A Captain's Duty

carefully by the pirates.
    As I worked the console, I sidled over to where the Leader was standing. “Hey,” I said. “You guys got cigarettes? We have some if you’re out.”
    He nodded. I went to the GMDSS table and grabbed a few cartons that I always kept there to give the harbor pilots and problematic port officials. I distributed them around. From being in places like Mombasa and Monrovia, I knew how popular tobacco was in Africa, and the last thing I wanted was some gunman with a nicotine shake pointing a gun at my guys.
    They lit up and a bit of the tension went out of the room. I grabbed some sodas and handed them over, too.
    The Leader took a puff and pointed to me.
    “What nationality?” he said.
    “Me?” I said. “Or the ship? What do you mean?”
    “The ship, the ship, what nationality?”
    “U.S.,” I said.
    His eyes lit up. I heard the other pirates whoop. Obviously, they’d hit the mother lode.
    “What about crew? Nationality?”
    “All different,” I said. “American, Canadian, African.”
    Now that I had them in a good mood, smoking and laughing, I wanted to slow things down. I needed time to think.
    The UKMTO knew we’d been taken by pirates. I was calculating in my mind how long it would be before help arrived, and I wanted to put the brakes on as much as possible. Any delay would give me time to strategize. I wanted to think out my moves a few steps ahead.
    The Leader wanted me to stop the ship and he was getting agitated. I was going through my rigamarole—“Ship’s broken, you must have done something to it”—when he finally barked at me, “STOP NOW!”
    I raised my eyebrows and, pretending I was trying to understand, dragged my index finger across my throat. You mean, kill the engine?
    I heard a voice behind me. “Will you please, ” said Colin, “stop giving ’em the international sign for murder?”
    I smiled. “Okay, okay.”
    The next thing they wanted was a cell phone. “We want to make phone call.”
    “Sell?” I said. “You want to do what?”
    “They’re saying they want to make a phone call!” shouted Colin. He didn’t understand what I was doing, and he thought I was going to get myself—and him—shot.
    “I got it,” I said out of the side of my mouth. “Relax. I know what they’re saying. Just let me talk to them. Just relax.” I was trying to slow every conversation down.
    Finally the Leader pointed to the satellite phone on thebridge and gave me a number to dial. It was a Somali country code.
    The mother ship , I thought. They want to get further instructions .
    The Leader watched me closely as I walked over to the phone. I dialed the number and waited. The numbers appear as you punch the buttons, so I couldn’t misdial, but I didn’t complete the final step. On most sat phones, there’s a last key you have to hit to send the call when you’re done.
    I didn’t do that. I showed the Leader the phone.
    “No work,” I said. “Phone broken.”
    He came over, glaring at me. “Let me see,” he barked.
    I showed him the LED display. There was his number, but the call wasn’t going through.
    I shrugged sympathetically.
    “No cell coverage,” I said. “Bad phone.”
    They gave me another number. Maybe it was their warlord or their backer in Somalia. Obviously they wanted to report they’d taken the ship and maybe get the ransom process started or get supplies or reinforcements out to the Maersk Alabama.
    That wasn’t going to happen. I kept dialing and the Leader kept glaring at me.
    “Radar,” he called out.
    I went through my usual “What? Excuse me?” routine before pointing him to the console. He waved the gun that I should go first. I walked over and he stood by me and peered down at the screen. It was blank.
    “Seventy-two,” he said. “Seventy-two mile scale.” He wanted to increase the range of the radar. So he knew something aboutnavigation and onboard technology. More and more I was coming to believe that the Leader wasn’t a simple fisherman. This guy had a little training.
    I did him one better. I turned the knob to ninety-six miles. He stared down.
    “Nothing there,” I said.
    He was perplexed.
    “Where is that?” he said. “What is this showing?”
    I knew by how surprised he was that the mother ship wasn’t out there. He was stunned that the radar didn’t show a nice comforting blip within a few miles of us. It was like his getaway car had disappeared off the face of the earth. By now he must have