As the rotors slowed, Eisenach pushed open the door and stepped down from the small helicopter. He ducked his head, held his peaked cap in place, and walked toward the waiting sedan.
Kapitän Werner Niels, Schmidt’s aide, climbed out of the car and saluted.
Returning the salute, Eisenach raised an eyebrow.
“The admiral arrived earlier, General Eisenach, and went on to the officers’ club. He awaits you there.”
“Very well, Kapitän. Let us join him.” Eisenach slipped into the rear seat, and Niels went around to get in on the other side.
Admiral Schmidt was frequently too independent for Eisenach’s tastes. The man could have waited a half hour for his commander to arrive. But no, Schmidt had been in command of ships for a long time, and he was as accustomed to making his own decisions as he was impatient. And Eisenach suspected that Schmidt felt some aversion to reporting to an air force general officer.
Perhaps, also, Schmidt was somewhat frustrated. He had wanted command of the 1st Fleet, but had been cajoled and threatened into accepting command of the Dritte Marinekraft. Though he commanded eighteen major vessels, Schmidt did not consider the task force’s mission as vital as Eisenach did.
The driver pulled away from the helicopter pad located on the quay and found his way through the labyrinth of warehouses and fabrication plants that crowded upon the docks. Sailors came to attention and saluted as they went by. Toward the back of the base, they passed parade grounds, large brick barracks, and administrative buildings. Elm and oak trees lined the streets, and the grass plots around structures were closely clipped.
The officer’s club was solidly built of red brick and was new. Eisenach and Niels got out and walked up the pristine sidewalk to the double glass doors, the kapitän holding one of them for him.
Schmidt was waiting for him in one of the private meeting rooms, a stein of lager in front of him. The admiral often boasted that he drank only beer. He was a large, florid-faced man in his early sixties. His steel gray hair was shorn to almost nonexistence, and his blue eyes were unwavering. The skin of his face was firm, but his ears jutted outward from his skull like semaphores.
“Well, Felix, you have finally arrived.”
Eisenach was not going to apologize to a subordinate for being late. “And Gerhard, you have started without me.” Schmidt smiled. “I have been at sea for twelve days. I was thirsty. I am also hungry. Are you ready for dinner?” Eisenach looked at his watch. “It is early, but yes, we can eat.”
Schmidt nodded to Niels, and the aide left the room, closing the door behind him.
The general took one of the castered and upholstered chairs opposite Schmidt. He fished in his pocket for a package of American Marlboros and lit one. Schmidt shoved an ashtray across the table toward him.
“All right, Gerhard. You asked for this meeting.”
“Right to the point?” Schmidt said. “No chattering over the sauerbraten?”
“I must return to Berlin immediately after dinner.”
“All right.” Schmidt sat up in his chair and leaned his elbows on the table. His eyes became more serious than normal, and they were normally serious. “I am going to request a transfer to First Fleet.”
“You’ll end up in a staff job, Gerhard.”
“Perhaps, but only for a while.”
The door opened and Niels came in with another stein for Schmidt and a Scotch and water for Eisenach. Werner Niels’s memory was very good, Eisenach thought. He tasted it and guessed that it was his preferred Glenlivet.
After the aide left again, Eisenach asked, “What brings this on, Gerhard?”
“Nothing brings it on. My disenchantment has always been there. The navy does not work well under an air force command that cannot distinguish the pointed end of a ship from the ass-end. For God’s sakes, Felix, all we do is sail back and forth like an endless clothesline. My tactical and strategic training exercises are farces. Morale is slipping badly.”
“I should think your men would be extremely happy,” Eisenach said. “Of your sixteen surface vessels, four are rotated into port for two weeks at a time. That is a lot of shore leave.”
“Leisure time that deteriorates the level of readiness,” the admiral said. “I am a realistic man, Felix. I do not embellish my reports to my superiors. The Third Naval Force is not a crackerjack unit. It is falling apart, and your planning group in Berlin does not allow me to do anything about it. They think they have airplanes to boss around. The mission of standing sentinel to a bunch of oil wells is not awe-inspiring to my ship commanders or their personnel.”
“That accounts for this morning’s incident?” Eisenach asked.
Schmidt snickered. “The idiot in the Tornado? Yes, he caught us by surprise. And do you know why?”
“You will tell me.”
“That is damned correct. Your planning staff has absolutely no concept of naval operations. They keep us strung out in single file, like that clothesline I mentioned, when I should have my ships clustered in battle groups. Jesus Christ! You can’t have a cruiser like the Hamburg exposed like it was today. I should have had destroyers on the flanks.”
Eisenach nodded, but reluctantly.
“It would have served you right if that Tornado pilot had punched us with a Kormoran antiship missile.”
“What do you suggest, Gerhard?”
“I suggest I go back to the real navy.”
Eisenach studied the navy man for a long moment before speaking. “Gerhard, you and I are not friends. Perhaps that is impossible. However, I respect you as a military man, and I do not want to lose you. If I were to remove the planning group from the chain of command — you would report directly to me — would that change your mind?”
Schmidt leaned back in his chair, studying Eisenach’s face. He took a long drag from his stein.
“I want to change the makeup of the force.”
“In what way?”
“I want the Stuttgart and another missile frigate. I’ll keep eight destroyers and release the rest. I’ll keep the subs, but I’ll put one at a time toward more fruitful training.”
“To what end, Gerhard?”
“I would create four three-ship surface battle groups. We will not often be in port, for my detached groups will be sent off on training sessions. I must broaden their thinking, and their horizons, Felix.”
“And that will keep you on the job?”
“It’s either that, General, or I tell my ship captains that they’re not really oil wells.”
With several short blasts of the nose thrusters, McKenna drifted Delta Blue backward out of its hangar and watched as the doors folded to the closed position like the petals of a tired rose.
The red warning strobes mounted on the spokes and at four points around the hub blinked clearly at him. They were only activated during departures and arrivals.
The earth looked inviting, rosily lit along a line from Leningrad westward. The dark side melted into the blackness of space, defined primarily by the stars it blotted out. The moon was an eerie white disk far down on his right.