Good God!
“I took these myself, Herr Reichsprotektor, while I was risking my life by flying overhead.”
“When would you like me to land, Herr Standartenführer?”
“I’ll let you know. I want to take some photos for the reichsprotektor. I’m sure he would like to see them.”
“Would you like me to fly a little lower, Herr Standartenführer?”
“No!” Cranz snapped, then recovered, and added evenly, “This height is perfect for my purposes.”
A minute later, the Storch encountered some turbulence, which caused the Zeiss to bump against Cranz’s face.
He suddenly ordered von Wachtstein, “Okay, return to the shore and land. I will get some shots of the actual landing of the boats.”
There was some more turbulence during the landing, causing the Storch to bounce twice back into the air.
“Sorry about that, Herr Standartenführer,” von Wachtstein said once he’d stopped the Storch and shut down the engine. “The winds coming off the sea . . .”
Cranz wordlessly got out of the plane and trotted toward the beach.
I think I’m supposed to stay here.
But, on the other hand, I wasn’t ordered to.
And if I go to the beach, "Perhaps I can be of some help to the Herr Standartenführer? ”
By the time von Wachtstein got there, two rubber boats had unloaded their crates and were already making their way back to the submarine for others. A dozen men in blue coveralls were with some difficulty carrying the heavy wooden crates across the loose sand of the beach and toward the trucks.
Standartenführer Karl Cranz, Fregattenkapitän Karl Boltitz, Sturmbannführer Erich Raschner, and “Mr. Schmidt”—all in civilian clothing—were standing with a navy officer, an SS-sturmbannführer, and two SS enlisted men. They were in somewhat wet uniforms. The SS men all stood at rigid attention.
Either Cranz or Raschner is giving them hell about something.
The third rubber boat approached the beach.
“You and your men get that crate out of that boat,” Cranz ordered coldly. “And I don’t give a damn how wet you get! And that includes you, Sturmbannführer! ”
The SS officer gave the Nazi salute, then shouted at his men, who ran into the surf to meet the rubber boat. The SS officer splashed in after them.
I suspect the Herr Standartenführer has just taught the Herr Sturmbannführer that it is not beneath an SS officer’s dignity to get one’s uniform wet in the performance of his duty.
Von Wachtstein saw that the navy officer—who was in a somewhat informal uniform, with a battered brimmed cap, a sweater, and shapeless navy blue trousers—was smiling at the sight of the SS splashing around in the surf.
In that moment, as von Wachtstein—to his great surprise—recognized the navy officer, Kapitänleutnant Wilhelm von Dattenberg spotted him.
“Hansel!” he cried happily. “You sonofabitch! I couldn’t believe it was you in that ugly little airplane! ”
“Willi! You ugly bastard!” von Wachtstein cried back, then ran across the sand to him.
They embraced, pounding each other’s back.
“I gather you gentlemen are acquainted?” Cranz said.
Neither von Dattenberg nor von Wachtstein paid any attention to him.
“They were at school together, Herr Standartenführer,” Boltitz offered. “I learned they knew each other only just now.”
“Herr Kapitänleutnant,” Cranz said. “If I may have a moment of your time?”
Von Dattenberg looked at him but didn’t speak.
“Is there any reason the rubber boats cannot stay here?” Cranz went on.
“How would I get back aboard my boat?” von Dattenberg asked jokingly. “That’s a long way to swim.”
“You are talking to a SS-standartenführer!” Sturmbannführer Raschner snapped.
“I’m sure the kapitänleutnant meant no offense,” Cranz said, putting oil on the troubled seas.
“I meant none,” von Dattenberg said to Cranz, then nodded toward Raschner, “but I take offense at his tone of voice.”
“Easy, Willi,” Boltitz said.
“You will have to understand, Herr Kapitänleutnant,” Cranz said, “that Sturmbannführer Raschner really has no idea of the stress you and your men have been under. I believe you owe the kapitänleutnant an apology, Raschner.”
Von Wachtstein thought, What the hell is Cranz up to?
Does he want the boats that much?
He doesn’t want to have a fracas in front of Schmidt?
Or for it to get back to Himmler that there was a fracas on the beach because his flunky didn’t like the way the U-boat commander talked to him?
“If I in any way offended you, Herr Kapitänleutnant, I apologize,” Raschner said.
Von Dattenberg nodded his acceptance.
“There are more boats on the Ciudad de Cádiz,” von Dattenberg said, turning to Cranz. “Could you make do with two?”
The Ciudad de Cádiz?
Oh, the new supply ship.
“I’ve been making do with none,” Cranz said charmingly. “If you could spare me two, Herr Kapitänleutnant, I really would be grateful.”
Von Dattenberg raised his voice.
“Everybody into one boat, we’re leaving two here!”
A seaman replied, “Ja, Kapitän.”
“And you’d better show someone how to deflate them,” von Dattenberg said.
The sailor replied by taking a wicked-looking knife from his boot and waving it menacingly.
“No, you idiot,” von Dattenberg said, laughing. “Open the valves.”
“I can do that, Willi,” Boltitz said. “I think it would be a good idea for you to put to sea.”
Von Dattenberg popped to attention. “Jawohl, Herr Fregattenkapitän. By your leave, sir?”
“Resume your conn, Kapitänleutnant.”
“Jawohl, Herr Fregattenkapitän.”
Von Dattenberg then saluted, clicked his heels, and took a step backward.
He turned to von Wachtstein.
“Hansel, if you remember to take a bath every day and stop trying to screw every female over the age of thirteen, maybe they’ll give you a real airplane again.”
“Go fuck yourself, Willi,” von Wachtstein said smiling, and wrapped his arms around him again.
Von Dattenberg looked at Cranz and Schmidt, nodded his head, said, “Herr Schmidt, Herr Standartenführer,” then trotted to where his sailors were about to launch the rubber boat back into the sea.
“Smooth seas!” Cranz called a moment later.
“I’ll help you deflate the rafts,” von Wachtstein said to Boltitz.
There was a flicker of surprise in Boltitz’s eyes, but he said nothing.
They went to the rafts. Boltitz got in and began unlashing the cover of the exhaust valve.
Von Wachtstein leaned in, as if to see what he was doing.
“Karl, if you’ve got a pistol, give it to me,” he said softly. “And don’t let anyone see.”
Boltitz looked at him long enough to see that he was serious, then said, “Get in here and give me a hand, please.”
Von Wachtstein climbed into the rubber boat.
Below the gunwale, out of the view of others, Boltitz handed him a Luger P-08. Von Wachtstein stuffed it in the below-knee pocket of his flight suit, then shoved a scarf into the pocket so the outline of the pistol wouldn’t be seen.
“Why?” Boltitz asked.
“I think Cranz is going to kill me as soon as we’re back at El Palomar.”
“Why?” Boltitz asked softly.
“My skin crawled a while back,” von Wachtstein said. “I’m not sure whether he’s intentionally trying to make me afraid, or whether he’s really going to get rid of me on the general principle of covering his ass and making himself look good. So, better safe than sorry.”
“And what are you going to do?”
“If he killed me, he would have to explain tha
t he found out about me. That would get my father hung on a meat hook.”
“So would your killing him.”
Von Wachtstein nodded.
“The choice, Karl, is either two dead von Wachtsteins—which would mean the end of the bloodline—or one von Wachtstein left alive and one SS sonofabitch dead. And more of them dead later.”
“Hans, don’t do anything impetuously,” Boltitz said, then, really surprising von Wachtstein, added: “I will pray for you.” He raised his voice. “Now just stand on it to force the air out, von Wachtstein. Don’t jump; that will puncture the fabric.”
Cranz walked up a moment later.
“Is there a reason Schmidt’s men can’t stand on there?” he asked. “We should be getting back to El Palomar, von Wachtstein.”
“Jawohl, Herr Standartenführer.”
“That sounded good, von Wachtstein, but from this moment, I again am Commercial Attaché Cranz.”
Von Wachtstein nodded.
“We’ll see you back in Buenos Aires, Boltitz. Make it in the morning. I think we have all done enough for the day.”
[SIX]
It was a three-hundred-meter walk up an incline from the shoreline to where the Storch was parked beside the trucks. Cranz walked behind von Wachtstein, and all the way von Wachtstein was very much aware of how the Luger P-08 in the low pocket was banging against his leg.
Not because it was uncomfortable—that too, of course—but because he didn’t see how Cranz could not notice it.
As they approached the trucks, the first of them moved off, and by the time they got to the Storch, only two were left.
“Good!” Cranz said, and a moment later von Wachtstein took his meaning. One of the soldiers in blue coveralls was standing ten feet away from the Storch. Beside the soldier were two twenty-liter gasoline cans.
Herr Standartenführer wants to make sure we don’t run out of benzene on the way to Buenos Aires.
As von Wachtstein topped off the tanks, he was afraid the swinging bulge on his right leg would attract Cranz’s attention. It didn’t. Cranz was watching one of the last two trucks drive off.
The last, its doors open, was just about empty. This truck apparently would carry the rubber boats and what men remained. The others had carried off the half-dozen wooden crates and the rest of the soldiers, both those uniformed and those wearing the blue coveralls.
“Can you hurry that up a bit?” Cranz called to von Wachtstein.
“I just finished, Herr Sta . . . Cranz. We’re ready to go anytime you are.”
By the time they’d gotten into the Storch and taxied to the end of the landing strip, the last of the trucks was moving off. Aside from some tire and foot marks, there was nothing on the beach that would tell anyone what had happened here.
By the time the runway lights of El Palomar appeared, von Wachtstein was not nearly so afraid of being shot once Cranz was safely on the ground as he had been.
Cranz had spent almost the entire flight wallowing in the success of the operation, first thinking about it, then sharing his thoughts with von Wachtstein, as if seeking his confirmation:
“All things considered, von Wachtstein, I’d say that Oberst Schmidt did a fine job. Just about as good as a German officer could have done. Wouldn’t you say?”
“I thought he did a splendid job, sir. And his men were obviously well-trained and well-disciplined.”
"I don’t think it would be rash to think, now, that the U-405 is safe from detection, do you?”
“I think once she reached the fifty-fathom line and submerged, sir, that she was as safe as she’ll ever be.”
“Zeiss makes a fine camera. I think those photographs will come out well, don’t you?”
“Zeiss is a fine camera, sir, and there was plenty of light.”
“The vibration—is that what you call it, ‘the vibration’?—of the airplane won’t make them, what, out of focus?”
“I think the speed of the exposure will keep that from happening, sir.”
“I’m sure the reichsprotektor—and others, of course, as well—will be interested in the photos.”
“You know what they say, sir. A picture is worth a thousand words.”
“I was wondering why Sturmbannführer Raschner and Kapitänleutnant von Dattenberg took such a dislike to each other.”
“Are you asking for my opinion, sir?”
“Please.”
"I would say that Raschner didn’t like von Dattenberg’s somewhat casual uniform....”
“You can hardly imagine the kapitänleutnant walking into the Kriegsmarine building dressed like that, can you?”
“No, sir. And Raschner probably thought that von Dattenberg didn’t treat you with the proper respect. And on von Dattenberg’s part, he is a captain, and they are kings in their castle.”
“I didn’t think von Dattenberg was being disrespectful, did you?”
“No, sir. I did not.”
An embassy Mercedes was waiting for them—or at least for Cranz—at El Palomar. Untersturmführer Johan Schneider was driving it, and had dozed off behind the wheel while waiting for his passenger to arrive.
This was not the behavior expected of a very junior SS officer when dealing with a very senior one—even one in a happy, self-congratulatory frame of mind—as Cranz made clear the moment he saw Schneider with his mouth open and his eyes closed.
Cranz got in the backseat finally, and the Mercedes drove off.
There was just time for von Wachtstein to conclude that he wasn’t going to be shot tonight when the car braked, then backed up to him.
The rear door opened.
“You’ll have to excuse me, von Wachtstein. I’m a little distracted.”
“That’s perfectly understandable, sir.”
“Get in. Where are you headed?”
“To my apartment, sir.”
“The baroness is there?”
Take the chance. All he can say is no.
“No, sir. She’s at the estancia. Sir, may I ask a favor?”
There was a just-perceptible pause before Cranz said, “Certainly.”
“While I will make every effort to report for duty on time tomorrow, may I ask your indulgence if I were to be as much as an hour, or an hour and a half, late?”
“You want to go to the estancia, right?”
“Yes, sir. If that would be possible.”
“Schneider!” Cranz ordered. “After you drop me at my apartment, you will take the Herr Major to his estancia.”
“Jawohl, Herr Cranz.”
“And try to stay awake, Schneider,” Cranz said. He turned to von Wachtstein. “That’s what’s known as killing two—no, three—birds with one stone. I am simultaneously being a kind superior, rewarding a subordinate for a good day’s work, and punishing another subordinate for falling asleep on duty.”
“Thank you very much, sir.”
[SEVEN]
Estancia San Pedro y San Pablo Near Pila Buenos Aires Province, Argentina 0020 24 July 1943
Von Wachtstein saw the glow of what had to be the headlights of Cletus Frade’s Horch—what other car could possibly be racing down the private macadam road connecting Estancia Santo Catalina and Estancia San Pedro y San Pablo at this time of night?—long before he saw the headlights themselves.
He pulled his mother-in-law’s Buick to the side of the road and threw the switch so the headlights went off and the parking lights came on.
When the approaching headlights were two or three hundred meters distant—close enough to blind von Wachtstein—they suddenly turned to dying glows, then went completely out.
What the hell!
It took perhaps twenty seconds for his eyes to regain their acuity, and then he could see very little except the patch of gravel shoulder illuminated by his parking lights.
After a moment, he got out of the Buick. He stood on the road, looking down it into the dark.
“You are alone, señor?” a familiar voice said behind him.
&n
bsp; Von Wachtstein turned and saw Enrico, his self-loading shotgun pointing at the ground.
“You really thought I was going to ambush him, Enrico?”
“We are perhaps a kilometer from where El Coronel and I were ambushed, Señor Wachtstein,” Enrico said, then added pointedly, “Either by Germans or by pigs working for the Germans.”
He walked in front of the Buick and signaled into the darkness that it was all right to come closer.
The enormous Horch headlights came back on and the car approached. When it was perhaps fifty meters distant, von Wachtstein could see that Doña Dorotea Mallín de Frade was driving, and that her husband was riding on the running board next to her, a Thompson submachine gun slung from his shoulder.
When the Horch had stopped parallel to the Buick, Frade jumped to the ground.
“We’re going to have to stop meeting this way, Hansel,” Frade greeted him. “People will talk.”
Von Wachtstein didn’t reply for a moment, then he said, “At about eighteen hundred tonight, six wooden crates—each a meter long, three quarters of a meter wide, and three-quarters of a meter deep—were brought ashore from the U-405, loaded onto Argentine army trucks, then taken I have no idea where.”
“My God!” Dorotea said.
“What was in the crates?” Frade asked softly.
“Almost certainly money. Probably gold and jewels, too. It’s the special shipment, Clete.”
“Where was this?” Dorotea asked.
“On a deserted beach near Necochea.”
“Necochea’s a small town on the coast,” Dorotea explained to her husband, “about ninety kilometers south of Mar del Plata.”
“How do you know they were Argentine army trucks?” Frade asked.
“Well, they were under command of a colonel of mountain troops, and some of them were wearing uniforms.”
“That’s some five hours ago,” Frade said. “Too late to do anything about the goddamned submarine.”
“I really hope so,” von Wachtstein said.
“Excuse me?” Dorotea said.
“Kapitänleutnant Wilhelm von Dattenberg, her commander, is an old friend of mine. We went to school together.”
XII
[ONE]
Death and Honor Page 41
