Dara was looking at the screen. "This is Sunday. Idris and Harry were watching Friday-why they were grinning. I wanted to ask Harry what he was so happy about, but I didn't get around to it."
Xavier said, "So they got SEALs for the job."
"Three Navy SEALs were dropped on the Bainbridge with sniper rifles and set up undercover on the fantail. The lifeboat on the tow rope was less than a hundred feet away, like point-blank range for snipers. But waves were tossing the lifeboat, making it hard to get a target that wasn't moving. They could barely make out the pirates through the boat's windshield, and it was getting dark. Word came down from the White House. President Obama said, 'If the captain's life is in danger, take action.' The SEALs watched one of the pirates put a gun to Captain Phillips's head and they were given the word. Each fired one shot and the three pirates were taken out."
Xavier said, "Wasn't there four of 'em?"
"Four when they started out," Dara said. "The Bainbridge sent a rubber boat to see if Phillips and the pirates needed anything, food, medicine. The fourth pirate jumped ship, went back to the Bainbridge in the rubber boat and gave himself up."
"Had enough of bein a pirate."
"He was sixteen," Dara said. "I'm not sure how old the captain's son is. On TV the captain's wife, Andrea, sent a message after he was rescued that said 'Your family is saving a chocolate Easter egg for you, unless your son eats it first.'"
"Lemme see do I understand your meaning," Xavier said. "What you sayin, Somali boys don't have chocolate Easter eggs, they get shot?"
Dara didn't answer him. She thought of something else and said, "The Alabama was bringing four thousand tons of corn-soya to malnourished refugees in Somalia while Somali pirates were holding the captain for two million dollars. It was also carrying three hundred and twenty tons of vegetable oil for refugees in Rwanda."
"You have reasons now," Xavier said, "not to feel sorry for the pirates."
"After the three in the lifeboat were killed," Dara said, "bloggers all over the Internet were saying, 'Don't fuck with Americans.'"
"How'd that leave you?"
"It made sense. We have a problem, we don't pay our way out, we go after it." She said, "You know what I've learned since? It's likely the rifles were mounted in gyroscopes and the snipers wore night-vision goggles and took aim through scopes on their rifles. Put red dots on the Somalis and they're off to where Allah gives them all those hot-looking chicks. I thought, Shot by cool guys who know what they're doing. I reacted like everybody else."
She said, "Remember in Eyl I told you what I wanted to do? Get Idris to let us visit a ship he's holding for ransom. Get back to work. Talk only to members of the crew, no pirates."
"I believe I asked why would he let you? You said 'cause CNN's put him in a good mood and you know how to talk to him."
"I told Idris the afternoon we visited," Dara said, "the world must wonder how you treat your hostages. I'll ask the ship's crew and they'll say the Somali pirates are decent," Dara said, "a couple of Saudis among fifteen Filipinos. And the first officer was Saudi. I mentioned it to Idris and Harry and Idris asked me how I knew about the crew. No, first he asked why I picked the Aphrodite with all the ships anchored out there. I said I was curious about it, an LNG tanker. I told him I looked at the crew list to get the names and nationalities and saw two Arabs among all the Filipinos.
"Harry asked if I happened to know what the vessel was carrying. I said, 'I just told you, liquefied natural gas.' Harry said, 'Isn't that highly combustible?'"
"Playin dumb," Xavier said.
"Then Idris told him don't worry, the ship will be gone in a day or two."
"I remember we went aboard," Xavier said, "we're told we could speak to the crew all we wanted, as long as we know Tagalog. Idris havin fun with us. Idris said it wasn't his ship, but he'd come along and watch over us. Said he'd tell the pirates aboard to duck if they saw me aimin the camera at them. Meanwhile you shootin away with your tiny spy pen while Idris is watchin me with the Sony."
Dara brought the video spy camera out of her jacket and clipped it in the breast pocket, the top inch of the pen, its pinhole lens showing. "A pen if you didn't know better."
Xavier said, "I thought it was a pen."
"It is. Anyone who stares at it," Dara said, "I slip it out of the pocket, stop shooting and start taking notes."
"Whyn't you use it at Idris's house?"
"Too dark in there. This one does need a lot of light. Push the button on top and I'm the camera. I did manage to get the two Saudis while they're ducking away from you." She said, "If there's some kind of plot…You know what I mean, to use a highly combustible ship? I don't think Idris would be in on it."
"But you act like you suspect somethin's goin on. Way you start lookin over your shoulder."
"It was later," Dara said. "After I found out Billy's watching the gas ship and knows more about it than we do."
CHAPTER ELEVEN
BILLY WAS DRIVING HELENE nuts. He'd say, "You don't mind living on the boat?" Helene would tell him she loved Pegaso, loved sailing.
Billy said, "I'm glad you go for champagne."
"Love it." Stay half in the bag it was easier to take the boring mind games he played.
"Champagne or coffee," Billy said, "why stock beverages we don't need."
He was starting to sound weird. He said to her while they were moored off Eyl, seeing only a few lights ashore but hearing the generator from up on the slope, "You don't feel cooped up?"
She wanted to hit him with something. The fire extinguisher.
"All I said was why don't we go ashore and take a walk?"
"No, you said why don't we go ashore and stretch our legs. Like they're cramped from being stuck aboard a couple of weeks."
Helene took a moment before saying, "Whether I said let's go for a walk or let's stretch our legs, I swear they both mean the same thing to me. I'm happy to be here, but I'd also like to fucking go for a walk. Okay?"
Billy liked it when she talked like that. He grinned saying, "I was teasing you. See if you'd hold your ground or start crying. Say it again."
"What?" Helene said.
"You'd like to fucking go for a walk. Most girls use the word, it doesn't sound right. You give it meaning. Let's hear you use it in a sentence."
The guy was unreal.
"You want me to say fuck or fucking?"
"Either one."
Helene said, "You want to take a walk or fuck?"
"Lemme think," Billy said, grinning at her. "TWO HUNDRED YEARS AGO," Billy said, "the last time a U.S. ship was attacked by African pirates, a young naval officer by the name of Bainbridge skippered a ship that took part in the action. Today the USS Bainbridge, named for that young officer, in naval combat off the coast of Tripoli, is again confronting African pirates. You realize that?"
"You sound like the guy on CNN."
They were in the Pegaso's salon watching the coverage on television.
"This time the wogs picked on an American ship with an American captain and crew, the Maersk Alabama. Maersk is the owner, he's Danish, but everybody aboard is a Yank. It's a seventeen-thousand-ton container ship. This time the wogs bit off more'n they can chew."
"But they have the captain."
"The hero of this action. Giving himself up so the wogs won't fuck with his men. Leave 'em alone. Captain Richie Phillips, they put him in that motorized lifeboat and thought they could sail off with him and ran out of gas."
"And the guy who should've kept the gas tank full," Helene said, "is thinking he's fucked, he's gonna get fired or go to prison for not doing his job. I wonder if anybody's thought of him." "HON, THIS HAS NOTHING to do with some oiler's misfortune. This is about the captain of the Alabama, now a hostage of the wogs. Four kids with automatic rifles have put Captain Richie Phillips in the most potentially heroic position of his life."