Triple (1991)

by Ken Follett

  TEL AVIV TO MV STROMBERG PERSONAL BORG TO DICKSTEIN EYES ONLY MUST BE DECODED BY THE ADDRESSEE BEGINS SUZA ASHFORD CONFIRMED ARAB AGENT STOP SHE PERSUADED CORTONE TO TAKE HER AND HASSAN TO SICILY STOP THEY ARRIVED AFTER YOU LEFT` STOP CORTONE NOW DEAD STOP THIS AND OTHER DATA INDICATES STRONG POSSIBILITY YOU WILL BE ATTACKED AT SEA STOP NO FURTHER ACMON WE CAN TAKE AT THIS END STOP YOU FUCKED IT UP ALL ON YOUR OWN NOW GET OUT OF IT ALONE ENDS

  The clouds which had been massing over the western Mediterranean for the previous few days finally burst that night, drenching the Stromberg with rain. A brisk wind blew up, and the shortcomings of the ship's design became apparent as she began to roll and yaw in the burgeoning waves. Nat Dickstein did not notice the weather. He sat alone in his little cabin, at the table which was screwed to the bulkhead, a pencil in hand and a pad, a codebook and a signal in front of him, transcribing Borg's message word by crucifying word. He read it over and over again, and finally sat staring at the blank steel wall in front of him. It was pointless to speculate about why she might have done this, to invent farfetched hypotheses that Hassan had coerced or blackmailed her, to imagine that she had acted from mistaken beliefs or confused motives: Borg had said she was a spy, and he had been right. She had been a spy all along. That was why she had made love to him. She had a big future in the intelligence business, that girl. Dickstein put his face in his hands and pressed his eyeballs with his fIngertips, but still he could see her, naked except for her high-heeled shoes, leaning against the cupboard in the kitchen of that little flat, reading the morning paper while she waited for a kettle to boil. The worst of it was, he loved her still. Before he met her he had been a cripple, an emotional amputee with an empty sleeve hanging where he should have had love; and she had performed a miracle, making him whole again. Now she had betrayed him, taking away what she had given, and he would be more handicapped than ever. He had written her a love letter. Dear God, he thought, what did she do when she read that letter? Did she laugh? Did she show it to Yasif Hassan and say, "See how rve got him hooked?" If you took a blind man, and gave him back his sight, and then, after a day made him blind again during the night while he was sleeping, this was how he would feel when he woke up. He had told Borg he would kill Suza if she were an agent, but now he knew that he had been lying. He could never hurt her, no matter what she did. It was late. Most of the crew were asleep except for those taking watches. He left the cabin and went up on deck without seeing anyone. Walking from the batch to the gunwale he got soaked to the skin, but be did not notice. He stood at the rail, looking into the darkness, unable to see where the black sea ended and the black sky began, letting the rain stream across his face like tears. He would never kill Suza, but Yasif Hassan was a different matter. If ever a man had an enemy, he had one in Hassan. He had loved Eila, only to see her in a sensual embrace with Hassan. Now he had fallen in love with Suza, only to find that she had already been seduced by the same old rival. And Hassan had also used Suza in his campaign to take away Dickstein!s homeland. Ob, yes, he would kill Yasif Hassan, and he would do it with his bare hands if he could. And the others. The thought brought him up out of the depths of despair in a fury: he wanted to hear bones snap, he wanted to see bodies crumple, he wanted the smell of fear and gunfire, he wanted death all around him. Borg thought they would be attacked at sea. Dickstein stood gripping the rail as the ship sawed through the unquiet sea; the wind rose momentarily and lashed his face with cold, hard rain; and he thought, So be it; and then he opened his mouth and shouted into the wind: "Let them come-let the bastards comet"

  Chapter Fifteen

  Hassan did not go back to Cairo, then or ever. Exultation fdled him as his plane took off from Palermo. It had been close, but he had outwitted Rostov againl He could hardly believe it when Rostov had said, "Get out Of MY sight." He had felt sure he would be forced to board the Karla and consequently miss the hijack of the Fedayeen. But Rostov completely believed that Hassan was merely over-enthusiastio, impulsive, and inexperienced. It had never occurred to him that Hassan might be a traitor. But then, why should it? Hassan was the representative of Egyptian Intelligence on the team and he was an Arab. If Rostov had toyed with suspicions about his loyalty, he might have considered whether he was working for the Israelis, for they were the opposition-the Palestinians, if they entered the picture at all, could be assumed to be on the Arab side. It was wonderful. Clever, arrogant, patronizing Colonel Rostov and the might of the notorious KGB had been fooled by a lousy Palestinian refugee, a man they thought was a nobody. But it was not over yet. He still had to join forces with the Fdayeen. The flight from Palermo took him to Rome, where he tried to get a plane to Annaba or Constantine, both near the Algerian coast. The nearest the airlines could offer was Algiers or Tunis. He went to Tunis. There he found a young taxi driver with a newish Renault and thrust in front of the man's face more money in American dollars than he normally earned in a year. The taxi took him across the hundred-mile breadth of Tunisia, over the border into Algeria, and dropped him off at a fishing village with a small natural harbor. One of the Fedayeen was waiting for him. Hassan found him on the beach, sitting under a propped-up dinghy, sheltering from the rain and playing backgammon with a fisherman. The three men got into the fisherman's boat and cast off. The sea was rough as they headed out in the last of the day. Hassan, no seaman, worried that the little motorboat would capsize, but the fisherman grinned cheerfully through it all. The trip took them less than a half hour. As they approached the looming hulk of the ship, Hassan felt again the rising sense of triumph. A ship ... they had a ship. He clambered up on to the deck while the man who had met him paid off the fisherman. Mahmoud was waiting for him on deck. They embraced, and Hassan said, "We should weigh anchor immediately-things are moving very fast now. "Come to the bridge with me." Hassan followed Mahmoud forward. The ship was a small coaster of about one thousand tons, quite new and in good condition. She was sleek, with most of her accommodations below deck. There was a hatch for one hold. She had been designed to carry small loads quickly and to maneuver in local North African ports. They stood on the foredeck for a moment, looking about. "She's just what we iieed," Hassan said joyfully. "I have renamed her the Nablus," Mahmoud told him. "She is the first ship of the Palestine Navy." Hamm felt tears start to his eyes. They climbed the ladder. Mahmoud said, "I got her from a Libyan businessman who wanted to save his soul." The bridge was compact and tidy. There was only one serious lack: radar. Many of these small coastal vessels still managed without it, and there had been no time to buy the equipment and fit it. Mahmoud introduced the captain, also a Libyan---the businessman had provided a crew as well as a ship, none of the Fedayeen were sailors. The captain gave orders to weigh anchor and start engines. The three men bent over a chart as Hassan told what he had learned in Sicily. "The Stromberg left the south coast of Sicily at midday today. The Coparelli was due to pass through the Strait of Gibraltar late last night, heading for Genoa. They are sister ships, with the same top speed, so the earliest they can meet is twelve hours east of the midpoint between Sicily and Gibraltar." The captain made some calculations and looked at another charL "Ibey will meet southeast of the island of Minorca." "We should intercept the Coparelli no less than eight hom earlier." The captain ran his finger back along the trade route. "That would put her just south of the island of Ibiza at dusk tomorrow. "Can we make-it?" "Yes, with a little time to spare, unless there is a storm." "Will there be a storm?" "Sometime in the next few days, yes. But not tomorrow, I think." "Good. Where is the radio operatorr "Here. This is Yaacov." Hassan turned to see a small, smiling man with tobaccostained teeth and told him, "There is a Russian aboard the Coparellf, a man called Tyrin, who will be sending signals to a Polish ship, the Karl& You must listen on this wavelength." He wrote it down. "Also, there is a radio beacon on the Stromberg that sends a simple thirty-second tone every half hour. If we listen for that every time we will be sure the Stromberg is not outrunning us." The captain was giving a course. Down on the deck th
e first officer had the hands making ready. Mahmoud was speaking to one of the Fedayeen about an arms inspection. The radio operator began to question Hassan about the Stromberes beacon. Hassan was not really listenin& He was thinking: Whatever happens, it will be glorious. The ship's engines roared, the deck tilted, the prow broke water and they were on their way.

  Dieter Koch, the new engineer officer of the Caparelli, lay In his bunk in the middle of the night thinking: but what do I say if somebody sees me? What he had to do now was simple. He had to get up, go to the aft engineering store, take out the spare oil pump and got rid of it. It was almost certain he could do this without being seen, for his cabin was close to the store, most of the crew were asleep, and those that were awake were on the bridge and in the engine room and likely to stay there. But "almost certain" was not enough in an operation of this importance. If anyone should suspect, now or later, what he was really up to ... He put on a sweater, trousers, sea boots and an oilskin. The thing had to be done, and it had to be done now. He pocketed the key to the store, opened his cabin door and went out. As he made his way along the gangway he thought: I'll say I couldn't sleep so I'm checking the stores. He unlocked the door to the store, turned on the light, went in and closed it behind him. Engineering spares were racked and shelved all around him-gaskets, valves, plugs, cable, bolts, filters . . . given a cylinder block, you could build a whole engine out of these parts. He found the spare oil pump in a box on a high shelf. He lifted it down-it was not bulky but it was heavy-and then spent five minutes double-checking that there was not a seoond spare oil pump. Now for the difficult part. I couldn't sleep, sir, so I was checking the spares. Very good, everything in order? Yes, sir. And what's that you've got under your arm? A bottle of whiskey, sir. A cake my mother sent me, The spare oil pump, sir, I'm going to throw it overboard ... He opened the storeroom door and looked out. Nobody. He killed the light, went out, closed the door behind him and locked it. He walked along the gangway and out on deck. Nobody. It was still raining. He could see only a few yards, which was good, because it meant others could see only that far. He crossed the deck to the gunwale, leaned over the rail, dropped the oil pump into the sea, turned, and bumped into someone. A cake my mother sent me, it was so dry ... 'Who's that?' a voice said in accented English. "Engineer. You?" As Koch spoke, the other man turned so that his profile was visible in the deck light, and Koch recognized the rotund figure and big-nosed face of the radio operator. "I couldn't sleep," the radio operator said. "I wasget ting some air." He's as embarrassed as I am, Koch thought. I wonder why? "Lousy night," Koch said. "Im going in." "Goodnight." Koch went inside and made his way to his cabin. Strange fellow, that radio operator. He was not one of the regular crew. He had been taken on in Cardiff after the original radioman broke his leg. Like Koch, he was something of an outsider here. A good thing he bad bumped into him rather than one of the others. Inside his cabin he took off his wet outer clothes and lay on his bunk. He knew he would not sleep. His plan for tomorrow was all worked out, there was no point in going over it again, so he tried to think of other things: of his mother, who made the best potato kugel in the world; of his fiance, who gave the best head in the world; of his mad father now in an institution in Tel Aviv; of the magnificent tapedeck he would buy with his back pay after his assignment; of his fine apartment in Haifa; of the children he would have, and how they would grow up in an Israel safe from war. . He got up two hours later. He went aft to the galley for some coffee. The cook's apprentice was there, standing in a couple of inches of water, frying bacon for the crew. "Lousy weather," Koch said. "It will get worse." Koch drank his coffee, then refilled the mug and a second one and took - them up to the bridge. The first officer was there. "Good morning," Koch said. "Not really," said the first officer, looking out into a curtain of rain. "Coffee?" "Good of you. Thank you." Koch handed him the mug. 'Where are we?" "Here." The officer showed him their position on a charL "Dead on schedule, in spite of the weather." Koch nodded. That meant be had to stop the ship in fifteen minutes. "See you later," he said. He left the bridge and went below to the engine room. His number two was there, looking quite fresh, as if he had taken a good long nap during his nighfs duty. "Hows the oil pressureT'Koch asked him. "Steady."

  "It was going up and down a bit yesterday." "Well, there was no sign of trouble in the night," the number two said. He was a little too firm about it, as if he was afraid of being accused of sleeping while the gauge oscillated. "Good," Koch said. "Perhaps it's repaired itself." He put his mug down on a level cowling, then picked it up quickly as the ship rolled. "Wake Larsen on your way to bed." "Right." "Sleep well." The number two left, and Koch drank down his coffee and went to work. The oil pressure gauge was located in a bank of dials aft of the engine.'Tbe dials were set into a thin metal casing, painted matt black and secured by four self-tapping screws. Using a large screwdriver, Koch removed the four screws and pulled the casing away. Behind it was a mass of many. colored wires leading to the different gauges. Koch swapped his large screwdriver for a small electrical one with an insulated handle. With a few turns be disconnected one of the wires to the oil pressure gauge. He wrapped a couple of inches of insulating tape around the bare end of the wire, thm taped it to the back of the dial so that only a close inspection would reveal it was not connected to the terminal. Then he replaced the casing and secured it with the four Screws. Wben Larsen came in be was topping up the transmission fluid. "Can I do that, sir?" Larsen said. He was a Donkeyman Greaser, and lubrication was his province. I "I've done it now," Koch said. He replaced the filler cap and stowed the can in a locker. Larsen rubbed his eyes and lit a cigarette. He looked over the dials, did a double take and said. "Sirl Oil pressure zerol" ozeror, "Yes!" "Stop enginest" "Aye, aye, sir." Without oil, friction between the engines metal parts would cause a very rapid build-up of heat until the metal melted, the parts fused and the engines stopped, never to go again. So dangerous was the sudden absence of oil pressure that Larsen might well have stopped the engines on his own initiative, without asking Koch. Everyone on the ship heard the engine die and felt the COparelli lose way; even those dayworkers who were still asleep in their bunks heard it through their dreams and woke up. Before the engine was completely still the first officer's voice came down the pipe. "Bridgel What's going on below?" Koch spoke into the , voice-pipe. "Sudden loss of oil pressure. "Any idea whyr "Not yet." "Keep me posted." "Aye, aye, sir." Koch turned to Larsen. "We're going to drop the sump," he said. Larsen picked up a toolbox and followed Koch down a half deck to where they could get at the engine from underneath. Koch told him, "If the main bearings or the big end bearings were wom the drop in oil pressure would have been gradual. A sudden drop means a failure in the oil supply. There's plenty of oil in the system-I checked earlier-and there are no signs of leaks. So there's probably a blockage." Koch released the sump with a power spanner and the two of them lowered it to the deck. They checked the sump strainer, the fall How filter, the filter relief valve and the ai relief valve without finding any obstructions. "If there's no blockage, the fault must be in the pump," Koch said. "Break out the spare oil pump." 'That will be in the store on the main deck," Larsen said. Koch handed him the key, and Larsen went above. Now Koch had to work very quickly. He took the casing off the oil pump, exposing two broad-toothed meshing gear wheels. He took the spanner off the power drill and fitted a bit, then attacked the cogs of the gear wheels with the drill, chipping and breaking them until they were all but useless. He put down the drill, picked up a crowbar and a hammer, and forced the bar in between the two wheels, prising them apart until he heard something give with a loud, dull crack. Finally he took out of his pocket a small nut made of toughened steel, battered and chipped. He had brought it with him when he had boarded the ship. He dropped the nut into the sump. Done.