“Dirty Duncan’s lost his marbles, Charlie,” Scragger had said. “You’re right,” Pettikin had agreed. “He’s just needling you, Scrag.” “Oh, no, I’m not. Your real protector’s China. Come hell or strawberries, China’s always going to be there. And only China will always be in a position to stop Japan if ever Japan got militant and strong enough to move south. My God, Australia’s the great prize in the whole Pacific, the treasure chest of the Pacific, The others nodded. In silence they watched the ship being detached from the barge’s umbilical cord.
To see better, Scragger went to the side of the bridge. Under more floodlights oilmen were laboriously unscrewing the twelve-inch pipe from the barge’s complex of valves. Six men were mere. Two Japanese crew, three Iranians, and a French engineer.
Ahead of him was the expanse and length of the flat deck. In the middle of the deck was his 206. He had landed there at de Plessey’s suggestion and with Kasigi’s permission. “Beaut,” Scragger had told the Frenchman; “I’ll fly you back to Siri, or Lengeh, just as you want.”
“Yoshi Kasigi suggests we both stay overnight, Scrag, and return in the morning. It’ll make a change for you. We can leave at dawn and return to Lengeh. Come aboard. I’d appreciate it.”
So he had landed on the tanker at sunset, not sure why he had accepted the invitation but he had made a pact with Kasigi and felt he should honor it. Too, he felt sickeningly responsible for young Abdollah Turik. The sight of the youth’s corpse had rocked him badly and made him want to be at Siri until the tanker left. So he had arrived and had tried to be a good guest, halfheartedly agreeing with de Plessey that perhaps, after all, the youth’s death was just a coincidence and that their security precautions would stop any sabotage attempt.
Since the loading had begun the day before, they had all been edgy. Tonight more so. The BBC news had again been very bad with reports of greatly increased confrontations in Tehran, Meshed, and Qom. Added to this was McIver’s report that Ayre had carefully relayed from Kowiss in French - news of the continuing investiture of Tehran’s International Airport, of the possible coup and about Kyabi. Kyabi’s murder had also shocked de Plessey. And all of this, along with the floods of rumors and counterrumors among the Iranians had made the evening somber. Rumors of imminent U.S. military intervention, of imminent Soviet intervention, of assassination attempts on Khomeini, on Bazargan his chosen prime minister, on Bakhtiar the legal prime minister, on the U.S. ambassador, rumors that the military coup d’état would happen in Tehran tonight, that Khomeini was arrested already, that all the armed services had capitulated and Khomeini was already de facto ruler of Iran and that General Nassiri, chief of SAVAK, had been captured, tried and shot.
“All the rumors can’t be true,” Kasigi had said for all of them. “There’s nothing we can do except wait.”
He had been a fine host. All the food was Japanese. Even the beer. Scragger had tried to hide his distaste for the hors d’oeuvre of sushi but he greatly enjoyed the barbecued chicken in a salty sweet sauce, the rice, and the deep-fried prawns and vegetables in batter. “Another beer, Captain Scragger?” Kasigi had offered.
“No, thanks. One’s all I allow myself though I’ll admit it’s good. Maybe not as good as Foster’s but close.”
De Plessey had smiled, “You don’t know what a compliment that is, Mr. Kasigi. For an Australian to say a beer’s ‘close to Foster’s’ is praise indeed.”
“Oh, yes, indeed I know, Mr. de Plessey. Down Under I prefer Foster’s.” “You spend a lot of time there?” Scragger had asked him.
“Oh, yes. Australia’s one of Japan’s main sources of all kinds of raw materials. My company has bulk cargo freighters for coal, iron ore, wheat, rice, soya bean,” Kasigi had said. “We import huge amounts of your rice though much of that goes into the manufacture of our national drink, sake. Have you tried sake, Captain?”
“Yes, yes I did once. But warm wine… sake’s not to my taste.” “I agree,” de Plessey said, then added hurriedly, “except in winter, like hot toddy. You were saying about Australia?”
“I enjoy the country very much. My eldest son goes to Sydney University too, so we visit him from time to time. It’s a wonderland - so vast, so rich, so empty.”
Yes, Scragger had thought grimly. You mean so empty and just waiting to be filled up by your millions of worker ants? Thank the Lord we’re a few thousand miles away and the U.S.‘ll never allow us to be taken over. “Bollocks!” McIver had said to him once during a friendly argument, when he, McIver, and Pettikin were on a week’s leave two years ago in Singapore. “If some time in the future Japan picked the right time, say when the U.S. was having at Russia, the States wouldn’t be able to do a thing to help Australia. I think they’d make a deal an - ”
“Dirty Duncan’s lost his marbles, Charlie,” Scragger had said. “You’re right,” Pettikin had agreed. “He’s just needling you, Scrag.” “Oh, no, I’m not. Your real protector’s China. Come hell or strawberries, China’s always going to be there. And only China will always be in a position to stop Japan if ever Japan got militant and strong enough to move south. My God, Australia’s the great prize in the whole Pacific, the treasure chest of the Pacific, but none of you buggers down there care to plan ahead or use your loaf. All you bloody want’s three days’ holiday a week, with more pay for less bloody work, free bloody school, free medical, free welfare, and let some other bugger man the ramparts - you’re worse than poor old bloody England who’s got nothing! The real tr - ” “You’ve got North Sea oil. If that’s not the luck of the devil I do - ” “The real trouble is you bloody twits Down Under don’t know your arse from a hole in the wall.”
“Sit down, Scrag!” Pettikin had said warningly. “You agreed no fighting. None. You try and thump Mac when he’s not smashed you’ll end up in the sewer. He may have high blood pressure but he’s still a black belt.” “Me thump Dirty Duncan? You must be joking, cobber. I don’t pick on old buggers….”
Scragger smiled to himself, remembering their bender to end all benders Singapore’s a good place, he thought, then turned his attention back to the ship, feeling better now, well fed and very glad that the loading was done. The night was grand. Far above him he saw the blinking navigation lights of an airplane heading westward and wondered briefly where its landfall was, what airline it was and how many passengers were aboard. His night vision was excellent and he could see that now the men on the barge had almost unscrewed the pipe. Once it had been winched aboard, the tanker could leave. At dawn the Rikomaru would be in the Strait of Hormuz and he would take off and fly home to Lengeh with de Plessey.
Then his sharp eyes saw some men running away from the semifloodlit pumping junction just ashore. His attention zeroed on them.
There was a small explosion, then a gush of flame as the oil caught fire. Everyone aboard watched aghast. The flames began to spread, and they heard shouting - Iranian and French - ashore. Men were running down from the barracks and storage tanks area. A sudden flicker of a machine gun in the darkness, the sharp ugly crackle following. Over the ship’s loudspeaker system came the captain’s voice in Japanese: “Action stations!” At once the men on the barge redoubled their efforts, petrified that somehow the fire might spread through the pipe to the barge and blow it up. The moment the nozzle fell away from the valve, the Iranians hastily jumped into their small motorboat and fled, their work completed. The French engineer and Japanese seamen ran up the gangplank as the tanker’s deck winch rattled into life, dragging the pipe aboard.