Those in Peril (Unlocked) (11 page)

‘I brought the chef down from Number Eight,’ Hector said as he dismissed the steward. On the Wedgwood platter was laid out a cold collation of fillets of red Gulf snapper and salads.

‘I know that you don’t take wine before sunset,’ he said as he screwed the top off a bottle of San Pellegrino, and poured the sparkling water into her glass. The fish was delicious. She tried not to gobble it down in front of him, but he had tactfully turned his attention to the computer screen. He let her finish and then swivelled his chair to face her.

‘Very well. This will be our situation room for the duration of this operation. We will try not to discuss any vital information outside of it. Now, tell me everything you know!’ he ordered her. ‘Try not to leave out any detail, no matter how insignificant you think it may be.’ She spoke quietly but lucidly. By the end of the recitation her hands were shaking and she was deathly pale.

‘Pace yourself, Mrs Bannock. This might take a long time. Eat and rest to conserve your strength.’ He saw her impatience and suppressed his smile. ‘Okay. No more lectures from me. You’re a big girl now.’

‘I have told you all I know. What have you got to tell me?’

‘Nothing concrete yet, but now with what I have heard from you I have a much better idea of what we’re up against.’ He turned to the map projection on the large screen on the wall opposite their desks. From the keyboard of his computer he was able to move the electronic pointer around the map.

‘Let’s look at the location. Is it entirely blind chance that the
Dolphin
disappeared on the front doorsteps of all the most important Al-Qaeda strongholds west of Pakistan?’ Hector moved the marker from the northern end of the Indian Ocean to the eastern coast of the Gulf of Aden.

‘Yemen! The number-one terror capital of the world.’ Then he moved the marker a short distance across the Strait of Bab el Mandeb to the African mainland. ‘The cosy neighbours of Yemen just across the Red Sea or the Gulf of Aden are Puntland in Somalia, Eritrea and Ethiopia. Here we have Satan’s Circle,’ he said. ‘A seething nest of fanatical Islamic killers.’ He moved the marker down the map to a position a relatively short distance to the south. ‘Here is where your
Dolphin
was, sailing right into their jaws.’ He stood up from his desk, crossed to the window and stood with his hands clasped behind his back, staring across the blue waters of the Gulf. Then he wheeled around and thrust out his jaw at her. ‘And they knew she was coming.’

‘How did they know that?’ she asked sharply.

‘Because you sail exactly the same route every year at the same time, don’t you?’ She inclined her head to acknowledge that the point was well taken.

‘But how did you know that?’

‘Mrs Bannock, you are my boss. I make it my business to know as much as I can about you. I even know what school you went to.’

‘Do you just!’ she challenged him.

‘Herschel Girls High in Cape Town.’ He didn’t wait for her confirmation but went on, ‘Every year the
Dolphin
stops over in Cape Town to enable you to visit your mother who lives on your wine estate there. I know that and they know that.’

‘Very obvious of me.’ She looked abashed.

‘They probably put somebody on board the
Dolphin
in the Cape.’ She arched one perfectly groomed eyebrow at him. Those bloody marvellous eyes, he thought, how I hate them. He looked up at the map on the wall. ‘How do I know that?’ He asked the question for her.

‘Well?’ she demanded. ‘How do you?’

‘Because of what happened after the yacht left Cape Town. They were in an ambush, but the
Amorous Dolphin
is a fast boat and the ocean is a big place. Somebody was vectoring them in. But this is guesswork. Can we check if the ship took any crew on board in the Cape?’ She nodded.

‘That should be fairly simple,’ she said. ‘The
Dolphin
is owned by a private company in Basle, Switzerland. All the administration is done from there.’

‘Including all the hiring and firing?’

‘Including that, yes.’ Hector glanced at the clock on the wall, which showed the time in all the main capitals around the globe.

‘It’s 1400 hours in Zurich. Can you phone your man there?’

She nodded and dialled the number from memory. ‘Please put me through to Herr Ludwig Grubber. This is Mrs Hazel Bannock calling.’ Hector was mildly amused by the alacrity with which Ludwig came on the line. ‘Mr Grubber? Can you please tell me if the
Dolphin
took on any crew in Cape Town? Yes, I’ll hold.’ She did not have to hold too long before he came back on the line. ‘Yes, you can scan it and send it to my usual email address. Thank you, Mr Grubber. Please give my warmest regards to your father.’ She hung up, and looked across at Hector. ‘The
Dolphin
took on a temporary third steward in Cape Town.’

‘Of course, he had excellent references, or he would never have been allowed aboard?’ Hector was stating a fact, and she nodded reluctantly and then gathered her courage.

‘Apparently he was a friend of my daughter’s. She vouched for him.’

‘But she never told you about this before you left Cape Town to come here?’ She shook her head and looked away. Hector hated to watch her come to terms with the possibility that her beloved daughter might be less than a vestal virgin.

He’s such an awful know-it-all
, she thought angrily,
and he is insinuating things about Cayla.
Hazel didn’t want to look at him just yet. She remembered what Henry had said of him the only time they had discussed him. ‘Young Heck is a heck of a guy. He flies by the seat of his pants and shoots out of hand but more often than not he hits the bull slap bang on the nose.’

‘What is the friend’s name?’ Hector’s probing was gentle. He knew she was seething. She glanced at the notepad.

‘Rogier Marcel Moreau.’

‘Sounds like a nice young Frenchman. Do we have a copy of his passport?’

‘Basle is scanning it to me.’ Fifteen minutes later the scan came through on Hazel’s laptop. Hector read it off.

‘Date of birth 3 October 1973. His place of birth is Réunion Island in the Indian Ocean. Pretty close to home?’ He took the phone from its cradle.

‘Who are you calling?’

‘Just a friend in Paris. He is a Chief Inspector in French Interpol.’ He began to speak in rapid-fire French that Hazel could not follow very well. He was obviously being transferred up the chain of command. At last he seemed to reach his final destination for there were many cries of ‘
Allons, mon brave!
’ and ‘
Courage!
’ and ‘
Formidable!
’ before he hung up and looked across at Hazel. ‘My bosom buddy, Pierre Jacques, has promised a copy of Rogier’s birth certificate within the hour. Sometimes I just love computers and jovial French coppers, don’t you?’ For the first time he smiled at her. It was strange how the shape of his face changed and softened when he did so.

‘Shall we continue our little fantasy?’ he suggested. ‘Now they have their man on board the
Dolphin
, and he has some kind of electronic transmitter, probably a transponder. Through him they will know the exact position of the yacht. Their ambush boat starts to move into position, but then panic! Mrs Bannock, who is their target, leaves the ship at Cape Town. This is totally unexpected. Then suddenly the panic is over. Miss Cayla Bannock remains on board, and she and Rogier are good friends. She trusts him. This is almost as good as having her mother in their clutches. The plan can go ahead.’ Hazel hugged herself and shivered violently.

‘This is terrible.’

‘It gets better. There is hope,’ he promised her. ‘Now everything goes exactly as planned. The
Dolphin
sails into the trap. Rogier is able to assist the boarding and get the pirates into the fast-moving ship. Smart lad, our Rogier. The crew is taken into custody. There is only one small bleep on the screen. Cayla Bannock is a bright brave girl. She manages even in these terrifying moments of her capture to get off a text message to her mother.’ Hector paused and glanced at his computer screen. ‘Excuse me. It seems I have mail.’ He tapped the keyboard opening the attachments to the message and then he swore bitterly, but immediately excused himself.

‘Go ahead. I am becoming accustomed to it,’ she said. ‘What have you got?’

‘Our junior ship’s steward was born Adam Abdul Tippoo Tip on Réunion. In 2008 Adam changed his name to Rogier Marcel Moreau by deed poll in Auvergne in the south of France.’ He was silent for a moment as he studied the copy of the birth certificate.

Hazel burst out impatiently, ‘Does that name mean anything to you?’

He shook his head. ‘Nothing at all,’ he admitted. ‘However, the good news is that your daughter is almost certainly alive.’

‘Where is she then?’ Hazel pleaded.

‘Even money that Cayla is a captive on the Arab ambush vessel. She is priceless goods. They would never harm her.’

‘And the
Dolphin
?’ She shook her head in bewilderment.

‘Oh, they scuttled her. She was too obvious a target. The US airforce would have picked her up within a few hours of her being reported missing. My guess is they blew the bottom out of her. She is probably lying in a few thousand feet of water at the bottom of the Mascarene Basin off Madagascar. I feel certain you have insurance cover on her, with a piracy clause.’

‘The money is not important,’ she said.

‘In my limited experience the money is always important. How much is she insured for?’

‘One hundred and fifty-two million euros. God, Cross, don’t you have any concern for other people’s feelings?’

‘Very little,’ he admitted. ‘Only one thing concerns me at the moment, and that is finding and rescuing your daughter. But in the meantime the sun is setting.’ He stood up and stretched. ‘I would like to make you a drink. Both our nerves are on edge but we don’t need to fight each other. There are lots of other lovely people out there for us to fight. Vodka and fresh lime juice with ice, is it not?’

‘Yes, and you were right. I did attend Herschel Girls High.’ He knew it was a peace offering. He poured the clear spirit over the crackling ice in the long glass, then filled it with juice. She thanked him with a smile. When he had poured Scotch into his own glass they saluted each other. After they had both sipped and murmured approval, she sat back and studied his face.

‘My husband told me once that you fly by the seat of your pants. Are you right about this one, Cross?’ she asked him. He touched the side of his nose.

‘It smells good to me. It’s better than a hunch. It’s a reasoned scenario that all hangs together.’

‘Then where is my daughter? If this is a hostage taking, why haven’t they come through with a ransom demand? It’s been almost ten days since the
Dolphin
disappeared.’

‘They are giving themselves time to get well clear. Their vessel is probably a slow and nondescript sailing dhow. They want to be in their own territorial waters where they are safe from the warships of the civilized Western powers before they break cover. Also they want you to soften up and start breaking down with the suspense and the uncertainty.’

‘How much longer?’

‘Say they can make fourteen knots, and they are heading for Yemen or Puntland in Somalia, then they will almost have reached their destination by now,’ he said. ‘Not more than two or three days more.’

‘You have mentioned Puntland before. I’ve never heard of it until now.’

‘It’s in north-eastern Somalia and comprises the Great Horn of Africa. It is an inhospitable semi-desert, rugged and arid, three times larger than New Mexico. It is virtually cut off from the rest of Africa by the high mountain range on the west side of the Great Rift Valley. These mountains also block the prevailing westerly winds which drop all their rain on the slopes. The vegetation of Puntland is coarse acacia, thorny shrub bush and sparse rank grass. However, the country is very strategically positioned on the coast of the Gulf of Aden guarding the approaches to the Red Sea. Puntland broke away from the rest of Somalia at the end of the civil war and declared itself autonomous. It named itself after the Land of Punt in ancient Egyptian historical lore. It is believed to be the country to which Queen Hatshepsut sent her famous expedition in 1550 BC. Now it is governed by a loose-knit gang of independent warlords who answer to nobody and keep their own particular brand of law and justice.’

He changed the subject with disconcerting suddenness. ‘Will you take your dinner in your room where you will be able to mope in private? Not recommended. Or will you dine with me in the mess? Chef has some superb Japanese Wagyu rib eye beef. Food, wine and company most highly recommended on page one hundred of the latest edition of the Michelin guide.’ She had sat alone all these last dreadful nights, and at least he was not boring. Infuriating? Yes definitely, but not boring. She smiled and capitulated.

During the meal he kept the conversation away from the subject of her missing daughter and yacht, instead he spoke about the political structure of Abu Zara and the operations of Bannock Oil in the Emirate, then he moved on to the subjects of horses and horse racing which he knew interested her.

‘My father kept a few horses in training on the ranch,’ he explained when she looked askance at his obvious knowledge of the subject. ‘As a skinny kid I was his head groom and jockey. Once a month we attended the race meetings in Nairobi. It was all knock-about and amateur stuff but we took it extremely seriously.’