The Black Tide

I hesitated. But the man was tired after the flight. He’d been drinking and I’d know soon enough. ‘No, wait,’ he said as I was moving away. And he asked me what the hell I’d been up to at the GODCO offices. *And you went to see Gault. Why?’

‘How do you know?’ I asked.

‘Think I wouldn’t have somebody keep an eye on you.’ He came lumbering towards me. ‘You been talking?’ His tone was menacing.

‘I like to know what ship I’m sailing on, where it’s berthed.’

‘You been asking questions?’

‘Look,’ I said. ‘Adrian Gault I’ve known on and off for years. Perrin, too. With time to kill I looked them up. Why not? And of course I asked them.’

‘I told you to keep yer mouth shut.’ He was glaring at me, and suddenly I couldn’t help it, I had to know.

‘Choffel,’ I said. ‘Will he be on the same ship as me?’

‘Choffel?’ He seemed surprised, repeating the name slowly, his voice reluctant, his eyes sharp. ‘No.’ He was frowning angrily, groping for the right reply. ‘The only engineer on board at the moment is the Chief.’ And to settle the matter he added quickly, ‘His name’s Price if you want to know.’

So I was right. That picture with Baldwick on the edge of it, at Sennen, when the crew came ashore. He had recruited him then, made all the arrangements for getting him to the Gulf. And now he was on board. He was there, waiting for me. I suppose I must have been staring open-mouthed. ‘You don’t concern yourself with Price. Understand?’ He was glaring at me, conscious that the name had meant something to me, but not certain what. ‘You’re not an engineer. You’ve never met him before.’ He was still glaring at me doubtfully and it was Varsac who came to my

rescue. He had been talking very fast in French to the new arrival. Now they were both of them looking at Baldwick — the same question.

‘Le tankair. Ou ca?’

Baldwick turned his head slowly, like a bull wearily finding himself baited from another direction. ‘We’re keeping it as a surprise for you,’ he growled. ‘Where the hell d’you think it is? In the bloody water, of course.’ His small eyes shifted to me, a quick glance, then he went off to get a shower.

We all had breakfast together, coffee and boiled eggs, with Baldwick’s beady little eyes watching me as though I was some dangerous beast he had to keep an eye on. Afterwards, when I had packed and was coming away from reception after handing in my room key, Khalid suddenly appeared at my side. ‘For you, Said.’ He slipped me a blue envelope. ‘Sahib say it arrive last night.’ He was gone in a flash, scuttling out into the street, and I was left with an English air mail letter card in my hand. The writing was unfamiliar, a round, flowing hand, and the sender’s name and address on the back came as a surprise. It was from Pamela Stewart.

I was thinking back to that lunch at Lloyd’s, the Nelson Exhibition room. It was all so remote. And to have reached me now she must have sent the letter off the instant Gault had reported my arrival in Dubai. The Land Rovers had started up, Baldwick shouting to me, and I slipped it into my pocket, wondering why she should have written, why the urgency.

It was just after ten as we pulled away from the

hotel, Baldwick with the engineer officers in the first Land Rover, Mustafa with myself and the other deck officers in the second. There was no sign of Pieter Hals. I slit open the air mail letter and began reading it as we threaded our way through Dubai’s crowded streets. It appeared to have been written in a hurry, the writing very difficult to read in places. Dear Trevor Rodin, it began. Daddy doesn’t know I’m writing, but I thought somebody should tell you how much we appreciate what you are doing and that our thoughts are with you. It went on like that for almost half a page, then suddenly she abandoned the rather formal language, her mood changing. I was a fool, leaving you like that. We should have gone on to a club and got drunk, or gone for a walk together, done whatever people do when the heart’s too full for sensible words. Instead, I made a silly excuse and left you standing there under the Nelson picture. Please forgive me. I was upset. And my mind’s been in a turmoil ever since. I stopped there, staring down at the round, orderly writing on the blue paper, aware suddenly that this wasn’t an ordinary letter. ‘God Almighty!’ I breathed. The Canadian was saying something. His hand gripped my arm. ‘It’s not Mina Zayed. Abu Dhabi is west of Dubai. We’ve turned east.’

I slipped the letter back into my pocket and looked out at the chaos of construction work through which we were driving. This was the outskirts of Dubai and he was right. We were on the coast road headed east towards Sharjah, and the shamal was starting to blow little streamers of sand across the tarmac road.

‘Is it Mina Khalid, you reck’n?’ I shook my head. I didn’t think it was deep enough. ‘Mebbe an SMB.’ He turned to Mustafa. ‘They got one of the big single mooring buoys for tanker loading along the coast here?’ he asked.