At the top, Graham shook hands with the man. “Is my crew here?” Subandrio nodded toward the containers lashed to the afterdeck. It was clear he wasn’t happy. “They came aboard in one of those yesterday afternoon. As soon as it got dark they let themselves out and came belowdecks.” He shook his head. “It’s bad business, Rupert, between them and my crew. You will have to do something before the situation gets completely out of hand.”
Bin Laden had arranged for eighteen crewmen, most of them Iranians, for the tough mission. But although they had a great religious zeal for the jihad, they were misfits who would have been better as suicide bombers in Baghdad, or mujahideen doing battle with the Americans in Afghanistan, than as a crew aboard a submarine. Graham had never met any of them, he’d only seen their dossiers, but he was convinced that by the time they got across the Atlantic they would be molded into an acceptable crew. He would kill any man who didn’t cooperate, and the sooner he got that message across the sooner their training could begin.
They would have only one shot at what he planned to do, and those plans did not include committing suicide for the cause. He would let his crew have that honor.
“What exactly is the trouble?” Graham asked.
“Let’s get off the deck first,” Subandrio said, and led Graham across to a hatch into the superstructure.
The passageway was dimly lit in red. Now Graham could more clearly hear the sound of machinery running somewhere below. And he could hear the murmur of several voices. Whoever was talking sounded angry.
“I want them to return to the container, but they refuse my orders,” Subandrio said. “You can hear them. They’ve been at it all night; arguing, fighting; making a very big mess of my galley and stores. My crew refuses to have anything to do with them.”
“I’ll take care of it,” Graham promised. It was better that he established a clear understanding between them right from the start.
“The pilot is scheduled to be here in less than three hours,” Subandrio said. “He sometimes comes early. If you or your crew are spotted the game will be up.”
“Is there food and water in the container?”
“Yes, and light. It will only be until we clear the breakwaters and the pilot leaves,” Subandrio said. “Maybe one hour longer, depending on traffic, and you may leave your little box.”
Graham put down his duffel bag. He took his pistol, a 9mm Steyr GB, out of his pocket, and screwed a Vaime silencer on the end of the barrel. “Wait here, Halim, I’ll go fetch them.”
Subandrio nodded. “How long will you be needing my ship?”
“We’ll be gone by midnight tomorrow.”
“Who are these guys? What’s the mission?”
“You don’t want to know,” Graham said. “Do you have any rolls of plastic?”
“Should be some in the dry-stores locker,” Subandrio said, puzzled.
“I’ll be back in a couple of minutes,” Graham said, and he headed aft to the galley and crew’s mess.
Subandrio ran his ship with a crew of only nine, including a cook, but all of them were out of sight this morning, keeping out of the way of the Iranians, who were holed up in the mess waiting for their own captain to arrive.
As Graham came around a corner, he heard someone say something in Arabic from an open door at the end of the narrow corridor, and several men laughed harshly. He stuffed the pistol in his belt at the small of his back, and walked to the end of the corridor, where he held up at the open door.
The strong smell of marijuana and something else pungent wafted out of the small dining area. His eighteen crewmen, all of them dressed in blue jeans or khakis and T-shirts, several days’ stubble on their faces, were crowded around two long, narrow tables littered with the remains of canned fish and beef, crackers, Coca-Cola, and other items they’d raided from the ship’s stores. A serving counter and service door at the back of the room opened to the galley that looked to be in a mess.
A couple of them spotted Graham in the doorway, but they just looked at him dumbly.
“Good morning,” Graham said in English.
All of them turned and looked at him with some curiosity, but very little else. One of them said something in Arabic and a few of the men chuckled.
“We’ll speak English from now on, if you please,” Graham said. “Who is Muhamed al-Hari?”
“I am,” a tall, slender man, drinking from a handleless mug, said. According to the dossier bin Laden had supplied, al-Hari had been a navigation officer aboard one of Iran’s Kilo submarines, and had even attended the Prospective Officers Special Course, at Frunze Military Academy in Leningrad.
“You will be my executive officer,” Graham said.
Al-Hari’s eyes lit up. “Then it’s true, we have a submarine?”
“We will if we can get out of Tunisia without being arrested, which will surely happen if the authorities discover your presence aboard this ship.”
“I’m not going back inside that stinking box,” one of them grumbled. “We’ll hide in the crew’s quarters. No pilot will bother looking there.”
“Very well,” Graham replied pleasantly. “Mr. al-Hari, there is a roll of plastic sheeting in the dry-stores locker. Bring me a piece of it, if you would, about two meters on a side, I should think. And see if you can find some tape.”
Al-Hari nodded uncertainly, but he got up and went into the galley.
“What is your name and rank, please?” Graham asked the crewman who’d complained.
“I am Syed Asif,” the crewman answered as if his name meant something. “I was an ordinary seaman. But I’m not going back in that box.”
“You are from Pakistan?” Graham asked.
The others were paying rapt attention to the exchange. One of them said something in Arabic, and a few of them laughed again.
Al-Hari came back with the sheet of plastic, and a roll of duct tape.
“Lay it out on the deck behind Seaman Asif, please,” Graham instructed.
The Pakistani was clearly nervous now, not quite comprehending what was about to happen, but beginning to realize that whatever it was might not be so good.
Al-Hari spread the plastic out behind the seaman, then stepped aside.
Graham pulled out his pistol, and, before anyone could move, fired one shot in the middle of Asif ’s forehead, killing him instantly, his body falling backwards off his stool and landing on the plastic sheet.
“Wrap Seaman Asif ’s body in the plastic and secure it with the tape,” Graham told the stunned crewmen. “When you are finished with that, you will clean the mess you have made here, and meet me topside — with the body — in ten minutes. I will be joining you in our luxurious on-deck stateroom. There is much I have to tell you.”
No one uttered a sound, but their eyes were locked on his. He’d gotten their attention.
“Is that clear?”
“Aye, aye, Captain,” al-Hari responded crisply.
“Very well, you may carry on,” Graham said, and he turned and left.
FORTY-ONE
McGarvey, dressed only in swimming trunks, a towel around his neck, slowed to a walk, and looked out across the Gulf of Mexico as a V formation of brown pelicans skimmed just above the water, seemingly without effort. His left shoulder, where he’d taken a bullet two weeks ago, was still sore and stiff, but each day of strenuous exercise was bringing him back to the peak of physical fitness.
He’d only spent the one night at the hospital in Bethesda, before he checked himself out and Liz had driven him and Kathleen to their new house on one of the barrier islands just south of Sarasota. The day after they’d arrived, he’d started his exercise regime, pushing his body to its limits. He was now swimming in the Gulf for a solid hour every morning at dawn, and then running five miles barefoot on the beach.