U-900 by Michel Poulin - HTML preview

CHAPTER 7 – OPERATION PICK-POCKET

 

23 :12 (Santiago de Chile Time)

Friday, September 10, 1943

Port refueling services dock

Port of Antofagasta, Chile (Pacific Coast of South America)

 

As the large fuel barge and its towing boat came to a rest alongside the quay used by the port refueling services, run by the Petrolina Chileno company, the night shift supervisor came out of his control hut, set at one extremity of the quay, and went to greet the pilot and captain of the tug boat as the latter climbed the wooden stairs leading up from the lower wharf to the top of the quay.

‘’Pedro, what took you so long? You had only one ship to refuel. And why didn’t you answer your radio?’’

Pedro Castillo, a grizzled man in his fifties with a short beard and moustache, shrugged his shoulders as he answered his boss and friend.

‘’Sorry, Baltazar, but that idiot in charge of the M.V. MERMAID forgot to switch on his navigation lights and didn’t answer my requests by signal lamp to identify his ship in the dark, so I ended up searching for him at night for a good hour. Then, he compounded that by having a faulty fuel valve that needed repairing before we could transfer our diesel fuel into the tanks of his ship. To top it off, he requested more fuel than he initially asked for by radio, so my diesel fuel barge is now nearly empty. As for my radio, it is broken…again!’’

‘’Did he at least pay for all that fuel, Pedro?’’ Asked the supervisor, concentrating on the most important point for him and his company. Pedro smiled and presented a fat envelope taken from one of the pockets of his rubber raincoat.

‘’Well, the man may not have brains, but he at least had lots of American dollars with him. You have here the full price for 1,136 metric tons of diesel fuel. Feel free to count the money.’’

‘’I certainly will, Pedro!’’ Said the supervisor, now in a better mood, while taking the envelope from the pilot of the tug boat. ‘’Once I have counted and certified the amount of cash you received, we will close shop for the night: no other ship is expected to either arrive or depart until the morning. You can send your crewmen home now.’’

‘’Thanks, Baltazar!’’

Returning on his tugboat, Pedro went to see his four crewmen, who were waiting for him in the small pilot house of the boat. Looking in turn at each man directly in their eyes, Pedro then spoke up in a sober tone of voice.

‘’Compadres, I don’t need to tell you again how important it is to not tell anyone what you saw tonight, even to your wives. You were well paid for the extra you did tonight and I know that you have little sympathy for those greedy Americans. The best you can do now is to forget what happened tonight and go home.’’

‘’You can count on my silence, Pedro.’’ Replied one of the crewmen, echoed at once by two other crewmen. The three men then left the tugboat, climbing the stairs to the top of the quay and disappearing among the poorly lit streets and alleys of the port. That left one man facing Pedro. That man was supposedly a replacement sailor for one of the regular crewmembers who had called sick, but Pedro knew better and spoke to him in a deferential tone.

‘’Well, your refueling problem has been taken care of, señor.’’

‘’Indeed, Pedro!’’ Said the fit, handsome man in his thirties, who then took out a thick envelope out of one pocket and gave it to the tugboat captain. ‘’Promise made, promise kept! Here is the second part of your payment. Be assured that I will keep you in mind if I need again something done in this port. You may now leave: me and the others will discretely leave the boat a bit later, when nobody will be around. Again, thank you for your assistance.’’

‘’It was my pleasure, Señor Santiago. Good luck on your mission.’’

Pedro Castillo then left the pilot house and climbed on the quay, leaving ‘Santiago’ apparently alone on the tugboat. Going to the deck house situated behind the pilot house, the crewman knocked on its door in a prearranged code, getting someone to open the door to him after a few seconds. Walking quickly inside to let the man who answered his knocks close the door behind him, Carlos Stein smiled at the man and woman now looking at him.

‘’Everything went according to plan, my friends. We will wait a bit, time for the docks to be deserted, then I will bring you to a safe house, where you will be able to wait for your target ship and also wash off any remaining diesel fumes smell from your bodies and hair.’’

‘’You did a hell of a job, Carlos, as usual.’’ replied Hugo Margraff, wearing a set of informal civilian clothes, like Hannah Blumenthal. Carlos Stein, a Chilean national of German descent who worked for the Abwehr, the German military intelligence service, nodded his head, acknowledging the compliment.

‘’Thank you, Hauptmann Margraff. If I may, I must say that I was surprised to see a young woman come out of the U-900 with you.’’

That made Hugo smile and he then patted gently Hanna’s left shoulder.

‘’Aaah, but this is not the first field mission for our good Oberhelferin Blumenthal. She proved herself two months ago, inside the United States and Canada. Did you hear news of our raid in Canada, or was the thing censored?’’

‘’Nothing like such a raid appeared in the local press or on the radio, so censorship must have been tight about it. What was that raid about, anyway?’’

Hugo took a few minutes to describe his infiltration up to Camp Bowmanville and back, making Carlos look at him and Hanna with renewed respect.

‘’Wow! That took some big cohones¹², Hauptmann. Well, hopefully, your cohones will do their magic again in a few days.’’

 

16:30 (Santiago de Chile Time)

Monday, September 13, 1943

Abwehr safe house, Antofagasta

 

‘’Good news, my friends! I just found the schedule for the loading of your tungsten, along with some details about the ship that will carry it.’’

Hugo and Hanna, who were growing seriously bored by now, grinned at the announcement from Carlos, who had just entered the safe house.

‘’Excellent! Come and tell us, Carlos.’’

Walking to the dining table around which Hugo and Hanna were playing chess to pass the time, Carlos took out of a vest pocket a couple of folded documents and a map, spreading the lot on the table before taking a chair. He then handed one of the documents to Hugo.

‘’Sorry if this is in Spanish, but I will translate this as needed for you. Basically, the mining complex in Chojilla, near La Paz in Bolivia, is going to ship by rail to Antofagasta a major shipment of tungsten metal products, to be then sent by sea to the American port of Seattle. The train is due to arrive in Antofagasta in six days, with the tungsten and other metals then stored in a port warehouse until the arrival of the Panamean cargo ship M.V. BUENAVENTURA, which is due in port on September 22. The BUENAVENTURA is due to take two days to load its cargo and will sail for Seattle on the 25^th, a Saturday.’’

‘’And how much tungsten are we talking about, Carlos?’’ asked Hugo, making the operative smile.

‘’About 690 metric tons of tungsten metal, or close to a quarter of the annual production of tungsten in Bolivia, which is the sole producer of tungsten for the whole of South America and also the fourth biggest producer of tungsten in the World.’’

‘’Wow! That should make Minister Speer happy.’’

‘’Wait! That’s not all! Since it would be quite uneconomical to ship only that tungsten by itself, the BUENAVENTUA will also load up 5,500 metric tons of Chilean metallic copper products, 430 metric tons of molybdenum, 310 metric tons of Brazilian manganese and 575 metric tons of Brazilian nickel, all going to the same smelting plants around Seattle. In total, the ship will be carrying some 7,505 metric tons of strategic metal products, many of which are essential to the making of specialty steel alloys that are extensively used in war industries.’’

‘’Even better! I will compose a short, encrypted message after this to pass this information by radio to the U-900. This is too vital to be delayed. After that is done, we will discuss the details of our plan of action concerning that cargo ship.’’

‘’Fair enough! In the meantime, I will make myself a good cup of coffee.’’

 

As Carlos started percolating some espresso coffee, Hanna went to the suitcase radio set she had brought with her and prepared it for transmission, while Hugo wrote quickly a condensed message, using code words and some encryption to make it opaque to anyone intercepting it. That took him less than five minutes, with Hanna, who was a practiced and efficient Morse code and radio operator, then contacting the U-900 with her HF radio set and passing on the message. She was able to shut down her radio and make an announcement by the time that Carlos sat back at the table with a steaming cup of strong coffee.

‘’Message sent and acknowledged by the U-900.’’

‘’Excellent!’’ replied Hugo, quite happy now. ‘’Next, let’s talk about our plan of action concerning the BUENAVENTURA.’’

 

The group had been discussing for a good ten minutes their plan when the telephone in the house’s living room rang, making the trio look at each other in surprise.

‘’Were you expecting a call, Carlos?’’ asked Hugo, making the agent shake his head.

‘’No! Nobody is supposed to call here, unless an emergency occurs. Stay quiet while I answer.’’

Going quickly to the telephone set, Carlos picked up its receiver just as it was ringing for a third time.

‘’Hola¹³!’’

He then heard a female voice which he knew very well.

‘’Carlos? This is Juanita! I am afraid that we have an emergency here in Valparaiso.’’

‘’What kind of emergency?’’ asked Carlos, stiffening at once. In his line of business, about anything could happen, including some very nasty things.

‘’I believe that some Americans are watching your house. One of your neighbors who owns a hotl warned me that a bunch of suspicious men have rented two days ago two of the rooms giving a view of your house. They speak with an American accent and, according to your neighbor, look quite intimidating. They also seem to do nothing but stay in their rooms, with one of them going out periodically for food. They came in two cars, which are now parked in front of the hotel, and they have been asking questions about you around. What shall we do?’’

With his mind now in overdrive, Carlos thought furiously for a few second before answering Juanita.

‘’How many of these Americans are there exactly?’’

‘’You neighbor told me that a total of six Americans have been coming in and out of their rooms since they arrived.’’

‘’Alright, here is what you will do until we could speak further: do not approach my house under any pretext and do not go meet my neighbor. Just call him to tell him briefly to avoid those Americans as much as possible and that he is not to call the police about them. As for you, continue to go to your work as usual but be on guard for any sign of surveillance or tailing against you. I am going to return to Valparaiso and will be there by tomorrow. I will contact you once I am back in town. In the meantime, exercise extreme caution. Do you understand me, Juanita?’’

‘’Y…yes! I will feel better once you will be back. Be careful yourself.’’

‘’I will! See you tomorrow.’’

Carlos then hung up, prompting a question in a worried tone from Hugo.

‘’Something is wrong, Carlos?’’

‘’Possibly! One of my agents in Valparaiso called to warn me that a group of six Americans apparently put my house there under observation. It sounds like the American O.S.S¹⁴. is on my trail.’’

Hugo frowned on hearing that: if Carlos had somehow been compromised, then the mission of the U-900 could well have been compromised too. On the other hand, things may still be salvaged…if prompt action was taken without delay.

‘’Do you have anything compromising hidden inside your house, Carlos?’’

‘’My radio set, code books and stash of weapons are hidden in my house. They would be pretty hard to find, but a thorough search could still uncover them. My worry now is that, with my house being obviously empty at this time, that those Americans may well decide to take the chance to break into my house at night to search it. I believe that I have no choice left now than to return as quickly as possible to Valparaiso and try to deal with this problem on the spot.’’

‘’Then, I am coming with you.’’ announced Hugo in a resolute tone. ‘’You will need some backup if you are to deal with six American agents.’’

‘’I’d like to come as well.’’ said Hanna, making the two men snap their heads towards her, shock on their faces.

‘’NO WAY!’’ nearly shouted Hugo. ‘’You are not a trained fighter and would actually impede us in any fight with those Americans.’’

‘’Who is talking about me fighting those Americans?’’ protested Hanna. ‘’What I had in mind was to help you by acting as an inconspicuous observer and to watch your back while you check Carlo’s house. We brought a pair of handheld radios with us: let’s use them for something where they could be truly useful. I could stay near the house with one radio, hidden, to make sure that no Americans could surprise you while you are in.’’

Hugo hesitated for long seconds then before nodding his head.

‘’Very well, Hanna. You can play the distant watcher in Valparaiso…but nothing else.’’

‘’Thank you, Hugo.’’

As for Carlos, he eyed Hanna for a moment before breaking into a smile.

‘’Decidedly, you are reminding me of my Juanita, Hanna. Now, I suggest that we pile into my car right away: we have over a thousand kilometers to do by road between here and Valparaiso. Bring whatever weapons you have with you, along with your suitcase radio: we can’t tell for sure what we will encounter at my house. We have twelve days before the BUENAVENTURA sails. Hopefully, that will be more than enough for us to go to Valparaiso, deal with the situation there and then return to Antofagasta before the 24^th.’’

Hugo went at once to the suitcases he and Hanna had brought with them and opened one of them, then foraged through the clothes filling it, extracting a Walther P38 pistol equipped with a silencer, plus three spare magazines, each with eight 9mm rounds, and gave the lot to Hanna.

‘’I hope that you won’t need this in Valparaiso, Hanna, but I will feel better with you being able to defend yourself.’’

‘’Thank you, Hugo. Are you going to bring your silenced MP43?’’

‘’With possibly six armed American agents to deal with, I believe that it would indeed be the prudent thing to do, Hanna. We will stuff our suitcases in the trunk of the car. If somehow this safe house becomes compromised, at least we won’t leave behind things that could help trace us.’’

The trio took only a few minutes to gather their things and carry them to Carlos’ Ford sedan, parked alongside the safe house, where the suitcases and bags were stuffed in the trunk. With Carlos at the wheel and Hugo sitting in the front passenger seat, the sedan soon backed out of its parking spot and drove off, heading towards the nearest access junction with the coastal national highway that linked Antofagasta with Valparaiso and Santiago. While Carlos drove at the maximum legal speed on the highway, he refrained from pushing his car’s engine to its maximum, in order not to overtax it: now was not the time to have a car breakdown.

 

06:49 (Santiago de Chile Time)

Tuesday, September 14, 1943

Port city of Valparaiso

 

Having reclaimed the driver’s seat before entering Valparaiso, and this after letting Hugo drive for more than half of the way from Antofagasta, Carlos drove towards Juanita’s home once inside the city, hoping to catch her before she left for her work at the port. However, he stopped and parked his car one block away from her residence, turning around in his seat to speak with Hugo and Hanna.

‘’I am going to go on foot, to check if anyone is watching Juanita’s building. I will then enter by the back door as an extra precaution. I will call you by radio to report if the way is clear. Hugo, you better take place at the wheel, just in case.’’

‘’A prudent thing to do, indeed.’’

Stepping out of the car and raising the collar of his trench coat, as if to ward off the fresh September wind, Carlos then started walking at a fair pace, his hat sunk low over his eyes. With all his senses on alert, he soon walked past Juanita’s apartment building. Not seeing anything suspicious, he nonetheless continued on without slowing down, turning at the next street corner and then turning again in a narrow alley on which the rear entrance of Juanita’s building gave. Again, he saw nothing suspicious there, so he entered by the back door and quickly climbed to the second floor level, where Juanita’s apartment was situated. Discretely taking out his silenced pistol and hiding it inside his opened trench coat, Carlos knocked lightly on her door, using a code long arranged with Juanita. A hesitant female voice then answered his knocks.

‘’Who is it?’’

‘’It’s me, Carlos.’’

It took only a few seconds before the door was opened, with Carlos immediately slipping inside. Juanita took the time to close and lock the door behind him before embracing him for a kiss.

‘’My God! I was so scared for you! Did you just arrive from Antofagasta?’’

‘’Yes! I brought two friends with me. Have you noticed any suspicious people or activities around your building lately?’’

‘’No! It seems that, while the Americans are suspecting you, they don’t appear to know about me.’’

‘’Good! That’s the way I want to keep it. Look, I intend to go check out my house today and empty it of any compromising item or document. Then, we will return to Antofagasta together. Plead the need to visit a very sick relative in order to skip work for a few days. If things turn sour here, it will put you far from the danger and, if things really go bad, we will then be in good position to disappear via submarine.’’

Juanita gave him a somber look, fully realizing the seriousness of the situation.

‘’I would hate to have to leave Chile, but it would still be much better than being captured and interrogated by enemy agents.’’

‘’True! First, pack two suitcases and gather your special equipment, then call your boss to say that you must go visit a sick relative for a few days. If he refuses to let you go, then too bad for him: there are other jobs available around. I will now go check my house. Stay here and don’t answer the door until I come back. You still have your revolver handy?’’

‘’Uh, yes!’’

‘’Then keep it near you. If some American agents try to break into your apartment, shoot them and then tell the police that they were robbers.’’

‘’Got it! Please, be careful, Carlos.’’

Carlos smiled tenderly to Juanita before kissing her while glued to her.

‘’I will, I promise. Now, call your boss and start packing.’’

 

Carlos felt his heart heavy as he walked out of Juanita’s apartment and went back down to street level. She was supposed to be a simple agent in his espionage network, but things between them had become a lot more than that in the last couple of years. Again using the back door and the narrow back alley, he walked back to his parked car and sat in the front passenger seat, giving an order to Hugo, who was in the driver’s seat.

‘’Start the car: we are going to my house to check it and take out the compromising things inside it, then will come back here to pick up Juanita. I will tell you which way to go.’’

‘’Understood.’’

Starting the Ford’s engine, Hugo then rolled out of his parking spot and into the early morning traffic of Valparaiso. With Carlos directing him, he ended up crossing the city center, then entered a sparsely populated suburb, rolling along a road following the coast. At one point, Carlos pointed at a sort of small hotel or inn that they were approaching.

‘’Slow down a bit. This is the inn from where the Americans are supposedly watching my house, which is only a further hundred meters down the road, on the right.’’

Hugo obeyed him and slowed down, as if looking for an address, while eyeing discretely the inn.

‘’Should we pass by your house or park near it?’’

‘’Simply pass in front of it: I want to see if there are any suspicious activities there.’’

‘’Got it! Hanna, avoid looking at the houses along the road for the moment. Let’s not look suspicious ourselves.’’

‘’Understood, Hauptmann.’’

‘’And, please, don’t speak German, even in private.’’

‘’Sorry…Hugo.’’ Said Hanna in English, blushing with embarrassment at the mild rebuke. She thus sat back in silence on the rear bench seat as their car rolled past a small house situated on the side nearest to the sea.

‘’Here is my house… Shit! There is a car parked alongside it and I don’t recognize it.’’

Hugo tightened his jaws on hearing that.

‘’Those American agent probably decided to go search your house when they saw no activity or movement inside it. We should go park somewhere nearby and approach your house on foot to investigate. We can’t let those Americans find your radio set and code books.’’

‘’Then, continue on for about 200 meters and turn right on a dirt trail that leads down to a beach. We can hide the car among the trees there and then approach my house on foot.’’

‘’Sounds like a plan.’’

‘’Uh, what about me?’’ aAsked Hanna from the rear seat, making Carlos twist his head to look at her.

‘’You stay in the car and monitor your radio. We will call you as needed, Hanna.’’

 

Seconds later, they turned right on a narrow dirt trail and entered a patch of trees, where Hugo turned off the trail and parked between two trees. As soon as the car was stopped, Carlos stepped out and grabbed his Astra 400 pistol, loaded with eight 9mm Largo rounds, then screwed quickly a silencer on its muzzle while Hugo went to the trunk to get his silenced MP43 assault rifle, along with two spare magazines for it. Carlos looked resolutely at Hugo as the latter was chambering a 7.62mm Kurz round in his rifle.

‘’Ready?’’

‘’Ready!’’

‘’Then, follow me!’’

Walking quickly at a crouch, with their weapons at the ready, the two men went deeper among the trees, heading in the general direction of Carlos’ house. They soon started to see it through the trees and slowed down to a cautious pace, still crouched. Stopping briefly near the tree line next to his house and taking a few seconds to examine it, Carlos saw through a window of his main bedroom a fleeting movement inside. Not saying a word, he made a hand signal to Hugo and ran as quietly as he could to the rear of his house. The two men were soon positioned on either side of the rear door, which Carlos cautiously unlocked with his house key. Nodding his head first at Hugo, Carlos then opened slowly the door and slipped inside, followed closely by the German soldier. As soon as they were inside, in the hallway connecting the front and the back of the house, Carlos saw a big man standing in a corner of his lounge, which faced the road. That man was discreetly watching through the window of the lounge and had a pistol in his right hand. The man then caught from the corner of his left eye the next movement by Carlos and snapped his head towards him, looking at him with alarm while starting to raise his pistol and shouting.

‘’WATCH…’’

The man didn’t have a chance to finish his warning, a 9mm Largo bullet striking him directly in his left eye, killing him instantly. However, the man’s shout and the muffled but still audible shot from Carlos’ pistol was enough to attract some attention. A shouted question came from up the stairs to the upper floor as Carlos, swearing quietly at his bad luck, took a few steps forward to give some clear firing space to Hugo.

‘’JACK? JACK? WHAT IS IT?’’

Showing a shocking lack of professionalism for an undercover agent, the man who had shouted from the top of the stairs then rushed down to investigate, giving a second target to Carlos. He fired twice, hitting squarely in his left side the man running down the stairs. Both bullets penetrated the left side ribs area and traveled upward, one of them piercing the left lung and the second one cutting in two the man’s aorta. Fatally wounded, the man crumbled down and rolled down the last steps before ending up spread face down at the bottom of the stairs, his Colt M1911 pistol coming out of his dead hand. As Carlos kept his pistol pointed up, Hugo quickly ran past him and then turned around, pointing his MP43 at the balcony of the upper floor. He was in time to see another man rush out of an upper room, pistol in hand. Before that man could point his weapon, he was hit by a short but well aimed three-round burst from Hugo’s assault rifle and crumpled across the door opening of the upper room, his head slumping forward and down. Hugo then made a quick sign to Carlos to tell him to hold still for the moment. Both men, weapons still pointed, froze on the spot and stayed silent, listening for any noise. Their tactic worked, as the noise of wooden stairs cracking came half a minute later from a staircase leading down to the basement of the house. The fourth intruder, despite being more cautious than his three dead colleagues, was still caught in a deadly crossfire when he emerged from the staircase, receiving no less than four 7.62mm Kurz and two 9mm Largo bullets in quick succession. The man was dead before he dropped on the floor of the hallway, letting go his short-barreled pump-action shotgun. Again, Hugo and Carlos waited quietly, hoping that no other intruder would show up. After two stressful minutes, the two men relaxed a bit, with Carlos speaking in a near whisper.

‘’I will go up to check out the rooms upstairs. Cover me from here.’’

‘’I have your back.’’

 

Moving as silently as he could, Carlos took a good fifteen minutes to cautiously search his whole house, making sure that there were no other intruders. He didn’t find any but was angered at the way the dead intruders had searched his house, trashing the rooms and spilling the content of drawers everywhere on the floor. Professional secret agents would have at least tried to keep their search discrete, in order not to awake suspicions in him whenever he would have returned to his house. The amateurish side of the intruders was further confirmed when Carlos searched the four dead men, finding plenty of papers on them, including American passports and even a small notebook. Sifting quickly through the notebook, he saw many pages of scribbling, with some being obviously addresses and telephone numbers. Carlos showed those notes to Hugo, who shook his head in disbelief.

‘’I thought that the American O.S.S. was more professional than that. Either these guys were supremely arrogant and assured of themselves, or they were supremely stupid.’’

‘’I would say that they were both.’’ replied Carlos, a smirk on his lips. ‘’Remember that the Americans believe that they own the whole of Central and South America and can thus politically and militarily intimidate the various governments of the continent. Unfortunately, they are too often right about that. However, despite what the Americans may think, the Chilean government and people are no stooges of theirs.’’

‘’That is well and good, but I must remind you that we found only four Americans in your house. There is probably still at least two other Americans watching this house from your neighbor’s inn. I propose that we go eliminate that threat before they have the chance to raise the alarm about their friends not coming back. We will then have plenty of time to study this notebook and decide our next actions.’’

‘’Good thinking, Hugo. May I suggest that you advise Hanna by radio before we move to the inn, so that she doesn’t worry for nothing?’’

‘’Right!’’

 

Calling Hanna and informing her of what had happened in the house and telling her to stay in the car took a couple of minutes. Carlos and Hugo then exited the house by its rear, seaside door. Using to the maximum the cover available, the two men made their way to the inn, making their final approach from the beach side, out of the field of view of the rooms facing Carlos’ house. Hugo, who had left his MP43 rifle hidden in Carlos’ house and had taken out his silenced Walther P38 pistol instead, removed the silencer and hid it and his pistol under his vest before following Carlos inside the inn. To his surprise, Carlos went directly to the reception desk of the inn and spoke with the graying man behind the counter before coming back to Hugo, who looked at it crossly.

‘’Isn’t it a bit dangerous to go see the receptionist like this?’’

‘’Not if he is a member of my network, which he is. Why do you think he called Juanita to warn her about these Americans? They occupy the rooms number 23 and 25, by the way. Let’s get rid of the remaining snoops…quietly.’’

Going up the stairs of the main staircase and following a fairly short corridor dimly illuminated by a couple of low power lamps, Carlos soon arrived at the two rooms that were of interest to them. Carlos whispered to Hugo as they stopped on each side of Rom 23.

‘’The receptionist told me that the two rooms are intercommunicating, which is probably the reason the Americans chose them. Let’s listen to find out if anyone is in.’’

They needed only a minute of listening to establish the fact that at least two men occupied the room, exchanging a few words from time to time. Carlos then took out a key from one of his pocket, showing it to Hugo.

‘’The hotel’s spare key for this room, courtesy of my friend the receptionist. Let’s screw our silencers back on before jumping inside.’’

That took only a few seconds, being done under their vests in order to hide their weapons from any customer of the inn who could show up in the hallway at an inappropriate moment. With their pistols now ready, Carlos very slowly inserted the hotel key in the door’s lock and turned it. When he heard the ‘click’ of the lock being activated, he very cautiously pushed the door open by two centimeters, to see if the internal safety chain had been put in place. When he saw no chain, Carlos gave a last nod to Hugo before quickly opening the door and rushing in, his pistol pointed. Inside, he encountered two big men standing in front of a window, with a tripod-mounted still camera equipped with a telephoto lens pointed outside. Both men were in shirt sleeves, revealing the fact that they wore handgun holster rigs. One of the men who had a pair of binoculars in his hands reacted at once, with his right hand going in a flash for his holstered revolver. Hugo didn’t give him time to draw and shot twice, hitting him in the heart and then in the head. The second American, who also tried to draw his weapon but was slower than his colleague, was shot between the eyes by Carlos before he could pull his Colt 1911 pistol out of its holster. As Hugo cautiously advanced to check the two Americans, Carlos hurried to close the door of the room and lock it. Once that was done, he went to check the adjacent, connecting room, but found nobody there. Returning in the first room, he saw that Hugo was already searching the two bodies, emptying their pockets onto the carpet. Carlos thus decided to return in the second room and searched it for documents, maps or papers of interest.

 

That search was actually fruitful, producing two American passports found in the pockets of two suit jackets suspended in the room’s closet. Two suitcases found under the large bed yielded some handgun ammunition, four grenades and one M3 submachine gun, commonly nicknamed ‘Grease Gun’ because of its shape, along with four spare magazines for the M3. However, the most interesting thing Carlos found was a map of Valparaiso with some markings in red grease pencil on it. Returning to the first room with the map and the two passports, Carlos presented them to Hugo, who had completed his search of the bodies and was sifting through a small notebook.

‘’Look at what I found, Hugo: a marked map and those two passports, one of them a diplomatic one.’’

Grabbing first the two passports, Hugo examined the personal information in them, along with the various entry and exit stamps in them. He then pointed the man he had shot.

‘’This one is supposedly a diplomatic attaché from the American embassy in Santiago. The stamps in his passport shows that he has not been out of Chile for the last nine months. On the other hand, his partner came to Chile recently, a week ago, on a regular passport. The four men we shot in your house also had regular passports, with entry stamps dating one week, on the same day as this one. I believe that those last five men were a hit team called up by the local O.S.S. cell to find and either capture or kill you. The diplomatic guy was probably either a member or the leader of the Santiago O.S.S. cell and a resident agent. Now, let’s see this map.’’

‘’Just hold on that for a second, Hugo. I need to do a call right now. Could you gather and put away temporarily the things they had in their pockets, while I do my call?’’

‘’And what do you intend to do, Carlos?’’ asked Hugo, a bit mystified.

‘’Get rid of those bodies.’’ Answered the Chilean Abwehr agent before picking up the receiver of the room’s telephone and composing a three-digit number. He got a response nearly immediately in Spanish.

‘’Reception desk! May I help you?’’

‘’Yes! This is Carlos, in Room 23. I need you to send two dependable employees to come change the carpets: some wine was spilt on them. Oh, and sorry if my car backfired a minute ago.’’

‘’No problem, señor: I will send a cleanup crew right away.’’

‘’Thank you! There will be a good tip for them, along with money to pay for the damage.’’

Carlos then hung up and went to search the two wallets found on the dead Americans. There were few cards in them but quite a lot of cash money, both American dollars and Chilean banknotes. He took all the money and pocketed it before returning to Hugo.

‘’So, let’s see this map.’’

Holding the map with both hands, Hugo looked at it for a moment before nodding his head slowly.

‘’I see now how they found you, Carlos. You see those two red straight lines on the map? They intersect right over the location of your house. My bet is that the Americans detected your radio transmissions the last time you emitted, then used radio direction-finding techniques to triangulate the position of your house. Also, look at the base point of each of the two lines: one starts from the location of the American embassy in nearby Santiago, a logical place to expect a listening station operated by the O.S.S.. The other line starts over this point on the map, which appears to be some kind of building near Santiago.’’

Carlos exchanged a look with Hugo on hearing that.

‘’Well, I believe that we should find and clean up that nest of bedbugs if we want to avoid that future transmissions from the U-900 be detected and triangulated.’’

‘’Agreed! All this however means one thing: you and your house are burned. You can thus expect more O.S.S. attention in the future. I am sorry, but you will have to go into hiding and change identity. Your house is unfortunately a goner.’’

Carlos passed one hand on his head, brushing his hair as he felt deep discouragement.

‘’Damn! I liked that house.’’

Someone knocked on the door at that moment, making Hugo tense up. Carlos however signaled him to lower his pistol, then went to the door and spoke through it in Spanish.

‘’Who is it?’’

‘’The cleanup crew! Roberto sent us.’’

Carlos, reassured by those words, unlocked the door and opened it, long enough for two local men to come in while carrying two long, rolled carpets. He then closed and locked the door behind them and showed them the two dead men on the floor, lying on top of a now blood-soaked carpet.

‘’Do you think that you could make those two Americans disappear, guys?’’

‘’No problem, señor! Just give us a few minutes.’’

‘’Then, take these car keys: they are for one of the cars used by these Americans. It should be parked in the inn’s parking lot. Also, take this money, to pay yourselves and help Roberto cover the costs of the cleanup.’’

One of the two men gladly took both the car keys and the thick wad of American dollars, then started to roll one of the bodies in the blood-stained carpet of the room. Carlos and Hugo left the room at that time, taking with them the papers, weapons and other items of interest they had found and giving some working space for the two employees.

 

After returning the hotel master key to the receptionist, Carlos and Hugo went to the small parking lot of the inn and, using the second set of car keys found on the Americans, looked for the car corresponding to the keys. They quickly were able to unlock a big Studebaker sedan and briefly searched it, but found little more than the car registration papers and two boxes of handgun ammunition in the glove compartment. Jumping in, with Carlos at the wheel, they started the sedan and drove off the lot, briefly following the main road and then parking alongside Carlos’ house, where they stepped out and entered the house. They also called Hanna by radio, making her drive Carlos’ car up to the house, so that they could join up again as a team. Hugo called Hanna to the kitchen table as soon as she was in and showed her the map, documents and papers found on the six dead Americans.

‘’Hanna, me and Carlos are going to get rid of the four bodies in this house. Could you go through this stuff in detail and see what you can make out of it. By the way, that map bears radio DF triangulation lines.’’

‘’No problem, I am on it.’’

Carlos, who stood nearby, nearly snapped his head around on hearing that exchange. However, he waited until he and Hugo were out of earshot of Hanna before whispering to him.

‘’You are letting HER analyze these papers and documents?’’

In response, Hugo gave him a no-nonsense look.

‘’Look, Carlos: I gave her that job because she is the most qualified for it. She may officially be a simple female auxiliary but she also happens to be a highly qualified and experienced radio traffic monitor and analyst, on top of being fluent in English and French and of being an excellent Morse code operator. She worked at the Paris office of the Abwehr, where she was monitoring daily radio traffic between London and American and British clandestine agents in France. If there is a pattern to be read in those papers, she will find it.’’

Carlos was left speechless for a moment by that, his soft macho side having some difficulty accepting those words. He however went over his prejudices and nodded his head once.

‘’Very well: you know her better than me. I propose that we load the bodies in the trunk of the car we took, so that we could drive them away from my house and then dump them in some isolated spot.’’

‘’Sounds like a plan. Let’s start with the two stiffs on the upper floor.’’

The two men ended up taking a bit over a hour to get rid of the dead Americans, driving to a seaside cliff three kilometers away and dumping their bodies into the sea. On returning to the house, they took Carlos’ large and heavy radio set out of its hiding place in the attic and carried it down before loading it into the stolen car’s trunk and covering it with a thick wool blanket. His code book and reserve of weapons, ammunition and explosives were also hauled out in suitcases, which were stuffed around the HF/LF radio set in the car’s trunk. The first to return to the dining room afterwards was Carlos. There, he looked with interest at the notes taken by Hanna.

‘’So, what did you find of interest out of all this, Hanna?’’

‘’Quite a few things, actually. First, that location at the base of one of the lines on the map is most probably the site of a radio DF station. Furthermore, in view of the bulk and weight of such equipment, It will be either a fixed installation inside a house or building, or a vehicle-borne set inside a van or a truck. However, a vehicle going around with a DF loop antenna on its top would attract a lot of attention, especially in view of how frequent Chilean Army checkpoints and barrages are. I thus believe that it will be a fixed set inside a building. Furthermore, such a listening station is typically manned by more than one man and is possibly doubling as a safe house or clandestine command post. Such a place thus could well contain much valuable information about the O.S.S. network in Chile. If we could raid and take out that station, it could constitute a hard blow against the Americans in Chile.’’

‘’Uh, why are you saying ‘we’, Hanna?’’

‘’Because she could be our backup support when we will raid that DF station, the same way she was part of my backup team during our mission inside Canada.’’ cut in Hugo, who had just entered the dining room and had heard the last sentences. ‘’Please continue, Hanna.’’

‘’Thank you, Hugo. I found Carlos’ name mentioned in a number of notes, plus his home address and telephone number and the name of the company where he works. I am sorry to say this, Carlos, but your present identity and address are totally burned. That information has probably been passed on to Washington by now and possibly to the British as well. You will have to either change your identity and find a new home and new job, or you will have to leave Chile entirely in order to evade capture.’’

Watched by Hugo and Hanna, Carlos sat slowly on a chair, visibly discouraged.

‘’What about Juanita? Is there any indication that the Americans are after her as well?’’

‘’The only thing I found was her first name, followed by a question mark, mentioned once by itself. However, her address was nowhere to be found in all those papers. The one name and address I found a few times in those notes are that of a man named ‘Otto Müller’, who has a house in Santiago. Do you know him?’’

Hanna and Hugo didn’t miss the way Carlos paled on hearing that name.

‘’Hell! That’s the name of the German embassy attaché who actually directs the Abwehr network in Chile. If they know about him like they knew about me and if the Americans decided to come and get me…’’

Carlos didn’t have to complete his sentence, as Hugo understood too well what it could mean.

‘’Then, Herr Müller could be in grave danger. Since he has diplomatic immunity, any action against him would have to be purely clandestine and anonymous. The Americans will certainly try to capture him alive in order to question him about his spy network. The question for us is: where would the Americans bring him in order to interrogate him away from witnesses? They certainly wouldn’t do that at the American embassy: that would be more than simply dumb.’’

‘’What about there?’’ Said Hanna, putting her index on the spot in the map at the base of one of the triangulation lines. ‘’A place discrete enough to deploy a DF loop antenna would certainly be discrete enough to interrogate someone, especially if that place has a basement.’’

Hugo exchanged a stunned glance with Carlos at those words.

‘’Scheisser! She is right! At the least, we will have to seriously check that place out.’’ said Hugo, making Carlos nod his head once.

‘’Absolutely! However, we will need some serious backup before rushing there.’’

 

19:43 (Santiago de Chile Time)

Hillside villa, northeastern suburbs of Santiago

 

‘’So, Mister Müller, are we becoming more reasonable now?... No?... Too bad! Jamie, send more juice!’’

The man tied naked to a solid wooden chair suddenly arched up, his face red and his jaws clenched together, as a man sitting at a nearby table vigorously turned the handle of a manual dynamo. After turning his handle for a few seconds, the dynamo man stopped to let the prisoner a chance to breathe. Müller needed long seconds to gulp air and recover a bit from the horrible pain caused by the electric shocks to his genitals. The man who had been standing in front of him and asking him questions then bent forward.

‘’You want higher voltage? TALK! WHO ARE YOUR AGENTS IN AND AROUND SANTIAGO?’’

‘’You…you are mistaken: I am only a diplomatic attaché, not a spy.’’

‘’And you think that we will believe that? We already uncovered your main agent in Valparaiso. He should soon join you here for some fun conversation.’’

‘’Again, I don’t know what you are talking ab…’’

BOOM

‘’What the…’’ started to say the interrogator, as he craned his neck to look up at the ceiling, from which direction the muffled explosion had come. That explosion was nearly immediately followed by multiple gunshots fired in quick succession. At the same time, as all the O.S.S. men were still looking up while starting to take out their handguns, the door of the basement room was violently thrown open and Hugo Margraff jumped in, his MP43 pointed and with Carlos close behind him, holding the pump-action shotgun captured from one of the O.S.S. men killed in his house. The Americans present had no time to point their weapons at the newcomers before Hugo started firing deadly, short 3-round bursts from his assault rifle. The interrogator was the first to be hit, receiving three bullets in his chest and belly that dropped him like a broken puppet. The second American to die was the one closest to the door, who got a shotgun blast in his face from a distance of two meters. The man at the manual dynamo, who had previously put his pistol on the table supporting the dynamo, was still reaching for it when two bullets from Hugo’s second burst struck him in the right side ribs area. One bullet went through his liver and continued on to pierce his left kidney before exiting his body, while the second bullet ripped through his intestines. Mortally wounded, the O.S.S. agent slowly collapsed to his knees, his arms over the table top and his eyes already glazing. The last American left standing in the room was pointing his revolver at Hugo when Carlos’ shotgun barked for a second time, peppering his torso, arms and head with buckshot pellets. The man had time to cry out in pain before an aimed burst from Hugo’s MP43 exploded his head like an egg hit by a hammer.

 

Hugo, his MP43 still raised to eye level and pointed, quickly looked around the room to make sure that there were no other Americans in it, then spoke to Carlos.

‘’Free Herr Müller and find his clothes while I keep watch.’’

Carlos hurried to do so, knowing that they would need to hurry and drive away before the Chilean police could be alerted. His first move was to detach the electrodes fixed to Müller’s genitals and to undo the ropes tying him to his chair. The German diplomat and secret agent, a mature man in his fifties, managed to speak weakly to him as Carlos was untying him.

‘’D…danke! How did you find this place?’’

‘’It’s a long story. Let’s get you dressed up first. We will be able to speak while driving away.’’

Searching quickly the basement room, Carlos found a cardboard box in one corner that contained a set of men’s clothes that had to belong to Müller. Bringing the box near the interrogation chair and putting it down, he looked at him with concern.

‘’Are you able to dress up by yourself?’’

‘’I…I think so. That man that was interrogating me: he was the head of the O.S.S. for Chile. There were at least another five men upstairs.’’

‘’I know! My men took care of them at the start of the fight. They were the ones who threw a grenade. Now, get dressed while I go search this house for interesting papers. My friend here will watch over you.’’

Carlos then walked out of the room at a hurried pace, his shotgun still in hand. As he started to slowly put on his clothes, Müller looked at Hugo, who was in the door frame and was watching the corridor beyond the room.

‘’Thank you to you as well, mister. That was some nice shooting on your part.’’

Hugo nodded his head once at the compliment.

‘’Danke! I am Hauptmann Hugo Margraff, of the Brandenburg Regiment. I came with the U-900.’’

‘’Ah yes! Is your mission still on track?’’

‘’It certainly is, Herr Müller. The urgent question now is: where could you go to be safe.’’

‘’The embassy.’’ said at once Müller. ‘’It is well guarded by the Chilean police and army: the Americans will never attack it.’’

‘’Well, don’t be so sure about that, mister. Our next move may just convince them to try.’’

‘’Your next move? What do you have in mind, Hauptmann?’’

A mean smile appeared on Hugo’s face before he answered Müller cryptically.

‘’Something that will mostly end the present danger to Carlos’ network, Herr Müller. The Americans chose to play rough but they will now find out that it is a game two can play.’’

 

09:51 (Santiago de Chile Time)

Wednesday, September 15, 1943

Chancellery building of the American embassy

Downtown Santiago de Chile

 

John Tisdale walked into his secretary’s office, which served as an anteroom to his own office of U.S. Police Affairs Attaché, and stopped in front of her desk to ask her a question on a polite tone.

‘’Miss Gates, have you seen Mister Spencer this morning? He is not in his office and is not at his home either.’’

‘’I haven’t seen him today, sir, nor has he called or left any message.’’ answered the middle-aged secretary, stopping for a moment her typing. ‘’Should I place a few calls to try to locate him for you, sir?’’

‘’Uh, that won’t be necessary, Miss Gates. Thank you!’’ replied Tisdale, who then retreated back in his office, a bit worried. As a senior agent of the F.B.I., he was the legitimate Police Affairs Attaché of the embassy, but it was a different thing where Jim Spencer was concerned. Officially, Spencer was Tisdale’s assistant, but the latter knew too well that the man was in reality the O.S.S. head of station for Chile and that Spencer was involved in a number of unsavory things Tisdale would rather not know about.

 

A bit less than one hour later, his desk intercom buzzed, making him press the ‘speak’ button.

‘’Yes, Miss Gates?’’

‘’Mister Tisdale, the Assistant Chief of Police for Santiago and a Chilean Army officer are here to see you.’’

Tisdale suddenly felt his stomach turn sour: this was probably not going to be a routine or even a friendly visit. At the start of the war, the United States had basically steamrolled the various countries of Central and South America into toeing the American line and had grabbed control of much of their main export items, which was in the case of Chile its production of copper and of nitrates. However, a number of spectacular events during the last two years had considerably hurt both the prestige and the influence of the United States in Latin America, notably the blowing up of the Pacific side locks of the Panama Canal by a German commando unit and the destruction of the Golden Gate Bridge and blocking of San Francisco Harbor about a year ago. Now that Great Britain was rumored to be close to collapse due to the German submarine blockade of its coasts and with the Japanese running roughshod over the American Navy in the Pacific, various Latin American countries, notably Chile, were now reasserting their rights with the United States.

‘’Very well, let them in, miss.’’

A few seconds later, his secretary opened the door of his office and let two men in. One of them wore a good quality civilian suit, while the other wore the uniform of a colonel of the Chilean Army. Both carried leather briefcases and had closed expression as Tisdale came to shake their hands.

‘’So, gentlemen, what may I do for you this morning? But, please, sit down first!’’

‘’Thank you, Mister Tisdale.’’ Said the man in a civilian suit, who then took place in a sofa with the army officer. He then waited until his host had taken place in an easy chair facing them before speaking again.

‘’Let me present myself first: Jorge Mazar, Assistant Police Chief of Santiago. I came with Colonel Valmont, of the Army Counter-Intelligence Department, to discuss a serious matter concerning a number of American citizens.’’

Mazar then opened his briefcase and took a file out of it, extracting a sheet of paper from it and passing it to Tisdale, who saw that it listed seventeen names.

‘’The men whose names you see in that list were all American citizens, according to the papers found on them. They were found dead in various locations, either shot, stabbed or strangled. They also all happened to have illegal firearms on or near them. Do you recognize any of these names, Mister Tisdale?’’

Realizing instantly what this could mean, the F.B.I. man gave Mazar a cautious answer.

‘’None of those names sound familiar to me, Mister Mazar. I am sorry.’’

Mazar fixed him for a moment, then took out what appeared to be an American diplomatic passport and gave it to Tisdale.

‘’Then, could you explain to me and Colonel Valmont why we found the body of your own assistant attaché, Mister Jim Spencer, in the same house where we found eight other dead Americans, dozens of illegal weapons, a clandestine long range radio transceiver and a radio direction-finding set?’’

Looking inside the passport and seeing the photo of his assistant, Tisdale did his best to look surprised and shocked.

‘’But… I don’t understand! I…’’

Valmont then spoke up for the first time, cutting off Tisdale’s attempt at an explanation.

‘’Well, we do, Mister Tisdale! Your so-called assistant attaché was obviously involved with an American clandestine intelligence cell here in Chile and may in fact have been running it, if we can believe the papers and documents seized by us at the locations where we found those dead Americans. That cell had dozens of completely illegal firearms in its possession, along with the unregistered radio transceivers we found. Right now, my services are busy rounding up more men in various parts of Chile, men whose names and addresses were found in the documents we seized. All this proves to me and my government that the United States was engaged in espionage and clandestine work on Chilean territory, something that we take very seriously. Would you care to explain or comment, Mister Tisdale?’’

Cold sweat broke on Tisdale’s forehead as he realized the extent of the disaster that was now striking the American intelligence network in Chile. Those agents captured by the Chilean counter-intelligence were no doubt going to face harsh interrogations and torture and may in turn reveal more secrets in the process.

‘’Gentlemen, I assure you that I know nothing about this alleged clandestine work by American citizens. This must be a setup, possibly organized by pro-German elements in the country.’’

‘’I very much doubt so, in view of all the equipment, weapons and documents found with those dead Americans, Mister Tisdale.’’ replied Valmont, a cold expression on his face. What he didn’t say then to Tisdale was that one of the documents found by his men happened to be the radio code book used by the O.S.S. clandestine service. However, what Valmont didn’t know himself was that there originally had been two such code books at the suburban villa. The second code book had not been found for the simple reason that Carlos had taken possession of it, deliberately leaving behind the other one, so that the Chilean intelligence services could find it and deal further blows to the O.S.S. in the future. Tisdale then tried to walk away from that subject, adopting an angry tone.

‘’And what about those who killed all those American citizens? Are you at the least trying to find their murderers, or are you only concerned about finding faults with American citizens?’’

Those words, influenced partly by a long standing attitude shared by all American officials about the United States interests having to prevail no matter what over those of their host countries, had the opposite effect to the one hoped for by Tisdale. Luis Valmont, his face now as hard as rock, bent forward and raised his own voice.

‘’Mister Tisdale, your country may have become accustomed in the past in taking my government for granted and in forcing its policies and interests on Chile, but I must remind you that the United States is presently losing the war in the Pacific, while your British allies are close to collapse due to the German submarine blockade against them. Very soon, Germany, Italy and Japan will be able to send their merchant ships where they want, without interference from American or British ships. Then, Chile will be able to sell its copper, nitrates and fish products to whoever it will want to, instead of being forced to sell them solely to the United States at deflated prices imposed by your government. When that moment will come, I will be one of the first ones to applaud. Concerning you, I have started the procedure to have you and a few other American diplomats here declared ‘Persona Non Grata’ on national security grounds, and I can tell you already that my government will approve it. Be prepare to be booted out of Chile soon, Mister Tisdale. As for the other American citizens residing in Chile who were engaged in illicit activities, they will have to face the full force of the Chilean justice system. Finally, know that the entry of more American citizens in Chile will be severely restricted and controlled from now on. Don’t expect to be able to introduce more clandestine agents into Chile in the future.’’

Both furious and feeling deeply insulted, Tisdale jumped on his feet and pointed an accusing index at Valmont.

‘’Feel free to act like a stooge for the Germans, Colonel, but expect to have to pay for it. The United States has many ways to make Chile regret any hostile gesture against its citizens and its interests.’’

Both Valmont and Mazar then got up from their sofa at those words, with Mazar replying to Tisdale in an icy tone.

‘’You will soon come to regret your attitude, Mister Tisdale. I hope for your citizens whom we arrested that they have very good lawyers: they will need them. Goodbye!’’

The two Chilean officials then walked out of the office, leaving John Tisdale both boiling mad and worried. As infuriating as it had been to him, the statement from Valmont about the United States losing the war in the Pacific was unfortunately correct. Australia was now alone and isolated in the Pacific, with Japanese air raids hammering it with increasing frequency and with what remained of American forces in that theater unable to do much about it. The locks on the Pacific side of the Panama Canal were taking longer than expected to be rebuilt, forcing American ships from the East Coast to continue to take the long trip around Cape Horn in order to enter the Pacific. As for the British, their navy was now all but immobilized by a severe lack of fuel, while Allied bombing raids over Germany had been curtailed for the same reason.

15:04 (Santiago de Chile Time)

Friday, September 24, 1943

M.S. BUENAVENTURA, docked in the port of Antofagasta

Chile

 

The first officer of the M.S. BUENAVENTURA, seeing from the bridge of the big cargo ship a young couple climb the access ladder positioned along the port side of the hull, hurried down to meet the couple at the top of the ladder, where a sailor was posted to control the access to the ship. Ramon Feliciano arrived there in time to greet the man and woman, who were carrying a total of three suitcases and one large handbag, as they were about to set foot of the ship. Ramon discretely admired the smooth and very pretty face of the young woman before nodding his head once at the couple and speaking in his fair English.

‘’Welcome aboard the M.S. BUENAVENTURA, lady and gentleman. I am the ship’s First Officer, Ramon Feliciano. You must be Mister and Misses Worthington?’’

‘’That’s correct, sir.’’ replied the man, while presenting to Ramon two Canadian passports and two tickets. ‘’Here are our passports and our boarding tickets for Seattle, all paid up.’’

‘’Thank you!’’

Ramon examined quickly the two passports, which bore exit stamps from the customs office of the port, as well as the two travel tickets delivered by the shipping company to which the BUENAVENTURA belonged. Finding everything to be in order, he gave back the passports and tickets to the couple.

‘’We are due to leave early next morning. I will show you to your cabin, where you will be able to drop your luggage. The Captain will of course be honored to have you at his table for supper.’’

‘’And we will be honored to accept his gracious invitation, sir.’’ said ‘Mister Worthington’.

 

Picking up their luggage, the couple followed Ramon to the ship’s aft superstructure, which they entered via a steel door on its port side. Going down a narrow corridor, they then turned into a second corridor, with Ramon stopping in front of one of the wooden doors lining the passageway. opening it.

‘’Your cabin for your trip to Seattle. The officers’ mess is situated one deck above your cabin. Supper will be served at six.’’

‘’Thank you very much, Mister Feliciano.’’ replied ‘Harry Worthington’. Ramon then left the cabin, closing the door behind him. Going first to the door and locking it, Hugo Margraff spoke in a low voice to Hanna Blumenthal, using English.

‘’Okay, let’s unpack part of our things. We will keep our weapons and your radio briefcase hidden for the moment. We won’t need to act until this ship leaves port.’’

‘’That’s when I will have to warn the U-900 by radio that we are leaving Valparaiso, right?’’

‘’Exactly! We seem to be the only paying passengers on this trip, so our job should be relatively easy. Let’s unpack, then we will go do a little promenade on the open deck.’’

 

Twenty minutes later, with their things in place, Hugo and Hanna left their cabin and went out in the open on the weather deck. A harbor crane was still at work, lifting from a rail car small but seemingly heavy pallets loaded with wooden crates and winching them down to the bottom of one of the cargo holds of the BUENAVENTURA. Hugo nodded his head with satisfaction when he was able to read the inscriptions on one of the crates being loaded in the ship.

‘’There’s the tungsten we need so much.’’

‘’Yes! The copper that is already loaded aboard will also be most welcome by our industries, along with the other metals this ship will carry. Overall, a mission that we will be proud of.’’

Hugo looked at Hanna, who was leaning like him on the guardrails alongside the deck’s edge, smiling to her.

‘’And a mission in which you killed your first enemy, which makes ME proud of you.’’

Hanna reddened a bit with embarrassment at Hugo’s compliment. During the raid against the hillside villa used as a safe house by the American O.S.S., when they had freed Otto Müller, Hanna had stayed outside, posted by Hugo near one of the doors of the villa and armed with the M3 ‘Grease Gun’ submachine gun taken from the men who had watched Carlos’ house. One of the O.S.S. men occupying the villa had tried to flee via that side entrance, only to be cut down by a burst from Hanna’s M3. That submachine gun, a very compact weapon that was also easy and quick to disassemble into a small package, was now hidden inside Hanna’s suitcase, wrapped within her spare clothes.

‘’I really had little merit in that: I emptied a whole clip just to hit that man twice. In truth, my shooting was lousy.’’

‘’Maybe, but it was shooting done under the stress of combat, with no prior training on that particular weapon. You did well, Anne.’’ replied Hugo, using her cover name. The ‘couple’ then fell mostly silent while watching the activity around the ship’s weather deck and around the port. There were only a few merchant ships in the port and harbor, most of the boats present being fishing trawlers or whaling ships. One large tanker ship moored at a quay near the BUENAVENTURA quickly attracted Hugo’s attention, making him nudge Hanna discretely.

‘’Anne, have a look at that big tanker ship two quays down to our bow. You notice anything about it?’’

Hanna focused her eyes for a moment on the said ship before answering him.

‘’Yes: it is an American merchant ship. I thought that ships from combatant nations could not enter neutral countries during a war.’’

‘’That applies only to warships, actually. However, we both know that the American government posted a ship advisory a year ago, after the Panama Canal locks on the Pacific side were blown up by raiders from the U-800. That advisory enjoined American-flagged ships to avoid stopping in Chilean ports, which were declared ‘unsafe for American ships’. Yet, this big tanker ship is here, at quay. Furthermore it certainly isn’t here to load up on oil or other fuels: Chile does not have sizeable oil deposits, while this tanker is loaded to the hilt, judging by how low it rides in the water. It apparently isn’t here either to unload, as I see no fuel lines connecting it to the shore. In fact, the quay it is moored to is not designed to be a fuel transfer quay. It all makes me wonder about why it is here at all.’’

Hanna, who had been examining the American tanker ship while Hugo spoke, then said something in a low voice, in order not to be heard by the crewmembers working on the weather deck.

‘’I see something else, Harry. There are two large objects that are covered with large canvas tarps, one on the bow and one on the stern. The crew also tried to hide them further by piling crates around them. This may not be a warship, but I could bet that it has two deck guns, and large ones.’’

‘’Damn, you’re right!’’ said Hugo after eyeing the two covered masses. ‘’Nicely done, Anne. Let’s see if we can find more about that ‘S.S. CHARLES FINLEY’.’’

Looking around the weather deck and seeing Ramon Feliciano, the First Officer of the BUENAVENTURA, Hugo told Hanna to stay by the side rails and went to the merchant marine officer, giving him a warm smile.

‘’You seem to be loading up some pretty heavy stuff on your ship, Mister Feliciano.’’

In response, Ramon rolled his eyes up and made a face.

‘’Tell me about it, Mister Worthington: one of my sailors made a stupid bet that he could lift one of those small crates of powdered metal and sprained his back as a result. Now, I am one man short for at least a few days.’’

‘’Oh, that’s never good for a typically small merchant ship crew. Talking about merchant ships, I was surprised to see an American tanker ship in the port. Last time I was in Seattle, I learned that there was a government advisory for American merchant ships to avoid Chilean ports, calling them ‘unsafe’. I believe that it was as a result of the blowing up of the Pacific side locks of the Panama Canal, over a year ago.’’

‘’You are correct, Mister Worthington. The American cargo ship transporting nitrates that blew up inside the Miraflores Locks was hijacked by Germans in the port of Valparaiso. That prompted the American government advisory. In a way, that provided my ship and its trading company more contracts, as American merchant ships could not come to Chile anymore.’’

‘’Then, what is that ‘S.S. CHARLES FINLEY’ doing here, loaded down with oil?’’

Ramon sneered in response, while looking at the American tanker ship.

‘’It didn’t have much of a choice, actually. It suffered some engine trouble as it was passing by Antofagasta, heading South, and had to call for the help of a local tug boat to come here to do repairs. I actually talked with its captain and helped him get some spare parts from my shipping company local office. I believe that they are nearly finished with their repair work and that it should in fact leave port at about the same time as us tomorrow morning.’’

‘’Oh, I see! But why go South, towards the Cape Horn, with a cargo of oil? The United States has plenty of oil available to them in the Caribbean Basin. They have no need to ship oil from a Pacific port towards the Atlantic.’’

‘’Again, you are basically correct, Mister Worthington. Normally, their trip would not make commercial sense. However, the captain of the CHARLES FINLEY told me that he was bringing his cargo of fuel oil and of diesel fuel to the Falkland Islands, which is still being used as a mid-point refueling stop for ships going around Cape Horn.’’

‘’Oh, that explains things! Thank you for your time, Mister Feliciano.’’

Very satisfied with the results of his short conversation with Feliciano, Hugo returned by the side of Hanna along the guardrails and spoke to her from the corner of his mouth.

‘’We will need to discretely send a radio message to the U-900 before supper. That tanker ship is bringing fuel oil and diesel fuel to the Allied mid-point refueling stop in the Falkland Islands. I will tell you more once back in our cabin.’’

 

01:50 (Santiago de Chile Time)

Saturday, September 25, 1943

American tanker ship S.S. CHARLES FINLEY

At quay in the port of Antofagasta

 

Feldwebel Franz Stein, leading a twelve-man boarding team, let the young Max Landau, who was an accomplished athlete, climb first the grappling hook and rope they had thrown up from their inflatable rubber boat. Landau, who had dragged behind him a thin rope attached to a rope and wood ladder, then pulled up the ladder and fixed it to the side railings of the tanker ship. The other eleven German men, each carrying silenced weapons and waterproof bags containing their kit, then climbed silently the ladder, crouching behind various cover once on the weather deck. As four sailors from the U-900 paddled their rubber boat back towards the high sea, taking some distance before starting again their outboard engine, Stein looked around the poorly lit weather deck. The Americans had posted two armed sentries on deck guard duty, but those two men had been posted near the top stairs of the access ladder linked to the quay. Stein smiled at that: the Americans had justly considered the threat of infiltration from the shore a serious one, but had in turn neglected the possibility of infiltration from the water side, a mistake that was going to cost them dearly. However, he was not planning to take out those sentries right now. Rather, his primary concern now was to find a good hiding place for his team on this ship. The time for real action would come tomorrow, after the CHARLES FINLEY will have left the port of Antofagasta. There was however one thing that he wanted to have done before going into hiding. He pointed at two of his commandos, then at the bow deck gun nearby, which was covered with canvas tarps and partially surrounded by piles of crates.

‘’Go remove the firing pin from the breach block of that gun. However, don’t break it and don’t throw it away. Go!’’

As the two men silently approached the bow deck gun at a crouch, Stein sent three more men to do the same with the aft deck gun. He waited until his first two men were back from the bow deck gun and had given him the stolen gun firing pin, then cautiously led his group towards the stern, to be closer to his three-man team when they would have finished their job. Then would be the time to find a good hiding place for the night.

 

07:51 (Santiago de Chile Time)

Bridge of the M.S. BUENAVENTURA

Sailing north out of the port of Antofagasta

Chilean coastal waters

 

Captain Alfredo Chavez was on his bridge, standing near the helmsman, when his two lone paying passengers knocked on the starboard outside door, with Harry Worthington then sticking his head in.

‘’Permission to come on the bridge, Captain?’’

‘’Granted, Mister Worthington.’’ Replied Chavez, smiling back at the Canadian businessman. His smile widened when the very cute young Madam Worthington followed her husband inside. Her youthful beauty had quickly charmed his whole crew and Chavez had truly enjoyed hosting her and her husband for supper last night. The couple then approached the captain, with Harry addressing him.

‘’Captain, I know that we maybe should have done that when still in port, but would it be possible to telegraph a personal message to my head company in Vancouver? I would of course be ready to pay a fee for that service.’’

‘’Uh, if your message is kept short, I believe that I could accommodate your request, Mister Worthington. However, please understand that our radio operator has to monitor a couple of key frequencies and cannot tune out one of them for very long…or often.’’

‘’I completely understand, Captain. This will be an exception and I will keep my message short. Uh, where is your radio cabin, by the way?’’

Chavez half turned around and pointed a door on the back wall of the bridge.

‘’Take that door, then enter the first door to your left in that short passageway. That will be the radio room.’’

‘’Again, thank you very much, Captain.’’

‘’You’re welcome!’’

 

Passing through the door shown by Captain Chavez, Hugo and Hanna nearly immediately encountered a door opening on the left side of the short, narrow passageway they were now in. Hugo gave a nod to Hanna, then pulled out his Walther P 38 pistol and started screwing on a silencer on its muzzle. Hanna did the same with her Walther PPK compact pistol, then took a deep breath to prepare herself: this may be her second clandestine mission overseas, but she was still a novice at this armed work.

‘’Ready!’’

Hugo then opened the door of the radio room and entered, taking a few steps to let space for Hanna to enter as well. The lone radio operator present in the compartment, who was reading a book while wearing a radio headset, looked up from his book, surprise on his face.

‘’May I help you with something, sir?’’

‘’Yes!’’ replied Hugo while pointing his pistol at the radioman, ‘’You can give your place to the lady. Take off your headset, raise your hands and go stand in that far corner. One shout or one false move from you and I will not hesitate to shoot you. Now, move!’’

The stunned man, thoroughly intimidated by Hugo’s pistol, complied quickly enough and went to the farthest corner of the cabin, his hands held up. The radioman’s eyes bulged when he saw Hanna sit at his original position and change the frequency on one of his two HF radio transceivers, to then start sending a message in Morse code, demonstrating an efficient, practiced hand at it.

‘’Who…who are you, people?’’

‘’High seas pirates!’’ answered Hugo with a big smile. ‘’Don’t worry: there will be no violence unless you or another member of the crew do something stupid.’’

Hanna soon got up from her chair, having just received an acknowledge from the U-900 to her very short, coded message.

‘’Done, Hugo!’’

‘’Good! Let’s all go to the bridge now.’’

 

As soon as they walked onto the bridge, Hugo made the radioman sit down against the back wall and left Hanna in charge of watching him before pointing his pistol on the stunned Captain Chavez.

‘’I am truly sorry about all this, Captain, but we have to hijack your ship. Please go sit down next to your radioman. Your helmsman can stay at his post for the moment.’’

‘’But, but, what is going on?’’ Could only say Chavez, eyeing the pistols held by his two ‘passengers’.

‘’What is going on is that someone else than the Americans neesd the cargo of tungsten metal you are transporting. I promise you that nobody will get hurt if you stay reasonable and obey my orders. Now, please go sit down.’’

Chavez reluctantly did so, giving at the same time a dark look at Hanna, standing a few paces away with her silenced pistol. That prompted an apologetic smile from her.

‘’I am sorry to have had to deceive you like this, Captain. It is nothing personal, believe me.’’

‘’And who are you really, ‘Misses Worthington’?’’ asked Chavez, putting irony in his two last words.

‘’I am a German serving her nation, Captain. Again, relax: we wish you and your crew no harm.’’

In the meantime, Hugo approached the now sweating helmsman, his pistol pointed.

‘’Start a very gradual turn towards the West, so that the rest of the crew won’t feel the change in heading. You will then follow the heading 260.’’

‘’Yes, señor!’’

The helmsman did as he was told, with the M.S. BUENAVENTURA soon heading away from the Chilean coast and towards the high seas. A tense silence reigned on the bridge for the next forty minutes or so, until a big, dark shape emerged from the deep in a sea of foam and bubbles, to then adopt a parallel course close on the cargo’s port side. Hugo went to the engine telegraph and rang a ‘Full Stop’ to the engine room, then ordered the shocked helmsman to go sit down with the captain and the radioman before looking at Hanna.

‘’Hanna, you may now go lower the port side access ladder.’’

‘’Right away, Hauptmann!’’

 

Walking out of the bridge and climbing down the steel stairs leading to the weather deck, hanna then hurried to the port side access ladder, which had been winched up in stowed position before their departure from Antofagasta. She and Hugo had taken some time the day before to examine the winching mechanism of the ladder and to watch as two sailors raised and stowed it, so she knew what to do. A rubber inflatable boat had already been put in the water by the U-900, with six Brandenburg soldiers and seven sailors aboard, by the time the access ladder started coming down. It was halfway down when Spanish words screamed at her made Hanna jerk, her heart accelerating at once. Snapping her head around, she saw one of the crewmembers of the cargo ship running at her, obviously intent on stopping her from lowering the ladder. With fear gripping her as the big man charged at her, Hanna grabbed her silenced-Walther PPK pistol from her right side coat pocket and pointed it at the man, then shouting.

‘’HALT!’’

Either because he was a brave man or either he simply believed Hanna to be incapable of shooting him, the Panamean sailor kept running at her, his face distorted by stress. Now approaching panic, Hanna pressed the trigger of her small pistol, shooting the man in his belly from a distance of nine meters. The 7.62mm Walther PPK may have been the perfect pistol for a woman, due to its small size, light weight and weak recoil, but its bullets were no man-stoppers. The sailor wince briefly with pain and hesitated for a fraction of a second, then continued his run towards Hanna. One of the Brandenburg soldiers in the approaching rubber boat saw that and, alarmed, raised and pointed his MP43 assault rifle. However, before he could fire, Hanna fired a second shot from a distance of four meters, hitting her opponent in the chest. Again, the Panamean sailor apparently ignored the bullet impact and fell on Hanna, both of his hands aiming for her throat even though he was already dying. Taken off balance by the charge of the much bigger man, Hanna fell down on her back, the sailor on top of her. With two strong hands squeezing her throat, a desperate Hanna emptied her pistol into the man’s belly. Her attacker’s grip finally weakened, while the sailor’s head slumped down on her chest, his eyes glazed and immobile. Nearly hysterical and pumped full of adrenaline, Hanna frantically pulled herself from under the dead man and got back up on her feet, taking some distance while staring at the sailor, hyperventilating and her empty pistol held with both hands. The first German soldier to climb the access ladder, Unteroffizier Herman Weiss, found her frozen like a statue, breathing quickly. Rolling over the dead sailor with one boot and checking him for a pulse, Weiss then straightened up and looked at Hanna, speaking in a calm tone in order to make her relax a bit.

‘’He is dead, Oberhelferin Blumenthal. You are now safe.’’

The soldier’s words and sight appeared to finally take Hanna out of her trance and she acknowledged him with a nod.

‘’Thank you, Unteroffizier! The Hauptmann is on the bridge, with three prisoners. The rest of the crew is dispersed around the ship.’’

‘’We will take care of them now. Uh, you should reload your pistol now: it is empty.’’

Looking down, Hanna saw that Weiss was right. She also saw that her coat and dress were now smeared with large patches of blood.

‘’Mein Gott! I am covered with blood.’’

‘’That can happen in combat.’’ replied Weiss, smiling to her. ‘’You did well, Oberhelferin.’’

With his five soldiers and six armed sailors now arriving on the weather deck, Weiss then dispersed them in order to find and detain the rest of the crew, with three armed sailors going up with him to the bridge. Her knees weak and her hands shaking, Hanna needed a few seconds to change the empty magazine in her pistol for a full one. Her next move was to go sit down on top of a steel deck storage bin, where she did her best to regain her composure.

 

More armed sailors, supernumeraries to the normal U-900 crew who were meant to serve as prize crews for captured enemy ships, arrived aboard the BUENAVENTURA sixteen minutes later, as the crew of the cargo ship was ordered into the small officers’ mess, which had its own adjacent washroom and a small kitchen and pantry. The merchantmen were then locked up there, with the sole access to it guarded by two German soldiers. As a crew of sixteen German sailors and naval officers started running the cargo ship, more sailors went to work to transfer to the U-900 a few tons of the precious tungsten metal carried by the BUENAVENTURA. At least, if the cargo ship sank or was recaptured by the Allies, some of that tungsten would still get to Germany. That cargo transfer work was still ongoing, with the U-900 clinging to the port side of the ship’s hull, when the American tanker S.S. CHARLES FINLEY showed up and sailed to a stop near the BUENAVENTURA. Ulrich von Wittgenstein, who had climbed aboard the BUENAVENTURA in order to pass a few directives to its prize crew, took hold of a bullhorn and shouted from the open bridge wing at the tanker ship.

‘’AHOY, CHARLES FINLEY! HOW DID THINGS GO ON YOUR SIDE?’’

Franz Stein answered him from the tanker’s bridge, also using a bullhorn.

‘’WE HAD SOME ACTION ABOARD, BUT WE HAVE FULL CONTROL NOW. TWO AMERICANS WHO TRIED SOMETHING STUPID ARE NOW DEAD.’’

‘’WE ALSO HAD SOME ACTION ON THIS SHIP: OUR GOOD OBERHELFERIN SHOT AND KILLED HER SECOND OPPONENT ON THIS MISSION.’’

That left Stein speechless for a second before he replied.

‘’TEUFFEL! MY HAT IS OFF FOR HER! COULD YOU SEND A SIZEABLE PRIZE CREW ON THIS TANKER? I WOULD ALSO NEED MEN ABLE TO MAN TWO HEAVY GUNS IN AN EMERGENCY. THAT SHIP HAS TWO FIVE INCH DECK GUNS.’’

‘’I WILL TAKE CARE OF THAT RIGHT AWAY! HOW MUCH AND WHAT KIND OF FUEL DO YOU HAVE ABOARD?’’

‘’I HAVE 9,000 METRIC TONS OF NAVY FUEL OIL, PLUS 5,600 METRIC TONS OF DIESEL FUEL. WE ALSO CAPTURED A SET OF THE CURRENT U.S. NAVY CODES. YOU ARE WELCOME TO HAVE THEM AS WELL AS THE FUEL.’’

‘’AMERICAN NAVY CODES? HELL, I WON’T REFUSE THAT! SEE YOU IN A FEW MINUTES.’’

Ulrich then turned around and looked at Hugo Margraff, who was also standing on the open bridge wing.

‘’Hauptmann, you and Oberhelferin Blumenthal did an outstanding job. This tanker full of fuel will greatly help us complete our mission. How is Blumenthal holding after having to kill that Panamean sailor?’’

‘’She is still a bit shaken but I believe that she will soon be over it. Up to now, I am very impressed with her.’’

‘’Good! I will make sure that she gets her proper dues once back in Germany. Well, once we will have transferred a prize crew to the tanker ship, we will be able to sail South as a group. We should be able to go around Cape Horn before the Allies realize that two of their ships are missing.’’

 

12:14 (Santiago de Chile Time)

Sunday, October 3, 1943

Electronic warfare compartment of the U-900

Sailing eastward on the surface, southwest of Cape Horn

Drake Passage, off the southern tip of the Americas

 

Ulrich von Wittgenstein went at once to his electronic warfare and intelligence officer, Leutnant zur See Werner Schultz, on his arrival in the large but still densely packed radio section of his submarine. An urgent call from Schultz via intercom had made him come down from the open upper bridge, where he had just finished taking a sextant measurement in order to confirm his precise position.

‘’So, what do you have for me?’’

‘’Possibly something very big, Herr Kapitän. We have detected a large number of radars, all coming from the same heading and approaching us on a reciprocate course. In view of the number and types of radars, I would classify them as the radars of an American Navy task group comprising at least two large units. However, they are still quite far away and are unable yet to detect us or our two prize ships.’’

‘’And what category of warship could these two large units belong to, Werner?’’

‘’Certainly cruiser size at the least, possibly carrier or battleship size, Herr Kapitän. If we want to avoid eventual detection, then we will need to start rerouting to the South now.’’

That left Ulrich with a tough dilemma. Normally, an enemy aircraft carrier or battleship would constitute a priority target for him. An enemy carrier heading towards the Pacific would be even more of a priority target, since aircraft carriers were playing such an important role in the fighting around the Pacific and since the Americans were desperately short of such carriers in the Pacific at this moment. On the other hand, his top priority was to escort the BUENAVENTURA and its precious cargo of tungsten safely all the way to France and Lorient. If attacking that American naval group resulted in the loss of the BUENAVENTURA, then Admiral Dönitz would have his head on a platter, even if he sank a carrier. He was still thinking about his options when one of the radio operators manning the extra radio intercept and jamming equipment installed in the U-900 before their departure from Lorient made an announcement.

‘’Sir, I am intercepting a coded radio transmission from that suspected enemy surface group.’’

That attracted at once Ulrich and Werner Schultz to his station, squeezed with another station between multiple electronic equipment racks supporting a variety of radio transceivers, direction-finding sets and radio jammers. The two officers however let the man finish writing down the intercepted message and waited until the operator had decrypted the message, using the code book found on the CHARLES FINLEY. The operator finally handed a paper note to Schultz while grinning.

‘’We have something really big approaching us, Herr Leutnant.’’

Schultz, with Ulrich reading over his shoulder, took the note and read it, quickly straightening up on seeing the content.

‘’Teuffel! This is a routine position report sent by a Task Group 43.6 headed by the fleet carrier U.S.S. INTREPID. This is certainly a very juicy target, Herr Kapitän.’’

‘’Indeed! If we were to attack that task group, do you believe that you could jam its transmissions, so that they could not send an alert message before sinking?’’

‘’With the extra equipment that was installed in Lorient? Yes, Herr Kapitän! Washington and Hawaii would still get a radio signal, but it would be so garbled by our jamming that it would be completely unreadable, especially if it was sent in Morse code.’’

‘’Then, be ready to do so on my command.’’ Said Ulrich, having taken a decision. ‘’I will order our two prize ships to immediately turn South at top speed, in order for them to stay out of radar detection range from those American warships. As for us, we will take an ambush position and wait for that task group. There are a few icebergs floating around that will help us hide from the American radars. I will now go plot that reported position, to determine how far those Americans are and to help choose a good ambush point for us. Keep up the good work, Werner.’’

‘’Danke, Herr Kapitän!’’

 

 

 

16:42 (Santiago de Chile Time)

Bridge of the fleet aircraft carrier U.S.S. INTREPID (CV-11)

Sailing westward through the Drake Passage with Task Group 43.6

 

The junior bridge officer who had gone out on the open starboard bridge wing of the aircraft carrier U.S.S. INTREPID returned inside the bridge after ten minutes. His temporary opening of the steel door was sufficient to send a blast of freezing air swirling inside the bridge that made its occupants shiver. Patting his frozen face with his gloved hands to regain some sensation in his cheeks, the young lieutenant apologized to the Captain, who was sitting in his command chair.

‘’Sorry about the cold draft, sir. The wind outside is fierce and will chill you to the bone in minutes. All the ships are maintaining formation as of now.’’

‘’No need to apologize, Lieutenant: everybody knows that the Drake Passage is about the worst expanse of sea to navigate in the World. You better go get yourself a hot cup of coffee to regain some colors.’’

‘’Thank you, sir!’’

As the young officer walked out through the back door of the bridge, which led to the chart room, radio room and a few other compartments, Captain Thomas Lamison Sprague returned his eyes to the front armored windows of his command bridge. His Task Group 43.6 had been plowing westward in this rough, freezing sea for over two days now and he was going to be happy when they would finally hit some more friendly weather. Unfortunately, because of the length of the trip facing his task group, his naval formation had to go at economical cruise speed in order to save fuel. That meant that Sprague could not go faster than twelve knots, well below the top speed of his brand new aircraft carrier and only two knots faster than a typical merchant ship convoy, resulting in a long transit time through the forbidding waters of the Drake Passage, the expanse of sea between the southern tip of South America and Antarctica.

Two minutes later, the bridge signaler manning the TBS¹⁵ transceiver set spoke up.

‘’Captain, the GATLING is reporting more icebergs ahead, some of sizeable dimensions. Its captain counsels that we make a temporary course change of four degrees to starboard in two minutes, in order to avoid them.’’

‘’Very well! Pass to all ships: be ready to alter course by four degrees to starboard on my command.’’

‘’Yes Captain!’’

‘’Damn icebergs!’’ Muttered Sprague to himself. Those giant floating ice cubes, much of which was under the surface of the sea, had been filling his long range radar screens with a multitude of large blips, while ship sonars were next to useless, their sound pulses bouncing constantly against the huge masses of underwater ice surrounding the task group.

 

16:44 (Santiago de Chile Time)

Electronic warfare section of the U-900

At periscope depth in ambush position behind an iceberg

Drake Passage

 

‘’Nine…ten… I confirm ten ships as part of that American task group, Herr Kapitän. We are facing the carrier INTREPID, the battleship IOWA, the light cruiser CLEVELAND, the destroyers GATLING, DORTCH, COTTEN and CLARENCE BRONSON, the attack transport VIRGO, the fleet oiler ASHTABULA and the troop transport GENERAL JOHN POPE. Thankfully for us, they are all transmitting in clear over their TBS net.’’

‘’Which is not surprising, as they think that no one is near enough from them to intercept their VHF calls.’’ said Ulrich von Wittgenstein, standing behind his radio operator. ‘’So, we will have to deal with four FLETCHER-Class destroyers in this battle: serious odds but nothing that we can’t handle, especially if we manage to keep surprise on our side.’’

Ulrich then thought furiously about how he was going to conduct his attack. Surprise was the main advantage of a submarine, followed by firepower, meaning the number of torpedo launch tubes available to do the attack and the number of reload torpedoes for them. Thankfully for him, he had an unprecedented sixteen tubes at his disposal, ten of which could be reloaded, while the six others were external tubes that could only be reloaded in a port. He also had a total of 64 torpedoes inside his automated reload carrousels, enough to create some impressive chaos and destruction. Ten targets, including two big warships that would probably need multiple hits before sinking, were going to demand some finesse on his part. However, he had learned quite a few tricks while serving under the expert hands of Otto Kretschmer.

 

17:02 (Santiago de Chile Time)

Bridge of destroyer U.S.S. DORTCH (DD-670)

On starboard side flank guard position of Task Group 43.6

 

‘’Bridge, this is Sonar: I thought that I just heard something from our port side. Could we reduce speed a bit so that we could conduct a proper sonar search?’’

Lieutenant commander Young, the captain of the U.S.S. DORTCH, grabbed at once the microphone of his intercom system.

‘’Negative, Sonar! We have to keep our place in the formation. What did you hear?’’

‘’I am not sure, sir. At this speed, and with the noise from those strong waves, it is very hard to make out anything. I may… Hold on! I may have something now… OH SHIT! TORPEDO APPROACHING!’’

Those last shouted words made Young freeze for a moment with complete surprise and stupor before he could start shouting orders at his bridge crew.

‘’HELM, STEER HARD PORT! ENGINES TO FORWARD FULL! SOUND BATTLE STATIONS!’’

As the bell of the battle station was just starting to clang around the ship, a powerful explosion made the rear half of the destroyer rise partly out of the water, sending its crewmen crumbling down on the various decks due to the force of the shock. Young was nearly ejected from his bridge command chair but somehow managed to hold on to it. At the same time, the whole ship went dark, its main power distribution system taken out. Emergency batteries then took over, but they could only supply a few emergency lights and electronic systems. Young realized at once that his ship was probably mortally wounded, something that a panicked watchman confirmed by shouting as he entered the bridge.

‘’SIR, OUR STERN HAS JUST BROKEN OFF!’’

Young clenched his teeth on hearing that: in this kind of rough sea, this meant the death warrant of his newly-built destroyer. Furthermore, the freezing waters of the Drake Passage would mean the quick death of any sailor who would jump into the sea. He then turned his head towards his bridge signaler.

‘’CONTACT THE INTREPID ON THE TBS! TELL THEM THAT WE HAVE BEEN TORPEDOED!’’

‘’YES SIR!’’

 

17:04 (Santiago de Chile Time)

Control room of the U-900

Submerged at periscope depth within the American formation

 

‘’Hit confirmed on the DORTCH, Herr Kapitän: we can hear sounds of hull breaking.’’

‘’Excellent! Our ZAUNKÖNING did its work. How much time left before our other torpedoes will hit?’’

‘’Our two torpedoes fired at the CLEVELAND should hit in any second now. Those fired at the IOWA and at the INTREPID are due to hit in fifteen seconds, Herr Kapitän.’’

Ulrich nodded his head to acknowledge that information. Having slipped inside the American formation when the DORTCH was still too far to detect him, Ulrich had then adopted an ambush position on the starboard flank of the main enemy column. At a carefully calculated moment, he had launched an acoustic-seeking T5 ZAUNKÖNING guided torpedo at the DORTCH from one of his two reloadable stern tubes, then had fired a total of eight TYPE 96-D torpedoes at precise times from his bow tubes, aiming at three separate targets: the light cruiser CLEVELAND, the battleship IOWA and the aircraft carrier INTREPID. In doing so, he had used a tactic learned from Otto Kretschmer: the ‘Time on Target Salvo’. By calculating in advance the time his respective torpedoes would take to run to their targets and by firing first at the most distant targets, it was possible to arrange that all the torpedoes of a full salvo could hit at about the same time. That preserved the element of surprise until the last moment and also prevented the enemy from reacting in time to his attack.

‘’ONE HIT ON THE CLEVELAND, HERR KAPITÄN!’’

While a bit disappointed to see that one of his torpedoes had missed its target, Ulrich consoled himself with the thought that even only one TYPE 96-D would be enough to cause severe damage to a cruiser and cripple it. The TYPE 96-D was a German license-built model of the Japanese TYPE 96 533mm torpedo, modified with the addition of a dual contact/magnetic detonator. That dual detonator permitted the torpedo to be set to pass under a ship and to detonate beneath it when the magnetic field of the target would trigger the detonator. Allied to the devastating 550 kilo warhead of the TYPE 96, which was twice as heavy as the one equipping German-designed torpedoes, that ensured that one hit would either cripple or sink a ship of up to cruiser size. Ulrich’s disappointment however evaporated when his elated hydrophone operator shouted in triumph.

‘’HITS ON BOTH THE IOWA AND THE INTREPID! I COUNT THREE HITS ON EACH SHIP, HERR KAPITÄN.’’

While happy, Ulrich knew that a lot was still left to do and he shouted a number of orders around him.

‘’RELOAD IMMEDIATELY ALL TUBES, SAME MIX! HELM, MAXIMUM SPEED FORWARD! GO DOWN TO DEPTH OF ONE HUNDRED METERS AND CROSS TO THE OTHER SIDE OF THE MAIN ENEMY COLUMN! FIRE CONTROL, BE READY TO FIRE ONE ZAUNKÖNING FROM OUR STERN TUBES AT THE U.S.S. COTTEN ONCE ON THE OTHER SIDE.’’

 

17:05 (Santiago de Chile Time)

Bridge of the aircraft carrier U.S.S. INTREPID

 

Captain Sprague needed a moment to recuperate from the tremendous shock felt across his whole ship from the three stupendous explosions underneath its keel. One bridge crewman had even sprained an ankle, while a few more now sported a collection of bruises. Conscious that his men needed his leadership, he then shouted orders in a firm, controlled voice.

‘’SIGNALER, CONTACT THE GATLING AND THE BRONSON TO START SONAR SWEEPS ALONG OUR STARBOARD FLANK. THE COTTEN IS TO TURN AROUND AND GO PROVIDE CLOSE ESCORT TO THE VIRGO, ASHTABULA AND GENERAL JOHN POPE. BRIDGE OFFICER, GET ME A DAMAGE REPORT, QUICKLY! AND SOUND BATTLE STATIONS!’’

Leaving his command chair, Sprague went to one of the armored windows of his command bridge and raised his binoculars to his eyes to examine how the IOWA and the CLEVELAND were doing. He had seen huge multiple geysers of water blow upwards from under the keels of the two warships just before his own INTREPID was hit. In his mind, only a pack of submarines could inflict so much damage in so short a time. The extreme precision of the torpedo firings and the fact that they exploded under his ships rather than against the sides of their hulls, the mark of magnetic triggers, denoted one thing in his mind: those were German torpedoes. However, those torpedoes were also proving to be much more powerful than usual German models. There was certainly a mystery there.

‘’SIGNALS OFFICER, SEND IMMEDIATELY TO PACFLEET HQ AND WASHINGTON NAVY HQ IN CLEAR: TASK GROUP 43.6 AMBUSHED BY SUBMARINE WOLF PACK IN DRAKE PASSAGE. FOUR SHIPS HIT. ADD ALSO OUR PRESENT POSITION.’’

‘’IN CLEAR, SIR?’’ Asked the lieutenant commander, hesitant. Sprague snapped his head around to glare at him. Normally, the objection of the signals officer would have made sense, but right now Sprague wasn’t sure about how long his ship would survive. Time was thus of the essence.

‘’YOU HEARD ME, MISTER! GET TO IT, QUICKLY!’’

Thoroughly intimidated, the poor lieutenant commander ran out of the bridge through its back door, heading to the nearby radio room. Just seconds later, the bridge duty officer came to him, his expression grim.

‘’Sir, Damage Control reports that we have three huge holes in our hull bottom. Five main compartments, including two boiler rooms and our Number Two turbine room, flooded nearly instantly, while four more compartments have sprung major leaks. Our damage control teams are doing their best but are not optimistic.’’

Sprague felt discouragement fall on him for a moment: in this rough, freezing sea, a ship sinking would mean the quick death by drowning or hypothermia of its whole crew. Right now, over 7,000 of his men were now at such a risk. He however shook himself quickly and pointed an index at his subaltern.

‘’Assign every man available to help the damage control parties. I want those leaks plugged!’’

‘’Yes, Captain!’’ Replied the bridge officer before going to the nearest bridge telephone.

 

 

 

17:08 (Santiago de Chile Time)

Radio room of the M.S. BUENAVENTURA

Coasting with the CHARLES FINLEY at two knots behind an iceberg 61 kilometers south of Task Group 43.6

 

Hanna Blumenthal had been carefully monitoring for the last three hours the frequency used by the American task group to send its routine position report. She knew that, once the U-900 would start its attack, it may have to dive deeper than periscope depth, thus would be incapable of listening anymore to the American radio transmissions. With the consent of Hugo Margraff, she had thus taken on herself to be ready to supplement the efforts of the U-900 to jam the enemy long range transmissions. Sitting patiently in the radio room of the BUENAVENTURA and with a radio headset over her ears, she was able to catch on the start of the radio message being sent in clear by the U.S.S. INTREPID. As nearly all naval long range messages of the time, it was being sent in Morse code, which was less subject to deformation than human voice over long distances. Hanna’s job in the Paris headquarters of the Abwehr had been the monitoring of such Morse code transmissions from American and British sources, so she instantly caught on to it and started at once to punch her own Morse keypad, doing it in a completely random manner while transmitting at maximum power. Those extra dots and dashes, mixed haphazardly with those sent by the INTREPID, created an incomprehensible jumble for anyone listening to the Morse message from the INTREPID, hopelessly jamming it just as the aircraft carrier was quickly running out of time to send the alert to Hawaii and Washington.

 

17:12 (Santiago de Chile Time)

Control room of the U-900

Now on the port flank of the American task group

 

‘’Fire Tube Ten!’’

On the command of Ulrich von Wittgenstein, a T5 ZAUNKÖNING acoustic homing torpedo was ejected from one of the stern tubes of the U-900, running towards the destroyer U.S.S. COTTEN, which was dashing at speed towards the three support ships forming the tail of the task force. With the intense noise created by the machinery and screws of the destroyer as it rushed to take position near the support ships, the T5 had no problem detecting it and homing on it. The T5, with a maximum speed of 24 knots, may have been a lot slower than the 31 knots the COTTEN was straining to do in the rough sea, but it was actually on a near reciprocal course to the destroyer. The two speeds nearly adding up, the T5 soon started running along the underside of the American warship. Its magnetic pistol detonated the 274 kilo warhead as it was passing under the forward five inch guns magazine. The whole destroyer jumped up under the force of the underwater explosion, while its bottom hull was ripped wide open like a sheet of paper punched by a fist, opening a huge hole in the thin steel hull. However, that was not the worse from the torpedo hit, as the shockwave of the explosion was transmitted to the shells stored in the forward magazine, initiating a devastating chain-reaction via sympathetic detonation among the hundreds of five inch shells and their propellant charges. The unlucky American destroyer then disintegrated in successive explosions from within, ending up with only its mangled aft section left floating for another minute before sinking.

 

As the T5 was running towards the COTTEN, Ulrich pointed his attack periscope towards the three support ships of the American task group, which were in the process of turning around and accelerating as fast as their machines permitted.

‘’Oh, you are not going to escape me, you three big boys.’’ said Ulrich, smiling, before starting to feed target azimuth information to his second in command, Bruno Barber, who was manning the tactical plot table and torpedo fire control calculator. He chose as his first target in the group the troop transport ship U.S.S. GENERAL JOHN POPE, which was by far the fastest of the three support ships, launching two T-96D torpedoes at it. With the present short engagement range of 3,100 meters and the 51 knots maximum speed of the T-96D, the GENERAL JOHN POPE stood little chance of escaping. The attack cargo ship U.S.S. VIRGO was next to be targeted with two T-96D torpedoes, with the fleet oiler U.S.S. ASHTABULA last to have two torpedoes launched at it. As his torpedo men frantically reloaded his 533mm tubes while the six outgoing torpedoes were making their runs, Ulrich searched for the two remaining destroyers of the task group with his periscope. He soon saw them on the opposite flank of the now decimated task group, running on near reciprocal courses towards what they believed to be the probable position of his submarine while their sonars were pinging in active mode. Unfortunately for them, their sonars had a strictly limited detection range. That, added to the ‘Alberich’ anti-sonar hull coating of the U-900, made the German submarine nearly undetectable by active sonar, except at very short ranges. Even though their sonars didn’t pick up their expected target, the two destroyers still started throwing in desperation dozens of depth charges in the water, hoping to at least force their invisible opponent to dive deep and stop its attacks. Ulrich took that opportunity, while the two remaining destroyers of the task group were busy wasting their depth charges on the opposite flank of the main column, to speed towards the three main warships, all of which seemed gravely wounded but were still afloat. Ulrich wanted badly to make sure that such prizes could not escape by some miracle. He could have used the four massive, powerful T-93D 610mm long range torpedoes contained in his bow outer tubes, but decided to continue on using T-96D 533mm torpedoes. His six 610mm external torpedo tubes, sandwiched between his pressure hull and the upper deck casing, could only be reloaded in port. Also, his T-93D had a very long range unmatched by any of his other types of torpedoes he carried and he wished to save them for occasions when their maximum range of up to 40,000 meters at 38 knots, or 20,000 meters at 50 knots, would be truly useful. As he was speeding at twenty knots underwater towards the U.S.S. INTREPID, Ulrich started hearing a string of explosions marking hits by his torpedoes against the three American support ships of the task group.

 

17:23 (Santiago de Chile Time)

Bridge of the troopship U.S.S. GENERAL JOHN POPE

 

‘’NOOO! GOD NO!’’

Captain George D. Lyon was near tears as his 11,500-ton converted passenger ship’s list to starboard started increasing dramatically, signaling its impending capsizing. Two powerful torpedo hits had ripped wide open the thin belly of the troopship, with massive and uncontrollable flooding ensuing. While a big ship, the GENERAL JOHN POPE was not as heavily compartmented as typical warships were and its damage control arrangements were limited. The flooding had thus spread very quickly to adjacent compartments, accelerating an already alarming rate of listing, and there was nothing that Lyon could do to prevent that. Now, 5,000 men from an Army infantry regiment meant to act as reinforcements for the beleaguered defenders of Australia were going to die in the icy waters of the Drake Passage, along with Lyon and his 450 crewmen. With a last groan of tortured steel, the U.S.S. GENERAL JOHN POPE capsized belly up in the next seconds. Lyon had time for a last thought about his wife and children before his bridge flooded with freezing seawater.

 

17:24 (Santiago de Chile Time)

Bridge of the destroyer U.S.S. CLARENCE K. BRONSON (DD-668)

On the starboard flank of the task group

 

Navy Commander William Veeder clenched his teeth together while he watched the U.S.S. GENERAL JOHN POPE capsize in the distance. The fleet oiler U.S.S. ASHTABULA, cut in two by torpedo hits, was now burning fiercely, while the U.S.S. VIRGO was sinking by the bow, a large section of which had been blown away. What made Veeder even more furious was the fact that he had left the three support ships without protection only to go chase after a ghost. The fact that he had done so on orders did little to diminish his fury. Charging to the bridge TBS transceiver set, he nearly ripped its handset from the hand of the bridge signaler and pressed its transmission switch.

‘’INTREPID, this is the BRONSON, over!’’

He had to repeat his call twice before getting an answer.

‘’This is INTREPID! Go ahead, BRONSON!’’

‘’From BRONSON, pass me Captain Sprague.’’

‘’Wait one, BRONSON!’’

Veeder only had to wait a few seconds before a new voice came on the TBS set.

‘’This is Captain Sprague. Speak, Commander Veeder!’’

‘’Captain, our sonar sweeps have not been able to find a single submarine on the starboard flank of the formation. Either it withdrew, or it crossed over to our port flank.’’

‘’It is quite probable that we are dealing with a whole submarine pack, as the continued enemy radio jamming from the South may indicate. I need you and the GATLING to come to me and to give some close protection to my carrier and to the IOWA and CLEVELAND. Let’s try saving what can be sav…’’

The voice of Captain Sprague was suddenly drowned on the radio by the noise of a powerful explosion, with the channel then becoming silent. A shocked Veeder snapped his head towards the INTREPID, some 4,500 meters away, in time to see the water from two imposing geysers falling back on the already damaged aircraft carrier. Those additional torpedo hits proved to be too much for the unfortunate warship, with the INTREPID starting to sink at the vertical four minutes later, as the BRONSON and the GATLING were running to its help. The demoralized crews of the two destroyers then found themselves surrounded by floating debris and frozen bodies, with very few men still alive in rescue rafts. While the BRONSON stopped to retrieve those few survivors from the INTREPID, the GATLING went to post itself on the port flank of the IOWA and of the CLEVELAND. The light cruiser appeared the most seriously damaged of the two, with its screws and rudders ripped off or deformed by a torpedo hit. The immobilized warship was now rolling and pitching uncontrollably in the two-meter waves and in the eighty kilometer per hour cold winds. Realizing that his cruiser was now condemned, with no realistic hopes left of being towed to a safe port in the present conditions, the captain of the CLEVELAND decided to call the BRONSON to his help, so that he could start evacuating part of his crew to the destroyer.

 

The BRONSON was only 300 meters away from the CLEVELAND and was approaching it at six knots when a new wave of torpedoes struck. No less than four torpedoes struck the battleship IOWA, giving it the coup-de-grace, while the GATLING was blown in two by a torpedo exploding under its keel. As for the CLEVELAND, two torpedoes finished to break away its aft section, making it sink in less than a minute. The BRONSON received the ultimate torpedo from that last salvo, breaking in half and sinking only minutes after the IOWA and the CLEVELAND. About 200 American survivors freezing to death while either swimming or riding in rafts were then left alone in the oil-covered water, debris from their once powerful task group floating around them.

 

Ten minutes later, a huge dark shape emerged from under the surface, some 400 meters from the sinking point of the CLEVELAND. Ulrich von Wittgenstein, very conscious of how many men he had killed today by his actions and unwilling to let more men die now that the American warships had been destroyed, had decided to rescue the few pitiful survivors from the task group. As his radio operators recalled the BUENAVENTURA and the CHARLES FINLEY to his position, he had his helmsman cautiously steer his U-900 towards the few life rafts bobbing on the surface of the sea. Unfortunately, all the survivors who had been swimming in the water were now dead, killed by hypothermia, while a few more men in the exposed rafts were dead as well. The grim German sailors of the U-900 deck rescue team were able to save only 48 Americans still alive in the rafts, bringing them inside and down to the submarine’s cafeteria, where Otto Hannig and his assistant cook, Ernst Mannerheim, hurried to serve them cups of hot coffee and bowls of steaming soup, while other submariners distributed wool blankets to the shivering Americans. However, Ulrich wasn’t ready to take unnecessary risks with his captives and had six of his embarked Brandenburg Regiment soldiers closely watch the Americans.

 

Four hours later, the American prisoners were transferred to the CHARLES FINLEY, on which the other prisoners taken on the tanker ship and on the BUENAVENTURA had been put together in a secondary storage compartment, watched by Brandenburg soldiers. Ulrich von Wittgenstein and Hugo Margraff had been in agreement about not leaving any prisoner aboard the BUENAVENTURA, whose cargo of tungsten was too precious to risk with a possible prisoners’ mutiny. With the U-900 back in the lead, the three German-controlled ships then resumed their eastward course around the Cape Horn.