Crash Dive

by Martin H. Greenberg

  But the Yanks learned quickly. Soon their cargo ships were traveling in convoys escorted by gunboats with air cover buzzing overhead. For a lone wolf like U-233, attacking armed convoys would be suicide. And despite his loyalty oath to Hitler and the Reich, Kapitän Kurt Bronner hadn’t brought U-233 and her crew all the way across the Atlantic to throw their lives away.

  As American air defenses improved, Bronner and U-233 moved south, taking targets of opportunity. Early in ’43 they hunted from Georgia to Florida before subhunting aircraft chased them down into the Caribbean. By ’44 U-233 had been hounded all the way down to the coastal waters of Brazil. Almost out of the war.

  South America was a backwater, of minimal strategic value. Still, Brazil had declared war on the Reich in ’42, which made all ships in Brazilian waters legitimate U-boat targets.

  Especially lone freighters.

  “No merchant ships are due in these waters for two more days,” Bootsmann Walli Bauer riffled quickly through the maritime schedules supplied by the Reich’s embassy in Argentina. “She must be a tramp freighter, Kapitän. What does the lady look like?”

  “A rust bucket, Walli. High-flung bow, broad beam, hasn’t seen a paintbrush since the last war. Or the one before that. Name . . . the Carmela, I believe.”

  “Flag?”

  “In tatters. Maybe Venezuelan. Can’t make it out.”

  “Carmela,” Bauer recited, reading from the naval register. Launched at Valparaiso, 1896. Listed at seventeen hundred tons, merchant freighter, Uruguayan flag, home port Montevideo . . .”

  “What is it, Walli?”

  “She must be a ghost, Kapitän. According to the records, Carmela was lost at sea, October, 1943. More than a year ago.”

  “Well, she could probably pass for a wreck, but she’s no ghost. Maybe the owner ran her aground for the insurance, then salvaged her afterward. We’ll ask her captain.”

  “Ask him, sir?” Leutnant zur See Scheringer echoed. Barely old enough to shave, Scheringer had joined Bronner’s staff as a replacement straight out of Breda submarine school, eager as a schoolboy, green as grass. After four years of combat at sea, he was still eager. But he wasn’t green anymore. None of them were.

  “She’s turning toward us, Mr. Scheringer, running for the river basin to get out of the rough seas. Barely making headway, though. Four or five knots, no more. Either she’s the slowest scow ever built or she’s got engine trouble. Seems to be towing a lifeboat, too. Who’s the senior man ashore on lookout?”

  “Seaman Voorheis, Kapitän.”

  “Good. Wake Leutnant Heitman, please, and ask him to report to the bridge. We’ll let Carmela come to us. When she heaves to, we’ll surface and board her, offload any stores we can use, then scuttle her in the shipping lane. Get Voorheis on the radio and tell him to keep his eyes peeled for aircraft. I want no surprises.”

  “Aye, Kapitän.”

  No one hurried. They all knew the drill by heart. Still, a ripple of excitement ran through the U-boat’s hardened crew as Scheringer worked his way forward to pass the word and wake Leutnant Heitman.

  Bronner retired to his tiny cubicle to change his clothes. Aboard ship, Bronner wore the same canvas U-boat overalls as his crewmen. Only his white-peaked cap marked his rank as commanding officer. Forty and fit, with gray eyes and a silver brush cut, Bronner was mild-mannered and easygoing. And hard as a crowbar.

  Ashore in Buenos Aires, the last port open to them, the men of U-233 wore civilian clothes to avoid drawing attention to themselves. But going into battle, even against a lowly tramp freighter, Kurt Bronner changed into his naval uniform.

  The winds of war had harried him across the Atlantic to the steaming green waters of Brazil. If half the rumors he’d heard on their last refueling stop were true, it would all be over soon.

  Hitler was in his bunker, people said. The Luftwaffe had been swept from the skies, the Wehrmacht was collapsing. Bolsheviks and Brits were overrunning the Fatherland’s borders. Nothing Bronner or the crew of U-233 accomplished in these waters would affect the outcome of the war. He knew it and so did they.

  Still, he was Kriegsmarine, son and grandson of German naval officers. He would continue to fight, no matter what. And when facing the enemy, he’d damned well look like a proper seaman.

  Moments after the sub’s bow and conning tower broke the surface the gun crews were scrambling out the hatches to man the eighty-eight millimeter deck gun and twenty-millimeter quad-barreled antiaircraft cannon. Jerking out the waterproof barrel tamps, the crews quickly unlimbered the guns and brought them to bear with practiced precision.

  At close range, the twenty-millimeter was actually the deadlier weapon. Bronner had less than a dozen rounds for the eighty-eight and he wasn’t about to waste them on a tub like the Carmela.

  Bronner, Bootsmann Walli Bauer and Leutnant Heitman took positions on the bridge, scanning the Carmela with binoculars for any sign of resistance.

  Nothing. Except for the machetes worn by some of the deckhands, the ship appeared to be unarmed. No weapons in sight, not even small arms. A local tramp freighter. Nothing more.

  Bronner relaxed, but Leutnant Heitman continued to scan the Carmela, eager as a gun dog on point. Hoping for a fight.

  Bauer and Bronner exchanged an amused glance behind Heitman’s broad back. A bullnecked, blonde athlete from Berlin, Heitman was new navy, a devout Nazi who still believed the Führer was luring the Russian army into Germany to destroy the Bolsheviks once and for all.

  Bronner admired his third officer’s dedication if not his intelligence. And he always included Heitman in boarding parties. Fanatics make first-rate warriors. Killing comes easy when death is a concept too complex to grasp.

  If the crew of the freighter were startled by the sight of a sub splashing to the surface three hundred meters off their starboard bow, they concealed it well. One of the deckhands lowered their ensign and ran up a white flag in its place. There was no panic. They’d apparently lowered a lifeboat during last night’s storm, but they made no move to abandon ship.

  Quite the contrary. A ship’s officer dressed in grimy whites appeared at the rail, waved cheerfully at U-233, then ordered an accommodation ladder lowered over the side.

  Frowning, Bauer lowered his binoculars. “Odd. He seems to be inviting us aboard, Kapitän.”

  “If you’re going to be raped, lie back and enjoy it,” Heitman muttered.

  “I hope you’re not speaking from experience, Number Three,” Bronner said.

  “Of course not, Kapitän,” Heitman said stiffly. “It’s just a saying.”

  “I’m relieved to hear it. Well, since the master of the Carmela is being so civil, let’s accommodate him. Assemble a boarding party, Heitman. Four men, myself, and Bootsmann Bauer. Scheringer will assume command in our absence.”

  “Jawohl, Herr Kapitän.” Heitman scrambled down the ladder, glad to be going into action and away from Bronner’s dry wit. Bronner was a superb naval officer, but his dry sense of humor could be unsettling.

  Issuing Mauser carbines and cartridge belts from the arms locker to four crewmen, Heitman chose a Schmeisser submachine gun for himself, then hurried back up to the bridge.

  Bauer had freed the twenty-foot motor whaler from its mount behind the Wintergarten and lowered it into the waves, its outboard gurgling merrily as it rocked like a child’s boat beside the massive metal hull of 233.

  “Boarders away,” Heitman snapped, though the crewmen were already scrambling aboard the launch. Heitman placed himself in the prow, Schmeisser at the ready while Bronner settled into his usual seat in the stem beside Walli Bauer.

  And they were off, putting across the long swells of the river basin toward the Carmela.

  A gorgeous day for a raid. A few miles offshore, the waves were still savage, remnants of the storm the night before. But here in the basin, the tropic sun was ablaze, beating down on the turbid waters, air so steamy a man could break a sweat with a single blink. A mile to the east
, the tangled vegetation of Brazil’s Green Hell towered above the shore, palm fronds waving in the wind.

  Halfway to the freighter, Bronner raised his hand and the AA gunner cut loose with a quick burst that hammered a half-dozen gouts of foam a few meters ahead of the Carmela’s bow, test-firing his weapon. And sending the tramp’s crew an unmistakable warning.

  Not that they needed it. The seamen lining the rail watched the Germans approach with more curiosity than fear. A ship’s officer in a soiled white uniform shouldered his way to the accommodation ladder carrying a megaphone.

  “Good afternoon, gentlemen. I am Captain Jose Stroessner, master of the Carmela. May I offer you the hospitality of my vessel?” Tall, slender as a riding crop, with a neatly trimmed goatee, Stroessner was as dark as any of his crew. Obviously Hispanic. But his German was very, very good.

  Bauer and Bronner exchanged a glance but made no comment. After two years in these waters they were immune to surprises.

  Heitman was first out of the boat, sprinting up the accommodation ladder, his Schmeisser covering the mela’ s captain all the way.

  “Get back against the rail with your men!” he ordered as the U-boat’s seamen scrambled aboard, taking up positions on the bridge to cover the Carmela’s deckhands.

  A rough-looking bunch. Heitman guessed they were Central Americans. Barefoot, wearing shorts and dirty shirts, coarse black hair, flat faces. Black eyes with invisible pupils, as expressionless as the carved stone faces of jungle idols.

  “Tell your men to raise their hands! And call out the rest of your crew!”

  “This is my crew,” Stroessner said mildly. “We are as you see.”

  “Seven hands for a ship this size?” Heitman snorted.

  “Do you take us for fools? Where are the others?”

  “Lost,” Stroessner shrugged. “We ran into heavy weather a few days ago off Ilha Diablo. A man was washed overboard, two more were crushed trying to stabilize the cargo.”

  “Bad luck,” Bronner said. “But not as bad as yours will be if you’re lying to us.”

  “I give you my word, sir,” Stroessner said. “Search the ship if you like.”

  “Thank you, I believe we will,” Bronner said mildly, nodding at Bauer, who immediately trotted off with two crewmen, leaving Heitman to cover the others with the Schmeisser. “No offense intended, of course.”

  “None taken, Kapitän,” Stroessner said. “May I lower my hands?”

  “If you like. But I wouldn’t do anything sudden. My men have been at sea a long time. We’re a bit edgy, I’m afraid.”

  “All the more reason to accept my hospitality,” Stroessner said. “I have a fine bottle of Napoleon brandy in my cabin. Would you care to join me?”

  “Sorry, but we won’t be staying that long. Nor will you. You speak very good German, Captain . . .?”

  “Stroessner, Kapitän, and I am German, or rather, my grandfather was. He emigrated to Mexico in the service of the emperor Maximilian nearly a century ago. Stayed on after the revolution. Which is why I have great sympathy for your situation.”

  “You’d best save your sympathy for yourself, Captain. I’m seizing this ship as a prize of war. We’ll take what we need and scuttle her. You and your crew will be put ashore unharmed. Unless you cause trouble. In which case we’ll put you over the side. Do we understand each other?”

  “Not quite. When I say I sympathize with your situation, Kapitän, I mean it. My grandfather, too, fought for a cause far from his Fatherland. But when that cause was lost, he took advantage of his opportunities. And became a very rich man.”

  “Did he? Forgive my frankness, Captain, but you don’t have the look of inherited wealth.”

  Surprisingly, Stroessner laughed. “I’m afraid I’m the black sheep of my family, Captain. Ran away to sea looking for adventure.”

  “If this scow is the measure of your success, I’d say you found more bad luck than adventure.”

  “An hour ago I might have agreed with you. But now I think my luck’s taken a turn for the better. Perhaps yours has, too.”

  “If you’re thinking of offering me a bribe, Stroessner, please don’t insult my intelligence. Everything aboard this vessel is already ours.”

  “Yours to destroy, true. But that would be such a waste. We’re intelligent men. Surely we can find another way, one that will profit all of us.”

  Bootsmann Bauer came trotting up. “No sign of anyone else aboard, Kapitän.”

  “What’s her cargo, Walli?”

  “I don’t know, sir. Produce of some sort. Bales of green leaves, tobacco perhaps. Jammed to the bulwarks. And its hot below, must be a hundred and twenty degrees Farenheit.

  “The leaves are cooking,” Stroessner explained. “Like green hay stored in a bam, it heats up as the bales decompose. If the cargo isn’t off-loaded soon it will spontaneously combust. Burst into flame. And that would be a great, great pity.”

  “Why?” Bronner asked. “What is this cargo of yours?”

  “Pharmaceuticals, Kapitän. Coca leaves from Columbia. The raw ingredients of cocaine. A miraculous stimulant, cocaine. I understand your Führer is very fond of it.”

  Bronner stared at Stroessner as though he’d grown a second head. “Sweet Jesus, Walli. That’s why this scow isn’t listed on the registry. She’s a smuggler. A verdammt drug smuggler.”

  “Drugs, pharmaceuticals, is there much difference, really?” Stroessner shrugged. “You and I are seamen, Kapitän, not merchants. But this cargo, delivered in Rio de Janeiro, is worth a fortune.”

  “To the Carmela’s owners, perhaps.”

  “Precisely. But we are her owners now, Kapitän, or rather, you are. As you said, the Carmela is a prize of war. Your prize. And maybe mine as well. The ship’s owner was lost in the storm. He panicked and tried to abandon ship in the lifeboat. But he was no seaman. He slipped climbing down to it.”

  “How unfortunate.”

  “For him, certainly,” Stroessner agreed smoothly. “Not necessarily for us. Don’t get me wrong, Kapitän, Senor Porges’s death was a great loss to me. We were like brothers, the owner and I. He told me everything about his rich contacts in Rio. Their names. And how badly they want this cargo. The owner was to be paid three quarters of a million dollars U.S. on delivery. Cash. In reichsmarks that’s—”

  “Fool’s gold,” Bronner snorted. “What are you suggesting, Stroessner? That we send you merrily on your way to Rio to sell your cargo to these rich drug dealers? And afterward, how would we collect our share? Through the mail?”

  “Not at all, Kapitän. At the moment I can’t make it to Rio anyway. The Carmela’s engines were damaged in the storm. If I sail her into the harbor, the buyers will simply take her from me, since I have no papers proving ownership.”

  “Then what do you have in mind?”

  “That you and your men take possession of the Carmela as a prize crew. We’ll sail to Rio together, with your U-boat as an escort. But instead of entering the harbor, we’ll send a launch to bring the buyers out to us. And we’ll offer to sell them the Carmela and her cargo for, say, half a million, two thirds of the agreed price. But if they try any treachery your sub will torpedo Carmela and send their precious coca to the bottom.”

  “Half a million?” Bauer whistled. “A lot of money.”

  “For them it’s a bargain,” Stroessner shrugged. “It’s less than they expected to pay and they get the ship as well. They must be greedy men to be involved in this dirty business. They will pay, I think.”

  Bronner eyed the Carmela’s captain for what seemed like a very long time. “Would you mind joining your men at the rail, Stroessner?” he said at last.

  “You wish to discuss this, I understand,” Stroessner said, smiling as he backed away. “Just remember—”

  “Get the fuck over there and shut your mouth,” Heitman barked, striding angrily up to Bronner. “Surely you can’t be considering this, Kapitän. We are Kriegsmarine, seamen of the Reich—”

&
nbsp; “A Thousand Year Reich which won’t see another Christmas,” Bronner snapped. “The last time we refueled in Buenos Aires I visited our embassy, Heitman. Do you know what our fearless Nazi diplomats were doing? They were burning documents: maps, codebooks, everything. They offered to sell me new citizenship papers for Argentina or Paraguay. But they wouldn’t accept payment in reichsmarks. American dollars only. This war is lost, gentlemen, we’ve all known it for months.”

  “We still have our duty to the Fatherland!” Heitman protested.

  “And I’ll continue to honor that duty to the last moment,” Bronner agreed. “But I also have a duty to protect my men. None of us has been paid for over a year. We’ll need money to get home, money to feed our families and start new lives. There’s some risk in escorting this scow to Rio, but the freighter will shield us from radar and we can run submerged in her shadow during the day. No self-respecting air defense pilot will give this tub a second glance.”

  “But we’re already shorthanded, Kapitän. If we put men on this ship—”

  “We’ll keep the prize crew small, Heitman, five of us should be enough. I’ll command it myself. If anything goes wrong, the responsibility will be mine alone. But desperate times require desperate measures, and this is not a debating society, gentlemen. The decision is mine. We’re going. Any questions?”

  “Collecting this money will mean taking the U-boat too close to the harbor at Rio,” Heitman argued. “We’ll be putting the ship at risk.”

  “We risk death every day for nothing,” Bauer said quietly.

  “Shut your mouth, Bootsmann!” Heitman snapped “You have no say in this. You’re a seaman and you’ll damned well do as you’re told.”

  “Of course he will,” Bronner said mildly. “Because, as you say, Heitman, we are Kriegsmarine, not pirates. We’re seizing this ship as a legitimate prize of war and we’ll divide the spoils by naval tradition among the officers and the men.