“I’ll think about it,” he said.
“Excellent,” Smith said with a wry grin. “Keep in touch.”
In the war room of his headquarters in Munich, Adolf Hitler stood before a towering map of Europe, staring smugly up at the colored lines which represented his Blitzkrieg of Poland. In two weeks, his troops had swept like two pairs of ice tongs, east across the Polish corridor then south, and east across southern Poland, then back up to link with the northern divisions. Warsaw was surrounded, battered by two weeks of devastating bombing raids.
Poland was his.
He laughed aloud. Behind him, Vierhaus applauded lightly.
“My congratulations, mein Führer. The whole world now knows the meaning of Blitzkrieg.”
Hitler nodded emphatically several times, his eyes burning with the fever of victory. “Exactly as planned,” he bragged softly. “Sixty thousand dead, two hundred thousand wounded, seventy thousand prisoners. And the war is less than three weeks old.”
“Next it’s France and then we drive the British back across the channel, eh, mein Führer?”
The mere mention of the English Channel gnawed at Hitler’s stomach. He stared at the narrow strip of water separating Europe from Great Britain. Although he never talked about it, the Channel was his greatest threat. He did not believe he had the resources yet to invade England.
“Never underestimate your enemy, Willie,” he said, waving his finger at Vierhaus. He strolled around his desk, his fists tight at his sides. “The British are tough. Proud. Dogged. They are exploiters. They are a psychological force embracing the entire world. And they are protected by a great navy and a very courageous air service.”
“Supplied by the Americans,” Vierhaus added.
“Exactly,” Hitler said. “You understand what I am driving at, eh, Willie?”
“Yes, mein Führer.”
“How fast can you activate Siebenundzwanzig?”
“I am ready to order the U-boat south, mein Fuhrer.”
“Who is in command?”
“Captain Fritz Leiger.”
“Ah!” Hitler said with raised eyebrows. “The U-17. And Siebenundzwanzig?”
“We are in touch with him through the newspaper ads. We can activate him immediately.”
Hitler eyed Vierhaus with suspicion.
“You anticipated my decision, Willie?”
“Not exactly, mein Führer,” Vierhaus said, not wishing to bruise Hitler’s fragile ego. “With the war in Europe, I am afraid Leiger may change his plans. Go someplace else. This may be our last opportunity.”
Hitler smiled. He put his hands behind his back, slapping the back of one in the palm of the other. “Of course you realize Operation Gespenst will force an open confrontation with the Americans.”
“They are supplying the British anyway. All they need is an excuse to get into it. They have just approved eighty-five million dollars for new aircraft, most of which we suspect will go to the Allies. Now is the time, men Führer. The longer we can delay the Americans, the better.”
“Of course, of course, I agree. We have nothing to lose anyway. When will the U-boat be in position?”
“It should take three weeks.”
“And when do you plan to carry out the mission?”
“The third week in November. On their Thanksgiving holiday. The timing could not be better.”
Hitler smiled. He went back behind his desk, patting his hand rapidly on it and then nodded.
“Gut, Willie. You have done an excellent job and so has Siebenundzwanzig. Activate him immediately. He has waited long enough. And so have we.”
The conning tower cut the smooth surface of the sea like a knife and a moment later the U-boat silently surfaced. The captain rapidly climbed the ladder up through the narrow con and, opening the hatch, stepped out into a cool September breeze.
Two other officers followed. Below him, two gunners emerged from the deck hatch to man the 8.8-centimeter gun. Nobody made a sound.
The captain peered through his glasses, scanning the black sea ahead of them, keening his ears. In the silence, he heard the deep rumble of engines, barely audible. He strained his eyes. Dimly in the dark, ships began to take shape. He counted them, aware that a hundred yards to his starboard, a second U-boat, the U-22, had surfaced.
“Small convoy,” the captain whispered. “I make six ships. No escort yet.”
“Shall I signal?” the mate whispered.
“Not yet
Like many of Germany’s U-boat commanders, Fritz Leiger was not a Nazi. A career navy man, he was a militarist with little interest in politics. But like most German military officers, he resented the Versailles treaty for the damage it had done to Germany’s pride and economy, so he favored the war against the British and French. He was a short, heavyset Austrian with a thick mustache and a stoic personality. He knew the dangers of U-boat service as well as the stress his crew would suffer before the war was over, so he cultivated few friends among his men. Although he was a fair and compassionate skipper, he felt he could not afford the luxury of comradeship.
In this first month of World War II, there were fifty-two Unterseeboote operating in the North Atlantic, type VIIC U-boats with a crew of forty-four men, a single deck gun, two antiaircraft cannons and five torpedo tubes. Leiger had been one of the first of the U-boat commanders. He had helped to develop the wolf- pack strategy, shadowing convoys and summoning other U- boats which would then launch nighttime surface attacks on British ships carrying aircraft and armaments from America to Great Britain. In twenty-eight days of war, the wolf packs had sunk nineteen British ships. Leiger’s sleek, gray shark, the U-17, had accounted for four of these, including the passenger ship Athenia, which had gone down with 1,400 crew and passengers, twenty-eight of them Americans.
Leiger suddenly stopped scanning the darkness and leaned forward. Refocusing his binoculars, he saw what a submariner fears most, the bubbling white water spraying off the bow of a British destroyer as it circled wide in front of the convoy and straightened out. The U-17 was directly in its path.
“Destroyer!” he yelled down into the con. “Prepare to dive.”
The warning horn blasted as Leiger and the bosun leaped through the hatchway and dropped down the narrow tube to the command deck of the sub. The bosun pulled the hatch closed behind him and locked it.
“Con clear!” he yelled.
“Take her to thirty meters,” the captain ordered. “We can’t risk a surface shot. Up periscope.”
He had his cap on backward and as the sub leveled off and the periscope rose, he swung it around. The destroyer was in the cross hairs, one thousand meters away and closing fast. He could see her silhouette clearly now as she sliced through the ocean toward them. He swung the scope around and focused on the convoy.
“Mark,” he said.
“Six hundred and fifty meters,” came the answer.
Leiger hesitated for only a moment before making his decision.
“First?” he said, still peering through the periscope.
“Yes, sir?”
“We’ll take the two lead ships. Launch four torpedoes, speed thirty-five, then we’ll dive immediately to sixty meters and go under the convoy.”
“Under the convoy, sir?” was the mate’s surprised answer.
“That’s right. The destroyer’s closing fast. When we fire, she’ll be looking for us on this side of the convoy.”
The first mate quickly nodded.
“Yes, sir.”
The captain, ignoring the destroyer, fixed the cross hairs on the first ship in the line. Just behind it, partially hidden by the shadow of the first ship, was a second vessel. By plan, the second submarine would take the last two ships in the convoy. Evasion was up to the individual sub.
“Reading?” the captain asked.