The Dogs Of War Part 25

"A thousand pounds sterling."

"In dinars or dollars?"

"In dollars."

Shannon thought it over. It might be the truth, or it might be that Baker was trying to squeeze a bit more out of him. If it was the truth, refusing to pay would simply force Baker to pay the Yugoslav out of his own cut. That would reduce Baker's margin to such a small amount he might lose interest in the deal, not caring whether it went through or not. And he still needed Baker, and would need him until he saw the white wake of the Toscana heading out of Ploce harbor on her way to Spain.

"All right," he said. "Who is this partner?"

"Fellow called Ziljak. He's out there now, taking care of the shipment right up to Ploce and into the warehouse there. When the ship comes in, he'll get the stuff from the warehouse through customs and onto the boat."

"I thought that was your job."

"It is, but now I have to engage a Yugoslav as partner. Honestly, Cat, they left me no alternative."

"Then I'll pay him personally, in travelers' checks."

"I wouldn't," said Baker.

"Why not?"

"The buyers of this shipment are supposed to be the government of Togo, right? Black men. Another white turns up, obviously the paymaster, and they might begin to smell a rat. We can go to Ploce, if you like, or I can go alone. But if you want to come with me, you'll have to come ostensibly as my a.s.sistant. Besides, travelers' checks have to be cashed at a bank, and in Yugoslavia that means they take the man's name and ident.i.ty-card number. If someone cashing them is a Yugoslav, there are questions asked. It would be better if Ziljak got cash, as he has asked."

"All right, I'll cash some checks here in Hamburg, and I'll pay him in dollar bills," said Shannon. "But you get yours in checks. I'm not carrying vast sums of dollars in cash around. Not to Yugoslavia. They get sensitive about that sort of thing. Security gets interested. They think you're funding a spy operation. So we go as tourists with travelers' checks."

"Fine by me," said Baker. "When do you want to go?"

Shannon glanced at his watch. The next day would be June 1.

"Day after tomorrow," he said. "We'll fly to Dubrov- nik and have a week in the sun. I could do with a rest anyway. Or you can join me on the eighth or ninth, but not a day later. I'll hire a car, and we can drive up the coast to Ploce on the tenth. I'll have the Toscana come in that night or early on the morning of the eleventh."

"You go on alone," said Baker. "I have work to do in Hamburg. I'll join you on the eighth."

"Without fail," said Shannon. "If you don't turn up, I'll come looking. And I'll be hopping mad."

"I'll come," said Baker. "I still want the balance of my money, don't forget. So far, I'm out of pocket on this deal. I want it to go through just as much as you."

That was the way Shannon wanted him to feel.

"You do have the money, I suppose?" asked Baker, fingering a lump of sugar.

Shannon flicked through a booklet of large-denomination dollar checks under Baker's nose. The arms dealer smiled.

They left the table and on the way out used the restaurant telephone to call a Hamburg charter company specializing in package tours for the thousands of Germans who vacation along the Adriatic coast. From this company they learned the names of the three best hotels in the Yugoslav resort. Baker was told he would find Shannon in one of them under the name of Keith Brown.

Johann Schlinker was as confident as Baker that he could fulfill his arms deal, though he had no idea that Baker was also doing business with Shannon. No doubt the men knew of each other, might even be acquainted, but there would not be a question of discussing each other's business together.

"The port should be Valencia, though this has yet to be fixed and is in any case the choice of the Spanish authorities," he told Shannon. "Madrid tells me the dates have to be between the sixteenth and twentieth of June."

"I'd prefer the twentieth for loading," said Shannon.

"The Toscana should be permitted to berth on or during the night of the nineteenth and load in the morning."

"Good," said Schlinker. "I'll inform my Madrid partner. He habitually handles the transporting and loading side of things, and employs a first-cla.s.s freight agent in Valencia who knows all the customs personnel very well. There should be no problem."

"There must be no problem," growled Shannon. "The ship has been delayed already once, and by loading on the twentieth I have enough sailing time but no margin to fulfill my own contract."

It was not true, but he saw no reason why Schlinker should not believe it was true.

"I shall want to watch the loading also," he told the arms dealer.

Schlinker pursed his lips. "You may watch it from afar, of course," he said. "I cannot stop you. But as the customers are supposed to be an Arab government, you cannot propose yourself as the buyer of the merchandise."

"I also want to board the ship at Valencia," said Shannon.

"That will be even harder. The whole port is sealed off inside a chain-link fence. Entry is by authority only. To board the ship you would have to go through pa.s.sport control. Also, as she will be carrying ammunition, there will be a Guardia Civil at the bottom of the gangplank."

"Supposing the captain needed another crewman. Could he engage a seaman locally?"

Schlinker thought it over. "I suppose so. Are you connected with the company owning the vessel?"

"Not on paper," said Shannon.

"If the captain informed the agent on arrival that he had permitted one of his crewmen to leave the vessel at its last port of call to fly home and attend his mother's funeral, and that the "crewman would be rejoining the vessel at Valencia, I suppose there would be no objection. But you would need a merchant seaman's card to prove you were a seaman. And in the same name as yourself, Mr. Brown."

Shannon thought for a few minutes. "Okay. I'll fix it."

Schlinker consulted his diary. "As it happens, I shall be in Madrid on the nineteenth and twentieth," he said. "I have another business deal to attend to. I shall be at the Mindanao Hotel. If you want to contact me, you can find me there. If loading is for the twentieth, the chances are the convoy and escort from the Spanish army will run the shipment down to the coast during the night of the nineteenth to arrive at crack of dawn. If you are going to board the ship at all, I think you should do so before the military convoy arrives at the docks."

"I could be in Madrid on the nineteenth," said Shannon. "Then I could check with you that the convoy had indeed left on time. By driving fast to Valencia, I could be there ahead of it, and board the Toscana as the rejoining seaman before the convoy arrives."

"That is entirely up to you," said Schlinker. "For my part, I will have my agents arrange the freighting, transportation, and loading, according to all the normal procedures, for dawn of the twentieth. That is what I contracted to do. If there is any risk attached to your boarding the vessel in harbor, that must be your affair. I cannot take the responsibility for that. I can only point out that ships carrying arms out of Spain are subjected to scrutiny by the army and customs authorities. If anything goes wrong with the loading and ' clearance of the ship to sail, because of you, that is not my responsibility. One other thing. After loading arms a ship must leave a Spanish port within six hours, and may not re-enter Spanish waters until the cargo has been offloaded. Also, the manifest must be in perfect order."

"It will be," said Shannon. "I'll be with you in Madrid on the morning of the nineteenth."

Before leaving Toulon, Kurt Semmler had given Shannon a letter to mail. It was from Semmler to the Toscana's shipping agents in Genoa. It informed them there had been a slight change of plan, and that the Toscana would be proceeding from Toulon not directly to Morocco but first to Brindisi to pick up further cargo. The order, Semmler informed the agents, had been secured locally by him in Toulon and was lucrative, since it was a rush order, whereas the consignment of mixed cargo from Toulon to Morocco was in no hurry. As managing director of Spinetti Maritime, Semmler's instructions were those of the boss. He required the Genoa agents to cable Brindisi reserving a berth for June 7 and 8, and to instruct the port office to hold any mail addressed to the Toscana for collection when she berthed.

Such a letter was what Shannon wrote and dispatched from Hamburg. It was to Signor Kurt Semmler, MV Toscana, c/o the Port Office, Brindisi, Italy.

In it he told Semmler that from Brindisi he should proceed to Ploce on the Adriatic coast of Yugoslavia, and that if he had no charts to negotiate the tricky straits north of Korcula Island, he should get them locally. He had to get the Toscana there on the evening of June 10, and his berth would be reserved. There was no need to inform the agents in Genoa of the extra leg from Brindisi to Ploce.

His last instruction to Semmler was important. He told the German ex-smuggler he wanted him to acquire a merchant seaman's card for a deckhand called Keith Brown, stamped and up to date, and issued by the Italian authorities. The second thing the ship would need was a cargo manifest showing the Toscana had proceeded straight from Brindisi to Valencia without a halt, and would be heading from Valencia to Latakia, Syria, after taking cargo aboard in Valencia. Semmler would have to use his old Brindisi contacts to obtain these doc.u.ments.

Before he left Hamburg for Yugoslavia, Shannon's last letter was to Simon Endean in London. It required Endean to meet Shannon at a rendezvous in Rome on June 16, and to bring certain maritime charts with him.

About the same time, the MV Toscana was chugging steadily through the Bight of Bonifacio, the narrow channel of limpid blue water that separates the southern tip of Corsica from the northern end of Sardinia. The sun was blistering, but mellowed by a light wind. Marc Vlaminck was stretched out, stripped to the waist, on the hatch cover of the main hold, a wet towel beneath him, his torso like a pink hippopotamus covered in suntan oil. Janni Dupree, who always turned brick red in the sun, was propped up against the wall of the after structure, under the awning, swigging from his tenth bottle of beer of the morning. Cipriani, the deckhand, was painting part of the rail around the forepeak white, and the first mate, Norbiatto, was snoozing on his bunk below after taking the night watch.

Also down below, in the stinking heat of the engine room, was the engineer, Grubic, oiling some piece of machinery that only he could understand but which no doubt was vital to keep the Toscana steady on her eight knots through the Mediterranean. In the wheel-house Kurt Semmler and Carl Waldenberg were sipping cold beer and exchanging reminiscences of their respective careers.

Jean-Baptiste Langarotti would have liked to be there. From the port rail he could have watched the gray-white sunbleached coast of his homeland slipping past barely four miles across the water. But he was many miles away, in West Africa, where the rainy season had already begun and where, despite the fever heat, the clouds were leaden gray.

Alan Baker came into Shannon's hotel in Dubrovnik just as the mercenary was returning from the beach on the evening of June 8. He looked tired and dusty.

Cat Shannon, by contrast, was looking and feeling better. He had spent his week in the Yugoslav holiday resort behaving like any other tourist, sunbathing and swimming several miles each day. He looked thinner, but fit and tanned. He was also optimistic.

After settling into his hotel, he had sent Semmler a cable at Brindisi requesting confirmation of the arrival of the vessel and receipt of the waiting letter mailed from Hamburg. That morning he had got Semmler's telegraphed reply. The Toscana had arrived safely in Brindisi, the letter had been received and acted on, and they would depart on the morning of June 9 to make destination by midnight of the tenth.

Over drinks on the terrace of their hotel, where Shannon had reserved Baker a room for the night, he told the dealer from Hamburg the news.

Baker nodded and smiled. "Fine. I got a cable forty-eight hours ago from Ziljak in Belgrade. The crates have arrived in Ploce and are in the government warehouse near the quay, under guard."

They spent the night in Dubrovnik and the following morning hired a taxi to take them the hundred kilometers up the coast to Ploce. It was a boneshaker of a car that appeared to have square wheels and cast-iron suspension, but the drive along the coast road was agreeable, mile upon mile of unspoiled coastline, with the small town of Slano at the halfway mark, where they stopped for a cup of coffee and to stretch their limbs.

They were established in a Ploce hotel by lunchtime and waited in the shade of the terrace until the port office opened again at four in the afternoon.

The port was set on a broad sweep of deep blue water, shielded to its seaward side by a long peninsula of land called Peliesac, which curved out of the mam coast to the south of Ploce and ran northward parallel to the coast. Up to the north the gap between the tip of the peninsula and the coast was almost blocked by the rocky island of Hvar, and only a narrow gap gave access to the sea lagoon on which Ploce stood. This lagoon, nearly thirty miles long, surrounded on nine- tenths of its perimeter by land, was a paradise for swimming, fishing, and sailing.

As they approached the port office, a small and battered Volkswagen squealed to a halt a few yards away and hooted noisily. Shannon froze. His first instinct said trouble, something he had been fearing all along, some slip-up in the paperwork, a sudden block put on the whole deal by the authorities, and an extended stay under questioning in the local police station.

The man who climbed out of the small car and waved cheerily might have been a policeman, except that police in most totalitarian states of East or West seemed to be banned from smiling by standing orders. Shannon glanced at Baker and saw his shoulders sag in relief.

"Ziljak," Baker muttered through closed mouth and went to meet the Yugoslav. The latter was a big s.h.a.ggy man, like an amiable black-haired bear, and he embraced Baker with both arms. When he was introduced, his first name turned out to be Kemal, and Shannon supposed there was more than a touch of Turk in the man. That suited Shannon fine; he liked the type, normally good fighters and comrades with a healthy dislike of bureaucracy.

"My a.s.sistant," said Baker, and Ziljak shook hands and muttered something in what Shannon a.s.sumed to be Serbo-Croat. Baker and Ziljak communicated in German, which many Yugoslavians speak a little. He spoke no English.

With Ziljak's a.s.sistance, they roused the head of the customs office and were taken off to inspect the warehouse. The customs man jabbered a few words at the guard on the door, and in the corner of the building they found the crates. There were thirteen of them; one apparently contained the two bazookas, and each of two others contained one mortar, including the baseplates and sighting mechanisms in each. The rest were of ammunition, four of them with ten bazooka rockets in each, and the other six containing the ordered three hundred mortar bombs. The crates were in new tim- ber, unmarked with any description of contents, but stenciled with serial numbers and the word Toscana.

Ziljak and the customs chief babbled away in their own dialect-and it appeared they were using the same one, which was helpful, because there are dozens in Yugoslavia, including seven major languages, and difficulties have been known to occur.

Eventually Ziljak turned to Baker and said several sentences in his halting German. Baker replied, and Ziljak translated for the customs man. He smiled, and they all shook hands and parted. Outside, the sunshine struck like a sledgehammer.

"What was all that about?" asked Shannon.

"Kemal was asked by the customs man if there was a little present in it for him," explained Baker. "Kemal told him there would be a nice one if the paperwork could be kept trouble-free and the ship was loaded on time tomorrow morning."

Shannon had already given Baker the first half of Ziljak's 1000 bonus for helping the deal go through, and Baker drew the Yugoslav to one side to slip it to him. The man's all-embracing bonhomie became even more embracing for both of them, and they adjourned to the hotel to celebrate with a little slivovitz. A little was the word Baker used. Ziljak may have used the same word. He did not mean it. Happy Yugoslavs never drink a little slivovitz. With 500 under his belt, Ziljak ordered a bottle of the fiery plum liquor and bowl after bowl of almonds and olives. As the sun went down and the Adriatic evening slipped through the streets, he relived again his years in the war, hunting and hiding in the Bosnian hills to the north with t.i.to's partisans.

Baker was hard put to it to translate as the exuberant Kemal related his forays behind Dubrovnik in Montenegro, in the mountains behind where they sat, on the coast of Herzegovina, and among the cooler, richer, wooded countryside north of Split in Bosnia. He relished the thought that he would once have been shot out of hand for venturing into any of the towns where he now drove on behalf of his brother-in-law who was in the government. Shannon asked if he was a committed Communist, having been a partisan, and Ziljak listened while Baker translated, using the word "good" for "committed."

Ziljak thumped his chest with his fist. "Guter Kom munist," he exclaimed, eyes wide, pointing at himself. Then he ruined the effect by giving a broad wink, throwing back his head, and roaring with laughter as he tossed another gla.s.s of slivovitz down the hatch. The folded notes of his first 500 bonus made a bulge under his waistband, and Shannon laughed too and wished the giant was coming along to Zangaro with them. He was that kind of man.

They had no supper but at midnight wandered unsteadily back to the quay to watch the Toscana come in. She was rounding the harbor wall and an hour later was tied up alongside the single quay of hewn local stone. From the forepeak Semmler looked down in the half-light cast by the dock lamps. Each nodded slowly at the other, and Waldenberg stood at the top of the gangplank, consulting with his first mate. He had already been instructed, following Shannon's letter, that he should leave the talking to Semmler.

After Baker had headed back to the hotel with Ziljak, Shannon slipped up the gangplank and into the captain's tiny cabin. No one on the quay took any notice. Semmler brought Waldenberg in, and they locked the door.

Slowly and carefully Shannon told Waldenberg what he had really brought the Toscana to Ploce to take on board. The German captain took it well. He kept his face expressionless until Shannon had finished.

"I never carried arms before," he said. "You say this cargo is legal. How legal?"

"Perfectly legal," said Shannon. "It has been bought in Belgrade, trucked up here, and the authorities are of course aware what the crates contain. Otherwise there would be no export license. The license has not been forged, nor has anyone been bribed. It's a perfectly legal shipment under the laws of Yugoslavia."

"And the laws of the country it's going to?" asked Waldenberg.

"The Toscana never enters the waters of the country where these arms are due to be used," said Shannon. "After Ploce, there are two more ports of call. In each case only to take on board cargoes. You know ships are never searched for what they are carrying when they arrive in a port to take on more cargo only, unless the authorities have been tipped off."

"It has happened, all the same," said Waldenberg. "If I have these things on board and the manifest doesn't mention them, and there is a search and they are discovered, the ship gets impounded and I get imprisoned. I didn't bargain on arms. With the Black September and the IRA about these days, everyone's looking for arms shipments."

"Not at the port of embarkation of fresh cargo," said Shannon.

"I didn't bargain for arms," repeated Waldenberg.

"You bargained for illegal immigrants to Britain," Shannon pointed out.

"They're not illegal until their feet touch British soil," the captain said. "And the Toscana would be outside territorial waters. They could go insh.o.r.e in fast boats. Arms are different. They are illegal on this ship if the manifest says there aren't any. Why not put it on the manifest? Just say these arms are being legally transported from Ploce to Togo. No one can prove we later deviate from course."

"Because if there are arms already on board, the Spanish authorities will not allow the ship to stay in Valencia or any other Spanish port. Even in transit. Certainly not to take on more arms. So they have to remain unmentioned on the manifest."

"So where did we come from to reach Spain?" asked Waldenberg.

"From Brindisi," replied Shannon. "We went there to take on cargo, but it was not ready in time. Then the owners ordered you to Valencia to pick up a new cargo for Latakia. Of course you obeyed."

"Supposing the Spanish police search the boat?"

"There's not the slightest reason why they should," said Shannon. "But if they do, the crates have to be below decks in the bilges."

"If they find them there, there's not a hope for us," Waldenberg pointed out. "They'd think we were bringing the stuff to the Basque territories. We'd be inside forever."

The talk went on till three in the morning. It cost Shannon a flat bonus of 5000, half before loading and half after sailing from Valencia. There was no extra charge for the stopover in the African port. That would present no problem.

"You'll take care of the crew?" Shannon asked.

"I'll take care of the crew," said Waldenberg with finality. Shannon knew he would, too.

Back in his hotel, Shannon paid Baker the third quarter of his bill for the arms, $3600, and tried to get some sleep. It was not easy. The sweat rolled off him in the heat of the night, and he had an image of the Toscana lying down there in the port, the arms in the customs shed, and prayed there would be no problems. He felt he was so close now, just three short ceremonies away from the point where no one could stop him, whatever was tried.

The loading started at seven, and the sun was already well up. With a customs man, armed with a rifle, walking beside the crates, they were wheeled on trolleys down to the dockside, and the Toscana hoisted them aboard with her own jumbo derrick. None of the crates was very large, and down in the hold Vlaminck and Cipriani swung them easily into position before they were roped down across the floor of the hold. By nine in the morning it was over, and the hatches went on.

Waldenberg had ordered the engineer to stand by for casting off, and the latter needed no second bidding. Shannon learned later he had suddenly become very voluble when he learned three hours out from Brin disi that they were heading for his native country. Apparently he was wanted there for something or other. He stayed well hidden in his engine room, and no one went looking for him.

As he watched the Toscana chugging out of the port, Shannon slipped Baker the remaining $3600 and the second 500 for Ziljak. Unbeknownst to either, he had had Vlaminck quietly prise up the lids on five of the crates, taken at random, as they came aboard. Vlaminck had verified the contents, waved up to Semmler on the deck above him, and Semmler had blown his nose, the signal Shannon wanted. Just in case the crates contained sc.r.a.p iron. It has been known to happen, quite frequently, in the arms world.

Baker, having received his money, gave the 500 to Ziljak as if it came from himself, and the Yugoslav saw the customs chief did not go without supper. Then Alan Baker and his British "a.s.sistant" quietly left town.

On Shannon's calendar of a hundred days, given him by Sir James Manson to bring off his coup, it was Day Sixty-seven.

No sooner was the Toscana out to sea than Captain Waldenberg began to organize his ship. One by one, the three other crewmen were brought into his cabin for a quiet interview. Although none of them knew it, had they refused to continue to serve aboard the Toscana, there would have been some unfortunate accidents on board. Few places are quite as well suited for a complete disappearing act as a ship on a dark night at sea, and Vlaminck and Dupree between them could have pitched anyone else on board a long way from the ship's side before he touched the water. Perhaps their presence did the trick. In any case, no one objected.

Waldenberg dispensed 1000 of the 2500 he had received in travelers' checks from Shannon. The Yugoslav engineer, delighted to be back out of his own country, took his 250, stuffed it into his pocket, and went back to his engines. He made no comment one way or the other. The first mate, Norbiatto, became quite excited at the thought of a Spanish jail, but pocketed his 600 in dollars and thought of the difference that could make to his chances of owning his own ship one day. The crewman, Cipriani, seemed almost happy at the prospect of being on a vessel full of contraband, took his 150, said an ecstatic thank you, and left, muttering, "This is the life." He had little imagination and knew nothing about Spanish jails.