Spargo shone his torch at the top of the rubble pile. It seemed to light up nothing, it was as if darkness swallowed the beam. Curious, he mounted the pile, dropping to all fours as he neared the top. The broken rock didn’t quite touch the roof of the tunnel; over the years it had settled and slumped to leave a narrow void like the slot of a letterbox. By leaning forwards and holding the torch at arm’s length he could see over the pile.
He expected his torch beam to light the roof or the walls on the other side of the collapse but there seemed to be nothing. He tried again, slithering forwards with his back against the tunnel roof and directing the torch beam in a different direction. Still he saw nothing. To make the gap bigger he shoved loose rocks through the gap and heard them tumble down the other side. It wasn’t long before he realised that if could loosen a few of the largest blocks and shove them through too, the gap would be wide enough to squeeze through.
He tried. Managed to get his head and shoulders into the gap. Managed, also, to drop the torch – his hands were wet and it was smeared with mud. The torch clattered down the rocks and went out.
Spargo told himself he didn’t need the torch. His imaginings were triggered not by darkness but by nearness to sleep – the time of night when thoughts ran wild and raised demons. Going back would be simple, he would slide down the pile and retrace his steps, keeping his head well down while he groped the adit sidewalls. On the way in he had seen no side turnings; the trip back to surface would be tedious but safe.
It wasn’t the thought of a torchless journey back to the cliff that made Spargo determined to get through the gap, it was simply that curiosity got the better of him. He was a mining man, and what he had seen on the other side of the collapse – or what he hadn’t seen, because the torch hadn’t lit anything at all – puzzled him. The possibility Bar might employ him made it even more important to see what was there. The more he could tell the man, the better.
If he could get his head and shoulders through the gap then the rest of him would follow and with luck his torch would still work and he would retrieve it. To widen the gap he removed more rocks. This time he pulled them towards him rather than pushed them through. Finally, when he was sure the gap was wide enough for him to slide through, he thrust himself forwards. It was a mistake. A protruding nub of rock in the roof tore against his side and unable to cope with the pain his body gave up. It was, Spargo thought in his last few seconds of consciousness, like lights in a shop at closing time, going off one by one.
The visions came to Spargo the way they always came – white ghosts walking, drifting past him, staring with unseeing eyes. As always he tried to run but his legs wouldn’t take him. He tried to hide. Tried to pretend they weren’t there.
Though the visions lasted only minutes, to him it was more like hours. Groaning, he came round slowly. Remembering where he was he groaned again. The pain in his side was now a dull throb but there were other pains, pains in his back, his legs and his arms. Exhausted, he lay still. He wanted to sleep. Wanted to lie there for ever.
It was time to get out. Slowly, taking care not to make contact again with the wedge of rock, he eased himself backwards. The gap was tight and his jacket rucked up, he couldn’t slip back, nor could he reach back to straighten it because to get through the gap he had stretched out both arms ahead of him. Like a fish on a barbed hook, the more he struggled the tighter he stuck. Reluctantly he realised there was only one way to go and he slithered, snake-like, through the gap and down the other side.
For the first time since he entered the adit he was able to stand upright. He took advantage of the space to stretch his arms, his legs and his back. He groped for his torch and when he found it he thumped it. It came on and its beam lit, albeit dimly, a cavern the size of a small house. He was in one of the mine’s old stopes – one of the huge underground voids left by the miners after they’d mined out the ore.
Conscious of the need to check dangers Spargo held the torch high, darting its beam across the stope’s roof and walls. The adit he had come down continued in the opposite wall as a much larger, square shaped tunnel, a mine drive twice his height. Returning to the surface without walking on into drive didn’t enter his mind. So far, all he could tell Bar was that the way into the mine was blocked by a collapse that could be moved easily. And then what? He needed to know.
He crossed the floor of the stope and entered the drive. Like the adit, it sloped gently downwards. Hoping to get more light from the torch he rubbed its glass with his jacket but the more he rubbed the dirtier it became. The dirt on the glass cast blurred shadows, and what had seemed like a good light in the adit now seemed faint and dim. He was taking risks now; if his torch failed he could well be in trouble; venturing underground with one source of light was a real no-no. He had broken so many rules, he was so unprepared.
He had only taken a few steps into the drive when he paused. Again, the echoes weren’t right. His footsteps, instead of sounding hollow and booming, were flat and mute, but in the torch’s dim light he saw nothing to trouble him. Then something, he didn’t know what, made him stop and he pointed the torch down. Six feet in front of him there was no tunnel floor.
The first miners at Kilcreg mined ore from mineral veins they followed through the rock. Later they learned the mineral they wanted was not just in the veins, it was also throughout the rock in small grains. To recover it they removed huge masses of rock, and in doing so they cut through old workings. Once-safe tunnels then ended unexpectedly, high up in the sides of great underground voids. Spargo, it seemed, had reached one of these subterranean death traps.
This was the end. If the crates had been brought this far into the mine then it was not to hide them, it was to destroy them. He took a shuffling step forwards. Then another and another, moving closer to the edge as drawn by a magnet. Dark underground voids can do that, you get close and you want to look down. To steady himself he moved to one of the side walls, reached out with his free hand and touched it with outstretched fingers. With his other hand he pointed the torch down, and although the weak beam appeared to light nothing at all, it seemed to throw shadows. He wiped the glass on his jacket and pointed the beam upwards. The tunnel roof was there but the walls seemed to continue into the void. It made no sense at all.
Concerned he was hallucinating, he blinked to clear his eyes. Bad air poisons you slowly, it affects your brain, slowing your reasoning. Spargo had been so concerned with the state of the roof and walls he hadn’t thought about air. On the other side of the blockage he’d had fresh, clean air. Here it lacked oxygen.
The only clear thought in Spargo’s head was that he was too close to the edge. He knew he had to step back but he realised, as his legs crumpled beneath him, that he no longer had control over his movements. Grabbing pointlessly at the wall he toppled forwards, into blackness.
CHAPTER
FORTY-FIVE
CONDITIONS IN U-1500 ARE GRIM. In the day it runs submerged and at night it runs on the surface where it is propelled by its diesels, replenishing air in its tanks and recharging its batteries. To do this it runs at schnörkel depth, a clever device that is, perhaps, not so clever. If the boat runs at more than a few knots there is a risk of bending the schnörkel’s steel tubes. If the tubes are bent the boat cannot submerge.
Tides run fast through the Pentland Firth. If Theo gets his timing right then deep water currents will carry his boat through. In the control room he sits at the scope with his eyes on the coast. They are not yet near the Firth; they have a long way to go.
‘You are submerged, Kapitänleutnant.’
A self-evident truth from Roth. He has come up behind Theo, spook-like. Theo tries to ignore him but the man hovers close. He touches the grey steel of the periscope.
‘May I?’
The request is hard to resist. Theo imagines Roth squatting on the pads, his pig-eyes seeing a coast that can only be Scotland. He imagines him checking the charts and that must not happen. Unwinding himself from
the column he stands in Roth’s way. Someone, like before, hits a switch. The periscope slides down between deck-plates.
‘About to submerge, Sturmbannführer. Silent running. Passing through enemy-patrolled waters.’
‘And these waters are?’
Unsure what to say Theo hides his anxiety. He wasn’t expecting this interest. Hidden in his cabin is a plot of their true course, a clear cellophane overlay that he alone sees – and that he alone updates regularly.
There is another chart on the control room’s chart table. Roth goes to it and stands behind navigator Rydel, who crouching over it drawing fine lines in blue Chinagraph pencil. Theo can hardly believe what he is seeing.
‘So this is our course, Volker?’ Roth asks, touching the fine line on the sheet. ‘This is the route in our orders?’
Theo’s mind runs in circles. It is almost unbelievable that he, Theodor Volker, has failed to anticipate that Roth might want to inspect the charts. It is even more unbelievable that Rydel has been stupid enough to take the chart from his cabin and expose it to view.
‘This place,’ Roth asks. ‘Where is this?’
Rydel responds. ‘Your orders, Sturmbannführer. I cannot comment.’
Roth swivels on his heel and stares hard at Theo. Theo looks at the chart, becomes transfixed by it. It is a new chart, one he’s not seen before. And it is a false chart. The course Rydel has plotted on it follows the one in Theo’s orders.
‘Here,’ Theo says quickly, pointing to the end of the short, fine blue line. ‘You can see our progress.’
Roth is tapping a finger on the cellophane overlay.
‘I asked what is this place, Kapitän, not where we are. I can see where we are.’
‘Scotland.’ Theo says. ‘These are the Shetland Islands. Our course takes us well north of them.’
‘I am aware of that.’
Roth’s fat finger traces the blue line. At each change of course there are points, each marked with a time. Everything is false; if they were following the correct course it would have been impossible to have travelled that far in such a short time. Roth inspects closely and nods his approval.
‘Very good. I shall retire to my quarters. You will call me when you next decide to surface.’
With a dull click of heels the man leaves. Theo stares at the map overlay. It is a complete work of fiction. Then he stares at Rydel. The face looks so young, so innocent. It blushes.
They run deep for an hour. The sound man sits nervously, headphones clamped to his ears and fingers on dials, turning and fine-tuning as he seeks far off sounds. At intervals Chief Engineer Lange stops the motors so the sound man can hear clearly.
Again at periscope depth, Theo scans the scene. They are thirty kilometres from the coast. Though much too far to the north to be seen is the Isle of Orkney and its Scapa Flow base. He is uneasy. He sees no boats, no patrols. Does this mean the waters ahead of him are mined? Have the British have changed their safe channels?
In the aft tube room Peter is awake. The boy is sitting up but looks sickly and pale. Theo sits beside him on the bunk and asks how he feels and if he wants food. The boy says nothing.
‘I have not used the tablet,’ Lewandowski says. ‘He has slept. He has been so quiet that I worry, Kapitän. I know he is sick, his eyes are strange, he does not focus them. I gave him thin oatmeal and he brought it all up.’
Theo shakes his head. The voyage has hardly started. If Peter is like this now, what will he be like in a month? Or in three?
A cook in the galley bundles long loaves in his arms, struggles with them to the Petty Officers’ space and dumps them on a makeshift table. Ten places are set, five a side. The cook has already brought fried eggs, fried bacon and sausage – a meal the Bosun calls The Enemy’s Breakfast. There is coffee, of sorts, made from god-knows-what. Rumoured to be burnt acorns.
Theo arrives at the table, reaches for a loaf and breaks off a large piece. Chief Engineer Lange is seated there, eating.
‘Have you seen Roth, Chief?’
‘A couple of hours ago, Kapitän. He was throwing up. He does not like the sea.’
They talk, joking and laughing. Lange speaks some English, as does Theo. Theo makes a joke that is a play on English words and they both laugh. To their surprise, so does Rydel.
Theo says, ‘You speak English?’
Rydel hesitates before answering. Laughing was foolish and careless.
‘I speak a little.’
Lange laughs again. ‘Don’t let Herr Roth hear you. He will have you shot as a spy.’
It is a poor joke and there is no more laughter. Theo exchanges glances with Lange and mumbles his oft-made comment that walls have ears. Even the walls of tin fish. After their meal Theo ushers Rydel to his cabin and closes the door. He looks the navigator in the eye and speaks quietly.
‘That course you were plotting. It had false entries, false positions. It was wrong of me to confide in you that I am deviating from the set course but you are the navigating officer, I had no choice. The responsibility is mine and mine alone and I cannot allow you to falsify documents, however well-intentioned your actions. From now on I shall navigate, I will update your charts. If Sturmbannführer Roth asks why you are no longer navigating then refer him to me.’
Navigator Rydel saved Theo’s skin, Theo knows that. But it was a clear breach of regulations he cannot condone, he dare not collude with juniors, however well-meaning. Nor can he bring himself to ask why the man put himself at such great risk.
As Rydel leaves Theo’s cabin, Roth appears. The cooks are clearing away plates and the man barges through the Petty Officer’s space like an uncaged gorilla, shoving and cursing.
‘The stink!’ he yells. ‘I will not tolerate such an appalling stench for one moment longer!’ He sees Theo. ‘Kapitänleutnant, I demand your attention! Do not walk away from me!’
Theo turns and glares.
‘Volker, this stench pervades my quarters, it turns my stomach!’
‘My cooks are cooking breakfast, Herr Sturmbannführer. My men need their food.’
‘I cannot believe you would have allowed such foul air to permeate the quarters had it been occupied by the Reichsmar – ’
Roth cuts himself off mid-word. All crewmen within earshot turn and stare. Until now the reasons for the strange configuration of their boat, the absence of armaments and the new cabins in the bow tube room have puzzled them. Now they have new information. Roth has been indiscreet and he knows it.
‘You will come at once,’ he says to Theo, no longer shouting. ‘You will come to my quarters. You will breathe the foul stench.’
Theo obeys. The air everywhere, in the gangway, the tube room and the cabins, is poor. But no worse than normal.
‘You see?’ Roth says. ‘These cabins stink like sewers. The ventilation does not work. You will have it checked and repaired immediately.’
Theo places a hand near the air vent near the bunk and feels a breeze of cool air.
‘It is working properly, Sturmbannführer. We are partly submerged so the air is not good. I have more pressing problems to deal with. I have a fault with one of my engines and its repairs must take precedence.’
‘Your vessel disgusts me. And your men, Volker! They stink like peasants!’
‘There is water for drinking and cooking. There is little to spare for washing.’
‘I do not want your excuses, I want actions. There is another thing that disturbs me. I have seen one of your officers fraternising with a common seamen.’
‘Fraternising, Sturmbannführer?’
‘I have seen them in conversation, talking socially. I have seen your navigating officer, that man Rydel, talking with the man Lewandowski who works on the engines. Talking in Polish, Volker! Is the navy now so weak you recruit immigrant peasants?’
‘I believe they are from the same town, from Rostock, which I am sure you know is now in Greater Germany, Sturmbannführer. We are on a small boat and we all have a common enemy
to defeat. It is difficult for my men not to… as you say… fraternise.’
‘With Polish scum?’
‘The Führer has called on all Aryan peoples to help overcome our adversaries, I am sure you are aware of that. You must also be aware the military has many Polish divisions.’
‘Of course. But it is the duty of all officers of the Reich to control and correct these lesser races.’
While they talk, Theo takes the opportunity to inspect the cabins. He attempts to distinguish the smells, sniffing vents and gratings the way a winemaster might check wine. Though they are mainly odours from cooking he detects amongst them the smell of the waste tank in the bilges. The bilges are vented to carry away methane – an explosive and dangerous gas – but the smell isn’t strong. He wonders how Roth would have coped on Theo’s last command, when the discharge pump failed and the sewage tank overflowed into the bilges. Even he, who thought he was used to such things, felt wretched.
Theo turns to leave. ‘I will do what I can.’
‘The details of this will be entered in my report, this fraternising, this stink, and your lax approach to discipline.’
‘You must do what you must do.’
‘And you must do something to stop this steel cesspit from rolling from side to side.’
Theo nods sharply and attempts a click of heels, knowing his soft leather boots will remain silent. He walks away, wondering who will read the man’s report. Does Roth really believe they will return to Germany? And if they do, does he believe there will be anything of Germany left?’
Theo knows about these things. Back at the dockyard Walter was less than discrete, he spent time with colleagues who confided that key government departments had moved out of Berlin and that the Soviets had reached the River Oder, faced there by divisions commanded by SS Reichsführer Peter Himmler – Hitler’s evil spirit – a man with no military training. What was it Walter said when they were standing together in the dockyard?
‘Either the man has hidden talents or our country is doomed…’
The Man Who Played Trains: The gripping new thriller from the author of Playpits Park Page 49