Convoy to Atlantis

by William P. McGivern

  "We have barely tapped the potentialities of submarine warfare. In this base with its limitless unexplored possibilities we will create a fleet of such strength that no nation in the world will venture its ships on the Atlantic without our authority."

  The impact of the captain's words was almost physical. Brick thought of the thousands of American seamen who would be steaming into the Atlantic lanes, secure in the belief that the British had the German submarine menace throttled with their destroyer blockade of Northern ports and bases.

  Even as the horror of this swept over him he was able to wonder, with a curious detachment, why the force of this German base had not been unleashed before on the stream of American ships carrying supplies to Britain. What motive did they have for holding back, practically encouraging America by their passivity to take still greater risks and send more and greater convoys into the Atlantic?

  The captain's voice interrupted his thoughts.

  * Early in 1941 it was reported that the Nazis were preparing a vast submarine campaign, and were constructing hundreds, perhaps even thousands, of undersea boats. For a time, Germany launched its entire submarine fleet at convoys off Scotland, and in the North Sea, and off Gibraltar, and losses were terrible. Yet, these were the giant subs of the Nazi fleet, and they were soon recalled. When the British heard of the pocket-subs, with their meager cruising radius, they scoffed, because it was obvious that they were only coastal craft, and could constitute no menace in the Atlantic. But they did not suspect that these craft were intended for a base far at sea, and under it!—Ed.

  "For years we have been working secretly in the development of this base. Pumping out the halls of one of the ancient cities of Atlantis to create harbors and locks for our fleet. Now that job is over, but we have not as yet utilized many of the vast unexplored regions of Atlantis. Even so we are ready now to wage the war that will win us the final victory in the battle of the Atlantic."

  Before Brick could reply a guttural German voice blasted into the room, seeming literally to fill it with its volume. The voice seemed to emanate above him, and glancing up he saw a loud speaker. The voice continued on for perhaps thirty seconds and then, abruptly, it stopped. Brick didn't understand German, but it was apparent from the inflection of the speaker that some announcement had been made.

  A tense, pregnant silence followed.

  The captain and the four guards stood rigidly at attention, right arms outthrust in the Nazi salute.

  "What is it?" Brick asked, puzzled.

  "Der Fuehrer!" the Captain barked. "Quiet!"

  CHAPTER IV

  The silence held for perhaps another minute. The only sound in the room was the breathing of the men. Pop stuck his hands in his pocket and leaned against the wall. With elaborate indifference he cleared his throat and spat contemptuously on the floor.

  Brick seated himself on the cot and waited.

  Within a few seconds the silence was shattered by a high strident voice. For the next ten minutes the voice drowned out all sound in the room, its pitch alternating from a screaming crescendo down to a hoarse fanatical whisper.

  The captain and the guards remained at statuesque attention, their faces shining and triumphant as the dominating voice of Hitler blasted through the loud speaker.

  Then, suddenly, it was all over. The echoes of the voice died in the room and the arms of the Germans dropped to their sides.

  The captain turned a flushed face to Brick.

  "The warning to our enemies has been repeated," he said gloatingly. "Indo-China has fallen to our loyal ally, Japan. French Dakar but 1300 miles from the Western Hemisphere is in our hands. Our friends in South America have not been inactive. Brazil is ready to receive us. Outposts such as the Philippines and the Cape Verde Islands will soon be welded into the chain of encirclement our Fuehrer is forging. A gigantic pincer movement is developing, but some nations are still too stupid to recognize its outlines."

  "You're forgetting the U.S. Navy," Brick said grimly. "Also you're overlooking the British fleet."

  The captain smiled. One of the guards laughed outright.

  "Oh, no," the captain said sarcastically. "We wouldn't be so impolite as that. Our plans include them too. We wouldn't slight them for the world."

  He moved to the door, then turned and smiled at Brick.

  "It is a pity you do not understand German," he said mockingly. "If you did you wouldn't be so rude as to accuse us of neglecting the great navies of America and Britain."

  With a sarcastic bow he stepped through the door, followed by the four guards. They were all smiling broadly.

  Then the door slammed behind them and Brick and Pop were alone.

  "What's the joke?" Pop demanded belligerently.

  "I wish I knew," Brick said worriedly. "The only thing I'm sure of is that there's nothing funny about it."

  Pop stamped across the room and sat down on the other bunk.

  "We got to get out of here," he said fiercely. "Got to do something about this set-up."

  Brick buried his face wearily in his hands. Despair was a strange emotion to him but it was creeping over him now. It was maddening to sit helplessly by while his country faced a menace that was so horrible in its potentialities. There had been a vicious threat behind the captain's suave references to the British and American fleets. But what kind of a threat? What trap was being rigged and baited for them?

  Even if he knew all the details, what could he do? How could he warn them? The two of them were pitifully insignificant against the might of manpower the Germans had available at the base.

  Their efforts would be about as effective as pebbles thrown at a battleship. That was the maddening thing. They were so completely, utterly helpless.

  "Well?" Pop demanded. "What are we going to do?"

  Brick lifted his head from his hands. His gray eyes were as hard as sunlight on burnished steel.

  "I don't know yet," he said softly. "But we're going to make one helluva try before we give up."

  "Atta keed," Pop crowed.

  They examined their rooms thoroughly. Even the small lavatory was painstakingly scoured, but they were forced to admit that any escape from this cell was practically impossible.

  The next day, and the days that followed, they memorized the time of the arrival of their meals. They were served three times a day, plentifully. But two guards stood in the room with guns drawn while they ate. The utensils given them were carefully removed after they had eaten. They cleaned their own cell, made their own beds. Their only contact with the men of the base was at meal time when they were served by a surly, gnome-like fellow in a white uniform, and closely watched by the two guards.

  The monotony of the routine was practically unbearable. But worse than that was their feeling of complete futility and helplessness. They knew from various indications that something big was approaching. The tension was apparent in the faces of their guards, in the sounds of riveting and hammering that kept up twenty-four hours straight. The entire base was preparing itself.

  But for what?

  "I'm goin' bats," Pop snapped for the dozenth time. "Lemme tell you, these krautheads are up to something. I can smell it in the air."

  That day Hitler spoke again. There seemed to be an additionally frenzied quality even in his voice. For fifteen minutes he spoke, dramatically and frantically.

  "Blasted madman," Pop muttered. "Can't even talk English like a civilized person. Besides, he said all this before. I'm sorry I understand the language!"

  Brick grinned, but as he listened to the shrill, fanatically determined voice flooding through the room, his smile faded. There was nothing funny about Hitler. Hitler was very, very unfunny.

  He thought of the thousands of men throughout the huge base standing rigidly at attention, listening to his every syllable as if it were originating from God himself.

  It was then that the idea crawled into the back of his head.

  It was a germ of a thought at first as whimsically fan
tastic as anything he could imagine. For a few seconds he toyed with it idly, carelessly. Then he forgot about it.

  But in a few minutes it was back, sticking persistently and doggedly in his mind. He turned the idea over then, exploring its possibilities. Or rather its impossibilities.

  It was hopelessly absurd. To risk two lives on anything so flimsy and uncertain was almost as ridiculous as the idea itself.

  He swung his legs off the cot and began pacing worriedly.

  "What's the matter?" Pop asked.

  "Nothing," he said, "Nothing at all."

  "Spill it," Pop said quietly.

  Brick continued to pace the room in silence. Finally he said:

  "It's a screwy idea that just hit me. It's crazy as hell, but it won't go away." He paused for an instant, then walked quietly to the barred door and peered into the corridor. Satisfied he stepped back to Pop. "It's something that might spring us out of this cell, at least."

  Pop reacted excitedly. He sprang to his feet and grabbed his arm.

  "Are you kidding?" he demanded fiercely.

  "I was never more serious in my life," Brick said quietly.

  "Then what're we waiting for?"

  "It's a thousand to one shot," Brick answered.

  "I never knew you to figure odds before," Pop said hotly.

  Brick sat down on his cot and stared at the floor.

  "I'm not worrying about us," he said. "It's just that if we fail this time we'll never get another chance. I'm trying to make sure that this scheme of mine is the only chance we've got."

  "Well stop being mysterious," Pop said irritably. "Lemme in on it."

  Brick told him in detail. When he finished Pop scratched his head in silence, and frowned darkly at the floor.

  "It's crazy," he said at last. "But sometimes the crazier a thing seems to be the better it works. I'm for it. Hell, it's a chance, a dang slim one, but we can't expect meat in our soup at this stage of the game."

  Brick stood up decisively. He picked up the rolled blanket from the foot of his cot and handed it to Pop.

  "You know what to do with this. Hide it in the wash room though until we're ready for it. We're goin' to take that thousand to one chance."

  Pop grinned delightedly and hurried to the lavatory with the blanket. When he returned he was still smiling.

  "If it works," he chortled, "it'll take twenty years off my life."

  "If it doesn't," Brick said grimly, "neither of us will have to worry about collecting old age pensions."

  "You're a pessimist," Pop said scornfully, "but I ain't. I just got the feeling that I'll be standing watch again with a good U.S. deck under me before long. They can't stop us. Hell, we're Americans."

  "I hope you're right," Brick said briefly. "Anyway we'll know soon enough. It's about time for dinner. During the meal you make some excuse to get into the washroom. Then if everything works right I'll handle the rest."

  "It ain't goin' to be a snap for you," Pop said. "There's two of em, you know. And the sour little guy who serves the food to boot."

  For the next few minutes the men were silent, tensely awaiting the tread of boots in the corridor.

  When the sound came it was a relief. As the measured stamp came closer Brick felt his taut nerves relaxing. He slumped back in his cot and closed his eyes. His muscles were loose and free, his breathing regular. Except for the pain which still bothered his ribs, he was in perfect shape.

  Pop's face was impassive but his blunt fingers were trembling slightly with excitement. He jammed his hands into the pockets of his dungarees to hide their perturbation.

  The two men were apparently resting easily when the lock clicked and the two guards entered. The German guards were heavy-set and capable-looking in their blue-grey uniforms. Their faces were stern and watchful as they stepped aside to allow the orderly to enter with the tray.

  Brick opened his eyes, blinked, and then sat up yawning sleepily.

  "I was just about to yell for you guys," he muttered, "I'm hungry as a lumberjack."

  The tray was set on a small table in the center of the cell and Pop pulled up his chair and began eating.

  One of the guards, Brick noticed, had his gun in his hand, but the other wore his in the holster at his hip. They kicked the door shut and took up their positions, one on either side of it.

  Brick appraised their location and attitudes carefully before joining Pop at-the table. He kept his eyes on the plate rather than risk a glance at Pop that might give away the excitement and hope that boiled within him.

  Halfway through the meal Pop suddenly clutched at his stomach. With a moan of pain he staggered to his feet his face twisted in a grimace of agony.

  The German guards watched him with stoic suspicion, but when he hugged his arms to his stomach and stumbled weakly toward the lavatory they made no move to stop him.

  Brick slowly released the breath he had been holding.

  If the guards had stopped him, or insisted on following him, their applecart would have been neatly kicked over. But they hadn't.

  Without attracting attention Brick managed to slide his chair back a few inches to give his knees clearance from the table. His feet twisted slightly as he braced himself for quick action.

  Outwardly he was calm, almost sleepy looking. But every muscle of his powerful body was coiled to strike and behind his expressionless face his brain was racing keenly and swiftly.

  Timing was all important. A tenth of a second one way or the other would mean the difference between success and failure, life and death.

  With a vicious effort of will he drove all thoughts of failure from his mind. He couldn't fail. To avoid suspicion he forced himself to raise his fork again to his mouth.

  The fork was halfway to his lips when an incoherent, screaming voice blasted through the room. It was the voice of a madman, raging and shouting a stream of incomprehensible words and phrases. For a dazed second, as the frenzied, but strangely muffled sounds crashed through the room, the German guards stared in helpless bewilderment about them.

  Brick crouched at the table, his muscles gathering and bunching. His slate gray eyes were on the guards un-winkingly.

  For another chaotic second the guards hesitated as the maniacal sounds poured into the room. Then with an automatic motion they stiffened to rigid attention, their hands snapping outward in the Nazi salute.

  "Der Fuehrer!" one gasped.

  Brick moved then! With a tigerish motion he wheeled and charged the guards. The one with the gun in his hand cried out in surprised rage, but he was too late to use the gun. Brick's shoulder slammed him against the concrete wall and his right fist drove into the Nazi's middle with the force of a battering ram.

  With an agonized cry the man slumped to the floor, his eyes rolling wildly as he clutched at his stomach.

  Brick jerked around but the other guard was already on top of him his big fists slamming into his head and shoulders.

  Brick weaved backward, snapping his left into the guard's enraged face. The German was big and powerful, with heavy shoulders that looked dangerous.

  Cursing he followed Brick, his arms pumping punches like well-oiled pistons. Brick backed away, waiting for an opening. If it hadn't been for the aching pain in his chest he would have slugged it out, toe-to-toe, but he couldn't take any chances now.

  Confident and careless the German dropped his arms and rushed Brick, hoping for a chance to grapple with the elusive American.

  Brick stabbed a left into his face and stepped in suddenly, his right chopping down in an axe-like blow that exploded against the German's exposed jaw with a sickening smack! It was a terrible blow, almost enough to kill an ordinary man. The German staggered back, eyes glazing, his jaw hanging queerly.

  Brick moved into follow up, but it wasn't necessary. The German sprawled backward to the floor, out cold.

  Brick wheeled—and his hands rose into the air.

  The orderly was facing him, a Luger pistol clutched in his fist. He was sta
nding in front of the wash-room door, face working excitedly. For that reason he didn't see the door open, didn't see Pop's roundhouse blow coming.

  The first knowledge he had of it, was when something like a sixteen inch shell crashed into the back of his neck exploding a complete constellation of stars before his eyes. He hit the floor and crumpled up like a sack of meal.

  "In the well-known nick of time," Brick panted.

  Pop's face was flushed triumphantly.

  "The first round is ours," he grinned. "Tell me lad? Did I really sound like Adolf, himself? My German is awful."

  "Close enough," Brick said. "With that blanket over your head disguising your voice I almost started goose stepping myself. Now aren't you glad you know German?"

  Pop stepped quickly to the guards and orderly and picked up their guns. He tossed one to Brick.

  "Let's get movin'," he snapped. "We can't wait to tie these lugs up."

  Brick stuck the gun in his belt and stepped to the door. One cautious glance showed the corridor still to be empty.

  "Let's move," he said grimly.

  Together they crept silently down the hall.

  Their greatest handicap was in their total unfamiliarity with the layout of the base. Then there were the lights, glaring brightly at all hours, ruining any chance or attempt at concealment.

  The corridor they were using was wide and deserted. They passed other doors, some barred and some of solid steel.