The Balboa sailed on the evening tide, and it was hardly out of the harbour before Kuznetsky, sitting alone in the bow, was approached by one of the Swedish crew.
“Bjorn Sjoberg, Comrade,” the man said in a low voice. “Do you have any instructions for me?”
“None for now.”
“Who are the other two men?”
Kuznetsky grinned. “Two serving German officers.”
Sjoberg showed his astonishment. “How—”
“Don’t worry, I’ll deal with them when the time comes.” He looked out across the sea. “How will your captain react if they are suddenly missing, do you think?”
“Difficult to say.” Sjoberg had recovered his poise quickly, which encouraged Kuznetsky. “He won’t turn the ship around and search the Atlantic for them, but he might ask awkward questions. And he might arrange a police welcome in Gothenburg.”
“That won’t matter. You contacted Rodrigues?”
“Yes, he’ll have watched the loading.”
“Good. Moscow will take all the necessary steps.”
Thirteen
“You haven’t told Zhdanov, I suppose,” Fyedorova said with a malicious grin. “I seem to remember you told him there was no chance of a German atomic bomb.”
“There still isn’t,” Sheslakov snapped. “And no, I haven’t told him,” he added more thoughtfully.
“Intriguing though, isn’t it?” she said in a similar tone. “It’s hard to find any reasonable explanation for the presence of the two Germans.”
“There must be one. The question is, what will we do about it?”
“Nothing.”
“We do have a U-boat, you know. It was grounded in the Gulf of Finland in 1942. It’s been repaired and it’s ready for service.”
“What service?” she asked.
“Well… I’m considering sending the Swedish boat an escort, even perhaps transferring the uranium to the U-boat at sea.”
She swung her legs to the floor in the familiar move. “No,” she said earnestly. He waited for the explanation as she went through the usual process of putting her thoughts in order. “For one thing,” she said, “it’s too elaborate. You’re seducing yourself with your own trickery again. For another, and much more important, imagine Kuznetsky’s reaction to the sudden appearance of a U-boat. He’ll throw the stuff over the side.”
Sheslakov looked at her appreciatively. “Why didn’t I think of that?”
“Because you’re itching to interfere. Look, the Germans must still think it’s a German operation, so there’s no reason for them to do anything before the ship reaches Gothenburg. And even if they do discover something before that, what can they do? They can’t hijack a Swedish ship with the crew and our people against them. It’s much more likely that Kuznetsky will dispose of them before the ship reaches Sweden.”
“Nothing then,” he muttered.
“Just make sure Gothenburg is swarming with our people when the ship comes in, including a few German-speakers in case the need arises.”
“Right. And if necessary we can dispose of them when we dispose of the other two.”
“What?”
“I forgot to tell you.” He passed across a sheet of paper bearing the General Secretary’s signature.
“For reasons of state security,” she said impassively. “And us?” she asked him.
He shrugged. “A good question. I doubt whether we’ll be sent advance notification.”
The days passed, blue seas giving way to green, calm waters to the rolling ocean swell. On clear days the thin line of the American coast was visible on the western horizon, emphasizing the distance still to be traveled.
Of the four of them, only Paul showed any inclination to mix with the Swedish crew, and this, it seemed to Gerd, had more to do with avoiding the three of them than with any genuine desire to play nonstop poker in the galley. He understood his friend’s need, but felt unable to share his means of assuaging it.
For many days he was haunted by the expression on Amy’s face that afternoon in Havana harbour. It had seemed out of all proportion when measured against what he knew of her and Paul. He sensed that she was hiding something, but he had no idea what it might be.
As the Balboa plowed northward this absorption faded, giving way to another. Sitting in Schellenberg’s office all those weeks before the whole business — America, atomic bombs, trains, and U-boats — it had all seemed quite fantastic, a crazy game that the mad masters of his country had decided to play.
Now, with the crates sitting out there on the deck, a few weeks at most from Germany, he was experiencing a growing feeling of revulsion at the thought of delivering them. Did he want to be one of the men who’d brought Hitler a weapon like that? “Defeat will have its compensations,” he’d told the U-boat captain, and that had been an understatement. Leaving the U-boat that night had been like stepping out of the war, giving him his first chance in years to look at the whole ghastly mess from the outside. And he knew now, as clearly as he’d ever known anything, that a German defeat would be the best possible outcome for everyone, the German people included. A swift defeat moreover, while the country was still in one piece.
And here he was helping to prolong the war, perhaps even to change its outcome. He didn’t want that. Aboard the U-boat they’d heard Hitler’s account of the bomb plot against him, the chilling voice announcing the revenge to come. And though a part of him still, almost reflexively, condemned the conspirators for breaking their soldier’s oath, the rest of him, most of him, had never felt prouder to be a Wehrmacht officer.
God knows, they should have acted sooner. They’d been blind, completely blind, and once the war had begun their eyes had been looking outward, their minds full of that shameful intoxication with victory, with sheer motion really, right up to that dreadful month outside Moscow.
But that was the East, not the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. Was it too late for treason? If he and Paul heaved the crates overboard, it wouldn’t make him very popular with Smith or Amy or the reception party that would be waiting in Sweden — in fact it might well prove to be their last meaningful act on earth. But as the days passed the vision of those crates sinking through the Atlantic swell seemed more and more like the only appropriate swan song for his war.
Kuznetsky spent his days sitting in the bow, hardly moving for hours save to light his cigarettes, staring ahead at the ocean still to be crossed. He had decided to kill the Germans on the penultimate night of the voyage. By then, he reasoned, he would be fit again, and there would only be around thirty-six hours for Torstensson to discover that two of his passengers had gone over the side. Twelve hours would have been better, but he didn’t completely trust Amy, and had told her it would be the final night. If by some chance her feelings got the better of her it would be too late.
Not that she’d shown any such inclinations when he’d told her. “You know they have to die,” he’d said on the occasion of their only conversation since leaving Havana.
“There’s no other way, is there?” she’d said simply, not even avoiding his eyes.
“There never has been. From the moment Sheslakov drew up the plan those two were dead, one way or another.”
She’d picked up on the name quick enough. “I’m slipping,” Kuznetsky had said, “no one should have known that name.”
“Do I have to die too now?” she’d asked with the same, almost unreal detachment.
“There’s a good chance that both of us will be considered unnecessary risks. You knew that, didn’t you?” And she had — he could tell by the expression in her eyes.