“That was no miss, son,” Linc said. “Once he gets out of the hospital that’s the cat that’s going to lay this whole thing on Makambo and Singer.”

It took ten minutes for Linc and Ski to get down to the dock. Linc approached Abala and squatted next to him. The rebel colonel was nearly in shock and didn’t acknowledge his presence, so Linc lightly slapped his face until he looked over. Spittle bubbled from Abala’s lips and he had a deathly pallor under his dark skin.

“Remember me, numb nuts?” Linc asked. Abala’s eyes went wide. “That’s right. Congo River, about a week or so ago. You thought you could double-cross us. Well, this is what happens.” Linc leaned close. “Never, and I mean never, mess with the Corporation.”

WHEN the Angolan army finally arrived at the Petromax terminal, the Oregon — with her equipment, her crew, and all of Moses Ndeble’s men, alive or dead — was well over the horizon.

The Angolan forces found that the oil flowing to the loading pier had been shut off and crews had capped the two offshore wells. They also discovered eighty-six corpses laid out next to an administrative building and over four hundred frightened men roped together and locked inside, many of them wounded. One of them, who had a bloody bandage wrapped around his truncated foot, had a sign draped over his neck that read:

MY NAME IS RAIF ABALA. I AM A COLONEL IN SAMUEL MAKAMBO’S CONGOLESE ARMY OF REVOLUTION AND WAS HIRED TO PERPETRATE THIS ACT OF TERRORISM BY DANIEL SINGER, FORMERLY OF MERRICK/SINGER. I UNDERSTAND THAT IF I DO NOT COOPERATE THE PEOPLE WHO STOPPED US TODAY WILL FIND ME.

HAVE A NICE DAY.

Chapter 29

29

THE shabby appearance of the Oregon was expertly applied camouflage to make her look neglected, but the dilapidation of the Gulf of Sidra was the real thing. For twenty years she’d tracked back and forth across the Mediterranean carrying her loads of oil while her owners eked every penny of profit they could. If something broke it was replaced with a used part, hastily repaired with duct tape and bailing wire, or discarded altogether. When her sewage treatment plant went down it was bypassed and repiped to dump directly into the sea. Her air-conditioning system merely moved hot air around the superstructure rather than cooled it. And with the galley’s walk-in cooler not working, the chefs had to balance taking food out of the freezer and letting it thaw but not spoil.

Her black hull was streaked with rust while bare metal showed on her superstructure, and her single funnel was so streaked with exhaust that it was impossible to tell it had once been painted green and yellow. The only modern piece of equipment aboard her was the new escape pod hanging over her stern, put there at the insistence of her captain once he learned where they were sailing.