“It’s all right, lad,” said Lundquist. “Do as I say.”
With a shrug the seaman pressed a button on the small console at the ladder head. There was a hum of motors and the ladder slowly lowered to the sea. Two minutes later four other men, all in black, were her
ding the seaman back along the deck to the superstructure while the fifth man made the launch fast. Two more minutes and the six of them entered the bridge from the port side, the seaman’s eyes wide with fright. When he entered the bridge he saw the other two gunmen holding his officers.
“How on earth ...?” asked the seaman.
“Take it easy,” ordered Lundquist. To the only gunman who had spoken so far, he asked in English, “What do you want?”
“We want to speak to your captain,” said the man behind the mask. “Where is he?”
The door from the wheelhouse to the inner stairwell opened, and Thor Larsen stepped onto the bridge. His gaze took in his three crewmen with their hands behind their heads, and seven black-clad terrorists. His eyes, when he turned to the man who had asked the question, were blue and friendly as a cracking glacier.
“I am Captain Thor Larsen, master of the Freya,” he said slowly, “and who the hell are you?”
“Never mind who we are,” said the terrorist leader. “We have just taken over your ship. Unless your officers and men do as they are told, we shall start by making an example of your seaman. Which is it to be?”
Larsen looked slowly around him. Three of the submachine guns were pointing straight at the eighteen-year-old deckhand. He was white as chalk.
“Mr. Lundquist,” said Larsen formally, “do as these men say.” Turning back to the leader he asked, “What exactly is it you want with the Freya?”
“That is easy,” said the terrorist without hesitation. “We wish you no harm personally, but unless our requirements are carried out—to the letter—we shall not hesitate to do what we have to in order to secure compliance.”
“And then?” asked Larsen.
“Within thirty hours the West German government is going to release two of our friends from a West Berlin jail and fly them to safety. If they do not, I am going to blast you, your crew, your ship, and one million tons of crude oil all over the North Sea.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
0300 to 0900
THE LEADER of the seven masked terrorists set his men to work with a methodical precision that he had evidently rehearsed over many hours in his own mind. He issued a rapid stream of orders in a language neither Captain Larsen nor his own officers and the young seaman could understand.
Five of the masked men herded the two officers and seaman to the rear of the bridge, well away from the instrument panels, and surrounded them. The leader jerked his handgun at Captain Larsen and said in English:
“Your cabin, if you please, Captain.”
In single file, Larsen leading, the leader of the terrorists next, and one of his henchmen with a submachine carbine bringing up the rear, the three men descended the stairs from the bridge to D deck, one flight below. Halfway down the stairs, at the turn, Larsen turned to look back and up at his two captors, measuring the distances, calculating whether he could overcome them both.
“Don’t even try it,” said the voice behind the mask at his shoulder. “No one in his right mind argues with a submachine gun at a range of ten feet.”
Larsen led them onward down the stairs. D deck was the senior officers’ living quarters. The captain’s suite was in the extreme starboard corner of the great sweep of superstructure. Moving to port, next came a small chart library, the door open to reveal locker after locker of high-quality sea charts, enough to take him into any ocean, any bay, any suitable anchorage in the world. They were all copies of originals made by the British Admiralty, and the best in the world.
Next was the conference suite, a spacious cabin where the captain or owner could, if he wished, receive a sizable number of visitors all at one time. Next to this were the owner’s staterooms, closed and empty, reserved for the chairman, should he ever wish to sail with his ship. At the port end was another suite of cabins identical but in reverse to the captain’s quarters. Here the chief engineer lived.
Aft of the captain’s cabins was the smaller suite for the first officer, and aft of the chief engineer dwelt the chief steward. The whole complex formed a hollow square, whose center was taken up by the flight of stairs going around and around and downward to A deck, three levels below.
Thor Larsen led his captors to his own cabin and stepped into the dayroom. The terrorist leader followed him in and quickly ran through the other rooms, bedroom and bathroom. There was no one else present.
“Sit down, Captain,” he said, the voice slightly muffled by the mask. “You will remain here until I return. Please do not move. Place your hands on the table and keep them there, palms downward.”
There was another stream of orders in a foreign language, and the machine gunner took up a position with his back to the far bulkhead of the cabin, facing Thor Larsen but twelve feet away, the barrel of his gun pointing straight at the white crew-neck sweater Thor Larsen wore. The leader checked to see that all the curtains were well drawn, then left, closing the door behind him. The other two inhabitants of the deck were asleep in their respective cabins and heard nothing. Within minutes the leader was back on the bridge.
“You”—he pointed his gun at the boyish seaman—“come with me.”
The lad looked imploringly at First Officer Stig Lundquist.
“You harm that boy and I'll personally hang you out to dry,” said Tom Keller in his American accent. Two submachine-gun barrels moved slightly in the hands of the ring of men around him.