Cold War Trilogy - A Three Book Boxed Set: of Historical Spy Versus Spy Action Adventure Thrillers

by William Brown

  This had to be some horrible nightmare, but Varentsov knew he wasn’t sleeping. He was wide awake, pacing back and forth in the trawler’s radio room; and Lindstromm’s last message confirmed his worst fears. The Israelis and their American lackeys had found that cursed U-boat. Here, off Sweden, not Poland! Worse still, Lindstromm’s message stopped in mid-sentence. That meant the fool had gotten himself caught and he would be talking his head off to them at this very moment, if he were not already dead. In either event, it left Varentsov stone blind at precisely the wrong moment — when he needed accurate information about the Israelis’ plans. Damn that fool Lindstromm!

  It was only a matter of hours before the Israelis would dive on the wreck again and photograph it or go inside and bring hard evidence that proved Neptune’s story was a tissue of lies. All those years of work, ruined. Ruined! Serov would not accept his lame excuses. He would have all the blame heaped on him now, leaving Varentsov with only two choices. He could go to the ship’s railing with a nine-millimeter pistol and blow his brains out. That would save him a life of pain and humiliation, and be his best choice; if it were not that Varentsov was a total coward. It was one thing to put a bullet in someone else’s head, and quite another to contemplate putting a bullet in one’s own, so that was out. Or, he could make one last attempt to stop them. Right now. At this very moment. Fate! Fate is an unforgiving whore, Varentsov cursed; but if that damned whaler made it back to Sweden, Varentsov was as good as dead.

  The MVD Colonel stumbled out the radio room door and headed for the crew compartment further aft where his diving team was waiting. He barged in and glared at the young Speznaz lieutenant. “Get your men ready,” he ordered in a hoarse, angry voice. “Now! We will move this ship closer in toward shore so you can take your team in and destroy that U-boat. That damned old whaler too, and everyone on it. All of them! And I will tolerate no mistakes. Do you hear me, boy!”

  “Yes, yes, Comrade Colonel, I…” the young officer stammered as he saw the desperation in Varentsov’s eyes.

  Varentsov didn’t wait for a reply. He turned and ran back to his own cabin. He was in agony. His skin was on fire and he needed a pill. A red one. And a purple one. Maybe two of them. His face and his hands were burning and the pills were the only things that could chase away the pain now. Oh God, he moaned as he threw himself on the bunk. The flames were burning the flesh off him now. He was right on the edge, the edge of the chasm and he knew this was his very last chance.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  Their morning began at first light with leaden clouds crowding the sky and a cold, pale mist masking the Swedish coast. It looked to be a somber day, and the mood on board the Brunnhilde was no brighter. The diving platform had been swung over the side and lowered into the water. The television camera remained bolted in place; but the magnetometer, the depth finder, and the rest of the search equipment had been replaced by more flood lights, all the platform could carry, an oxy-acetylene torch, gas cylinders, coils of rubber hose, bolt cutters, and a couple of long crow bars and prying irons. Michael knew what the foredeck hatch and the torpedo room looked like, and they would need every bit of that gear if they hoped to pop it open and get inside.

  They were sending three men down this time: Michael, David Schiff, and Balck. They were busy suiting up and rechecking their tanks, regulators, and personal equipment, while the others finished bolting the gear to the platform. Michael turned and saw Leslie standing by herself near the bow railing watching him. Her arms were folded across her chest and her face looked pale, drawn, and very troubled. He walked over, but she turned away and stared out to sea, her eyes glassy and sunken.

  “Are you all right?” he asked quietly, laying his hand on her arm.

  She jumped, startled, as if she had been touched by a high-voltage line. She turned her head, saw his wet suit and diving gear, and shuddered.

  “You’re freezing,” he said as he put his arm around her.

  “I’m fine.”

  “Leslie, last night happened. It’s something you’re going to have to get past.”

  “Maybe you can, I can’t.”

  “Lindstromm would have killed you, if Balck hadn’t stopped him.”

  “You didn’t see his face,” she whispered.

  “It was a bad way to die.”

  “Not Lindstromm’s; I meant Balck’s.” Even the name seemed to terrorize her. “It was like something I’ve never seen before — his eyes. The expression on his face — I can’t even describe it. He didn’t kill Lindstromm; it was an execution, a… ritual slaughter.”

  “Leslie, I know the whole thing was horrible, but…”

  “No,” she shook her head and tried to find the words. “You don’t know. You can’t even begin to know, if you didn’t see his expression. The man is evil. My god, when he drove that knife into Lindstromm it was like he was possessed.”

  Michael put his hand on her shoulder and tried to reassure her. “A couple of hours, Les, that’s all we need.”

  “You can’t go down there with him.”

  “I’m sure as hell not leaving him up here with you. Relax, I’ll keep an eye on him.”

  “What about the Russian trawler?” she asked. "You don’t know what Lindstromm told them. They’re not going to sit out there much longer.”

  “We still have time, Leslie. They’re Russians; they can’t do anything without orders,” he lied confidently. “A few hours, then it’ll all be over.”

  “No, it won’t." she said angrily as she turned toward him. “Don’t go down there with him. If you do, you’ll never come back. I know it.” She raised her hand and placed her hand against his cheek. “I couldn’t handle that, Michael.”

  “I’ve come too far to stop now, Les. I’ve got to go down there and touch it again, like you did; and I’ve got to get inside. I owe that to Eric Bruckner and his crew, and I promised Eddie.”

  “Eddie? My brother, Eddie?” She looked up at him, stunned.

  “I promised him people would know what happened back there; that I wouldn’t let them get away with it.”

  “They aren’t getting away with it, Michael. We found their U-boat. Now, we can go back to Sweden and tell the whole world what’s down there.”

  “We need proof, Les; we need proof. And I have to be the one to go.”

  Her eyes pleaded with him, but she saw it was hopeless. His mind was made up. Slowly she let her hand slip off his cheek and drop to her side as she turned away.

  “It was my idea to let Balck dive with me today,” he told her. “Not his. So relax. It won’t take long — a half-hour. It shouldn’t take much more. Then we’ll go, I promise.”

  “No. Somebody’s going to get killed down there, and it’s probably going to be you,” she said in a quiet, pain-filled voice. “I can’t handle that.”

  “You’re imagining things.”

  She shook her head, resigned to her fate and to his. “I wish my Daddy had never seen that damned newspaper story. I wish…” but she couldn’t finish the words. There was nothing else for him to say, either. He knew he’d never change her mind, and Schiff and Balck were waiting for him at the ladder.

  Michael left her standing there and slipped over the side into the dark, icy water to begin his quick descent to the bottom, focusing all his attention on the dive. Unfortunately, the events of the night before and this morning had taken their toll. Leslie’s words were still echoing in his ears, and the satisfaction he expected to feel on finally heading down to the hull of the U-582 wasn’t there. He felt stiff and slow as he followed the cable down, and even the water felt colder today. It was pure illusion, of course; but that didn’t stop an icy shiver from running down his spine.

  When they reached the platform, the new lights had helped create wider and brighter pools of light and he could see the dim outline of the U-boat below. Despite the weeks of preparation, his stomach leaped into his throat as he realized it really was the U-582 lying there. He turned his head, his eyes follow
ing the U-boat’s hull as it disappeared into the vast, black unknown; but right at the edge of the circle of light, he saw the dim outline of the battered conning tower jutting up at an awkward angle. In his mind’s eye, he saw it the way it looked that terrible night it went down, standing proud, with a small rubber raft, a thin moon riding high in the sky, the brisk wind, and the numbing cold. And he saw the sudden explosions, the orange fireballs, the clouds of choking black smoke, and the empty, painful silence that followed. To be here again, on the same deck where he and Eric Bruckner said good-bye over six years ago, took his breath away.

  Michael’s pulse quickened as he took a rope from the platform, tied it off to a railing on the conning tower, and pulled it tight to anchor the platform and its lights over the foredeck hatch. Les was right. Being here and touching it wasn’t the same as watching it on that small black-and-white TV up in the wheelhouse. He now had a clear view of the foredeck hatch where he and the Russian POWs had lowered all those boxes and crates that day in the submarine pen in Königsberg. The hatch was set midway between the conning tower and the bow, recessed below the old wooden deck planks. It was sized so that torpedoes could be slid down into the compartment. That explained why it had a wider diameter than the others, but Bormann and Kruger would have known that long before they sent their trucks to Königsberg, those bastards! They would have known precisely what size crate would fit down through that hatch. They had it all figured out. They had everything figured out, except a U-boat Kapitan with a conscience and an American stowaway.

  The deck was covered with silt and debris, the railings were bent and twisted, and what was left of the wooden decking had largely rotted away. Still, in a disturbingly quiet way, the hatch and its steel collar looked much the same as they had six years before. There was rust and corrosion, and no one could tell how badly the plates had been twisted and sprung, but there appeared to be no serious damage that would stand in the way of their forcing the hatch open and getting inside. It was round and hump-backed like all the other hatches, with a thick steel collar and a large circular locking wheel at its center. He swam closer, reached out, and touched it. Even through his thick rubber gloves, he felt the numbing cold of the old, rusted steel — felt, or imagined? The real chill would come from the sobering realization of what lay on the other side. He wrapped his fingers around the locking wheel and tried to turn it, but the wheel wouldn’t budge, not that he expected it to after all these years. He flexed his hands and tightened his grip, bracing himself, and tried once more; but again, nothing. The wheel would not turn.

  Balck had followed him down. He appeared next to Michael and motioned him aside while he slipped a long, steel prying bar between the spokes of the wheel. Together they pushed and pulled on the bar, trying to leverage the wheel — still nothing. While they were trying to turn the wheel, Schiff finished uncoiling the black rubber hoses and nozzles of the acetylene torch and motioned both of them away. He turned the valves and a thin stream of bubbles gushed from the jets. He adjusted the nozzle and squeezed the starter. A brilliant flash of light bathed the scene in a stark white, much harsher and brighter than the overhead lights. Schiff lowered a dark visor over his face and adjusted the valves one last time, focusing the flame into a blinding, four-inch blue dagger. He touched the flame to the hatch collar directly opposite the hinge, where he knew one of the thick, steel flanges would be located. The edge of the thick collar began to melt in big drops, but until Schiff cut a chunk of steel away, there was nothing for Michael to do but float nearby and wait, keeping one eye on the torch and an even more watchful eye on the German. Not that he believed everything Leslie said, he just didn’t believe in taking any chances, either.

  In a few minutes, Schiff had cut a deep arc through the thick steel collar. He set the torch aside and motioned for his two companions to have another try with the prying iron. Balck wedged the tip of the bar into the fresh cut while Michael lent a hand, bracing their feet against the rear edge of the collar and pulling back. The two divers strained, once, twice, a third time, until they felt a large piece of steel snap off with a sharp Crack! exposing the flange and a section of fresh, bright steel. They tried again to force the wheel to turn, but the hatch remained tightly sealed.

  Schiff set to work again with the acetylene torch. Between the bright glare of the floodlights and the cutting torch, Michael kept glancing over at Balck, searching his eyes for some clue as to what the German was really thinking; but the Mate gave away nothing. His attention appeared to be focused on the hatch too.

  For the next few minutes, they alternated between the torch and the bar, nibbling chunks of steel off the collar like mice working around a block of hard cheese. After the fifth try, they passed the bar through the spokes of the wheel and tried to turn it again. They felt it begin to give, only a few inches at first; but the wheel did begin to turn. He and Balck glanced at each other and nodded, each man taking a fresh grip as they leaned into the bar. The wheel moved again, squealing in loud protest as a thin stream of air bubbles escaped around the edge of the hatch. This would be stale, foul air, trapped inside the U-boat’s hull for more than six years, perhaps the very air he breathed himself, and that was a bone chilling thought. Schiff tapped him on the arm and motioned them aside again. Their oxygen was half gone now; and he knew they must keep moving.

  Floating motionlessly in the water and backlit by the bright lights from the platform, Michael suddenly saw a flash of silver pass by only inches from his head. It continued on down and bounced off the U-boat’s hull with a loud Chink!, leaving a fresh gouge on the thick steel plate. It was a long silver spear. Michael’s first thought was Balck. The bastard must have got above them and fired his spear gun at him. When he looked around and located the German, he realized he was wrong. The spear was full-sized, not one of the short darts they carried; and the trajectory was all wrong. Balck was floating off to Michael’s left, level with him, and appeared to be as surprised as the American. The spear had come from high above and to the right. Pivoting around and shielding his eyes, Michael tried to look up into the bright floodlights and locate their attacker. That was when a second stainless-steel spear sliced between them and dug its sharp point into the rotting wood of the U-boat’s foredeck.

  Instinctively, Michael backpedaled and tried to put as much water as he could between himself and their unseen attacker. One man? Or two? Whoever he was, he had the high ground and darkness on his side, while the three of them were blinded by the lights and lit up like ducks in a shooting gallery.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  Michael thought his reflexes were good. In addition to playing tight end in high school, he had played a little third base, where he learned to catch the ball or lose some teeth. But he couldn’t move half as fast as the German. Even underwater, he was cat-quick and certain, with nerves of steel. He had tracked the path of the second spear and pointed up and to the right where the shooters were lurking above the lights. Now, Michael saw them, too. They weren’t much more than shadowy grays on black, but he saw four silhouettes closing in on them in a box formation, blocking any hope of their retreating to the surface. These guys were pros. Their wet suits, masks, equipment harnesses, fins, and tanks were matching and of the most modern design. They had to be Red Navy frogmen from the trawler, carrying long-barreled spear guns, and closing in for the kill. That meant the waiting game was over. Whatever Lindstromm told them in his message last night, someone must have decided the time had come to put a violent and permanent end to this game.

  In that moment of grim recognition, Michael saw two bursts of air bubbles, and two more of the three-foot long silver spears sliced through the water toward them. One spear was aimed at Balck. Michael watched in disbelief at how quickly and calmly the big Mate reacted. Like a gymnast working in slow motion, at the last possible moment Balck lashed out with a powerful kick that propelled him upward and out of the way, his body bending around the oncoming spear like a matador sidestepping a charging bull. The spe
ar passed only inches from his chest, as if he had it under control the whole time.

  David Schiff was not so lucky. With his visor down and his attention focused on the acetylene torch, he was unaware they were under attack until the second spear caught him in the back. Michael groaned as the spear pierced Schiff’s wet suit. The big man rolled forward and dropped the blazing torch on the deck. His hands reached back, pawing at the shaft of the spear with his fingers, while a dark cloud of blood formed around him in the water.

  The odds had not been good to begin with, and they were getting worse by the second. It was now four against two and the hunters seemed to be a lot more skilled at this than the hunted. The Russians held their tight formation as they closed in. Each of them had now fired his spear, so they dropped the spear guns and were not even bothering to reload. Michael didn’t find that particularly encouraging. With less than thirty feet to go, each man let something else drop. It was a heavy disk, like a thick dinner plate with a handle. They wobbled and fluttered as they fell through the water and landed on the deck. Round, flat plates with handles? Those were limpet mines, and Michael knew each carried enough plastique to destroy what was left of the U-boat and blow the Brunnhilde halfway to Leningrad. That was exactly what the Russians had in mind, he realized.

  With their hands now free, the Russians drew their knives and let the blades flash in the bright glare of the floodlights. Once they carved up these two remaining minor irritants, the Russians would destroy the U-boat and the whaler. This time, not even the dead would be left to tell the tale. Michael looked up at the platform. The lights and TV camera were still running, and Person, Yuri Chorev, and Leslie would have ringside seats to a very lopsided fight. He could only pray that Einar would have the good sense to cut the Brunnhilde’s lines and get away before the Russians came after them, too.