Diamondhead (44 page)

Authors: Patrick Robinson

Tags: #Suspense, #Fiction, #Political, #Thrillers, #Weapons industry, #War & Military, #Assassination, #Iraq War; 2003-

Finally, still wearing his leather driving gloves, he used his key to open the trunk and placed his French guidebook in his bag. He took out the new trainers and a navy-blue sweater. He placed his black loafers and tweed jacket inside, zipped the bag up, and backed off, leaning over to put on his new footwear. He rammed down the trunk lid with his elbow. Then he squirted the liquid onto the lock, polished around that wide area, and the car was clean.

Mack walked to a trash bin and dumped the plastic carton and the remainder of the dusters. As far as he was concerned it was now dinnertime, and he walked to a new pub one street off the seafront, and ordered fish and chips with a pint glass of sparkling water.

He already missed his French guidebook, but although he did not mind being recognized by local people, he did not wish to be seen planning a trip to France. When he blew out of this fishing port, he wanted his destination to be a total mystery for as long as possible. He also knew that particular mystery might not stay secret indefinitely.

His fish was perfectly fried cod, and he accepted the landlord’s advice of sprinkling salt and vinegar, the way the English prefer it. Professor Henry Higgins would have been perplexed at the strangeness of Mack’s accent, and the landlord, a retired fisherman, doubtless wondered whether he had ever eaten fried fish before.

As good as the cod was, the fries were not to Mack’s taste; they were too heavy-cut, too big, and he did not wish to weigh himself down with that kind of food. Not tonight, when he would need to be sharp and agile. So he ordered another piece of delicious cod, and somehow had to leave two large portions of fries.

He lingered for a while, sipped his water and ordered more, plus a large cup of black coffee. He could see outside the clouds were moving in. The bright summer day was gone, and if he was any judge there would be rain before midnight. By a quarter of nine he could see it was very gloomy, and the clouds caused night to fall early. He paid his bill, pulled on his driver’s gloves, and walked back to the deserted parking lot. There were lights along the jetties near the boats, but nothing was obviously preparing to get under way.

Mack went straight to the parking lot, opened the trunk, and pulled out his toolbox and leather bag. He placed them close to the wall in the shadows and then went around to the front of the vehicle, pulled out his new screwdriver, and removed the license plate.

He walked back down the side of the car and suddenly noticed the tax disk stuck in a clear plastic holder on the lower-left windshield. “Fuck,” he muttered, noting that the car registration was written on that disk. He reached for his key, gloves still on, opened the door and whipped the plastic off, and shoved it in his pocket.

Then he moved to the back of the car and unscrewed the rear plate. Leaving his bags by the wall, he walked down to the water and skimmed both metal plates like Frisbees into the middle of the thirty-five-foot-deep harbor. He took the tax disk out of its holder, and ripped the red colored paper into about a thousand pieces and placed half of them in one trash bin and half in another.

It was nine when he pulled on his driving gloves, gathered up the toolbox and bag, and walked down onto the deserted jetty. He could see the harbor master was not in his office, and he passed no one as he walked toward the section where
Eagle
was moored.

The trawler was close in, no more than three feet off. Swiftly, he tossed the bag aboard and jumped across the gap, holding the toolbox. He made straight for the lifeboat, an inflatable Zodiac with an outboard, which was attached to a davit on the starboard side. He shoved the bag and box under the cover, and then clambered in himself, taking care not to dislodge his black wig.

And there in the dark of this Sunday night, Mack Bedford waited. It was almost nine thirty when things began to liven up on the jetties. Mack could hear fishermen talking about the weather to the harbor master.

Sea’s getting up out there—shouldn’t be surprised if we got a bit of a storm.

Forecast’s not bad—the glass is falling, but they don’t think it will amount to much.

Probably worse farther south—they’re saying it veered off toward the Channel Islands.

Damn good thing too—stop the Spanish stealing our bloody cod.

Evenin’, Fred. This weather putting you off?

Not me. I’ve been out in a lot worse, and I need the money! Ready, Tom?

Mack heard two men come aboard. Fred Carter and his first mate, Tom, who sounded much younger. They checked their gear for a few minutes, and then the rumble of twin diesels shuddered the boat.

The wheelhouse was in a raised for’ard upperworks, with the engines astern, a deck below. Mack heard a door slam shut and guessed that Fred was at the helm while Tom was casting off. In fact, he heard the harbor master shout from the jetty, “Stern line comin’,” and he heard it drop on the deck as it was thrown over.

Then Tom shouted, “Okay, Teddy, I’ll take it”—and again Mack heard a mooring line land, this time on the foredeck. The boat trembled slightly as Fred Carter opened the throttles very slightly with the wheel hard over. Then
Eagle
leaned to her port side, before straightening and moving dead ahead.

The harbor was still flat calm, despite the rising wind, and the trawler moved slowly between the other boats, heading to the harbor’s outer reaches before coming a few degrees to starboard and making directly for the inshore waters down the south Devon coast.

It was dark now, and Mack knew the flashing light on Berry Head was somewhere up ahead. He felt the rise of the ocean as they stood fair down the Channel, leaving the land behind, making around fifteen knots now toward the bad weather and, Fred hoped, toward those big shoals of cod or mackerel.

The ebbing tide would be with them for the next thirty minutes until they crossed the estuary of the River Dart, hugging the shore until they reached the lighthouse at Start Point, fifteen miles from Brixham. Right there they would head out to the open sea.

With the wind gusting from the southwest, Mack was certain he would know when they reached the lighthouse, and, simultaneously, the end of the shelter from the land. Conditions would surely deteriorate as
Eagle
began to take a buffeting from the hard Atlantic wind.

He had not heard the wheelhouse door slam for a second time, and he was uncertain whether Tom had joined Fred. In a good-sized dragger like this, there were always a hundred different tasks to complete before the nets were dropped, and Tom could easily be in the hold preparing gear for the night’s catch.

In any event there was not much Mack could do about it. So he just lay very still, awaiting the change in sea conditions and then making his move. It was almost twenty minutes past ten when he felt an unmistakable increase in the size of the swell.
Eagle
started to ride up and then wallow as she rode down into the trough of the wave.

They were clear of Start Point now, no doubt in Mack’s mind. He risked a peep out from under the tarpaulin, aware that he might be looking straight into the eyes of Tom, the first mate, and then he would have to kill him, which he did not wish to do. He pushed the tarp higher and looked up into the wheelhouse. There were two men in there, and one of them had to be Tom, steering the ship.

Mack climbed out of the lifeboat and made his way to the bottom of the short flight of steps, where there were two round white life preservers clipped to the bulkhead. He removed them and placed them on the deck. Then he climbed three steps until he could reach the door handle, opened it, and yelled, “Fred! Get the hell out here!”

He heard Tom shout, “Who the fucking hell’s that?”

At which point big Fred Carter came into the wheelhouse doorway and leaned out. Big mistake. Mack Bedford grabbed him by the balls and heaved. Fred roared and fell forward. Mack took him by the throat and, with an outrageous display of strength, using the full forward weight of the
Eagle
’s skipper, hurled Fred Carter over his head, straight over the side, and into the English Channel.

Before Fred hit the water, Mack had the life preserver in his hands and dropped it about one foot from the powerful hands of Captain Carter. Instantly, Mack turned around to see Tom, with one hand on the wheel, standing gaping in the wheelhouse doorway, in shock at what he had just seen.

Mack came up the steps like a panther, grabbed Tom by the belt, and hauled him forward. Mack dropped down to deck level, and Tom’s hand was torn from the wheel. Overbalanced, he fell forward, and Mack caught him, hurling him over the side into a full summersault, exactly like the boss. Tom hit the water with his backside, and plunged under the waves. The other life preserver almost hit him on the head as he came to the surface.

Mack leaped into the wheelhouse and hauled back on the throttle, slowing down and sliding into reverse. He backed the trawler up forty yards to where the two fishermen were swimming, secure in the big life preservers. “Sorry, guys,” he yelled in his latest Leeward Islands accent. “I need boat. Don’t panic. You’ll be rescued. Warm water, eh? Very good.”

Tom could not believe what he was seeing, and for the second time in as many minutes he demanded, “Who the fucking hell’s that?”

“’Ow the hell do I know?” bellowed Fred. “He’s a fucking pirate, that’s what he is. And he’s not getting away with this. No bloody way.”

“Have we been hijacked?” asked Tom. “I mean like you see on the news?”

“Hijacked!” cried Fred. “We’ve been robbed, that’s what’s happened! That bastard up there with the fucking black beard has nicked the fucking boat, that’s what he’s done!”

“He was as strong as a bear,” said Tom. “He just threw me up in the air. Talked funny as well, didn’t he?”

“Never mind all that,” said Fred. “We have to get home. If the clouds break, we can follow the North Star—it’s got to be back there, the opposite way to
Eagle.
She’s headed for France; we have to swim to South Devon.”

Mack checked the compass and held course at 135 degrees. He flicked on the GPS electronic map, which showed the south coast of England and the north coast of Brittany. The black triangle was just off the English coast. Speed on the sidebar showed 17.2 knots.

He opened the throttles until the trawler was lurching along at around 20 knots, rolling with the swells, occasionally taking silver water over her bow.

She felt very seaworthy, as Mack had been sure she would. She had a good motor, and she was definitely full of gas. Before him was a run of well over 110 miles, which at 20 knots would take him almost six hours. If the sea flattened out on the far side of the Channel, he could probably wind her up to 25, driving the motor hard in a completely empty ship.

The trouble was he needed speed, as much speed as he could muster, because Fred and Tom in the busy sea-lanes off the coast of Devon stood a very fair chance of being rescued within two or three hours, and the ship-to-shore radio would take only moments to alert both French and English coast guards that a Brixham trawler had been hijacked by a pirate. It was even possible that someone would find the two fishermen by midnight. All stations would be alerted, and satellites would be sailing through the stratosphere looking for the
Eagle.

But none of it would be easy for the searchers, not in the dark, trying to scan a “possibility-zone” area of 110 miles by 110—that’s more than 12,000 square miles, and no one had the slightest idea in which direction this bearded monster was going. Especially since Mack intended to transmit nothing. He would steam to France with no running lights, no radar, and no sonar. He had his map of the south coast of England, the English Channel, and the north coast of Brittany. With the compass to guide him, Mack could find his way across the pitch-black, and probably rain-swept, Channel. But he needed to be in French coastal waters before first light around five thirty. That gave him seven hours’ running time.

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