The alarm bells ceased a moment later, and the ship was cast into silence amid the swells crashing against the hull and the low drum of the engine below.
"Where are they going?" Harris said again, this time even quieter than before.
The U-boat was moving quickly to the southwest.
"Come about," the captain ordered. "Tuck in behind them. I want to see what those Nazis are up to."
"Aye, captain. Coming about," one of the officers standing next to the helm confirmed the order.
At three hundred feet, the destroyer was a long ship, but it was able to turn faster than most. Even with that capability, the maneuver to get in behind the U-boat took a few minutes as the ship steered in a wide arch, looping back around into the submarine's fading wake.
"We're in firing range for the guns, sir," the officer standing closest reported.
"We're in range for our torpedoes as well, lieutenant. But I want to know what this sub is up to. If it's a ruse, we'll know soon enough. Hold your fire."
He peered through the bridge's windshield, waiting, watching. His breaths came in short bursts, a side effect he'd grown accustomed to over the years. It was something that always happened just before battle, a nervous tension that caused a man to tighten up prior to diving headfirst into hell.
The engines continued to hum below as the bow of the destroyer ripped through the Atlantic's swells. The U-boat maintained course as if they had no idea they were being followed. A normal reaction would have been to drop below the surface and try to evade the heavily armed enemy ship. But the German captain made no such effort.
"It's like they're running from something," a young blond operator said from a console on the other side of the room.
"No, son, that boat is modeled from the type IX, though it is much bigger. It's capable of doing at least eighteen knots." He didn't want to say anything to unnerve his men, but it was the biggest U-boat he'd ever seen, at least twice the size of the largest he'd studied or encountered previously. The captain checked their speed on one of the instruments nearby and then returned his gaze to the sea. "We're maintaining with them at fifteen knots. That means they're either on a patrol, or a journey."
The lieutenant's head turned slightly at the implication of the latter. "Where would they be going, sir?"
"I've heard rumors," Harris said. The gruff tone in his voice matched the gray and brown stubble on his face. "You've heard them too, I'm sure. The war is ending, gentlemen. Hitler can't fight forever. There have been reports that indicate some of the higher ups in the German command are trying to escape via submarine." He answered the question of everyone in the room before it was asked. "They'll likely head for South America. And based on this ship's trajectory, that's exactly where they're going."
He waited patiently for another sixty seconds. All two hundred pairs of eyes on the Slater watched with tense anticipation. Suddenly, a strange fog began to form, seemingly out of nowhere. The sky above had been perfectly clear, but now faded into a misty gray soup.
"Sir, the instruments," the redheaded sailor said, pointing at his panel.
The captain spun around and glanced at the malfunctioning console. The sonar had lost power. He looked over at the radar operator's station and realized the same thing had happened.
"What's happening to our power?" he asked. A second later, the lights flickered briefly, then died.
"Emergency backup generators, lieutenant," he snapped the order without hesitation.
He could see the man's face in the dark, shaking slowly from side to side. "Everything is down, sir. We have engine power. Nothing else."
Visibility was decreasing by the second. If he waited much longer, they would lose the Nazi vessel in the fog. "Take out their engines with the guns. Fire a torpedo from tube two."
The officer ran out onto the gangway and shouted the orders to the men below. They immediately began relaying the message. The young man at the com grasped the microphone and started to give the order to the torpedo crew, but the line was dead. Whatever was interfering with the ship's power was even knocking out the communication lines.
"It's not working, sir," he informed the captain.
Harris's face grew grave. He'd heard of strange things happening at sea, even seen a few in his time on the open water, but losing every single thing that relied on electricity was an occurrence he'd yet to witness. If the generators went down and the motors weren't providing any current to the batteries, they still had backup battery power that could last many hours.
The guns began to roar at the front of the boat as the gunners opened fire on the fleeing sub. The captain walked around to the side and stood on the grated metal walkway, listening as the gun barrels blazed, flashing bright orange light into the hazy darkness.
In the distance ahead, a white glow seared through the thick fog for a brief second, and then dissipated as quickly as it had appeared.
"Cease fire!" the captain ordered down to the crew below.
They echoed the command through a sequence of other sailors until it reached the front. The guns went silent again, still smoking from their toils. The sour scent of gunpowder drifted back to the bridge where the captain leaned on the railing.
"What in the blue blazes was that?" he asked quietly.
To his right, the bridge lights blinked for a few seconds and then burned steadily once more. The sounds of the control room resumed with a few clicks, beeps, and pings occasionally escaping from the machinery.
"Sir, everything seems to be working again," the lieutenant reported, stating what the captain had already ascertained.
He stepped back through the entryway and onto the bridge. "Where's the U-boat? Did we destroy it?"
The redheaded man stared at a screen with a line going around in a circle. "It's gone, sir. They must have sunk it."
Captain Harris's face steeled at the news. There'd been no sound of an explosion, no concussion, no resulting waves, and the light he'd seen was certainly not like any he'd seen in his years at sea. Something wasn't right. And there wasn't a doubt in his mind that they hadn't sunk the enemy ship.
"The fog is clearing, sir." The man at the helm pointed out through one of the narrow windows.
Harris spun around and stepped over to the windshield. Just as quickly as it had come, the fog disappeared, making way for the perfectly clear sky, the pale glow of the moon, and calm, rolling tides of the ocean. It was a peaceful scene. Except for an entire U-boat that had disappeared without a trace.
1
Sean sprinted up the three flights of stairs, taking them two at a time as he ascended. His heart pounded, not just from the exertion, but also from knowing his window would be limited.
He reached the third floor of the hotel, pulled open the stairwell door, and ran straight down the corridor. His room was positioned ten doors down from the end of the hall. Practicality wished it were closer. But he knew it was the only vacancy in the hotel where he could get a clear line of sight.
When Sean arrived at his door, he already had the room key in his fingers and slid the plastic into the slot. The green light blinked twice, and the electronic locking mechanism whined inside the door before it clicked. He turned the latch and rushed into the room.
The interior walls were white, much like the exterior of the hotel. Lavish curtains of purple and gold hung over the windows. The bed featured decorative round pillows sewn from Far Eastern silks of deep red and plush, brown pillows with crisscrossing striped patterns across the surface.
He hurried to the other side of the room and knelt down beside the bed. The blinds covering the balcony doorway were open, letting in the bright early afternoon sunlight. He lifted the comforter and bed skirt, finding the case exactly where he'd left it.