A Ravel of Waters

Grohman turned contemptuous. 'The Royal Navy! Do you remember 1976? Do you remember your so-called research ship, the Shackleton, snooping about in our waters with depth-charges and electronic gear aboard? The Argentinian destroyer Almirante Storni opened fire on it for illegal activities. The Shackleton turned and ran for Port Stanley…'

'That appears to be a common occurrence in these parts’ I remarked.

'The British warship was probing our naval secrets!' rapped out Grohman. 'We opened fire legitimately when it refused to surrender..

Once again Brockton came to my rescue. 'The Shackleton was simply an oceanographic research ship measuring the extent of continental drift off the Horn,' he said briskly. 'Your so-called depth-charges were seismic charges for use in sonic underwater observations. The Almirante Storni demanded that she submit to arrest – on the high seas. The British captain quite rightly sought shelter in the nearest British port – Port Stanley. His ship holed up there until the storm blew over. It was all part of Argentina's continuing campaign of harassment over the Falklands.'

Grohman looked as if he could have knifed Brockton. 'We have proclaimed a two-hundred-mile territorial limit round the Malvinas,' he said. 'Therefore the British warship was inside Argentinian territorial waters.'

I drained my drink and got up. 'I am not prepared to listen to any more of this nonsense,' I said. 'Tomorrow I fly to Port Stanley. Are you accompanying me, Grohman, or are you staying here?' 'I am coming.'

'Good. We'll be on the same plane. I intend taking Jetwind to sea as soon as possible.'

Grohman gave an unamused smile. 'You call my reasons nonsense. You will see tomorrow they are not.' 'Say what you mean, man!'

Brockton had also risen to his feet, apparently more concerned than I was at Grohman's air of truculent triumph.

'An Argentinian warship – the same Almirante Storni -is at this moment on her way to Port Stanley to detain Jetwind.’

Chapter 8

I disbelieved him – until next day.

Our plane was over the ocean, about an hour out from Comodoro Rivadavia, heading for the Falklands. The scheduled flight time was about two and a half hours. The obsolescent F-27 Argentina Air Force plane was grinding its way southeastwards; the mainland was out of sight behind. The day was clear and bright but the far horizon was a purplish line – the menace of Southern Ocean weather, the unsleeping threat of Cape Horn. It looked a good day down on the surface. Only occasionally did I spot a white crest. It was a rare in-between day when the wind was making up its mind from which quarter to rip in next -northwest or west.

I had just been handed a thin, stale sandwich and a cardboard cup of synthetic fruit juice by a cabin dogsbody who sported an Air Force uniform and a rash of acne. He, like the rest of the four-man crew, treated Brockton and myself like patients with a highly infectious disease. Brockton had the window-seat next to me. Suddenly his stocky frame stiffened and his square jaw went rigid like a bull mastiff confronting the bull.

He dropped his voice below the level of the other passengers' hearing. 'Grohman wasn't conning you, Peter. Look out there.'

I was slow to pick up the ship's profile against the mirror of water.

'That's her – the Almirante Storni.’ Brockton's voice was full of concern.

I craned forward to see; out of the corner of my eye I noted one of the flying crew slide back the curtain into the cabin and beckon Grohman into the cockpit. Grohman was sitting with a group of four fellow-countrymen. At take-off I had wondered what their business might be in Stanley.

'How can you tell at this distance?' I asked Brockton in surprise.

He scraped at his jaw with his knuckles, as if the quality of his shave worried him.

'Ex-United States Fletcher class’ he replied. 'You can identify 'em anywhere by that high mast for'ard with the heavy stay on the port side. It supports the radar gear.'

When the destroyer rose on a wave, I made out her distinguishing feature.

'Gives the ship a lopsided appearance,' I said. 'How do you know though that she's the Almirante Storni?’

'The U.S. turned over some Fletchers to Argentina in the fifties,' he said. 'They were a pretty successful class. They did a great job during the war, odd mast or not.' 'Y'ou're sure she's the Almirante Storni?’ 'Sure.'

The previous evening I had dismissed Grohman's statement about the warship's mission to detain Jetwind as patriotic claptrap; now the evidence on the sea below was irrefutable.

I said in an undertone, 'She's square on course for the Falklands.'

'Yeah. I reckon she'll be off Stanley during the night. A Fletcher's best cruising speed is about fifteen knots. I guess that's what she's doing now. She's got no problems with either the sea or the weather.'

'You seem to know a hell of a lot about the Fletcher class, Paul.'