Dead Sea by Peter Tonkin

he continued without missing a beat, ‘the captain will be following the naval tradition of blessing the voyage with a glass of champagne . . .’
    â€˜
Naval tradition
,’ said Willy, highly amused, an hour later. ‘That was impressive.’
    â€˜Years of practise,’ answered Richard round a mouthful of foo yung. ‘I could bullshit for Great Britain at the next Olympics.’
    The camera lay between them on a table in the Chinese restaurant, its side panel open to reveal the vivid picture of
Katapult
vanishing northwards across the lagoon towards Te Ava Tepuka Vili channel under full sail. ‘Captain Mariner could skipper
Katapult
for Great Britain at the next Olympics,’ observed Willy. ‘I thought you said she’ll find it hard to tack straight through the channel south of Tepuka . . .’
    â€˜I know,’ said Richard, laying aside his chopsticks in favour of a spoon. ‘She went out like a ferret down a drainpipe. I never cease to underestimate her.’
    His cell phone purred. He slid it out and pressed it to his ear. ‘You got any footage left on that?’ he asked after a moment or two of attentive silence.
    â€˜Half an hour or so,’ answered Willy. ‘Why?’
    â€˜Something I want you to see. More news, maybe – though something for later, when the heat’s gone out of the
Katapult
story.’
    Half an hour later still, Willy and Richard were at the north end of the airport runway, looking west away over the breathtaking Lake Tarasal towards the eastern horizon. And here, as though by some massive magic trick, a supertanker had appeared. Willy could see the name
Prometheus
on her forecastle, and Heritage Mariner colours at her masthead and on her funnel. Behind him, the New Zealand Air Force choppers began to thunder up into the afternoon air.
    â€˜What’s this?’ asked Willy, confused, bellowing to get his voice over the thrumming rotors. ‘An oil tanker?’
    â€˜A supertanker, yes,’ answered Richard. ‘But in this case not an
oil
tanker.’
    â€˜Then what?’ demanded Willy, pulling out his camera as the first of the choppers began to settle away across the South Pacific towards the massive vessel like a dragonfly dipping towards a lily pad.
    â€˜Well,’ began Richard, satisfyingly aware that, just as he had underestimated Robin’s seamanship, so she had underestimated him. ‘What you’re actually looking at there is a quarter of a million barrels of fresh, clean drinking water.’

Fears
    R ichard had no trouble hitching a lift on one of the RNZAF choppers and was back at their base in Ohakea, North Island, a couple of days later, all too well aware that he was heading in exactly the opposite direction to the woman he loved. But he had little time to mope or to indulge the lively fears that peopled his nightmares during the few restless hours of sleep he achieved in the interim. The guys at Ohakea were happy to drop him down to the nearest international airport, but only after he agreed to be guest of honour for dinner at the station’s mess.
    Another all but sleepless night of travel twenty-four hours after the mess night put him on the six ten a.m. BA flight from Wellington to Heathrow, and he touched down, nearly five thousand dollars poorer, frazzled and full of unreasoning fears – even after thirty-five hours in the pampered calm of first class – at five fifty BST on a cold and overcast morning at the beginning of the second week of August. He took a taxi to the company flat the Mariners kept at Heritage House on the corner of Leadenhall Street in the City of London – using the opportunity of a hold-up at seven a.m. as they crawled past Heston services to phone ahead and warn the twenty-four-hour people at Crewfinders that he was on his way home. And so he heaved himself in through the private entrance and stepped into the lift a little before eight