Standing on the bridge of his corvette, binoculars to his eyes, Thibault could see the Greek flag flying from the stern and make out the name painted in black along one side of the snub-nosed prow: Aristides. He’d been expecting her arrival; as part of a new international protection force, his job was to see her and other vessels safely through the dangerous waters off the Horn of Africa, on their way to port in Mombasa.

As Thibault watched her moving forward at a good rate of knots, leaving very little wake behind, his First Officer, standing beside him on the bridge, tapped him on the shoulder and pointed. Thibault shifted his binoculars and saw a skiff, so small that it took a moment for him to focus on it. It was close in, under the overhang of the larger vessel’s stern, hugging dangerously close to her side. He wondered momentarily if it were a dinghy let down by the Greek ship’s crew to make some repair, but dinghies didn’t look like that – a dilapidated wooden craft that couldn’t have been more than fifteen feet from bow to stern, with a mast that looked like the branch of a tree. Half a dozen figures sat huddled in the little boat, one at the stern holding the rudder of a massive outboard motor, which looked heavy enough to overturn the fragile craft.

Pirates. They must have crept up on the ship in the dark, lurking alongside until dawn began to break. They couldn’t have noticed the corvette waiting in the darkness and, if they saw it now, must be gambling on taking over the ship before it intervened. Captain Thibault watched with fascination as the men in the skiff began lifting a long thin metal ladder; it rose straight into the air like a construction crane, then tilted gently until it leaned against the side of the ship. It was being carefully extended, a segment at a time, aiming for the lowest point of the deck, at the stern. He could see the curved ends at the top of the rungs, designed to hook as tight as handcuffs over the deck rail.