A Bridge of Magpies

'Fine, fine,' I broke in. 'I'm not a maritime court. I have no discretion. You can argue with the fisheries frigate. She'll be here at any moment.'

'How d'ye know, if your radio's out of operation?' de. manded Kenryo.

Emmermann's temper showed through his smooth social facade, enabling me to side-step Kenryo's punch question. 149

'It may interest you to know that at dawn today the frigate was two hundred miles away. At the northern end of her patrol beat.'

That knocked me. It meant Denny hadn't sent my signal. Or, if he had, the warship couldn't possibly be at Possession by that day. It also revealed something equally disquieting- Sang A was monitoring the frigate's movements. Emmerman realized that at the drop of a hat Kenryo and I would be at each other's throats. He said in a conciliatory way, 'That's as may be. The important matter is that U-160 was sunk in the Possession channel during the war.

'She wasn't sunk.' Jutta's reserved mood had now completely dissipated-like the fog. She was alert and animated. Up to then neither Emmermann nor Kenryo had regarded her as being in their league. They probably thought she provided me with Possession's only distraction.

Her words poured out. 'U-160 first sank the City of Baroda. She then sank the frigate which pursued her. The last that was heard from her was that she was making for the open sea. She was badly damaged and losing oil. But she was afloat.'

There was something-more imagined than reaJ perhaps-behind Kenryo's eyes I didn't care for. He spoke rapidly to Emmermann… all their attention switched away from me .. I wanted to yell at Jutta to stop.

• Emmermann's restraint was obvious. 'You are informed about U-160? How strange for a woman!'

… no, that part of it doesn't matter. I know however that Captain Schlebusch fired a spread of four torpedoes at the City of Baroda and then used the U-boat's two stern tubes against the warship. He got her too.'

Kenryo's voice had a dull, flat note, like a counterfeit coin's dud ring.

'U-160 sank. She is -' he thumped a heel on the floorboards -' right under us at this moment. We have located her.'

'That's what the buoys are for,' added Emmermann.

'Nor exclaimed Jutta. 'No! You're wrong! She got away. She..

'Yes?'

She had the sense, at least, not to reply to that bit of Emmermann's prodding. I tried again to signal her to play it cool but she was being driven along by some inner compulsion.

When she hesitated Emmermann repeated, 'She is here. Right under Sang A.'

'Transit sonar,' I jibed.

He looked startled but let it pass. He was far too interested in Jutta. He found a lead weight in the safe and brought it for her to inspect.

'Sounding lead,' he explained. 'Look! Look at what came up from the wreck below.'

Mixed in with the typical sand and shell of the channel floor were some red and grey flakes.

'Paint. Red lead underneath, with grey above it. U-boat grey.'

'No,' J said. 'British naval grey. Gousblom! Emmermann and Kenryo's attention switched back to Jutta when she added, 'Her magazine blew up. It's she you've located, not U-160:

'So now! So now!' They were only four short words from Emmermann but they said everything.

Kenryo addressed Jutta with the controlled menace of a panther stalking. 'You are extremely knowledgeable about naval matters.'

Emmermann helped himself to some more schnapps. 'Would you know what U-160 was carrying?'

'A couple of prototype torpedoes. Samples of new explosives. The latest counter-measures to Allied submarine devices. A Nazi agent.'

She had them riveted. If she went on they'd never let us off the ship. So I brushed aside the rest of what she had: 0 say. 'Technically, all of it was old hat within a year. Nothing that's worth salvaging in this day and age.'

'Her phosphor-bronze torpedo tubes are worth?100 apiece at today's prices,' replied Emmermann.

'She had six. Six hundred quid. That wouldn't even pay our way for a couple of days. It's aJso peanuts compared with your outlay.'

Emmermann looked across at Kenryo for the go-ahead: got it.

'Captain Weddell. We are men of the world. If I told you hat U-MO was carrying something which-if you choose to: co-operate-could help you to be comfortable for the rest of your life, would you believe me?'

'If you're going to say she had aboard Captain's Kidd's treasure or the Alabama's gold or a trunk-load of diamonds, you can keep it. It's just another Sperrgebiet yarn when the lights are low and the brandy goes round.'

'You are sensible not to be gullible. No. U-160 was carrying two hundred tons of liquid mercury, as ballast. In canisters. Attached to her keeL'

'So what?'

'In the early days of the war mercury was dirt cheap. Cheap enough to be ideal ballast. Germany bought a lot from Mexico at bargain basement prices. Today.

He let the rest of the sentence hang.

Kenryo compleled it. 'At today's prices two hundred tons of mercury is worth over a million dollars. Tax-free.' He gave a tight-lipped grin. 'With your co-operation.'

'See here, Captain Weddell,' Emmermann punched home the offer. 'We're not asking you to do anything. Anything, you understand? All you have to do is to sit and watch us from Possession-if you want to watch. If you agree in principle, we can discuss terms. We will be generous-I assure you.' He turned to Jutta. 'You have information about U-160. Information is also a saleable commodity. For example, if we knew more details of the action in the channel we could plot U-160's firing angles. We could obtain transits. That in itself, by narrowing down possible areas, would be worth thousands of dollars of search time.'

Something had come over Jutta since they'd started their talk about buying us. She'd been all fired up at the start-unstoppable almost -now she'd gone cold.

'I… I… need time to think:

Kenryo spotted the change in her, too. All I wanted was to get away. I rose to my feet. 'Well talk it over.. I was nearly thrown to the floor. Sang A shimmied under a hammer-blow concussion from outside. I felt as if someone had tapped me on the head with a rubber truncheon and at the same time thumped me in the diaphragm. There was a white photo-flash of light across the cabin. My ears reeled. We threw ourselves at the portholes.

A few hundred yards away a geyser-spout of water-it had a dirty-curly black top like a giant ostrich feather-stood up higher than Sang A's stack. One of the boats that had been fussing about was tumbling sideways out of the mess-men and timber falling in all directions.

'Christ!' I exclaimed. 'They've tripped one of U-160's old mines!'

They had indeed, with that wire sweep of theirs.

We rushed on deck; Emmermann and Kenryo shouting orders. They'd forgotten us amid the general uproar. '

Beat it!' I said to Jutta. 'Now's our chance!'

We slipped over the side and sneaked away in the dinghy towards Possession.

We'd gone nearly half-way when Jutta suddenly exclaimed, ' Struan! U-160 didn't have mercury ballast: she was built too late. She was a Class IXC boat. Mercury ballast was confined to earlier types,'

C H A P T E R T W E L V E

I rested on my oars. 'It's the chopper, Jutta.'

'I don't understand.'

'You've put a short fuse under us. Any moment the powder keg will explode. We couldn't be more vulnerable.' 'What I said back there?'

'What you said. You went up like that old mine yourself.' 'I couldn't stop myself: everything came bunting out when they brought up the subject of U-160:

'You're the best strike they've made since they hit the Bridge of Magpies. Don't imagine they won't be following it up.'

'J only said..

'You showed you were loaded with enough information to make a salvage man's tongue hang out. You didn't only hint-you positively shouted it-that there was a packet more where it came from.