transfixed and praying that what she suspected wasn’t true.

  They both slowed to a halt. Their vessel of hope had been the largest of the four and the largest of those that remained wasn’t large enough. The Dutch captain’s vessel had gone. It had sailed without them.

  The girl dropped to her knees, more out of staggering dis appointment than anything else.

  Stratton sat down beside her and stretched out his feet.

  She looked at him, trying to see into his eyes in the darkness, wondering if she would find the same distress and frustration that she was feeling. But she could see nothing of the sort in them. She wasn’t surprised. Not any more. She found him to be a most unusual man. He got angry like normal men, showed petty frustrations and irritation at predictable times. But when most people reached the point where they were expected to lose hope, and could be forgiven for it, this one simply went cold and began to hatch an alternative plan, looking like he had missed a bus. He never seemed to tire of looking for options.

  She wondered what he was thinking. Then she decided to search for an option herself. It was no surprise to her to discover the one that came to mind, something they had considered from the beginning, and probably the only other reasonable option available to them.

  ‘I suppose we look for a small boat now,’ she said.

  ‘Out of land, sea and air that remains our best option,’ he said.

  He looked towards the cove in front of the first cargo carrier. She followed his gaze. Several small boats bobbed in the protected waters of the unusual loop in the beach.

  He looked to the skies, the gentle breeze rustling his scraggly hair. ‘I’d say we have five or six hours of darkness,’ he said. ‘We could be miles from here by dawn even with a poor sail.’

  She felt like she could have cracked up on seeing their cargo ship gone. But his sheer confidence and tenacity prevented any chance of that happening. She got to her feet, doing her best to forget the cargo vessel and focus on the next plan. ‘Let’s do it then.’

  He got up and they walked down to the beach and towards the boats.

  12

  Stratton and the girl reached the shore and studied the boats anchored beyond the surf. Stratton’s first concern had been that a sentry might be nearby. It didn’t surprise him to see no sign of one.

  He saw several kinds of boat, the majority exposed skiffs, their empty poles sticking in the air, sails stowed, or simple rowing boats. They walked along the beach to get a better look at some slightly larger craft. In the darkness it was difficult to make them out but one appeared to have a kind of cabin.

  ‘What do you think?’ she asked.

  ‘I was thinking sail earlier. But now I’m thinking motor.’

  ‘A motor won’t get us across the Gulf. Not without a lot of fuel.’

  ‘We don’t need to cross the Gulf. All we need to do is reach the transit corridor. Something like eighty ships a day use it. And then there are all the naval ships.’

  ‘Could we even get that far in a motor boat? The Gulf is a couple of million square miles. That’s a lot of ocean to get stranded in if we run out of fuel. At least with a sail we have power all the time.’

  ‘We won’t have speed though. There’s little wind right now.’

  ‘It’ll pick up when we’re out there.’

  ‘I’d rather get as far away as I could from this coastline as quickly as I could.’

  She decided he showed at least one sign of stress. He had no time for anyone else’s ideas. Unless of course he was like that all the time.

  ‘Let’s take a look,’ he said. ‘If there’s not enough fuel, then we’ll sail.’

  He walked into the surf and dived at a breaker and swam hard into the next set. She stood on the beach and prayed that once she stepped off the sand and into the water she would never have to return. She waded in until a large wave rolled in and she dived into it. The water was chilly and it felt good as she pulled hard to catch up with him.

  Both were soon through the breakers and swimming over the deep swell. Stratton paused to get his bearings and find the boat he had been aiming for. He saw it and waited for her to catch up before setting off again.

  The swim was further and more tiring than either of them had calculated, not that it would have made any difference. When they arrived at the boat, Stratton hauled himself on board. The girl grabbed the side and held on to catch her breath. Stratton took a firm hold of her hands and yanked her out of the water.

  He surveyed the boat while he caught his breath. It was basic and untidy with all kinds of fishing equipment scattered around. It had a wheelhouse in the centre the size of a phone booth. A couple of outboard engines bolted to the transom with their props out of the water. Stratton went straight to them.

  The engines were two different makes, one a one-twenty with an extra-long shaft, the other a seventy-five with a standard draught. They were an odd match but he doubted the fisherman who owned them cared for the equilibrium as long as they worked.

  The girl made herself useful and checked around for fuel. The two working tanks seemed to be full, judging by the weight. She inspected the contents of a large drum lashed to the side of the wheelhouse, the fumes engulfing her. ‘This is just over half full,’ she said, closing the lid.

  The engines looked well used but short of starting one up he had no way of knowing if they would work. He looked towards the only other motor boat he could see that might have been big enough for the proposed journey. But it did not appear to be as seaworthy as the one they were on.

  ‘Let’s take a paddle over to that one,’ he decided. ‘See what fuel it has.’

  He found a couple of oars, handed one to the girl and went to the bows and untied the line attached to a buoy. They had to fight against the tide, moving at an angle across them. They pulled hard together, the girl leaning over the stern. The distance between the boats quickly shrank as they heaved with the desperation of escaping convicts.

  Stratton dropped his oar inside the boat as the gunwales collided and the girl grabbed a line and looped it over a cleat. She leaned back and held on to it firmly and Stratton nimbly cross-decked.

  He inspected the working tank attached to the single outboard engine. It was heavy and he carried it over and lowered it into their boat. He searched the vessel for more and found several cans beneath a large decaying canvas.

  He couldn’t find anything else of use and climbed back over.

  ‘What do you think?’ she asked.

  ‘A wild guess … I’d say we have enough to get a hundred miles, give or take a few. That’s if the motors are working OK,’ he added.

  ‘How far is this transit corridor?’

  He looked at her. ‘I thought you would know that better than me.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Weren’t you sailing the bloody Gulf?’

  ‘I knew about the corridor but I didn’
t plan on sailing that far north.’

  Stratton took a moment to see the map in his head. He thought he remembered the Gulf being around two hundred miles across but the Yemen and Somali coastlines didn’t quite run parallel. ‘I’d say the corridor was around a hundred miles away, give or take.’

  ‘And when we get there we just wait to be picked up?’

  ‘That’s about it.’

  Trying to break the plan down didn’t look like it had helped her.

  ‘It’s not going to get any better than this, sweetheart,’ he said.

  She knew he was right, once again. If he had asked her to swim back to the beach to try and come up with some other plan, she would have found it very difficult.

  ‘How long will it take?’ she asked.

  He wasn’t sure what she meant exactly. ‘To find a boat once we get to the corridor? Hours maybe. Half a day max, I would’ve thought.’

  ‘All together? The journey and everything. How long?’ she asked, holding on as a swell rocked the boat. ‘I don’t really care. We’re going to do it. I just want to know that’s all. I want something to aim for.’

  ‘My advice is to aim to wait for days.’ He walked over to a five-gallon plastic container and unscrewed the top. He sniffed it quickly before picking it up and raising it to his lips. He took a short sip and then a long drink before putting it back down. ‘We can live three weeks without food, three days without water and we have enough here for a couple of days if we ration it. So there’s five days to aim for.’

  She didn’t look enthralled with the target.

  He set about checking the engines. Whoever had rigged them had done it in a weird way. They were both pull-start with their control arms linked by a wooden pole so that they could be turned in unison by one person. The twist throttle control on each arm had a crude clamp device attached to it made of wood and fishing line. He could find no engine or steerage control of any sort from the small bridge house, the various cables intended for such use having long since gone.