Thunderbolt by Wilbur Smith (reading strategies book .txt) 📕

‘It was brave,’ said Mo. At least he didn’t follow up with ‘but’.

Focusing on the horizon I saw that the approaching boat was a fair bit closer. It looked like some sort of deep-sea fishing outfit, prickling with stumpy rods. We’d be off Kenya here: the red dots aboard were no doubt game fishermen out of Mombasa or perhaps Watamu. What would the wealthy fishermen on board see? The battered cruiser we were on, a sleek speedboat, and a foundering, swamped yacht with a snapped mast.

No doubt they’d picked up the same distress call as Flip-flops. Would they wonder why nobody was now on the other end of the yacht’s shortwave radio, or were they assuming that it had stopped working? Presumably they’d expect us, the rescuers, to have a working radio and the ability to speak to them. All the pirates were in view: none on a radio. Maybe that’s what made the fishermen slow down when they were still a fair way off, or perhaps they caught sight of the two sailors bound either side of the broken mast-stump. It certainly wasn’t my flag-T-shirt waving that made them alter course. But they’d got wind that something was wrong, and by the time I was able to breathe properly again – despite the molten pain in my chest – their boat was veering away.

Immediately the dive boat gave chase. Pete had always run it up to top speed gradually, but Barrel-man must have thrown both throttles all the way forward at once. The boat pretty much leaped from the sea. It careened off a low wave and the propellers bit nothing before slamming into the water again.

The captain slewed us round too, headed towards the fishing boat at a comparatively leisurely pace. This meant we were leaving the sailors on their swamped yacht.

I couldn’t stop myself looking back as we moved off. To begin with they just sat there, but after a few moments, when we’d opened up a safe distance, I was relieved to see movement.

The sunburnt woman, evidently having managed to tear herself free of the gaffer tape, got up and went to liberate her partner. His head was still bowed. That cut on his leg must have been painful. And yet – I tried to conjure up some hope for them – their yacht hadn’t sunk any lower in the water while we’d been alongside. Hopefully their distress signal was still pulsing, or the radio was still operational, or they had flares. I grasped at these straws as they slipped from sight.

Without Pete’s boat in pursuit I’m pretty sure the deep-sea fishermen would have made their escape. But the speedboat, a greyhound after a cat, ran them down in a matter of minutes. We floundered along, following the chase. I saw something flashing in the dive boat well before I heard the staccato crackling of gunfire.

The anglers had come to a halt by the time we caught up, with the dive boat slowly circling them. Would they have their own weapons with which to fight back? It didn’t seem so, or at least if they were armed they must have thought themselves outgunned, and since they couldn’t flee or fight they’d opted instead to give in. The speedboat burbled back to us and the big guard from our boat jumped in. The pirates evidently wanted a two-man boarding party for this catch.

My first thought then was that the captain was the sole pirate left on board with us. He must have reckoned Mo would still be watching his back – and perhaps the boy was – but something about the way he had tried to stop me getting myself shot made me doubt it.

‘Guys,’ I said.

‘What are you thinking?’ asked Xander.

The burning in my chest meant I felt completely unready to follow through with what I was about to propose, which may have been why I said, ‘Isn’t it obvious?’ instead of spelling it out.

Mo said, ‘No! You must learn! It is madness to resist now.’

At which Amelia said, ‘Completely. Say we throw the guy overboard. Then what? Off we set in a slow boat to nowhere. You think the armed crew in that power boat will simply wave us off?’

Through gritted teeth I said, ‘We have to do something though.’

‘Yes,’ murmured Mo. ‘But only when we can be effective. We should wait. I will help you plot a proper escape, once we reach land.’

Since we’d been captured, I’d not thought about when we would set foot ashore again. I’d not allowed myself to dwell on the question because I’d actually been more worried about ‘if’ than ‘when’.

But unless these pirates were planning on throwing us overboard – which made no sense given they’d kept us safe till now – they would presumably have to hang on to us until they made landfall.

Operating out of a forty-foot boat, they wouldn’t be staying out at sea indefinitely. Sooner or later they would have to dock to cash in their loot and pick up supplies.

Mo was right; the thing to do was wait until then. But watching Barrel-man, Flip-flops and the Bear, who’d socked me with his rifle, as they prepared to board the fishing boat, I felt sick that I could do nothing to help now.

20.

It turned out that the deep-sea fishermen hadn’t in fact reached the same conclusion as me. The three guys on deck with their hands in the air did make it look like they’d surrendered, but as Barrel-man brought the dive boat alongside so the guards could climb aboard, a fourth fisherman jumped up among the stumpy rods sticking from the fishing boat’s stern.

He had a pistol in his hand. It bucked three times in quick succession, then jammed.

The dive boat was close by. This fisherman had waited to take his chance at close range. And he hit his mark. The Bear who’d battered me immediately spun