She smiled at the memory of what they had done. Jumping into the sea to avoid being captured, adding a few more hours to their lives. He had finally gone out of her life, after a short but significant introduction. With him went any further chance of cheating death. In a strange way, despite the circumstances, she had grown used to his company. He was assertive and considerate, particularly in the face of adversity. An attractive quality most women never got to see in a man. She wondered how many people knew him that well or had misjudged him. Few people ever got into situations that exposed their true qualities.
She felt for the line as she considered his silly plan. He was still connected to her, but she knew she would never see him again. In an odd way she was sadder for him than she was for herself. The reason for it was simple enough. He had a noble purpose, she didn’t. She could argue her case but it wasn’t convincing. She had done what she did out of fear.
She could at least be pleased with how calmly she was taking her own death. She hoped she would maintain the same level of dignity until the end. Her body was beginning to chill but not too badly. Not yet. She suspected when her temperature did start to fall, it would happen quite fast. She wondered if she should try and fall asleep. That way she might not even know when she slipped into hypothermia. On the other hand, there was something wrong about spending your last hour or so on this earth asleep if you could help doing otherwise. She decided to stay conscious for as long as possible and she started thinking back through her life, starting as early as she could remember. Right back to when she was a kid. She expected to fall unconscious long before she got to the end. But it might not be such a bad way to go.
The water lapped around her ears and so she didn’t hear the distant sound of gunfire. As she searched her mind for the earliest memory of her life, she felt a tug at the back of her harness. It frightened her at first, her brain unable to interpret what it was. As she began to accelerate away, she remembered the line.
Stratton’s plan. They had been snagged.
Her speed quickly increased and she shot across the water, the life jackets taking the brunt of the bumpy waves. She spread out her arms and legs to remain as stable as possible and prevent from flipping over. She tried to raise her chin to look ahead but she couldn’t get enough of an angle. All she could do was lie flat on her back and get dragged along.
It was all so bizarre. It felt extremely tenuous and alien. The waves set up a jolting rhythm. Her teeth rattled in her mouth with every bump.
She wondered how long she could last. The water was coursing through her clothes. She felt OK, as if she could ride like that for a long time. Stratton’s insane plan was working, the first part of it at least. A hint of elation rippled through her. She suddenly saw a chance they could be rescued. She couldn’t see what was dragging her, but she knew it had to be some kind of ship. That meant she was in touch with civilisation, be it remotely. All it took to be saved was someone from the ship to see them. It was a small chance, but suddenly a real one.
Stratton had managed to twist around on to his back so that the gushing water didn’t drown him. Which was a far more comfortable way of being towed at speed. The swell bumped against his back and it was like being dragged across a corrugated roof. He had no idea how fast he was going. It felt like he could have water-skied at that speed.
Stratton leaned his head up to look for Lotto’s boat. He could just about see it coming on after him, as he expected it would, the gap between them several hundred metres. He studied the picture, wondering if the pirate boat might be gaining. It was difficult to tell.
He made an effort to look ahead for the bulker but he couldn’t. As he tried to manoeuvre himself to one side, he almost flipped on to his front again. He decided to leave it alone, for the time being at least.
The bumping suddenly increased markedly and he felt himself passing over a set of larger waves. Had to be the bulker’s bow waves. He spread out his arms and legs to make himself a more stable platform. He was drawing in behind the carrier. When he was over the waves, the ride became a lot smoother. He wondered how far he was from the vessel and where the girl might be. He had been five or six hundred metres from the cargo ship when he was on his front. That meant she had to be a good fifteen hundred metres behind him. Well behind the pirates.
He craned up to see the pirate ship cutting across the bow waves and falling into the bulker’s track.
A young British private security guard on the stern of the cargo ship was observing the pirate vessel through a pair of binoculars.
As he watched it cross the bow waves, he raised a radio to his mouth. ‘Bob. That dodgy boat I reported earlier. It’s even more dodgy now. It’s moved in right behind us.’
‘Roger that,’ came the reply over the radio. ‘Sound the alarm. All security hands to the stern. Don’t forget your bloody weapons. You got that, Captain?’
‘Yes, Bob,’ came the captain’s voice over the radio.
The bulker’s alarms began to sound and crewmen working on deck dropped what they were doing, hurried into the ship’s superstructure by the nearest door and bolted it shut. A security guard hurried through the carrier ensuring it was battened down.
‘Full speed, Captain,’ Bob shouted over the radio. ‘Commence evasive action.’
As the stern guard continued to observe the vessel following it, two more security guards stepped from the bulker’s superstructure carrying AK-47 assault rifles. They jogged along the decks and down steps, converging on to the poop deck to join their mate on the rear rail beyond a massive pair of anchor winches. After a couple of minutes the other security guard stepped down to the group. Another joined them. They now made five. The entire bulker vibrated as the engines reached maximum revolutions. A claxon joined in the general cacophony of bells and whistles.
The water directly below the poop deck churned up through the massive submerged propellers to create an even larger wake The carrier began to lean over a little as it started a hard turn.
An overweight, older-looking security guard marched out of the superstructure and across the deck to join the others looking over the rail. By his bearing and confidence, he was clearly the senior man.
‘What we got here then?’ Bob, the head of the security detachment, asked gruffly, grabbing the binoculars hanging around his subordinate’s neck to take a look for himself.
‘You reckon they’re pirates?’ one of the men asked, anxious. Apart from Bob, young guys made up the team, all of whom had military experience of a kind. Two were territorial soldiers who had missed out on any long-term drafts abroad and seen no action at all. One was a former fusilier who had done a basic three years with a short draft to Iraq but seen no action. The other two were ex-Royal Marine drivers and had done a couple of stints in Afghanistan with a little action but nothing to write home about. All had joined the maritime security circuit for two reasons only and they were the pay and a chance to travel. The men had all worked the maritime circuit for a few years but none had seen a pirate before.
‘Where’s all the other smaller boats they’re supposed to use?’ asked the bigger of the two ex-Marines.
‘There’s no usual when it comes to these fellas,’ Bob said.
The other Marine nudged his mate and gave him a look like he doubted Bob knew that much about it. ‘So just ’ow many pirates ’ave you actually seen, Bob?’ he said.