The Mammoth Book of Historical Whodunnits Volume 3 (The Mammoth Book Series)

by Mike Ashley

  First Officer Willi Rendt, a bearlike but peaceable man, asked no questions, but he pondered possible reasons for the mission. The sub wasn’t armed with torpedoes and was carrying only the minimal amount of ammunition for its deck gun. That boded well.

  Doubting that U-7 was about to engage in an act that might precipitate war, Rendt waited patiently for further instructions from his commander.

  Wick and Braithwaite’s suspicions centred on Manningly, the dashing bachelor, and journalist Rob Coyle. But Braithwaite did remind Wick that Lucy Burnwright was an actress. British Intelligence might think her eminently capable of deception and might have entrusted her with the plans, appealing to her romanticism as well as patriotism.

  While Braithwaite concentrated his attentions on the attractive Lucy Burnwright, Wick managed to become involved in a poker game with Coyle, Manningly, and several other men in the Gentlemen’s First-Class Lounge. Deliberately losing early, he excused himself from the game and left to search the cabins of both men as well as that of Lucy Burnwright, who was being kept occupied by Braithwaite. He had told her he was toying with the idea of financing a play.

  After stopping at his cabin to get the small Leica camera Braithwaite had given him, Wick stepped out into the passageway and was confronted by Lorna Palin.

  She smiled and kissed his cheek. “I snuck up here with the rich folks to see if you wanted to stroll on the deck.”

  He couldn’t help catching the sweet scent of her perfume, feeling the warmth of her closeness. Couldn’t help touching her cheek. “I, uh, told you that wasn’t possible, Lorna.”

  She glanced down at the camera he was carrying. “Isn’t it too dark to take pictures?”

  “Yes. I’m on my way up to the Gentlemen’s Lounge to show someone how this works.” He knew she couldn’t follow him there.

  “Ah! Is it part of your work then?” she asked, grinning at the delicious adventure of it.

  “Please, Lorna, don’t even mention that. Only trust me. I don’t want you to be in danger.”

  “I don’t care –”

  “Or to put me in danger.”

  She paused and stared up at him, then kissed him again, this time gently on the lips. He couldn’t help it. He held her close and kissed her back.

  When they separated, he whispered, “Please, Lorna!”

  “I understand, love,” she said. “But later . . . ?”

  “Later,” he promised.

  She hesitantly took her hand away from his arm. Smiling, she left him.

  Minding his mission, Wick hurried in the opposite direction, toward the first of the cabins whose door he was to open with the master key Braithwaite had mysteriously procured. It was all enough to make one have complete faith in Berlin.

  But after thorough searches, Wick had found nothing suspicious in the cabins of Manningly, Coyle, or Lucy Burnwright.

  “We must extend our searches,” Braithwaite told him later that night. “And soon.”

  The next morning, as Colonel Brookes strolled on deck for his daily exercise while his wife reclined in a deck chair and read a Jacques Futrelle novel, Wick found the plans hidden in a false bottom of the colonel’s suitcase.

  He was waiting for the colonel when he returned to the stateroom to change from his walkers.

  Brookes stood motionless while his glance shot to the still-open suitcase then back to Wick.

  “Mrs Brookes still reading?” Wick asked.

  The colonel didn’t blink. “You know she is, or you wouldn’t be here. A Futrelle novel. Chap’s on board, you know.”

  “The plans are gone,” Wick said. “I’m putting them in a safe place.”

  “And where would that be?” the colonel asked. His bearing was much different now. The doddering, kindly military fossil was suddenly vital and sharp-eyed.

  “My stateroom, one of the last places Braithwaite would search.” Wick stood up from his chair and extended his hand. “I’m Captain Evan Wick, British Intelligence. I’m also a German double agent. They think I’m working for them.”

  Brooks hesitated before shaking the hand, then said crisply, “Explain.”

  Wick did.

  The U-7 had reached its destination 370 miles off the coast of Newfoundland.

  “We will soon be engaged in a recovery operation,” Captain Geerhauser told his officers. “An object in a watertight container will be jettisoned from the ocean liner we are to shadow. It will float a few feet beneath the surface and emit a radio signal, and fifteen minutes later a stream of yellow dye. The U-7 will home in on the signal, then visually on the dye, and recover the container.”

  He then turned command over to Willi Rendt and retired to his quarters. When it was dark, the U-7 was to surface and lookouts were to be posted. Neither Rendt nor any of the other officers had asked what was in the container they were to recover. Geerhauser would have informed them if he’d wanted them to know.

  On the fourth day at sea, Braithwaite answered a knock on his stateroom door to find the six-foot, hulking form of Nels Svenson looming in the passageway

  “You’d better have good reason to be here,” Braithwaite said, grabbing the man’s arm and pulling him inside before anyone saw him.

  “I’ve been watching Wick, as instructed,” Svenson said. “He’s been secretly seeing a woman on board.”

  Braithwaite stared at him, then sneered. “One of those idiot twins?”

  “No, a third-class passenger.”

  “That’s absurd. He’s a loyal German agent with a mission.” But Braithwaite knew Wick was also a man.

  “They try to look casual or stay out of sight, but they act like newlyweds. They sneak kisses and pose for pictures. They make love in dark places. And I saw them talking the day we sailed, as if they already knew each other.”

  Braithwaite jammed his hands in his pants pockets, paced a few steps this way and that, then stood still and looked calmly at Svenson. “She’s an unacceptable security risk.”

  “You mean she won’t reach New York?”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “Of course you didn’t,” Svenson said. “And there’s something else. That fellow Rob Coyle’s seen them together, too. I saw him watching them.”

  “He’s a journalist snooping for a story,” Braithwaite said. “We’ll make sure he doesn’t get one.”

  Svenson kept an eye on Lorna Palin as the journey progressed. On the third day at sea, he followed her up on deck after supper, thinking she might be on her way to meet Wick. The evening was cool, Rob Coyle was safely located in the lounge playing whist, and the part of the deck where the woman walked was deserted except for an elderly British gent with a bushy moustache, stubbornly trying to get a pipe lighted.

  Svenson nodded to him as he crossed to the other side of the deck, still watching Lorna. He was lucky to notice her pause, then veer toward a ladder. Her pale skirt whipped briefly in the wind like a signal flag as she climbed to the deck above. Svenson glanced around to make sure he wasn’t being observed, then followed.

  It took him a few minutes to locate her. She was still alone, leaning with both hands on the rail and looking out to sea. She was beautiful, all right, Svenson thought, with her chin raised high and her hair blowing. He could understand how Wick had fallen.

  Quietly, he walked to a spot a few feet behind her. She hadn’t noticed him.

  Didn’t notice him until he had one huge hand at the nape of her neck, the other gripping her skirt that he’d bunched between her legs. He was hoisting her high to hurl her over the rail. “I hope you can swim, dear,” he told her, as if it were all a joke.

  Then they were both yanked backward. The tall man who’d had her staggered to keep his balance. Wick was there to punch him in the jaw.

  But the man didn’t fall. Instead, he shook his head, grinned, and grabbed Wick by his collar.

  That was when the elderly gentleman she’d noticed on the deck below stepped from the shadows and struck the tall man on the head with what lo
oked like a leather sap. The man still didn’t fall, but stumbled and slumped against the rail. He reached again for the paralyzed Lorna. Wick punched him again, and the elderly gentleman, still with his pipe clamped firmly in his jaw, quickly stepped forward and pushed the man over the rail.

  Just like that, simple, fast, unreal. But it had happened, she knew. There had been no scream, and they were too high even to hear a splash. But the tall man had been there, and now he was gone.

  Then Wick had her, holding her close, asking if she was hurt.

  When he was sure she wasn’t, he walked with her to her cabin. Glancing back, she noticed the elderly gentleman pick up a shoe the tall man had lost in the struggle and casually toss it out into the night.

  “How will you deal with Braithwaite?” the colonel asked Wick when he’d joined him later in the Gentlemen’s Lounge.

  “As of now,” Wick said, “he still regards me as a loyal, if love-struck, German agent, and he needs me to help him find and photograph the plans. He’ll play dumb about the Swede’s disappearance from the ship, and so will I.”

  Colonel Brookes drew thoughtfully on his pipe, then exhaled a great cloud of smoke that smelled like dry pine needles burning. “Do you know yet how he plans to transport the photographed plans to Germany once he has them?”

  Wick shook his head. “The Germans never reveal any more information than is necessary.”

  “I dare say that’s so you can’t answer if a British agent asks you,” the colonel told him.

  “I dare say,” Wick agreed.

  Later that evening, Lorna surrendered to her emotions and decided to go to Wick in his stateroom. He didn’t answer when she knocked, but he’d given her a key in case she needed some place to hide. She used it to let herself in, then looked around at the unsuspected luxury.

  As she stood motionless on the plush carpet, she heard another key grate in the lock, and she decided to conceal herself behind a Chinese folding screen with a dragon design and surprise Wick.

  Staring through the vertical crack between the screen’s panels, she drew in her breath. The man who entered wasn’t Wick. It was the large, bullish man she’d heard the stewards refer to as Mr Braithwaite.

  Now she had a problem. She considered simply stepping out from behind the screen and telling the truth, then thought better of the idea. Braithwaite probably wouldn’t stay long in another man’s stateroom. Besides, what was he doing here?

  He wasn’t acting as if he were looking for something. Instead, he sat in a chair that appeared too dainty for him, crossed his legs, and peered at a pocket watch on the end of a long silver chain.

  Which was when the door from the passageway opened again and Wick entered the room. Lorna remained still and silent behind the screen, peeking through the narrow space where the panels were hinged. Though Braithwaite remained seated, something in his demeanour made it clear that he was Wick’s superior. “Considering your history,” he said in an irritated voice, “I expected that by now you would have located the plans.”

  “What do you know about my history?” Wick asked.

  “Oh, I know much about you. Your real name is Erik Kolb, and you’re considered one of the most efficient agents in the organization. You scored high when you were in London six years ago on an industrial espionage mission, posing as a young British sculptor named Bertie Wicker. Berlin also described you as a bit of a rogue. At times you tend to digress from orders and work your own strategies.”

  “That last is because you can trust no one in our occupation.”

  “You needn’t trust me, completely,” Braithwaite said. “In fact, I’d be disappointed in you if you did. What you must do is obey my orders to the letter.”

  “As I do.”

  “It’s a changing world, and some men have wavering loyalties.”

  “I am not one of them, Herr Braithwaite.”

  Lorna felt her shattered heart continue its plunge. Wick wasn’t pretending – he actually was a German agent.

  “There’s still plenty of time before we reach New York,” Wick – or was it Erik Kolb? – assured Braithwaite.

  Braithwaite stood up and went to the door. “We need the plans as soon as possible, not simply before the ship docks. Tonight, in fact. It’s imperative. I suggest you use your time effectively, or there will be repercussions.” He went out.

  Wick didn’t move for a moment, then locked the door and slowly began undressing for bed. Apparently he was going to disregard Braithwaite’s ultimatum.

  Lorna waited for hours, trembling and silent behind the screen, before Wick’s deep and even breathing assured her he was sleeping and she could creep from his stateroom and return to her bunk below deck.

  On board the U-7, which had been running on the surface during the night to intercept, then shadow and close on the ocean liner, Rendt and the rest of the crew were astounded to see the massive, brightly lighted form of the Titanic appear in the darkness.

  Rendt’s voice quavered with awe and alarm. “Captain –”

  “Stay calm, I see it,” Geerhauser interrupted. The huge ship was moving deceptively fast and he had to act quickly.

  “Iceberg dead ahead,” the lookout conveyed to the sub’s conning tower, and peering through his binoculars, Geerhauser immediately saw the menacing pale form.

  He wasn’t thrown. “Titanic will bear hard to port to avoid the iceberg,” he confidently told Rendt. “We will submerge to a shallow depth to remain out of sight and veer slightly in the same direction.”

  He barked his orders, and U-7 slipped beneath the dark sea as the towering wall of Titanic’s hull approached. The plan was for the sub to pass between the Titanic and the iceberg. Geerhauser smiled as he realized the iceberg would reduce the area of ocean where they’d be searching for the container to be recovered in the gigantic ship’s wake.

  Who was he, really? Lorna wondered as she lay in her bunk, finished with her crying. Was Wick really Erik Kolb, German agent? Did his loyalties waver? Might he love her enough to consider changing sides in reality?

  But she knew she was trying to fool herself. Most likely he’d been using her in some way. She rolled onto her side and was sure she’d begin to sob again, but she found that her eyes burned and were dry of tears.

  Beneath the Atlantic’s surface, the crew of the U-7 exchanged horrified glances. The churning sound of Titanic’s giant screws continued drawing closer.

  “Hold course,” the disciplined Geerhauser ordered calmly. He knew Titanic would soon veer sharply left to pass the iceberg. She must.

  Geerhauser and Rendt looked at each other, each man waiting for the sound of the Titanic’s screws to begin subsiding.

  But the frightening sound didn’t subside. It grew to a gurgling roar.

  The sub began to rock.

  Rendt smelled fear.

  “Dive deeper!” Geerhauser shouted, his voice breaking. Then he stared at Rendt, his eyes bright with terror and puzzlement. And resignation.

  Too late, he’d realized along with Rendt and the rest of the crew that the tiny U-7 would be crushed between the iceberg and Titanic’s hull.

  Lorna felt the mattress move slightly beneath her, and a slight shudder caused a water glass on a wooden shelf to vibrate and rattle. Then everything was as it had been before. She glanced at the clock on a nearby table. 11:40. Not even midnight yet.

  She settled deeper beneath her warm blanket and continued to seek the oblivion of sleep.

  The crew of the Titanic at first thought the ship had narrowly avoided the iceberg, as indeed it had. No one could guess the presence and destruction of the U-7.

  Then the rent along the starboard side of the hull was discovered. Water was rushing in below decks, filling watertight compartments one by one.

  Wick sat up in bed. Something was wrong. People seemed to be rushing about in the companionway. Voices not usually heard at such a late hour were filtering into the stateroom.

  He climbed out of bed, slipped into his clothes and
shoes, and left to investigate.

  As soon as he stepped into the passageway, he was bumped by a uniformed crewman.

  “What’s going on?” he asked the man. “What’s happening?”

  “It’s . . . well . . .”

  Wick could see that beneath calm, wooden features, the man was badly frightened. He clutched him by both shoulders. “Tell me,” he said, looking him in the eye.

  “We’ve struck an iceberg, sir. The ship is . . . sinking.” He started to say something more but seemed to choke on the words.

  “What else?” Wick demanded, tightening his grip, shaking the man.

  “The ship wasn’t supposed to sink. There aren’t enough lifeboats.” The crewman wrenched himself free of Wick’s grasp and hurried away.

  Trying to comprehend fully what he’d just heard, Wick noticed for the first time that the passageway floor was tilted slightly toward the bow. He had to see for himself what was happening. Tucking in his shirt, he made his way up on deck.

  The night was cool but bright with starlight, and the deck was already teeming with passengers, most of them wearing life jackets. Wick knew the water was too cold to allow survival for very long.

  The forward angle of the ship wasn’t yet severe, and while there was excitement, there certainly wasn’t panic. Even among passengers who knew the lifeboat situation, true realization hadn’t yet set in. This, and what must follow, was simply unacceptable. There was no precedent or protocol for such a thing. They refused to believe, yet they knew. The bright, gay, floating city, thought to be unsinkable, would soon be on the ocean floor for all eternity.

  A hand touched Wick’s shoulder and he turned. Braithwaite, appearing impatient but confident as always, was at his side.

  “We’re sinking,” Wick said.

  Braithwaite nodded. “You know the lifeboat dilemma?”

  “I’ve been told.” Wick knew something else. Braithwaite had ordered the Swede to kill Lorna because she was a security risk who endangered the mission. Now he wouldn’t want her to be one of the survivors. There was a way Wick might protect her. The success of the mission might be enough to make Braithwaite forget her at least for the moment, maybe long enough. The coming war, duty to country, seemed very far away now. Love, and death, were much nearer.