by Antony Trew
Lindemann made a small gesture of despair. “Not enough to take the ship to sea. Less than half our complement.”
Rohrbach wondered what it was, but didn’t like to ask. The Newt’s tugboat friend had said about twenty; he was probably not far off the mark.
With the aid of alcohol the conversation brightened and within half an hour the ice had broken, both sides privately pleased with the night’s work so far. The Germans were pressing hosts—not holding themselves back—and this complicated the slow drinking act, for there were limits to how slow it could be without arousing suspicion. Fortunately Johan acted as barman for the third round and managed to pour ginger ale only for his companions’ “Horses’ Necks,” the drink they’d agreed on with an eye to leaving out the brandy whenever possible. Hester Smit and Johan’s interest in each other grew with the night, to Moewe’s intense annoyance; the Newt and Di Brett concentrated on each other, and Mariotta and Lindemann flirted so openly that Rohrbach suspected they were more than old friends. Perhaps she’d had a romance with him when she’d travelled out in the passenger ship of which he was chief officer before the war. It was none of his business, but it seemed to explain Mariotta’s influence with the Captain.
Only Cleo, sitting by herself in the big arm-chair, pale and withdrawn, seemed out of the party. Occasionally the Newt would speak to her, and once or twice Johan tried to cheer her up, but she smiled sadly and when he chided her she said she didn’t feel well. At that, Hester Smit whispered in his ear: “She’s in love. Madly! With a South African she met the other night at Costa’s. He promised to phone her and never did. Men!” She shook her head.
“You’d be miserable without them.”
“Drop dead!” She squeezed his hand on the side away from Moewe who was sitting on her right.
The Newt had a hand in his coat pocket and was fingering the sodium seconal capsules, wondering how and when, if ever, he could use them, when Lindemann invited Mariotta to accompany him to the bridge to settle an argument they were having about the stars. Rohrbach heard them and looked at his watch. It was 2140. There were unlikely to be any stars on view, but in ten minutes’ time the fishing boat would begin moving down on the Hagenfels‚ and the fewer people on the upper deck of the German ship the better. There was nothing he could do, however, but pray. Pray that they might go no farther than the chart-house—that love and not the stars was the object of the exercise. He suspected it was.
It was now time to put into operation a small detail of the plan. He stood up and said to Kuhn in German: “Excuse me, Herr Kuhn, but—the toilet?” He spoke with the slight embarrassment which overcomes young men in mixed company on these occasions.
Kuhn smiled understandingly, nodding towards the door leading into the Captain’s sleeping cabin. “Through that door and to the left.”
Rohrbach looked over towards Johan and the Newt and said: “Hookey’s this way, chaps.” In the sleeping cabin he found the door which led into a small W.C. with wash-basin. Soon he was joined there by the Newt and Johan, who had left the Germans in the cabin suspicious but powerless to do anything about this altogether plausible move. In a whisper Rohrbach told them of Kuhn’s and Lindemann’s pretence that the main engines were out of order, and how he knew they were lying.
“Thank God for that!” breathed Johan. “Nearly went round the bend when Moewe told the same sad tale to Hester and me. I’d forgotten about the engines turning yesterday.”
The Newt nodded. “I heard Moewe telling you. Must say I felt a bit put out, too. It looked as if we were bitched at the start.”
Rohrbach looked at his watch. “Another fifteen minutes and the balloon goes up.”
Through his coat the Newt patted his shoulder-holster. “Comforting, aren’t they?”
Johan, towering above him, said: “Telling me!”
“I’m going to beat it,” whispered Rohrbach. “Don’t be too long.”
Mariotta and Lindemann were still missing when he got back to the day-cabin, Moewe was in a corner laying down the law about something to Hester Smit, who was saying: “Don’t be so childish, honey! He’s a nice guy, that’s all. I’m helping your party along.”
Di Brett had been talking to Kuhn, but as Rohrbach came in she stopped and went over to Cleo. Then Johan and the Newt came back and Moewe insisted on pouring them all drinks. Johan made a bee-line for Hester.
Kuhn disappeared into the pantry and the Newt found himself standing near the desk alone. The Captain and Mariotta had not returned; Günther Moewe was pouring drinks, his back towards the room and everyone else was busy talking. The moment couldn’t have been more propitious. Casually, using his left hand in which there was a cigarette, the Newt dropped the capsules into the partly filled steins left by Lindemann and Kuhn. Then he stopped in front of the bookcase, looked at his watch, and examined the titles of the books. Three minutes, he was thinking, can be an awful long time. The capsules didn’t fizz. He’d tried them out at the Polana. No fizz, but three minutes to dissolve. Twelve minutes to act. That’d be 2155!
On the far side of the cabin Rohrbach, talking to Cleo and Di Brett, was obsessed with the compulsive thought—when will Mariotta and Lindemann get back to the cabin? For Christ’s sake when will they get back? Kuhn came in from the pantry with a plate of cakes and took them round. The Newt joined up with Hester and Johan, and Günther Moewe handed out the drinks he’d just mixed. There was no escaping the alcohol this time and, indeed, the male visitors were glad of it. Waiting for the show to start was a nerve-racking business.
Moewe put the tray down and questioned the Newt about his life in Oporto and South Africa—getting monosyllabic and unhelpful replies, he switched to Johan, whom he now doubly disliked because Hester had so clearly fallen for him. What was more they spoke to each other in Afrikaans, which he couldn’t understand, and this infuriated him,
“You are a farmer, I believe, Herr le Roux?” From under thick eyebrows he peered morosely at the big Afrikaner.
Johan looked down on the German cheerfully. “That’s right.” Adroitly he changed the subject. “You must be fed up with this place, Herr Moewe. Think you’ll ever make a run for it?”
The question was so direct and unexpected that Moewe was off his guard. “Well—er—no! I mean, we can’t,” he stammered.
Johan nodded sympathetically. “The verdoemde Royal Navy, I suppose. I mean, you couldn’t get past them, could you?”
Moewe bristled with outraged national dignity: to think that this ape should assume that they couldn’t run the blockade! “We are not interested in the Royal Navy. We have raiders, supply vessels and U-boats operating very successfully outside.” He pointed with his stein of beer in the general direction of the Indian Ocean. “Perhaps you have seen some of the survivors coming in, Herr le Roux? The Royal Navy don’t seem to have been much help to them.”
“Of course, Herr Moewe. You Germans are so efficient. And so brave,” he added enthusiastically.” I mean, how could the decadent British worry you. But why is it, then, that you have not sailed?”
“I have already told you, Herr le Roux. There is a serious defect in the main engines.”
“Yes. That’s now, Herr Moewe. But before. You’ve been here since the war started. Why haven’t you sailed before?”
This was too much for Moewe. “Because, Herr le Roux, we Germans obey orders. When we are told to go, we go.” He stood erect, resentful of Johan’s height, the words more or less hissed from a half-shut mouth. Günther Moewe was on his fourth stein of Münchener. Valour had taken over from discretion.
Amusement flickered in Johan’s eyes. “I see, Herr Moewe. So you are waiting for orders to go?”
Moewe stiffened at once. “I did not say that.”
“Of course. Forgive me. My mistake.” Johan patted his cauliflower ears. “These don’t work so well nowadays. They’re always getting bent in the scrum.”
Hester Smit tittered.
“I do not know what you’re talking about,” M
oewe muttered; then, conscious of his blunder, he walked away.
In the alley-way outside, they heard Mariotta laughing and a moment later she and Lindemann came back. To the Newt’s dismay, she sat down in what had been the Captain’s chair and picked up his stein of beer. “My goodness, I’m hot and thirsty!” She looked at Lindemann. “Mind if I drink this, Kurt?”
“Of course not. Go ahead.”
She did. The Newt sighed. There was nothing he could do about it. To his relief, however, Kuhn had gone back to his old seat and was swallowing the Münchener.
Fifty per cent return, anyway, muttered the Newt, but poor old Mariotta …
The fly-screen door to the cabin swung open and the conversation stopped suddenly. Von Falkenhausen and Heinrich Schäffer stood in the doorway.
“Ah!” smiled the Freiherr, “A party. Charming. May we join you?”
Rohrbach looked at his watch. It was 2155.
“Dear God! “he breathed.
Chapter Thirteen
Time was dragging for the men huddled in the sternsheets of the fishing boat, silent but for an occasional monosyllable, straining in the darkness for anything that might come to them from the Hagenfels. The dark bulk of the ship lay astern of them, the anchor and deck lights and those from the portholes under the bridge illuminating parts of her dimly, so that she was a disembodied complex of lights and shadows.
Occasionally they heard hammering from the direction of the Clan McPhilly, and sometimes the wind brought to them faintly the sound of voices and the laughter of men and women in the German ship.
“Seem to be enjoying themselves,” said Widmark caustically.
McFadden cleared his throat. “They’re no’ round to fightin’ yet, that’s for sure.”
Widmark looked at the luminous hands of his watch—2143—seven minutes to go. In a low voice he ran once more through the probable disposition of the German crew at ten o’clock—2200. “Crew totals, say, twenty,” he began. “Nine are ashore—that leaves ten or eleven. Let’s say eleven. We don’t know how many officers there are on board. Probably the lot, since Lindemann’s giving a party. That puts four of them in the Captain’s cabin. It’s pretty certain the steward’ll be there, too. That’s five of the eleven. There’ll be a night watchman somewhere on the upper deck. If he’s like a British sailor he’ll be between the gangway and the galley most of the time fixing himself cups of cha. That’s six. Five still to be accounted for. There’ll be one or two bodies in the engine-room watching the generators and auxiliaries—that leaves three or four. Crew accommodation is for’ard, so they may be there or, on a hot night like this, they could be hanging about on deck. Maybe somewhere near the Captain’s cabin where they can listen to what goes on. You know what sailors are,
“Once on board we remain concentrated. We’ll make first for the fo’c’sle and deal with whoever’s there. Then we’ll make for the Captain’s cabin and join up with David and company. If trouble starts there before we arrive it’s up to them to deal with it. After that we’ll fan out and round off any odds and sods left over, like the bods in the engine-room. Got that?”
This was the plan they’d been through several times since they’d known that some of their number would start the operation in the Captain’s cabin. But Widmark knew that this last minute summary was a good thing—it helped the time to pass, it steadied nerves and freshened memories. His watch showed 2247. Almost time to begin. “Check your gear,” he said quietly. “Off raincoats. Fix your cosh-thongs on your wrists.”
There was a bustle of activity in the boat.
“All set?”
There were answering “okays.”
“Right!” he said tensely. “Stand by to weigh. Out fenders.”
Four pudding fenders were hung over the starboard side to take the rub once the boat was alongside the German ship.
At that moment, faintly but distinctly, Widmark heard the sound of a motor boat. “Shissh!” he warned. “Belay everything! There’s a boat approaching.”
They could all hear it now, the note of the engine growing stronger, coming from somewhere between the Hagenfels and the shore. Then it was shut out by the noise of hammering from the Clan McPhilly, and Widmark wished that Captain McRobert might not for the moment be so diligent. The hammering stopped. McFadden said: “Look! The gangway.”
On the starboard side of the Hagenfels they saw the gangway being lowered, and a launch came out of the darkness into the circle of light and went alongside. Three men got out of the sternsheets and went up the gangway, the launch waited for a moment then the engine roared into life and it made for the shore.
“Name of a name!” said Widmark. “What the bloody hell’s going on?”
“Liberty men returning?” suggested McFadden.
“Not likely at this time,” said Widmark.
It was 2155. Whatever this development might mean they were committed; there was no going back.
“Out paddles,” he ordered and then, after a pause, “Weigh anchor!” Mike Kent and Hans le Roux pulled on the anchor rope and the fishing boat moved slowly ahead; they lifted the anchor a few feet clear of the bottom when the rope was up and down and secured the line round a bollard. Caught by the tide the boat drifted, slowly, stern first, towards the Hagenfels. They manned the paddles and from time to time Widmark would order: “Paddle starboard!” “Paddle port!” or “Paddle together!” and in this way they steered the boat. It was not long before the Hagenfels’s bows loomed above them, black and forbidding, shafts of light from the portholes penetrating the outer darkness, clouds of insects round the wire screens. They manhandled the boat round the stem to the port side and Hans released the anchor rope, paying it out until the anchor held again; then, hitching it round a bollard, he held the boat under the flare of the Hagenfels’s bow, where they were hidden from anyone on deck. There they waited, their minds full of the new complication, nerves and bodies taut.
It was 2203.
Still no riveting.
Widmark ground his teeth in frustration. For Christ’s sake, he thought, what has happened in the Clan McPhilly? He daren’t start warping the boat down the side until the riveting started. They waited for another four minutes—2207—then he decided there was nothing for it but to go ahead, whatever the risk. Paying out the anchor rope, they drifted aft with the tide, down along the port side of the Hagenfels, McFadden and Hans holding the boat off the steel plating. It was no easy task but somehow they succeeded and a few minutes later, when Widmark judged they were opposite the after well-deck, the rope was secured and the boat rode to her anchor again, the pudding fenders taking the rub against the Hagenfels’s side.
Widmark prayed for the sound of riveting but nothing came. Even the hammering had stopped.
Hans le Roux climbed on to the bow of the boat and with a powerful throw sent the hook rope sailing up into the darkness on to the deck of the Hagenfels. In spite of the grapnel’s foam rubber sheathing there was a metallic clang as it struck the steel deck. In the boat they shuddered. Hans pulled on the hook rope until it held and then went up it hand over hand, his feet braced against the side of the ship, the scaling ladder over his shoulder. From the boat they could see nothing of him for although the rain had stopped the sky was still overcast and the boat was shrouded in darkness. Night and time seemed to pause in fearful expectation while they stood in the sternsheets waiting, their nerves jarring, faces turned upwards, trying in their minds to picture what was happening in the blackness above. There was the sound of footsteps along the steel deck and a deep voice called: “Wer ist da?” There was no answer and the call was repeated. With chilly apprehension, they waited.
There were the fragmented, unreal sounds of a scuffle, two solid thumps, what sounded like a groan—then silence—followed seconds later by the scrabbling noise of the scaling ladder coming down the side. From the rail above came Hans’s rough whisper: “Okay—come up.”
Widmark went first, followed by McFadden. Mike Kent, the last m
an to leave the boat, pulled the sea-plug and, once he could hear the water gushing into the bottom of the boat, he, too, went up the ladder.
In the dim glow of the lights on the winch island they saw Hans standing over a body which lay humped on the steel deck.
“Must have been the night watchman,” he whispered. “The grapnel made a helluva noise. Soon as I got on deck I hid behind that ventilator cowl. Then I heard this bloke coming. Walked past me calling, ‘Wer ist da?’ so I coshed him.”
“Think he’s out for long? “Widmark spoke quickly but dispassionately, his eyes on the midship island of the Hagenfels, the direction from which more trouble was likely.
“For keeps, I reckon.” Hans shrugged. “First time I’ve used a cosh. I don’t know the dose. This bloke mumbled after the first one, so I gave him another for luck. His head made a nasty noise. Don’t think it did him any good.”
Hans sounded hit up and slightly hysterical.
Widmark said: “Okay, Hans. Take it easy.” He looked at his watch. “We’re way behind schedule.” It was 2211.
At that moment, like a sudden but infinitely prolonged burst of machine-gun fire, the sound of riveting came down on the wind.
Widmark grinned sardonically; from the shoulder-holster beneath his coat, tucked away under his left armpit, he drew the automatic, transferring it to his left hand, gripping the cosh in his right. The others did the same.
It was no longer necessary to whisper.
“Come on,” he said. “Let’s go!”
At 2150 the Port Authority launch delivered the pilot, Carlos Alberto d’Almeida, on board the Clan McPhilly where she lay at anchor in the Espirito Santo and having done so left immediately for the shore. As he went up the gangway, d’Almeida cursed the wet darkness of the night and the thoughtlessness of the Clan ship’s Captain in anchoring so far upstream; with the ebb tide it meant that the ship would have to be turned as soon as the anchor was aweigh, and the river was narrow here and the anchorage crowded.