Lindemann closed the door behind them. Acting quite mysteriously, the captain pointed to a dark corner of the cabin where against the wall, the orange crate sat, squat and rectangular like a menacing coffin.
“You want to look inside that crate, don’t you, Hulsing?”
“What, sir?”
“Go ahead, man, open it up; take a good look inside, and then I want you to report back to all the men on board what you’ve seen. Will you do that for me, Lt. Commander?”
Punishment, embarrass the junior officer, Erwin silently realized. He nodded, glad that this was all there was to his dressing down. “If this is your wish, Captain, of course, but we both know it is what it appears—oranges.”
“How startlingly observant you are, Detective Hulsing.” Lindemann’s smirk had turned to a full-fledged snicker. “Do it, Hulsing. Lift the lid and take a long look inside the damn box.”
Erwin took in a deep breath as he stepped toward the box. Behind him, he could feel Lindemann’s cold presence, imagining his glee, as the man’s icy stare bored a hole into his back. “Who doesn’t want to look inside a mysterious box? One brought on board Bismarck by der Fuhrer himself, eh, Lietenant-Commander Hulsing, eh?”
“Yes, sir… .yes, sir.” Hulsing listened to the irk-irk-irk sound as he snatched up the lid which had been pried open earlier. but replaced. The nails had been pried loose on all sides, making it obvious that Lutjens and Lindemann had already taken time to partake of the sweet fruit.
Erwin stared down at rows of carefully wrapped oranges, shelved within the crate, a few shaken loose from having been handled. That’s all it was—precisely as it was presented. Stacks of damned oranges. No mystery here.
Lindemann broke into a rare laugh. “Now, you are in the inner circle of the orange affair. Who best to spread the truth of the matter but a former police detective who saw to removing dead victims from Berlin streets? Perhaps we can diffuse a mutiny before it happens!” The captain was laughing as if his words were the funniest joke he’d ever told.
Hulsing stood looking into the crate of oranges, saying nothing as Lindemann added, “Go ahead, dig deep, make sure nothing is hidden beneath the fruit, like perhaps some sort of satanic cross… ha! Or a talisman, or perhaps even the Arc of the Covenant itself?”
Rumors of Hitler’s obsessive fascination with occult matters, biblical relics, magic, and a preoccupation with the afterlife had circulated among the educated classes of Berlin and Germany for several years. It was rumored he had men searching for The Arc of the Covenant as well as the Lost Continent of Atlantis.
Erwin Hulsing gritted his teeth at the inference that he’d merely been a man to clean up the streets of bodies during his stint as a detective in Berlin. He dropped the lid with a loud thud just as Admiral Lutjens stepped into his quarters. “Well… I see you’ve gone ahead with your plans, Lindemann. I hope it has the desired effect, but we both know it will not!” Lutjens acknowledged Hulsing’s salute, returned it, then found a seat at his desk. “Lt. Commander, thank you for acting as our siren to the men. I take it you volunteered.”
“Ahhh, yes sir.”
Lindemann had inched toward the door and held the it open, a sure sign this interview was over. “You may go now, Hulsing.”
Erwin nodded, unsure how many ‘yes sirs’ he’d said to his captain. He found himself outside in a growing sea fog, stumbling to find his way from the bridge back to the lower decks where junior officers belonged. As he went, he muttered, “Lesson learned.”
Lessons actually. He’d just been reminded how exacting the hierarchy on a ship was and how either Lindemann or Lutjens, finding fault with him, could see that he was put away for years into some black hole where no one would ever see or hear from him again.
Erwin was angry with himself for having been so easily eavesdropped upon by his captain, and over what—damned oranges. The rumors about Hitler’s bloody gift to Lutjens had spread like a wildfire aboard Bismarck. Everyone had been speculating just as Lindemann had said, and he wanted Erwin to put the thing to rest, ostensibly for the good of crew and ship. The captain, without being precise, had managed to make it clear; he wanted Lt. Commander of Engineering to spread the word via the seaman’s vine. He was to tell all the junior officers who would in turn inform their various units throughout the ship. As far as the orange crate brought aboard by Hitler: no snakes, no eerie crosses, nothing remotely occult about the Fuhrer’s gift. An orange is an orange is an orange.
Obviously, at some point, Admiral Lutjens had let it slip that he loved oranges and word had gotten back to Berlin and thus back to Hitler. There was obviously nothing unusual about the commander-in-chief coming aboard to inspect the ship and crew. After all, this ship was the pride and joy of all Germany, and nothing wrong with the Fuhrer bringing a gift for Admiral Lutjens.
Still, former Detective Erwin Hulsing and now Seaman Hulsing knew how superstition had a life of its own on any seagoing vessel, and how deeply superstitious many sailors were. Most of them were fresh off the farm, which was another place superstitious belief ran rampant. The real threat here might be less Hitler and more the men aboard Bismarck. Hulsing must hold it together, watch his back, and be far more cautious of Lindemann, who had just proved himself a shrewd and well-read man, not like Lutjens who huddled each night with his Bible and believed wholeheartedly in the party line which stated that God had placed His power in Adolf Hitler’s hands to restore His chosen people, the Aryan Nation, to former dominance over the Earth and to crush all inferior races.
Hulsing imagined a time fast approaching when Lindemann might well have the power to have the Lt. Commander court-martialed, perhaps sending him to a prison camp, for of all things, gossip! If Lindemann suspected him of worse crimes, he hadn’t given himself away, and if Lindeman and Lutjens together had any clue as to Erwin’s real crimes aboard Bismarck, the two were playing it quite cagey at indeed.
Chapter Three
On Board the Windwalker in the North Atlantic, June 11, 2013
The Windwalker was a ship twice the size of the last salvage vessel that had gone after the Bismarck, only a month and a year after the horrible, failed mission of The Victory. All manner of superstitious nonsense had come out of the unfortunate Victory incident: the demise of the three men who’d attempted to land on the Bismarck. The divers had planned to enter the battleship from the forward deck, easily recognized by the gigantic Swastika still clearly visible some seventy-odd years after the British ships had sunk Bismarck. The mighty ship had been destroyed thanks to some serious British coordination between the Royal Air Force and the Royal Navy.
To complete your reading pleasure with BISMARCK 2013 — Hitler’s Curse find it at a kindle store near you! Thanks so much for reading Titanic and these opening pages, Rob Walker ( www.robertwalkerbooks.com )
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Titanic 2012 (inspector alastair ransom) Page 53
