Chapter 2
Lieutenant Commander Christoph Neuzetser pressed his face against the U-boat periscope’s eye shield as he struggled to focus on the approaching Destroyer. It greatly annoyed him that age had degraded the fine-tuned machine he once was and threatened to put him on an equal level of his inferior enemies. He was only forty-five years old. Growing up, his father never told him how a man’s body changed as he aged. He might understand if he were in his sixties, certainly in his seventies. But forty-five?
Perhaps it was stress. Something a member of the Nazi SS was sure to live with but never allowed to admit. The doctor had suggested stress affected the eyes’ performance and issued him eyeglasses; something he would use only to read with—and mostly when he wasn’t in view of others. He was the commander, a representative of the feared Kriegsmarine, not a cripple. Christoph would lead without curved glass filtering the fire of his ice-blue eyes.
The twin diesel engines growled incessantly as U-616 cruised beneath the waters of the North Atlantic. Faint aromatic petrol fumes permeated the air. Everything in the submarine’s compartments had a slightly oily feel. Shaving and showers were land luxuries not afforded to submariners.
“Destroyer… Cannon class. Three kilos… one point abaft starboard beam,” Christoph said.
“Alone?” Lt. Gunter Bach asked. Though ten years younger than Christoph, the gray peppering his dark beard made him look older.
“Yes. Definitely alone.”
“A Cannon class should be escorting merchant ships, not roaming the ocean.”
“We are not far from a shipyard. Perhaps this one is on its maiden voyage and will present us no harm.” Christoph had both wrists resting on the periscope’s turn handles. He stepped a slow 360° while straining to focus across the endless waters. No other vessels in sight. “We are heading straight for a storm.”
“The storm is interfering with the radar. I’ve never seen anything like this,” Ensign Otto Faulk said, seated at his station.
Problems with the radar was something they didn’t need right now. His left foot stepped in something wet. His boot smeared a swatch of grime across the floor. Christoph looked over in the corner of the command room. His son, Erik, held his head low, sulking.
Part of Christoph wanted to grab Erik by the shoulders, give him a good shake, and slap him back into reality, saying, The German youth fights for the Führer and the people. The war with the Allies was sure to be lost, but the war Germans fought every day of their life, to be a proud and superior race, would go on. World War I threatened Germany’s survival. Even though they had lost The Great War, the Aryan race, mainly through the leadership of the Führer, rose from the ashes to near world domination. One, all it takes is one person to change the course of history, he had often told Erik. Christoph wanted only the best for his son and for him to be head and shoulders above the elite.
The other part of Christoph wanted to hug his son tightly and let Erik know he understood the severe grief he felt. Allied bombing had killed Gerda, Erik’s mother, only three weeks before. Losing his wife had been tough on Christoph too, but in a different way. A very different way. The war had separated them for years. Even before the war, their relationship had become strained. Learning of her death brought great sadness. Not so much for losing their future together, but for losing what should have been but never was from the beginning.
It was much harder for a fifteen-year-old boy to lose his mother than a man estranged from his wife.
“Erik,” Christoph said, authority in his voice, waiting for his son to look his way. His call passed through the room with no effect. “Son, fetch a tool bag from the engine room. A flange from a ballast tank is leaking.”
A round-faced officer from the SS Security Service, with a fine chiseled nose and strong chin, stepped just to the entrance of the airlock into the command room. He hesitated entering farther, not calling attention to himself. The officer was either being polite or was spying. SS officers weren’t known for politeness. His hand dropped alongside his chest, a glowing cigarette between his fingers.
Erik slowly lifted his gaze through drooping eyelids. His expression hid whether he hadn’t understood the request or if it was a task he had decided not to do.
Christoph stepped away from the periscope. He motioned his head to the side, signaling Bach to take his place. “If you are in my command room you must make yourself useful. We don’t need bodies taking space. Get some tools and tighten the flange, or leave and help the cook in the galley. You earned a ribbon shooting targets with a Mauser in Youth Camp. I am sure you are skilled enough to peel a potato.” Christoph regretted his condescending words as soon as they left his lips. He didn’t want to embarrass the boy, only inspire him. It certainly didn’t come out that way.
Erik slowly shook his head, the spark of life dim in his eyes. “If I leave or stay doesn’t matter to me. Wherever I go, life is the same. I am still in a boat. I am no longer in the Fatherland. My home is gone. My leader is dead. My mother is dead. My country has lost the war.” His bottom lip rose and quivered. “My country is dead.”
“Hold your tongue!” Christoph said. His hand was forced, now was the time. He had to set his son on a path that would save or utterly destroy him. With a raised finger, Christoph pointed, face reddening, and a growing snarl curling his lips. Before he could release Armageddon, Bach interrupted.
“Commander, the Destroyer is turning on an interception course. We are discovered.”
Emotions had distracted Christoph from his duties as commander. A US Destroyer, designed specifically for submarine warfare, threatened his final mission. The most important mission in his life. The U-616 carried drawings, arms, medical supplies, instruments, lead, mercury, caffeine, steels, optical glass, and brass. There was secret cargo too. Two short tonnes of uranium oxide designated for the nuclear project hid away. But the most precious cargo, the primary purpose of this mission, was getting a select few out of Germany, out of the hands of the Allies, and brought safely to Brazil.
Christoph looked at the man who shadowed the airlock’s entrance, Klaus Barbie. A member of the Gestapo, he had earned the nickname of The Butcher of Lyon. The commander didn’t know how much truth was in the rumors concerning the cruelty of this man, but he could feel the coldness of his presence between them. “Captain Barbie, please inform the other guests and our two patients of the situation.”
The glowing tip of Barbie’s cigarette smoldered.
Christoph wasn’t a fan of tobacco, but he was thankful others were. The smell of cigarettes was more desirable than the body odors, mildew funk, and battery and machinery fumes ever present in a U-boat.
“Erik, go with the captain and make yourself useful. Make sure the patients are comfortable,” Christoph said.
Barbie mashed the fading glow of his smoke on a callused palm. He left without saying a word. He didn’t need to speak; the commander knew what was at stake.
“Even if we surface, we can’t outrun them,” Christoph said. “This is our final mission. Our duty is to ensure it is the Destroyer’s last mission too.”