Chapter 89
“Do you think that’s helpful ?” asked Mzenga.
“I’m not sure.....it might have been another Captain.....but you say it was a different ship,” said Ashby, wondering aloud.
“Yes. So, where to from here, Mr Ashby ?”
“I must think about it,” came the reply.
All of what the adjuster had told him was tenuous at best. Yet, it seemed too remarkable to be a co-incidence. If it was Christoforou who had the run-in with the customs man – and it sounded just like him – it would have been less than a year before the sinking of the Captain Stratos. Why would he have gone to Lagos twice ?
After ringing Wells in London a second time, Ashby was later told that there was no ship called the Provincial in the LRE Register and there were scores of ships with similar sounding names. The background to the Provincial was therefore a mystery.
This left him with an assortment of facts and circumstances. There was no direct evidence of fraud linked to the Captain Stratos. Stefanides had also rung him : the fax number on the hotel booking was unlisted. It would take time to find out who the subscriber was. Again, this placed them no further forward.
In the hotel bar over a pint of Guinness, Ashby sat with Mzenga and plotted his next move. There were plenty of unanswered questions.
“If Hellas Global is a rogue shipowner, then Benin Maritime is likely to be too. Are they linked ? Is Christoforou the common factor ? The hotel register says that he and his crew were here in March 1980. That was one month after the Captain Stratos sank – supposedly with them on it. Why pretend that they all perished and then re-surface in Lagos one month later ? What were they doing before they got here ? And how did they get here ? Why even come here ? Why Lagos ? Why not somewhere else ? It’s possible they came on a ship but the Harbourmaster has no record of them. Maybe they came as passengers. But why would they do that ? They must have come here to do something or to get something. The hotel manager said Christoforou was seeing someone. And in his Captain’s uniform. Perhaps he was doing some sort of work as a ship’s master ? But why would he do that here in Lagos ? And the crew all had money to burn and tickets home. Who paid them ? The Marseillaise is the only ship of interest at the time of Christoforou’s arrival. Yet, it could turn out to be a red herring. They could have flown here or even travelled overland. Then again, getting a train to Lagos from somewhere in north Africa would be a strange thing to do after your ship sank. And Benin Maritime wouldn’t be the only rogue shipping company operating in west Africa. What do you make of it ?”
“I think the Greek Captain wasn’t here as a tourist. It looks like he came here twice, not just once. He must have been doing some sort of business in Nigeria, probably involving shipping or cargo or chartering. Maybe he and his crew thought Lagos would be a good place to disappear. No-one would think of looking for them here.”
“With organised crime, there’s always a pattern,” said Ashby. As he spoke, he was writing on a beermat. To Mzenga, Ashby’s doodling could have been hieroglyphics but was in fact, Greek lettering arranged in a theorem. “Hellas Global, Christoforou, Benin Maritime, Kikuna and the Liberian and Bahamian companies – all of them are either secretive or crooked or both. In the seafaring trade, what happens on the high seas can be covered up and known only to the master, the crew and the owner. Occasionally, someone dies on board a ship and because of international flags of convenience, even murders are hushed up. The way Kikuna reacted when I asked him if he knew the Greek Captain – it was a dead give-away. His response was a mixture of amusement and scorn – he was surprised that I mentioned it out of the blue – he couldn’t help ridiculing Christoforou because he’s a hard man to deal with. Aside from that, we also know that Hellas Global are smugglers. It may be that Benin Maritime and Kikuna are part of the same smuggling ring. If I can prove they are, we’ll have netted the shipowners. Because of that, I want to take a look at the Marseillaise when she docks in Cape Town, so that will be my next stop, the day after tomorrow. I’ll be leaving Lagos on the next flight out.”
“But Mr Ashby, isn’t that taking a big leap in the dark ? What do you hope to find on the Marseillaise ? Why go all that way, just on a vague supposition ?”
“Supposition ? It’s more than ‘supposition’. Look at this – theta and gamma represent Hellas Global and Benin Maritime. What do they tell us ? They’re saying that the occurrence factor ‘O’, is double the usual probability scale, ‘PS’. There is clearly a connection.”
As he was explaining this, Ashby pointed to the theorem he’d scrawled on the beermat. The adjuster could only stare in amazement. What was Ashby saying ? What did it all mean ?
Plantation A Legal Thriller Page 89