Pirate Alley: A Novel (10 page)

Finally Suzanne said, “What the hell.” One of the men rolled her a cigarette and she lit up, to Irene’s horror.

*   *   *

Aboard
Chosin Reservoir,
Admiral Tarkington listened to his chief of staff, Captain Flip Haducek, his ops officer, Commander Myron Snyder, and his SEAL team leader as they tossed around the possibility of getting some SEALs aboard
Sultan
that night if the afternoon matinee didn’t work.

The first problem was intercepting the ship. Helicopters would need to put at least four rubber boats with six men each into the water ahead of
Sultan
. Assuming the
Sultan
didn’t turn, for any reason, the SEALs would have to motor alongside, shoot grappling hooks attached to ropes, and climb them about twenty feet to the fifth deck, the first one that had an entrance piercing the hull. The dangling pirate ropes were interesting, but no one had much faith in pirate technology. Besides, the ropes could be a trap.

“Radar?”

“Our rubber boats will be difficult to see on radar, sir.”

Toad raised an eyebrow. Cruise ships had good radars, he knew, because they had to constantly avoid small fishing and pleasure boats when going into and out of busy harbors. The real question was, Would anyone be watching the radar scope as
Sultan
charged along in the hour or two before dawn?

“You’ll be lucky to get four men aboard,” Flip Haducek said to the SEAL officer. “And once aboard, you will … what?”

The SEAL team leader was Lieutenant Angel Cordova. With a plain, unmemorable face, he stood about five feet seven inches tall and had wide shoulders, huge arm and chest muscles, and a ridiculously thin waist. The veins in his arms stood out like cords. He looked like a professional bodybuilder, Toad Tarkington thought.

“Once aboard…?” the admiral murmured.

“Fight our way forward and up, sir, to the bridge. Kill the opposition as we go.”

“What if they start shooting hostages? What then?”

“We take them out with silenced weapons as we get to them, regardless.”

“Hostages or no hostages?”

“Yes, sir.”

“So how many pirates are aboard?”

“We estimate between twenty-five and fifty.”

“Estimate.”

“Yes, sir.”

“What is the minimum number of men you need to get aboard to have any realistic chance of handling twenty-five to fifty armed pirates?”

“At least ten, sir.”

“Each of your boats holds six men?”

“Correct, sir.”

“So you must rendezvous with
Sultan
with at least two boats.” Toad looked from face to face. Small rubber boats on a night sea, trying to get alongside a ship doing ten knots—ten knots just now—getting swamped in the wash if they failed to get their grappling hooks to snag. Hoping no one on deck saw them and started shooting while they were climbing the ropes.

“What’s Plan B?” the admiral asked.

“We jump overboard. The saltwater will activate our beacons. Someone comes to pick us up.”

“Too iffy,” Toad said. “We need a better plan that this.”

The brain trust was still noodling when a yeoman brought Toad a Flash message from Washington. “Green light for SEAL mission.” There were several more paragraphs, but Toad didn’t bother reading them. He handed it to Commander Snyder, who actually read it while Toad listened to Angel Cordova.

Snyder interrupted. “Admiral, they want to know when the mission will launch.”

“We’re not going to do it,” Toad said. “Too risky.” Cordova’s face fell.

“Aye aye, sir.” The ops officer headed for the admin office just off the flag plot spaces to draft a reply.

“I don’t want you people dead for nothing,” Toad told Cordova.

“Yes, sir. I understand, sir.”

Time for the showdown, the afternoon matinee. Sea still calm, high cirrus clouds moving in …

The admiral’s aide, a Hornet pilot, brought him a message. “Better read this one, Admiral. Some guy on that ship has been e-mailing a radio station in Denver. Everyone on the planet is reading his stuff.”

Toad read the message, then passed it back. Oh, boy. Stuff like this would light a fire under the politicians, stimulate them mightily. Murders, rapes, brave resistance from the crew …

Toad was eating a salad in the raised chair in Flag Plot when another message from Washington arrived. He read it in amazement. The National Command Authority, which meant the president of the United States, ordered him to launch the SEAL team mission.

Commander Snyder was there, wearing a worried look, along with Flip Haducek.

“No,” Toad said. “In my judgment, the mission is too risky. What did you tell those people?”

“Just that, sir.”

Toad wadded up the message and gave it back to Snyder.

The chief of staff cleared his throat. He tried to resist the urge to point out the obvious because that tactic rarely sat well with the admiral. He lost the inner battle and said, “Sir, that’s an order. From the president.”

Toad handed his salad to Snyder, took the message and smoothed it out. He removed a pen from his pocket. He began writing on the back of the sheet the reasons he thought the mission would probably fail. If the SEALs couldn’t get enough men aboard
Sultan
to win control of the ship, they would die or be captured. Passengers and crew might be caught in a crossfire. Pirates might begin executing hostages.

Toad summed up, “The chances of a handful of SEALs successfully intercepting and boarding
Sultan
at night while under way are small. The chances of those who do successfully board winning the battle for control of the ship are even smaller. When the pirates get
Sultan
into a port, they will undoubtedly demand ransom, which, if paid, means that no civilian lives will be lost. If the decision is made to refuse to pay ransom, a much larger, more capable military force can be deployed against the pirates, one that will maximize the possibility of victory and minimize the loss of life.”

He used another paragraph to explain the benefits of a show of force. It could happen quickly; if the pirates were cowed, they would surrender and marines could board the ship, and if they weren’t, the navy had risked little and could try something else. A lot of upside, little downside. Those were the best kind of military operations. And he would be ready soon.

Tarkington handed the sheet of paper to Captain Haducek. “Send that,” he said, “and copy everyone in the chain of command. That’s the problem in plain English.”

An hour later, Washington answered Admiral Tarkington’s message. He was ordered to launch the SEAL mission.

Toad managed to keep a deadpan look on his mug as he struggled to hold his temper. Overruling the judgment of the officer on the scene was not the way the navy worked. The system was designed to find the best-qualified officer, put him in charge, let him make the judgment calls and hold him responsible for the results. Micromanaging from long distance certainly wasn’t unprecedented, but on those occasions in the past when the politicians had tried it, the results were usually not good.

Tarkington summoned Angel Cordova and handed him the clipboard containing the message. Cordova read it with raised eyebrows.

“Looks like you are going to have to give it a try,” Tarkington said dryly. He searched for words while Cordova rubbed his chin. “I want you to know that I think your chances of successfully pulling off a boarding are poor. Too poor to justify risking your life and the lives of your men. I made my case and lost. The ‘National Command Authority’ says go, so you are going.”

“Yes, sir.”

“That being said, if you do get aboard, or any of your men do, you don’t have to do the Alamo trick. I want you to try to disable the engines, stop her at sea. If the pirates aren’t going anywhere, we can negotiate a surrender.”

Cordova nodded.

“Flip, get the engineers to talk to Mr. Cordova. Brief him on the engineering plant and find him as many demolition charges as he and his men can carry.”

Toad frowned. “It’s goddamn thin, Cordova. Use your best judgment. Disable the ship if you can. If you can’t, kill as many pirates as possible.”

“Oh, you can bet on that, sir. But what if they use the crew or passengers as human shields?”

“Kill anyone you have to kill to save your own lives.”

Lieutenant Cordova took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. “I’d like that in writing, sir.”

“Flip, write a direct order to Mr. Cordova to attempt to board
Sultan of the Seas
and disable her engineering plant. Authorize him and his men to kill anyone to save their own lives, including passengers and crew used as human shields. I’ll sign it.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Then send a copy to Washington. Hell, send it to everyone on the distribution list as info addees. When it’s gone with a date-time group, give Mr. Cordova a copy.”

“Yes, sir.”

Toad Tarkington fixed his gaze on the SEAL lieutenant. “You are being handed a really tough mission. If you don’t think it’s doable, say so. No one is ordering you or your men to undertake a suicide mission. We don’t do suicide missions in the United States Navy.”

“We can do it, sir.”

Goddamn gung-ho kid,
Toad thought.

“You ever been shot at before?”

“No, sir.”

“You are about to get an education. Get cracking. I want a complete briefing from you before you go.”

“Aye aye, sir.”

*   *   *

Jake Grafton thought he understood what had happened in the Gulf of Aden when he went to the director’s conference room at CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia, for the 7:30
A.M.
meeting. He had read all the message traffic and even Rosen’s e-mails, which the night duty staff had arranged in chronological order by date-time group.

CIA director Mario Tomazic was a new guy, a retired army four-star who made his bones in Iraq. He got this job, Jake suspected, because he was quite good at not saying things the staffers at the White House didn’t want to hear.

“Who are these pirates?” the director asked.

The silence that followed was pregnant, so Jake Grafton stepped in. “Apparently they work for a pirate warlord named Ragnar, which is not his real name but a
nom de guerre.
Either he’s a fan of Ayn Rand or someone told him a lie or two. In any event, NSA says he and the pirate leader aboard ship have been gabbling back and forth. Our files say Ragnar’s base is Eyl.”

“Any ransom demands yet?”

“Not yet, sir. If they hold to their normal routine, there won’t be until they get the ship in the harbor and the people into the old fortress on the bluff.”

“What’s 151 going to do about all this?”

An aide directed the people at the table to the appropriate messages. Of course Jake had already read his copies. Now he reread them as the others digested Adrmiral Tarkington’s messages and the national security staff’s responses.

The director got it. “The staffers decided they know more about pirates than Admiral Tarkington.”

Grafton met Tomazic’s eyes. “Oh, man,” the retired general said disgustedly. He swept the pile of paper in front of him aside.

“Okay,” he said to the aide. “Where the hell is everybody out there?”

That was an easy request to answer. The computer display was soon on the screen on the wall. On the left side was a legend that explained the symbols. An aide pointed out ship positions and enemy strongholds with a white piece of wood, one little more than a large splinter.

“Let’s assume the ship reaches port, somewhere,” the director said. “There’ll be a ransom demand. That’s where the politicians will go into a dither. Pay or don’t pay? Shoot or surrender?”

“What if the ship owners or governments or private people refuse to pay ransom?” one staffer asked.

“Those people on that ship will expect the government to pay or rescue them,” said another.

“One or the other.”

“What about all those foreigners aboard
Sultan
? Should the U.S. government pay ransom to get them back?”

“Their governments can figure it out.”

“So we only buy out Americans?”

“Foreigners don’t pay taxes or vote. The American taxpayer is tapped out. And in a pretty damn sour mood.”

“It’s a British ship. Don’t forget that. This is really London’s problem, not ours.”

“It’s registered in Monrovia, Liberia.”

“So call the Liberians.”

“This is amazingly insightful,” Tomazic said dryly. He glanced at Grafton, who had been sitting with his mouth firmly closed. “Don’t we have a covert team in Somalia?”

“A snatch team camped out in the desert,” Jake said with a curt nod. “Eating MREs, shitting in a hole and working on their tans.”

Tomazic grunted and glanced at his watch. “Well, I gotta get over to the White House and get told what we’re gonna do.” He stood and the meeting was over.

*   *   *

The remainder of the afternoon passed slowly with
Richard Ward
and
Chosin Reservoir
keeping station four miles away on each of
Sultan
’s flanks. Ospreys and choppers ferried marines to the
Ward,
just in case. Fighters from the carrier to the northeast flew lazy patterns high overhead.

When he had done everything he could, Toad Tarkington went to his stateroom and tried to nap. He tossed and turned and fumed at the politicos in Washington.

He wrote a letter to his wife, worked his way through a pile of routine paperwork and was on the flag bridge to watch the sun sink in the west.

As darkness settled over the ocean,
Sultan of the Seas
kept every light ablaze as she steamed south, even the ribbon of decorative lights on a wire that ran from the funnel to the masthead, then down at an angle to the bow.

Toad Tarkington stared through his binoculars at the cruise ship. No one on deck that he could see, but
Chosin Reservoir
was now just a half mile to port, behind
Sultan
’s beam. A destroyer was on
Sultan
’s starboard side. It was possible, although not probable, the pirate might jam the helm over and try to ram the warships, so Toad had cautioned the captains to be careful. He also wanted to stay out of range of rifle and machine-gun fire.