Dark Star

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In the late autumn of1937,in the steady beat of North Sea rain that comes with dawn in that season, the tramp freighterNicaea stood at anchor off the Belgian city of Ostend. In the distance, a berthing tug made slow progress through the harbour swell, the rhythm of its engine distinct over the water, its amber running lights twin blurs in the darkness.

The Nicaea, 6,320 gross tonnes, of Maltese registry, had spent her first thirty years as a coastal steamer in the eastern Mediterranean, hauling every imaginable cargo from Latakia to Famagusta, back to Iskenderun, down toBeirat,north to Smyrna, then south to Sidon and Jaffa-thirty years of blistering summers and drizzling winters, trading and smuggling in equal proportion, occasionally enriching, more typically raining, a succession of owner syndicates as she herself was slowly rained by salt,rast,and a long line of engineers whose enthusiasm far exceeded their skill. Now, in her final years, she was chartered to Exportkhleb, the Soviet Union's grain-trading bureau, and she creaked and groaned sorrowfully to lie at anchor in such cold, northern seas.

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