Hungry as the Sea by Wilbur Smith Page B

Mouette ‘s reported position or. the chart. “She’s a hundred miles ahead of us.”
    “No,” Nick shook his head, “he’s lying.”
    “Sir?”
    “He’s lying. He always lies.” Nick lit a cheroot and when it was drawing evenly, he spoke again to his radio officer. “Did you get a bearing?” and the Trog looked up from his radio direction-finding compass on which he was tracing La Mouette ‘s transmissions.
    “I have only one coordinate, you won’t get a fix.”
    But Nick interrupted him, “We’ll use his best course from Golfo San Jorge for a fix.”
    He turned back to David Allen. “Plot that.”
    “There’s a difference of over three hundred nautical miles.”
    “Yes,” Nick nodded. “That old pirate wouldn’t broadcast an accurate position to all the world. We are inside him and running five knots better, we’ll put a line over Golden Adventurer before he’s in radar contact.”
    “Are you going to open contact with Christy Marine now, sir?”
    “No, Mr. Allen.”
    “But they will do a deal with La Mouette - unless we bid now.”
    “I don’t think so,” Nick murmured, and almost went on to say, Duncan Alexander won’t settle for Lloyd’s Open Form while he is the underwriter, and his ship is free and floating. He’ll fight for daily hire and bonus, and Jules Levoisin won’t buy that package. He’ll hold out for the big plum. They won’t do a deal until the two ships are in visual contact —and by that time I’ll have her in tow and I’ll fight the bastard in the awards court for twenty-five percent of her value. But he did not say it. “Steady as she goes, Mr. Allen,” was all he said, as he left the bridge.
    He closed the door of his day cabin and leaned back against it, shutting his eyes tightly as he gathered himself. It had been so very close, a matter of seconds and he would have declared himself and given the advantage to La Mouette .
    Through the door behind him, he heard David Allen’s voice. “Did you see him? He didn’t feel a thing - not a bloody thing. He was going to let those poor bastards go into the boats. He must piss ice-water.” The voice was muffled, but the outrage in it was tempered by awe.
    Nick kept his eyes shut a moment longer, then he straightened up and pushed himself away from the door. He wanted it to begin now. It was in the waiting and the uncertainty which was eroding what was left of his strength.
    “Please God, let me reach them in time.” And he was not certain whether it was for the lives or for the salvage award that he was praying.
     

Chapter 2
    Captain Basil Reilly, the Master of the Golden Adventurer , was a tall man, with a lean and wiry frame that promised reserves of strength and endurance. His face was very darkly tanned and splotched with the dark patches of benign sun cancer. His heavy mustache was silvered like the pelt of a snow fox, and though his eyes were set in webs of finely wrinkled and pouchy skin, they were bright and calm and intelligent.
    He stood on the windward wing of his navigation bridge and watched the huge black seas tumbling in to batter his helpless ship. He was taking them broadside now, and each time they struck, the hull shuddered and heeled with a sick dead motion, giving reluctantly to the swells that rose up and broke over her rails, sweeping her decks from side to side, and then cascading off her again in a tumble of white that smoked in the wind.
    He adjusted the life-jacket he wore, settling the rough canvas more comfortably around his shoulders as he reviewed his position once more.
    Golden Adventurer had taken the ice in that eight-to-midnight watch traditionally allotted to the most junior of the navigating officers. The impact had hardly been noticeable, yet it had awoken the Master from deep sleep - just a slight check and jar that had touched some deep chord in the mariner’s instinct. The ice had been a growler, one of the most deadly of all hazards.
    The big bergs standing high and