American underground. For some reason they just wish to hide their real identity from us. It's too much of a coincidence,' he went on. 'I traced Winter to Hamburg. Someone high up in France told me he was involved with LeCat, who had recruited a team of ex-OAS terrorists. I then traced Winter to Alaska just before the ^ Challenger ^ sailed again. I think that French terrorist team is aboard – and they were financed by Arab money according to my French contact…'
^ 'It sounds like a simple ransom demand,' Peretti pointed out. 'And in any case, what is at stake are the lives of twenty-eight British seamen – and one American girl. I'm not prepared to risk the lives of those innocent people.'
^ 'We're not going to let that terrorist ship into the Bay, I hope,' Col Cassidy protested.
^ 'We could negotiate with them in the Bay,' Peretti said firmly, 'Once they pass under Golden Gate bridge we have them at a disadvantage. They can't get out of the Bay again if we don't want them to – they're trapped…'
^ 'And I don't like risking twenty-nine people – including one American girl – getting shot,' Peretti replied forcefully. Aldo Peretti was a very humane man; something of his humanity had undoubtedly impressed enough voters at the previous election to make him mayor of San Francisco. He was, a lot of people agreed, a pleasant change from the tough and ruthless Governor of California, Alex MacGowan. The recent Grove Park scandal, involving corruption at a high level, had hammered the final nail into Alex MacGowan's political coffin.
^ The argument swayed backwards and forward for another hour; whether or not to let the terrorist ship inside the Bay. If he put it to the vote, Peretti calculated, they would split evenly down the middle, the humanitarians against the rest, as he privately put it to himself. He was on the verge of taking a decision when the phone rang. He listened, asked a few questions, then replaced the receiver, his face grave.
^ 'I don't understand what's happening, gentlemen, but it just became a political matter. A fresh signal has come in from the ^ Challenger ^ – and for some reason I also don't understand, the people aboard her seem to want maximum publicity. They radioed the signal to the United Press wire service. The news will race round the world within hours. Now they are demanding two hundred million dollars – yes, Col Cassidy, I did say two hundred million – to be paid into the account of a bank in Beirut. The signal was signed the Free Palestine Movement. Sullivan was right – we are dealing with the Arabs, maybe by remote control with the Golden Apes themselves…'
^ At ten o'clock at night inside the Clift Hotel Winter sat in front of the colour TV set holding a glass of Scotch. He was reading the newspaper, not listening to the FBI thriller, not looking at it. His role now was to remain inside the city as a one-man Trojan horse, checking on the authorities' reactions to the terrorists' demands, then warning LeCat if he considered a change of tactics was called for.
^ His means of communicating with the tanker had been organised by Walgren; a mobile transmitter had been set up inside a truck which at the moment was hidden inside a nearby garage. The moment Winter wished to get in touch with LeCat, he only had to phone Walgren at the number the American had given him. The truck would then be driven to a remote part of Marin County across Golden Gate bridge, Winter would transmit his instructions, and the truck would be driven away before it could be located by any radio-detection equipment the Americans might be operating.
^ The news flash came through at 10.5pm. 'Terrorists have seized a British oil tanker off San Francisco… demand two hundred million dollars for the lives of the twenty-nine hostages aboard, one of them an American girl…'
^ Winter drank some more Scotch and waited for the comment. LeCat was working exactly to the plan he had devised – to keep the Americans off balance with a series of alarming and confusing messages. The real demand would come later – after the next subterfuge, after the Americans had let the tanker enter the Bay…
^ It was ten o'clock at night in San Francisco when Winter heard the news flash. In Baalbek, seven thousand miles away, a fresh day was dawning where it was seven in the morning. Sheikh Gamal Tafak lit another American cigarette and switched off the radio, then walked over to the lattice-work window which looked out over the anti- Lebanon mountains. In January there was snow along the crests.
^ It was the news item which had rattled him: the Americans were still discussing whether to let the tanker inside the Bay. It was time LeCat played his next card. He had to get the timing right, to hit them before they took a final decision. With his eyes ^ half-closed, Tafak recalled the personal briefing Ahmed Riad -who would shortly land in San Francisco – had given LeCat.
^ They will not decide to let you in at once. There is bound to be a delay while they think about it. But they are a sentimental people, the Americans. So, choose your moment, then play the big card…'
^ By now Tafak had completely forgotten that it was Winter who had fashioned the big card, the incident which would persuade the Americans to let the ship pass through the Golden Gate narrows. Taking his cigarette out of his mouth, Tafak looked at his hand. He was sweating. He would go out and get a breath of fresh morning air. It was not the atmosphere which was making him sweat. To bring about the final catastrophe it was vital that the Americans let the tanker inside the Bay.
^ As Sheikh Gamal Tafak stood in the front doorway, breathing in the morning air, his head and shoulders filled the telescopic sight, the vertical crosshair split him down the middle, the horizontal crosshair guillotined his neck. The target was in view, thirty metres from where the Israeli marksman lay sprawled out on a table inside a first floor room.
^ The rifle was propped on a sack filled with sand and the muzzle pointed through an open window. The room was in shadow because the sun was aimed in the same direction as the rifle barrel. The marksman, Chaim Borgheim, took the first pressure. A second squeeze and Tafak was dead.
^ Albert Meyer, the man who had quietly intimidated Lucille Fahmy, the switchboard operator who had provided a telephone number in Beirut, sat at the back of the room with an automatic weapon across his lap. He jumped when the phone rang, jumped because it could have disturbed his colleague's aim. He moved very quickly, scooping up the phone by his side. 'Albert here…' His eyes widened as he listened, then he said 'understood,' put down the receiver and moved swiftly and quietly across the room. Albert was sweating.
^ 'No, Chaim…' He extended one finger carefully across the top of the rifle barrel, being very careful indeed not to touch the ^ ^ weapon. He could feel sweat dribbling down his back. 'Jesus Christ.. .'Chaim released the first pressure, looked up with a blank expression.
^ 'I thought I was too late. They just phoned through – not yet. Not yet, they said.'
^ 'Some crisis – in another part of the world. They cannot yet assess its implications. We must wait.'
^ Through the fog the men on Mile Rocks lighthouse at the entrance to Golden Gate channel saw the ^ Challenger ^ burning.
^ It was dark, it was foggy, but the glare of the flames broke through both darkness and fog, a hideous half- seen conflagration which chilled them even more than the night air round the exposed lighthouse. They immediately signalled the Port Authority, which transmitted their signal to the mayor's office, and this signal arrived at almost the same moment as a message from the tanker.
^ The meeting in the mayor's office, which had gone on for hours, with a brief break for refreshments, was breaking up. Peretti listened on the phone, said wait a minute, then called out to the men leaving the room. 'Hold it! Something else is just coming through…'
^ They waited while he went on listening, scribbling notes on his desk pad. They were tired, worn out with arguing, and Cassidy, by sheer force of character, had persuaded the mayor to wait until morning before he finally decided – whether or not to let the terrorist ship inside the Bay. There had been more threats from the ship, now signed by LeCat, and Peretti was wracked with anxiety that he might be responsible for the violent deaths of twenty-nine innocent human beings, one of them a woman. Reluctantly, he had given way to Cassidy.
^ In his shirtsleeves despite the low room temperature – to save fuel the thermostat was turned down to sixty-two degrees -Peretti felt soiled and rumpled and badly in need of a shower. That was, before the phone rang. Now he had become alert again, staring at Cassidy while he listened on the phone. He put down the receiver, glanced at his notes. 'Get back to your seats, gentlemen, this thing isn't finished for tonight. It's only just beginning.' 'What's happened?' Cassidy demanded crisply. 'Two more signals – one from Mile Rocks lighthouse, one from the ^ Challenger ^ herself. There's been a serious explosion aboard the tanker, then a bad fire. Nine people have been very seriously hurt – five of them hostages, and one of them is Miss Codrell. They're asking for immediate permission to steam into the Bay so the casualties can be taken ^ off. ^ Four of them are terrorists
