The U-19's Last Kill

by Jack Finney

  For several seconds I sat studying his face and eyes, then I knew he was serious. “All right, Vic,” I said quietly, “cut out the build-up; I don’t need it. What the devil are you talking about?”

  He leaned still farther toward me and spoke almost in a whisper. “About one and a half million dollars, Hugh; two hundred and fifty thousand apiece, tax-free. More money than you’ll ever get your hands on in any other way.”

  Again I watched him, studying his eyes; then I sat back in the booth. “And what way is that?”

  He shook his head, sitting back too. “I can’t tell you now; not till we know you’re pretty well interested.”

  “Then we’ve run out of conversation, Vic, because I’m not.”

  “Why?”

  “A million and a half dollars”—I smiled—“that you need a submarine to get, and it’s all a big secret. Whatever you’re doing, Vic, it’s illegal, isn’t it? A crime.”

  “Sure.” He nodded. “Technically, anyway I don’t think it’s really a crime, and I don’t think you or anyone else would either. But legally it is; get caught, and you’ll go to prison, and for a long, time. You might even get killed; it’s dangerous too.”

  I smiled. “You still selling me, Vic, or you talking me out of it now?”

  “Still selling you, Hugh.” He smiled back “We’ve got four or five possible guys on our list for the sixth man, but you’re the one we want. I’m glad I ran into you today, but I’d have located you one way or another; I’m pretty sure you’re the guy we want, and I’ll tell you why.” For several moments he was silent, staring at me, then he said quietly, “There’s a word you don’t hear much any more, Hugh; not spoken seriously, anyway. It’s out of style, and you’re supposed to smile when you say it. You know what the word is?” His eyes went somber, and again he leaned forward, his voice dropping. “It’s ‘adventure,’ and you hardly hear or see it any more, except in the titles of books for boys. But myself, I still like the word; I still like what it means. Why, hell”—he threw himself back in the booth—“today even college boys talk security!” Vic leaned closer to me, his voice a murmur. “But you’re not like that, Hugh, and that’s why I’m talking to you now. I don’t think you’re willing to grow up into a man and then settle for life in the suburbs. I’m not!” He glared at me.

  For several moments, his nostrils flaring, his eyes bright, Vic sat staring at me. Then he sat back and said quietly, “And that’s all I can tell you now, Hugh. All I can promise you, now or ever, is this: Decide to come in with us, and you’ll be scared to death, and with darned good reason. And you may end up dead—or regretting it forever.” His eyes wide, he was staring past me. “But you’ll have a good time,” he murmured, “the kind you were made for.” His hand suddenly clenched to a fist, and now his eyes focused on me again. “You’ll have a good time,” he repeated more loudly, “the best there is. With a chance of making a quarter or a million dollars to boot!”

  I looked up at Vic again, and he said softly, “What do you say, Hugh? Are you interested?”

  I smiled at him sardonically. “No,” I said and leaned toward him. “Because you know what this sounds like to me? Whatever it is? Like something four or five guys sitting around over a few drinks might have dreamed up and got all excited about. Sunken treasure maybe, or something of that sort, which sounds like fun; adventure maybe, but it sounds unreal, even childish; and if you say different, you’ve got to convince me.”

  “And if we did, what then?” I didn’t answer immediately, and Vic said softly, “You’d be interested then, wouldn’t you, Hugh? You like money, don’t you? You’d like a lot of it, wouldn’t you? How’d you like to sail on the Queen Mary first class?”

  I was irritated—I don’t like to be sold anything; I don’t like being handled or managed, the way Vic had been trying to; and I spoke the truth besides. “I wouldn’t give a damn for it,” I said. “I don’t care if I never sailed on the Mary or any other ship, first class or tenth.” For the first time Vic looked defeated, puzzled. I leaned forward, grinning. “But I’d like two hundred and fifty thousand dollars,” I said gently. “Boy, how I’d like it. And do you know what I’d do with it, Vic?” He sat staring at me and shook his head. “Nothing,” I said. “I wouldn’t spend a lousy dime of it.”

  The waitress brought our sandwiches and coffee then, and we each sat back, watching her set them, with the silverware, on the table. Then I picked up my sandwich and leaned toward Vic again. “A lot of people think this and say this, Vic, but they wouldn’t really do it. I would, though; I wouldn’t spend that money. I’d buy Government bonds with it, at banks and post offices here and there. And at only three per cent interest, it would give me seventy-five hundred dollars a year for the rest of my life, and my family’d have it after me—I wouldn’t even need life insurance. For that, Vic, I’d do almost anything—not for the lousy two hundred and fifty thousand dollars, but for the seventy-five hundred it would bring me each year.”

  I was silent for a moment, then I took a sip of coffee and said, “That’s all I want, Vic; that’s all money means to me. But I’d give plenty for that; I’d do almost anything. Now, what’s it all about?”

  “Come and see for yourself,” he said, grinning and exuberant again. “Meet the others, size them up, and let them size you up, those who don’t already know you. And if they suit you and you suit them, you’ll find out all about it.”

  “And when would that be?”

  “Tomorrow; we’re ready to start, Hugh, and we’re pressed for time.”

  I took another sip of coffee, then said, “If I do, Vic, I’ll decide for myself just how technical this crime is and how much sense your scheme makes. And if I don’t like the sound of it, I’m out.”

  “Sure.” Vic put down his sandwich and dusted the crumbs from his palms. “One thing, though; if you didn’t come in with us, we’d have to trust you to keep your mouth shut. We could do that, couldn’t we, Hugh? You’d better be sure we could.” After a moment I nodded, and Vic said, “Well, then. Tomorrow’s Sunday. Can you meet me in Penn Station around ten o’clock, at the main information booth?”

  “Sure,” I said to Vic. “I’ll be there.”

  TO BE CONTINUED

  It was the strangest crime ever conceived—and the strangest weapon.

  That Frank Lauffnauer was able to find the old U-19 again was a miracle. For the little sub, whose existence was known only to him, lay hidden under 100 feet of water off Fire Island. Here Lauffnauer, as a young German sailor, had abandoned her in 1918. Even more surprising, however, was the Tact that the sub appeared still to be watertight. Thus there was a chance, Lauffnauer thought, of operating her again and of making her part of his incredible plan.

  Later Vic DeRossier, now in league with Lauffnauer, sought out Hugh Brittain, who had served with Vic on a U.S. Navy submarine. Without disclosing the plan, Vic tried to tempt Hugh to join the mysterious venture. Would Hugh like a share of a million and a half dollars? Would he like to sail on a sub again? Intrigued, Hugh agreed to meet Vic’s accomplices.

  II

  We walked in silence for a quarter of a mile along the beach at Fire Island. We hadn’t said much on the way, either, but just read the Sunday paper, occasionally exchanging sections of it.

  Then I looked down at Vic beside me. He was wearing blue denims and work shirt. I wore a white shirt and gray wash pants. “You haven’t said anything about who I’m going to meet here, Vic.”

  He looked up at me. “No.”

  “You want to watch my reactions when I meet them cold.”

  He nodded. “We thought it might be a good idea. I was on the phone with them last night, to say you were coming.”

  “All right.” I nodded. “That’s all right with me, but you’d have found out what I think anyway. I don’t consider this a social call. Vic; no occasion for politeness or pretense. A million and a half bucks with a darn good chance of death or prison instead is serious. You’ll find out what I think, all
of you, precisely and in clear detail.”

  “O.K., Hugh.” He smiled up at me. “Don’t get huffy.”

  “Sure,” I said, “But don’t treat me like a kid, either. Now, just exactly where are we going?”

  He pointed to a gray-shingled cottage some two hundred yards ahead; one of an endless row of almost identical houses just back of the low dunes. “Right there. We’ve rented the place for a month.”

  I stared at the open porch of the little cottage ahead. A man sat on the railing, and as we walked along the smooth, damp sand toward him, I narrowed my eyes, and within a few dozen more steps I could begin to make out his features. He was about fifty, I thought, though I learned later he was older, and his face was thin, the cheeks cutting in very sharply under the cheekbones, and grooved with two straight lines angling down from the base of his nose. There was a stern dignity about the man, and I felt he was, or had once been, somebody.

  Now—we were a dozen yards from the steps—he stood up from the railing and smiled at us very pleasantly, his eyes friendly and pleased, and I suddenly felt that I was going to like him. From the corner of my eyes I saw Vic smile: he’d been watching my face, and when he spoke I could tell from his voice that he was relieved at my reaction. “Come on down, will you, Frank?” he called to the man on the porch, “And bring the others,” Turning to me, he said, “Let’s sit out here in the sun, O.K.?” and I nodded.

  We sat down on the sand in front of the house, and a moment or so later a woman in a black bathing suit and a man in maroon trunks, carrying a folded beach umbrella, walked out of the house and came down the porch steps toward us. The man’s face was hidden by the orange folds of the umbrella, but I could see the woman clearly; she was young, oliveskinned and had a magnificent, widehipped figure. Her face wasn’t pretty, but it was striking, memorable—the nose small and delicately hooked with a perfectly even curve, the brows wide and arched and dead black, as was her hair, coiled in two tight braids on top of her head. Her eyes, as she stared at my face, studying me frankly, were big and black. In her black bathing suit she was a stunning sight, and Vic was grinning.

  “Rosa,” he said, as the girl stopped before us, looking at me without smiling, “this is Hugh Brittain. This is Mrs. Lucchesi, Hugh,” and I spoke and smiled.

  “Hello, sucker,” she said in a soft, surprisingly low-toned voice; then she smiled suddenly, a flashing, wonderfully friendly smile, taking the sling out of what she’d said, and, as I got to my feet, took my hand. “You are crazy, like the rest of us?” she said, and I realized she had a faint foreign accent; Italian, I supposed.

  “Not yet,” I said, smiling down at her. “I haven’t joined the club; so far I’m just looking, not buying.”

  She smiled and sat down then, and I turned toward the man with the umbrella. He was planting it in the sand beside us; then he unfurled it, and now I saw his face—and knew I’d seen it somewhere before. For a moment he stood looking at me, a corner of his mouth curling in a wry little smile. Then he said. “Hi, lieutenant,” and I stared at him and could not think who he was.

  He was probably thirty-two years old, short, quite dark, his chest very thick and black with hair, a strong, heavily muscled, but very lithe man. His face, though, was beginning to round a little with fat, and I knew he was heavier—thicker in the middle—than when I’d seen him last. “Moreno,” he said then, his voice contemptuous of my failure to remember his name. As he spoke, he pushed a hand forward with an easy roll of one shoulder.

  “Yeah.” I shook his hand perfunctorily and dropped it. “I remember now; torpedoman, first class, weren’t you? And not on my ship at all; no particular reason why I should remember you, is there?” and I smiled at him.

  “No. No reason,” he said, smiling at me a little mockingly as he sat down on the sand beside the girl. “But I remember you, lieutenant.”

  I didn’t answer—I wasn’t here to bicker and act the kid—and I sat down on the sand, smiling at the girl across from me because I had the sudden feeling it would annoy Moreno. She smiled back, but faintly, her eyes amused, knowing exactly what I was doing, and I grinned.

  “Rosa is a relative of Ed,” Vic said, nodding at Moreno, which didn’t explain anything to me, but I didn’t question him, because now the man I’d first seen on the porch came out of the house and walked down the steps toward us. He smiled, plodding through the dry sand, and I started to get to my feet again, but he wagged a hand at me. “Stay where you are,” he said pleasantly, and sat down on the sand a yard from Moreno. Vic was beside me to the right, lying back on one elbow in his denims and blue work shirt. Moreno sat opposite him, cross-legged on the sand. Rosa, beside him, lay back on the sand on an elbow now, one goodlooking knee raised, watching us all with amused interest.

  “This is Hugh Brittain,” Vic said to the new man, then he turned to me. “Frank Lauffnauer,” he said.

  “Glad to know you,” Lauffnauer said, smiling and leaning forward from the waist to extend his hand.

  “Glad to know you,” I said as we shook hands, and in that instant I decided it would be me who’d open the meeting, and that whatever I said would be abrupt and challenging. I spoke immediately, taking the floor before anyone else could begin. “You a navy man, Frank?” I said.

  “Highest-ranking man here,” Moreno said casually, but instantly. He was trying to take the initiative away from me, I knew, but I didn’t give him the chance.

  “What rank?” I said, and Lauffnauer folded his arms across his chest, regarding me pleasantly.

  “Commander,” he answered, and something in the way he pronounced the word struck a spark of recognition in my mind, and I realized something else that had been simmering in sonic part of my brain. “Glad to know you.” he’d said a few moments ago, and now I realized that he’d pronounced “glad” almost, though not quite, as though the d had been followed by a t. And now the C in “commander” had been slightly stressed, as though in his mind the word was spelled with a k.

  “What navy was that, Frank?” I said.

  “German.” he answered, his tone confirming that he understood I knew he would say this; and the G in “German” came out a “Ch.”

  Moreno said, “You know, lieutenant, we might have a question or two ourselves. If you don’t mind.”

  “Yeah. Hugh.” Vic said easily and conciliatingly. “We’ll brief you thoroughly on everyone here; and there’s still a fifth man in the house. But first——”

  “It’s all right, Vic . . . Ed,” Lauffnauer said, wagging a palm at them, then folding his arms again. “He should ask all he wishes to know. It is quite right; and we should understand each other. I think Hugh and I will be friends.”

  In a dead monotone, giving no weight or emphasis to any of the words, I said. “Were you a Nazi?”

  He moved one arm, palm upward, in what amounted to a shrug, then folded them across his chest again. “I am never sure, in this country, what people mean when they ask that.” he answered. “Was I a member or the National Socialist Party of Germany?” he continued “No, I was not. But did I fight in the armed forces of Germany under the rule or the Nazi Party? Yes, of course. And did I hate Adolf Hitler?” Again, with a slight move of one shoulder, he shrugged. “Not at first,” he said quietly, “not before the war.”

  He put his hands on his thighs and leaned toward me, eyes narrowed and intent on my face. “When I was a young man, Mr. Brittain, back home finally, in the early 1920’s, a veteran of the first war, honorably discharged, things were—difficult in Germany. More so than I think you may know. Jobs were most hard to find: the pay very low; and often I did not eat at all, and seldom enough. But when Hitler became Reichschancellor”—he pronounced it “Reich-kunslur,” as well as I can reproduce it—“things changed. Then I worked; then I even got more schooling. I became a student at a German school for submarine men—secretly, for the Treaty of Versailles forbade it, as it forbade a great many things which kept Germany hungry during my youth. But under Hitler I becam
e an officer—me, a former enlisted man. Hitler concerned me, Mr. Brittain, for I truly do not like fanatics of any kind. But still”—again he shrugged—“I ate, I had dignity again, I became an officer in the navy. And I did not hate Hitler at first.”

  I nodded “And so you became a submarine commander?”

  “In time. For over three years of the war I only trained others. I commanded a U-boat for just over five months, before the war ended.”

  “Sink many ships?” I said pleasantly.

  “Four. And hit two others.”

  “Were any of them American?” I said it softly, smiling at him.

  “No,” he said, “as it happened, none. I sank four merchant ships, three of them British, one of them Greek. I torpedoed an English grain vessel, completely disabling, but not sinking it; it was my last torpedo, and I returned to base at Kiel. And so, Mr. Brittain, yes, I was a submarine commander. And I did what submarine commanders do in wartime. I fought on the wrong side, true, Mr. Brittain, all Germans say this now, and a very great many of them lie, but not all; I did not know—I was in the navy throughout the war, and I simply did not know or the terrible things Germans were doing in occupied Europe. I truly did not, and when you come to know me, you will believe me.”

  I believed him now. Here, a yard away from me, smiling, was a former German submarine commander; yet there was no monocle in his eye, and he hadn’t once shouted, Achtung!

  “Well”—I looked around the group—“any more navies represented?”

  “One,” Moreno said shortly. He was sitting up now, and I could see he’d had enough of my taking over, and he muttered something I couldn’t make out, which was probably a good thing. Glancing up at the house, he called, “Linc!” and we all turned and sat staring at the door. A tall, thin Negro in gray wash slacks, black sweater and a white shirt open at the collar came strolling out onto the porch, eating an apple. As he came down the steps, smiling, and walked toward us across the sand, I saw that his brown eyes, deep-set under his brows, were wise and intelligent; just now they looked a little amused. I got to my feet as he stopped beside us, and Vic said, “This is Lincoln Langley, Hugh; usually called Linc . . . Hugh Brittain, Linc,” and we each said something and shook hands.