“Are you going to tell me the whole story about an atomic bomb attack on Portsmouth isn’t true?”
Kirchner seemed to think for a moment. “Well, yes and no.”
Riley raised his eyebrows, waiting for an explanation that didn’t come. “I’m very tired,” he said, stretching his neck, “and my ribs are killing me, so save your riddles for another day.” He started to get up.
“Wait a sec, Alex,” Jack said, taking his arm. “You have to listen to this.”
Riley saw the guarded looks on their faces and sat down again.
Kirchner put two crinkled, typewritten sheets of SS letterhead in front of Riley. “According to these documents, the Phobos was an active participant in Operation Apokalypse. It seems they had thirty Nazi agents set to disembark in enemy territory.”
“Nazi agents?”
“SS spies and saboteurs who were to deploy before the attack.”
“I see . . . And where exactly were they going to disembark?”
“We couldn’t tell,” Jack said. “But in the end, it doesn’t matter. The Phobos isn’t going anywhere.”
“So?”
“We found out the Phobos also had, aside from the agents, a Wunderwaffe.”
“What?”
“We were wrong, Alex. The Nazis weren’t going to attack from a sub like we thought. They were going to do it from the Phobos.”
It took Riley a moment to process what he was being told. “Hold on . . . Are you saying that the Wunderwaffe they were going to win the war with is sunk off Gibraltar?”
Jack nodded, gently biting his lip.
“Wonderful!” Riley clapped his hands. “Problem solved! Done deal! We should celebrate!” His smile faded when he saw the serious faces around him. “What?” he asked. “Is there something else?”
“There’s much more,” Jack said. “According to what Elsa and Helmut found, it seems the Phobos wasn’t heading for Portsmouth. Its destination doesn’t appear in the documents, but we’re sure it wasn’t Portsmouth.”
“Hold on.” He motioned with his hands for Jack to stop. “How? I thought that’s all we were sure about.”
“There are two ships!” Elsa blurted out. “The documents misled us. There are actually two bombs on two different ships. The Phobos has a sister ship, the Deimos.” She fixed her green eyes on Riley’s. “It’s going to Portsmouth, not the Phobos. It seems the Deimos is also flying a false Dutch flag and has thirty-some agents in its cabins and, we think, another fission bomb.”
Riley leaned back, squinted, and rubbed his temples. “Let me see if I follow . . . You’re telling me the Phobos had one of these uranium bombs and was going somewhere you can’t figure out, but either way the Nazis can’t use it, because the ship is sunk. Right?”
“Yes.”
“But now there’s a second ship. A ship identical to the Phobos that has one of those bombs too. That one’s going to Portsmouth, and it’ll try to sneak in and detonate the device inside the port.”
“That’s right.”
Riley scratched his head. “Two ships. Two bombs. Two targets,” he murmured, drumming his fingers on the table. “It keeps getting stranger . . . But regardless,” he sighed, “we know a lot more than before. We don’t have to worry about the Phobos, and we know the size and name of the other ship and where it’s headed. Anyway, tomorrow we’ll decide what to do with that information or if we should sell it to March with the machine. But now I have to go sleep.” He yawned and started to stand. “I’m very, very tired, and this can all wait a few hours, so I’ll go to my cabin to see if I can slee—”
“Shit, Alex. Shut up and listen!”
Riley was about to reprimand Jack, but when he took another look at their pained faces, he decided not to. “Okay, I’ll listen,” he said. “But can you tell me what the hell is actually going on?”
Jack looked at Kirchner and Elsa before speaking. “It’s not a question of what, but where.”
“I don’t follow.”
Jack scrunched his nose. “Like I said before, Helmut repaired the radio so we can receive messages. On our way to Larache, I asked him to check if the Enigma worked or if it was damaged in the wreck.”
“Well done.”
“Yeah, I guess,” he said tiredly. “The point is, after a few hours with the code book you took from the Phobos . . . Remember? That little blue book you found in the safe?”
“Oh right, small, with a Nazi eagle on it.”
“Yeah.” Jack nodded. “So we tuned in to the frequency it said and started getting lots of messages from Berlin to their ships at sea. Then we used the corresponding key for yesterday on the Enigma and started deciphering the messages one by one.”
“So it works,” Riley said happily.
“Oh yes. It works perfectly.” Jack looked down and winced. “It’s just that . . .”
“What?”
“You see, Alex . . .” He seemed to have trouble going on and looked around for help. Finding none, he took a deep breath. “One of them was for the Deimos, ordering it to keep absolute radio silence to prevent being identified and to maintain position at thirty-six-thirty north and twenty-five-double-zero west”—he showed Riley a piece of paper with the coordinates and orders in German on it—“until midnight the day after tomorrow. Then they set course for Portsmouth at full speed and reach their target four days later, entering the Gulf ‘with extreme caution.’”
Riley stared at him quietly, trying to integrate the new information with what he already knew—or thought he knew. “And these coordinates are for . . .”
“Thirty miles south of Santa Maria Island, in the Azores archipelago.”
Riley did some mental math and stared at the paper as if he could discern something from the scribbled German. “But that makes no sense.” He looked at Kirchner. “You must have made a mistake. The Azores are more than a thousand miles southwest of England in the middle of the Atlantic. A German cargo ship would never take that route to Portsmouth. It’d be like going from Los Angeles to San Francisco via Hawaii. It’s absurd.”
“I know,” Kirchner agreed. “But the message is correct.”
“It can’t be,” Riley said, shaking his head.
Jack gestured to Elsa, and she went to the map table, took out a nautical chart, and gave it to Jack, who spread it out on the table.
Riley was surprised to find it was not a navigation chart, but an old National Geographic map that he’d bought during his stay in London, which showed the entire Atlantic, from the North Pole to Antarctica and from the American coast to Europe and Africa.
Jack bent over the three-by-six-foot map, pencil in hand. “The Deimos left from here.” He made a little cross on Kiel, Germany. “And Santa Maria Island is more or less here.” He made another cross on the Azores.
“And Portsmouth is here,” Riley said impatiently, putting his finger on England.
Jack stared at him and sighed again. “That Portsmouth is there.”
Riley stared blankly. “There’s another Portsmouth?” he asked, looking closer at Great Britain. “I didn’t know, but either way the route to any other part of the British coast is . . .”
Jack put his hand on the map, covering all of Western Europe. “Alex,” he said, “not there.”
“What?”
“Look,” he said, lifting the pencil tip off the map.
Riley felt his blood pump harder as Jack moved 2,400 miles east to the coast of the United States.
He stopped on a peaceful little port town in New Hampshire just seventy miles north of Boston. Riley knew the place from visiting with his parents when he was a kid. He felt dismayed to read the little black letters spelling its name.
44
An overwhelming silence fell over the room like a dense and gloomy haze, making it difficult to even breathe.
Alex Riley, pale as a marble statue, stared at the straight line from the insignificant island in the Azores to the coast of New Hampshire. Minutes passed before he snapp
ed out of it.
“I want . . .” he said, running his hands through his hair. “I want you to explain to me, slowly, how you got to this conclusion.”
“Sadly,” Jack said, pointing at the paper in front of Riley, “it’s all written here. They’ll need four days going full speed to cross the 2,200 miles from the Azores to the coast of the US. And the part about entering with Gulf ‘with extreme caution’ must refer to the Gulf of Maine. They didn’t mention the route, but as you know, there’s only one Portsmouth near a gulf, and that’s the Gulf of Maine.”
Riley turned back to the colorful map, looking for another explanation for the series of clues leading in the same direction. But deep down he knew Jack was right, and Adolf Hitler had decided to annihilate a placid, irrelevant fishing port less than a hundred miles from Boston, his hometown.
“But there’s hardly anything worth destroying in Portsmouth,” Riley said, trying to convince himself too. “Just a little shipyard and a few subsidiary factories. Certainly nothing to justify an attack of this magnitude. Why would the Nazis go through so much trouble to blow up an insignificant city? It makes no sense.”
“None,” Jack said.
Riley met Jack’s melancholy eyes. “The US isn’t at war with Germany, and Roosevelt and Hitler are both being careful to avoid conflict. It’d be really stupid of the Nazis, with the majority of their resources on the Russian front, to attack the US and force them to enter the war. It’d be crazy.”
“Alex, remember we’re talking about Hitler and that crazy people have a tendency to do crazy things.”
“But this is . . . irrational. No matter how crazy he is, he has generals advising him. Even the dumbest soldier would know attacking the US unprovoked could make the Germans lose a war they’ve almost won.”
“Maybe . . . they think the war against the Soviet Union and Great Britain is over, and they want to take it across the Atlantic,” Jack said with a shrug.
Riley thought for a moment, then shook his head. “I doubt they think that, no way. The British can still resist, and Russia is very big—and full of Russians. I still think you must have made a serious mistake decoding or interpreting all this,” he added, looking at the two Germans. “Based on just a radio message and some pages written by a machine with an SS logo”—he lifted the papers up with two fingers and shook them to show their flimsiness—“I’m not going to buy something like this. No way.”
Jack turned to Kirchner for help. “It’s also possible,” Kirchner said, clearing his throat as usual, “that it’s an act of intimidation.”
“What do you mean?” Riley asked.
“I mean, if the Nazis have made a fission bomb with a destructive capacity thousands of times greater than any other weapon known to man, it may not be so crazy to use it against a country as a warning not to get involved in the war.”
“But if they want to intimidate the American government, why not attack New York, Washington, or some other major city?” Riley said. “Why some place as unimportant as Portsmouth?”
Kirchner shook his head. “That supports my theory. The Nazis would know that if they destroyed a big city and killed millions, the White House would have to declare war, even if just for revenge. However, if the attack were not as brutal, but close enough to a big city like Boston, highlighting its vulnerability, the show of Nazi military strength would be just as clear, but the popular pressure to enter the war wouldn’t be as strong. It’s typical Nazi behavior,” he said with a sad wave. “They shoot you in the knee to warn you not to fight back.”
Riley made a fist so hard his knuckles turned white. “If that’s what they think, they’re in for a big surprise. The United States isn’t easily intimidated, and no matter how terrible the Nazi weapon is, the whole country will rise up and never rest until they get revenge. If some Nazi idiot thinks they can intimidate us, it’s because they don’t know my people.”
No one dared contradict him.
Elsa raised a hand. “But what if Hitler knows what he’s doing? The Führer may be demented, but he’s not stupid, and neither is his long list of generals. If they really have this Wunderwaffe and decided to use it against your country, it’s because they believe it fits their plans for conquest.”
“Then why not blow up Russia or Great Britain?” Jack asked. “If they blew London to bits, the English would surrender the next day.”
Kirchner scratched his stubble. “It’s hard to say. It could be because uranium-235 is hard to process, and they only had enough fissile material for two bombs. Or maybe it’s because they plan to occupy Great Britain, and like I said, this type of bomb could make the site uninhabitable, maybe for centuries. A reason that applies to the USSR too, of course.”
“Maybe that’s why they don’t mind detonating it in the US,” Elsa said, “because they don’t plan on using America for their lebensraum.”
“Lebensraum?” Jack asked. “What’s that?”
Elsa seemed to regret the reference. “It’s the term Hitler uses when talking about living space, which according to him is destined for use by the Aryan race. In Mein Kampf he advocates for the expansion of Germany across Europe and Asia, eliminating or displacing the native populations, which he classifies as Untermenschen, or inferior races.”
Jack snorted. “Shit. We have to put up with Franco in Spain because he won the war, but you chose that nut in an election. What the hell were you thinking?”
Kirchner looked serious. “I didn’t vote for him. But there were 38 million other desperate German citizens, Mr. Alcántara. And desperation is always a bad advisor.”
Jack seemed ready to reply but seemed to think better of it when he saw the look on Riley’s face. “What are you thinking, Alex?”
Riley was staring at the map and took a moment to react. “I was thinking about the late—I hope—Agent Smith. If he’s an MI6 agent like he said, the British know about Operation Apokalypse and want to keep it a secret, and kill anyone who knows anything about it.”
An uneasy silence overtook them.
Elsa leaned on the table with a questioning look. “But . . . I don’t understand. Why would the English want to help a Nazi mission against the only country that can save them from absolute destruction?”
“I don’t get it either,” Jack said.
Riley rubbed his eyes. “Think about it. Like Helmut said, the US is the only country that can tilt the balance in favor of the Allies . . . but they won’t. Roosevelt refuses to declare war against Germany, but the British know that if he doesn’t change his mind fast, it’s only a matter of time before Hitler invades”—he saw Jack’s eyes widen—“so they have nothing to lose helping the Nazis go forward with their plan, hoping the Americans will finally join the war.”
The three others groaned.
“I can’t believe those ungrateful bastards would do something like that,” Jack said. “With all the help they get from the American public sending convoys of food and supplies across the Atlantic, and they—” He bit his lip, too angry to go on.
“This all seems like a big blunder,” Elsa said. “Hitler attacks the US to keep them out of the war . . . while Churchill wants him to complete his mission for the opposite reason. Absurd!”
“Another thing,” Kirchner added. “If the British know about the attack, why don’t they make it public? If the Americans knew the Nazis were planning it, the reaction would be the same.”
Riley shook his head. “No, Helmut. Those against entering the war would find a way to minimize it or even accuse the British of trying to manipulate them. And German subs have already attacked several American freighters; less than a month ago they sunk the destroyer Reuben James near Iceland. Still, Roosevelt insists on looking the other way and staying neutral. Believe me, the US won’t enter the conflict unless it has to.”
“But Americans support Great Britain,” Kirchner insisted. “Betraying them makes no sense.”
“Not so, Dr. Kirchner. That’s where all the pieces of the puzzl
e start to fit together. Winston Churchill always says desperate times call for desperate measures. He’s doing whatever he can to get the US in the war, even if it means allowing the Nazis to commit a massacre.” He clenched his teeth. “Tens of thousands of innocent civilians will pay with their lives . . . unless we do something to stop it.”
He stood up and gravely faced Jack. “Tell Marco, César, and Carmen to come here. I have to talk with everyone right away.”
The order was completed promptly, and a few minutes later the whole crew, along with the three passengers, sat around the table, waiting for an explanation.
César had left the engines idling, and Julie had put the ship on standby after making sure there were no boats for miles around. The Pingarrón swayed rhythmically with the waves, gently pushed south by a wind of eight knots that wafted in through the holes dotting the starboard bulkhead, filling the room with cold, damp air.
The atmosphere was undeniably bleak as Riley went over what they knew and their conclusion about the terrible consequences the Nazi attack would have for the United States and the war. He stood at the head of the table as he looked them over before going on. “We have five days before the Deimos attacks,” he said. “And we don’t have time to get to the US to warn them or a radio to inform the War Department in Washington. Though even if we did, they probably wouldn’t believe us without any proof.” He put his hands on the table. “And I’d bet the British fleet has an order to sink us any chance they get, and same goes for the Nazis. I also don’t think it’ll be possible to find a port to dock in since the Gestapo and MI6 have agents from here to Cape Town. So whatever country we touch down in, whether Allied, Axis, or neutral, sooner or later someone will recognize us and a new Agent Smith will try to do away with all of us. In sum,” he said bluntly, “we have no way to alert Washington and no port to hide in.”
“Wonderful,” Marco groaned from the other end of the table with his bandaged leg resting on a stool. “It just keeps getting better.”
Captain Riley (The Captain Riley Adventures Book 1) Page 28
