the first mo - ” Through the half-opened door Dubois saw the Iraqi manager approaching. Much more loudly now and in a slightly different voice, he said, “This assignment with Oceanrider’s perfect, Mr. Gavallan, and I’m glad to tell you the captain’s very content.” “Okay, Marc, I’ll ask the questions. When is she due to finish loading and what’s her next port of call?”
“Probably tomorrow.” He nodded politely to the Iraqi who sat behind his desk. “We should be in Amsterdam as scheduled.” Both men were having difficulty hearing.
“Do you think you could stay with her all the way? Of course we’d pay freighting charges.”
“I don’t see why not. I think you’ll find this experiment will become a permanent assignment. The captain found the convenience of being able to lie offshore and yet get into port for a quick visit worthwhile but frankly the owners made an error ordering a 212. A 206’d be much better. I think they’ll want a rebate.” He heard Gavallan’s laugh and it made him happy too. “I better get off the phone, just wanted to report in. Fowler sends his best and if possible I’ll give you a call on the ship to shore as we pass by.” “With any luck we won’t be here. The birds’ll be freighted off tomorrow. Don’t worry, I’ll monitor Oceanrider all the way home. Once you’re through Hormuz and clear of Gulf waters, ask the captain to radio or telex contact us in Aberdeen. All right? I’m assigning everyone to the North Sea until we’re sorted out. Oh, you’re sure to be out of money, just sign for everything and I’ll reimburse the captain. What’s his name?” “Tavistock, Brian Tavistock.”
“Got it. Marc, you don’t know how happy I am.”
“Me to. A bientot.” Dubois replaced the phone and thanked the manager. “A pleasure, Captain,” the man said thoughtfully. “Are all big tankers going to have their own chopper support?”
“I don’t know, m’sieur. It would be wise for some. No?”
The manager smiled faintly, a tall middle-aged man, his accent and training American. “There’s an Iranian patrol boat standing off in their waters watching Oceanrider. Curious, huh?”
“Yes.”
“Fortunately they stay in their waters, we stay in ours. Iranians think they own the Arabian Gulf, along with us, the Shatt, and the waters of the Tigris and Euphrates back to their source - a thousand and almost two thousand miles.”
“The Euphrates is that long?” Dubois asked, his caution increasing. “Yes. It’s born in Turkey. Have you been to Iraq before?” “No, m’sieur. Unfortunately. Perhaps on my next trip?”
“Baghdad’s great, ancient, modern - so’s the rest of Iraq, well worth a visit. We’ve got nine billion metric tons of proven oil reserves and twice that waiting to be discovered. We’re much more valuable than Iran. France should support us, not Israel.”
“Me, m’sieur, I’m just a pilot,” Dubois said. “No politics for me.” “For us that’s not possible. Politics is life - we’ve discovered that the hard way. Even in the Garden of Eden… did you know people have been living around here for sixty thousand years? The Garden of Eden was barely a hundred miles away; just upstream the Shatt where the Tigris and Euphrates join. Our people discovered fire, invented the wheel, mathematics, writing, wine, gardening, fanning… the Hanging Gardens of Babylon were here, Scheherazade spun her tales to the Calif Harun al-Rashid, whose only equal was your Charlemagne, and here were the mightiest of the ancient civilizations, Babylonia and Assyria. Even the Flood began here. We’ve survived Sumerians, Greeks, Romans, Arabs, Turks, British, and Persians,” he almost spat the word out. “We’ll continue to survive them.” Dubois nodded warily. Captain Tavistock had warned him: “We’re in Iraq waters, the platform’s Iraqi territory, young fellow. The moment you leave my gangplank, you’re on your own, I’ve no jurisdiction, understand?” “I only want to make a phone call. I have to.”
“What about using my ship to shore when we pass by Al Shargaz on the way back?”
“There won’t be any problem,” Dubois had told him, perfectly confident. “Why should there be? I’m French.” When he had made the forced landing on the deck, he had had to tell the captain about Whirlwind and the reasons for it. The old man had just grunted. “I know nothing about that, young fellow. You haven’t told me. First you’d better paint out your Iran numbers and put G in front of whatever you like instead - I’ll get my ship’s painter to help. As far as I’m concerned if anyone asks me you’re a one-shot experiment the owners foisted on me - you came aboard in Cape Town and I don’t like you a bit and we hardly ever talk. All right?” The captain had smiled. “Happy to have you aboard - I was in PT boats during the war, operating all over the Channel - my wife’s from the Ile d’Ouessant, near Brest - we used to sneak in there from time to time for wine and brandy just like my pirate ancestors used to do. Scratch an Englishman, find a pirate. Welcome aboard.” Dubois waited now and watched the Iraqi manager. “Perhaps I could use the phone tomorrow again, before we leave?”
“Of course. Don’t forget us. Everything began here - it will end here. Salaam!” The manager smiled strangely and put out his hand. “Good landings.” “Thanks, see you soon.”
Dubois went out and down the stairs and out onto the deck, anxious to be back aboard the Oceanrider. A few hundred yards north he saw the Iranian patrol boat, a small frigate, wallowing in the swell. “Espcce de con,” he muttered and set off, his mind buzzing.
It took Dubois almost fifteen minutes to walk back to his ship. He saw Fowler waiting for him and told him the good news. “Effing good about the lads, effing bloody good, but all the way to Amsterdam in this old bucket?” Grumpily Fowler began to curse, but Dubois just walked to the bow and leaned on the gunwale.
Everyone safe! Never thought we’d all make it, never, he thought joyously. What a fantastic piece of luck! Andy and Rudi‘11 think it was planning but it wasn’t. It was luck. Or God.
God timed the Oceanrider perfectly to within a couple of minutes. Shit, that was another close one but over, so no need to remember it. Now what? So long as we don’t run into bad weather and I get seasick, or this old bucket sinks, it’ll be grand to have two to three weeks with nothing to do, just to think and wait and sleep and play a little bridge and sleep and think and plan. Then Aberdeen and the North Sea and laughing with JeanLuc, Tom Lochart and Duke, and the other guys, then off to… off to where? It’s time I got married. Shit, I don’t want to get married yet. I’m only thirty and I’ve avoided it so far. It’d just be my bad luck to meet this Parisienne witch in angel’s clothing who’ll use her wiles to make me so smitten that she’ll destroy my defenses and ruin my resolve! Life’s too good, far too good, and dredging too much fun!
He turned and looked west. The sun, hazed by the vast pollution, was setting toward the land horizon that was dull arid flat and boring. Wish I was at Al Shargaz with the guys.
AL SHARGAZ - INTERNATIONAL HOSPITAL: 6:01 P.M.
Starke sat on the second-floor veranda, also watching the lowering sun, but here it was beautiful over a calm sea below a cloudless sky, the great bar of reflected light making him squint even though he was using dark glasses. He wore pajama bottoms and his chest was strapped up and healing well and though he was still weak, he was trying to think and plan. So much to think about - if we get our birds out, or if we don’t.
In the room behind him he could hear Manuela chattering away in a patois of Spanish and Texan to her father and mother in faraway Lubbock. He had already talked to them - and talked to his own folks and the children, Billyjoe, Little Conroe, and Sarita: “Gee, Daddy, when ya coming home? I got me a new horse and school’s great and today’s hotter’n a bowl of Chiquita’s double chili peppers!”
Starke half smiled but could not pull himself out of his ocean of apprehension. Such a long way from there to here, everything alien, even in Britain. Next Aberdeen and the North Sea? I don’t mind just a month or two but that’s not for me, or the kids, or Manuela. It’s clear the kids want Texas, want home, so does Manuela now. Too much’s happened to frighten her, too much too quick too soon. And she’s right but hell, I don’t know where I want to go or what I want to do. Have to keep flying, that’s all I’m trained for, want to keep flying. Where? Not the North Sea or Nigeria which’re Andy’s key areas now. Maybe one of his small ops in South America, Indonesia, Malaya or Borneo? I’d like to stay with him if I could but what about the kids and school and Manuela?
Maybe forget overseas and go Stateside? No. Too long abroad, too long here. His eyes were reaching beyond the old city into the far distance of the desert. He was remembering the times he had gone out past the threshold of the desert by night, sometimes with Manuela, sometimes alone, going there just to listen. To listen to what? To the silence, to the night, or to the stars calling one to another? To nothing? “You listen to God,” the mullah Hussain had said. “How can an Infidel do that? You listen to God.” “Those are your words, mullah, not mine.”
Strange man, saving my life, me saving his, almost dead because of him then saved again, then all of us at Kowiss freed - hell, he knew we were leaving Kowiss for good, I’m sure of it. Why did he let us go, us the Great Satan? And why did he keep on telling me to go and see Khomeini? Imam’s not right, not right at all.
What is it about all this that’s got to me?
It’s the out there, the something of the desert that exists for me. Utter peace. The absolute. It’s just for me -
