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Port Captain’s office and its precincts, the Old Fort, the dry dock and boat harbour, a cluster of tugs, two Portuguese sloops, and then the sheds and warehouses along the Gorjao Quay where the bent heads of the cargo cranes looked like monstrous birds feeding from the ships alongside. Beyond them the Espirito Santo, a mosaic of blues, browns and greys, shimmered in the sunlight, stretching across to the sandy beaches and scrub of the far bank where barges lay offshore. Small boats and lighters were moving among the ships at anchor.
    They’d been there for a few minutes when Rohrbach said: “Don’t turn round but there’s a policeman watching the car.”
    Slowly Johan put the binoculars back into their case. “Not to panic,” said Rohrbach quietly. “We’re in a parking prohibido zone. It’ll take him two or three minutes to reach the car.”
    “Which are the Jerries, David?” Johan was looking down the river to the oil sites where, beyond a three-masted barque, her bare poles high and tapering, four merchant ships lay at anchor.
    “Those over there. Down towards Matola.”
    “They look pretty harmless. Third from the right must be the Hagenfels . No boiler-room ventilators. Low, thick funnel.”
    “Did you see her name with the glasses?”
    “No. Too far.”
    Rohrbach looked back towards the street again. “The Portuguese cop’s coming this way. Let’s shove off.”
    They drove into the town, parked the car and walked across to the fishing harbour where they mixed with the tourists, hangers-on and fishermen. There was something restful about the place, reflected Rohrbach. The boats with their atmosphereof hiatus between a task completed and one about to begin. Some fishermen, leather faced, were squatting on the quayside repairing nets, talking in monosyllables; near them a man lowered a bucket over the side of a boat, slowly recovered it and sluiced the deck, steam rising from the sun-hot planks. Beyond him a youngster in blue denims, a black cigarette drooping from his mouth, gutted a fish while he talked to an old man who was working on an engine, his hands and face smeared with grease. On the far side of the harbour, the motor ferry for Catembe was filling with Africans who chattered gaily under their load of babies and bundles.
    Rohrbach beckoned to Johan and they moved on, making their way across to the Gorjao Quay, past the tugs and sloops and the sheds beside the big ships where the bustle of cargo work, the shouting of stevedores, the whirr of electric cranes and the puffing of shunting engines, shut out other sounds. They went down the line of ships, walking between the railway trucks, the heavy lift cranes and the cupola, past the coaling berths and cold store. The quay was clear here and they could see up river towards Matola. The German merchantmen were within half a mile. The ships looked bigger, darker, more menacing, thought Rohrbach, probably because they were the enemy. Men could be seen moving about their decks.
    There were four steamships and beyond them a sailing ship. The steamers’ names had been painted out, but they knew from the list Widmark had given them that one would be the Italian ship, the Gerusalemme , and the others the Germans. The old four-masted steamship was the Aller, the newer vessel with two masts and a single funnel the Dortmund, and the largest of the three, the only motor ship, was the Hagenfels . They watched her with curious unbelief. They’d talked about the ship so often, conjured up endless mental pictures of her and here she was at last.
    “Lucky they don’t know what’s cooking,” said Johan.
    “Come on,” Rohrbach started across the quay, “let’s see what these blokes know.”
    Some handline fishermen sat on the quayside, their legs reaching down towards the water. Rohrbach and le Roux made for them, walking at a leisurely pace, and once among them asked about the fishing.
    At the first three they drew blanks; either dumb stares or head shakes