They had started by boarding and capturing merchant vessels steaming past their coast just offshore. With time and expertise, they had ranged farther and farther east and south. In the beginning, their captures were small, their negotiations clumsy, and suitcases of dollar bills were dropped by light aircraft, flying up from Kenya, at a preagreed drop zone at sea.
But no one trusts anybody on that coast. There is no honor among these thieves. Ships captured by one group were stolen by another clan while at anchor. Rival packs fought over floating suitcases of cash. Eventually, a kind of agreed-upon procedure prevailed.
The crew of a captured vessel was rarely, if ever, brought ashore. Lest an anchor drag in the pounding rollers, captured ships were anchored up to two miles offshore. The officers and crew lived onboard in barely reasonable conditions, but with a dozen guards, while negotiations between their principals—shipowner and clan chief—dragged on.
On the Western side, certain companies of insurers, lawyers and negotiators became expert with experience. On the Somali side, educated negotiators—not simply Somalis but from the right clan—took over the talking. This was now done with modern technology—computers and iPhones. Even the money was rarely dropped like bombs from on high; the Somalis had numbered bank accounts, in which the money would immediately appear.
With the passage of time, negotiators from the two sides came to know each other, each simply concerned about getting the job done. But the Somalis held the aces.
For the insurers, a cargo delayed was a cargo lost. For the shipowners, a vessel not earning was an operating loss. Add to that the distress of the crew and their desperate families, and a speedy conclusion was their pressing aim. The Somali pirates knew this, and they had all the time in the world. That was the basis of the blackmail: time. Some vessels had been moored off that coast for years.
Gareth Evans had negotiated ten releases of ships and cargoes of varying values. He had studied Puntland and its mazelike tribal structures as if for a doctorate. When he heard the Malmö was steaming for Garacad, he knew which tribe controlled that stretch of coast and how many clans comprised the tribe. Several of them used the same negotiator, a smooth, urbane Somali graduate of a Midwestern American university named Mr. Ali Abdi.
All this was explained to Harry Andersson as a summer dusk settled over London and, half a world away, the Malmö steamed west to Garacad. Takeaway dinners were nibbled at the polished table of the conference room, and Mrs. Bulstrode, the tea lady who had agreed to stay on, served relay after relay of coffee.
A room was set aside as operations control for Gareth Evans. If a new Somali negotiator was going to be appointed, Capt. Eklund would be told by Stockholm which London number to call to get the ball rolling.
Gareth Evans studied the details of the Malmö and her cargo of gleaming new cars and privately calculated that they ought to be able to settle for about five million dollars. He also knew that the first demand would be miles too high. More, he knew that to agree with alacrity would be disastrous. It would immediately double. To demand speed would also be self-defeating; that, too, would raise the price. As for the imprisoned crew, that was their bad luck. They would just have to wait in patience.
Tales from repatriated seamen related that as the weeks dragged by, the onboard Somalis, mostly ill-educated tribesmen from the hills, turned the once-spruce vessel into a stinking pesthole. Lavatories were ignored, urinations took place as and when Nature called. And where, inside or out. The heat did the rest. Oil to power the generators, and thus the air-conditioning, would run out. Unfrozen food would rot, putting the crew onto the Somali goat diet, slaughtered on deck. The only diversions were fishing, board games, cards and reading, but they held boredom at bay for only just so long.
The meeting broke at ten p.m. If set on maximum power, which she probably would be, the Malmö should enter the bay of Garacad around noon London time. Shortly thereafter, they should learn who had taken her and who the nominated negotiator was. Then Gareth Evans would introduce himself, if need be, and the intricate gavotte would begin.
• • •
Opal arrived in Marka as the town slumbered in the blazing post-noon heat. He found the compound and hammered on the door. This compound was not sleeping. He could hear voices and running steps, as if someone was expected but was late.
The latch door in the heavy timber gate flicked open and a face peered out. It was an Arab face but not Somali. The eyes scanned the street but saw no pickup truck. Then they settled on Opal.
“Yes,” snapped a voice, angry that a mere nobody should seek admittance.
“I have papers for the Sheikh,” said Opal in Arabic.
“What papers?” The voice was plainly hostile but with curiosity.
“I don’t know,” said Opal. “That was what the man on the road told me to say.”
There was a buzz of conversation behind the timber. The first face was pulled aside and another took its place. Neither Somali nor Arab, but Arabic-speaking. Pakistani?
“Where are you from and what papers?”
Opal fumbled under his windbreaker and produced a sealed package.
“I come from Marka. I met a man on the road. He had crashed his pickup truck. He asked me to bring these and told me how to find this place. That is all I know.”
He tried to stuff the package through the aperture.
“No, wait,” shouted a voice, and the gate began to open. Four men stood there, fiercely bearded. He was grabbed and hauled inside. A teenage boy ran out, seized his trail bike, wheeling it inside. The gate closed. Two held him. The man who might be a Pakistani towered over him. He studied the package and sucked in a deep breath.
“Where did you get these, dog? What have you done with our friend?”
Opal played the terrified nobody, which was not hard.
“The man driving the truck, sir. I fear he is dead . . .”
That was as far as he got. A right-handed slap with full force laid him on the ground. There was confused shouting in a language he did not understand, though he spoke English, Somali and Arabic apart from his native Hebrew. Half a dozen hands picked him up and hustled him away. There was a shed of sorts built into the compound wall. He was thrown inside and heard a bolt slam. It was dark, and the place stank. He knew he had to keep up the act. He sank onto a pile of old sacks and buried his head in his hands, the universal posture of bewildered defeat.
It was half an hour before they returned. The two or three of bodyguard stature were there, but also a new one. He was