The telescope swept the waterway. The bow of the long, low-lying freighter sailed into view. The ship was churning from right to left. Tomlinson flicked the telescope just to the right to keep the ship in view. The stern came into full view. From it fluttered a horizontally divided red-white-black flag with the so-called eagle of Saladin in the middle of the white stripe. Tomlinson picked up the phone. "Gibraltar Lookout to HMS Sabre." "HMS Sabre. Go ahead, Gibraltar." "We've got an Egyptian freighter entering the channel. Can't make out the name on the stern. I'll leave that one to you, ole boy." "Roger that, Gibraltar. We are on it." HMS Sabre The Straits of Gibraltar Lieutenant Stephen Stacks, commanding officer of the HMS Sabre, scrambled his four-man crew. Within minutes, the patrol boat was cutting through the waters at Gibraltar Harbor. Flash message traffic indicated that Britain's closest ally was on the hunt for an Egyptian freighter, the Al Alamein, and that such freighter might try escaping the Mediterranean either via the Suez Canal or the Straits of Gibraltar.
