fact, we were damned close to canceling the thing, then somebody came up with the idea of a merchant ship. A neutral.”
Noordendam
was laboring too hard, DeHaan thought, and had the helmsman come a few points west.
“Truth is,” Sims said, “where we’re going, it’s not healthy for submarines. Our side has the east and west ends of the Med, with Gibraltar, and the fleet at Alexandria, but, in the middle, that’s another story. There are French airbases at Algiers and Bizerta, Italian planes across the Sicilian Channel at Cagliari, and they have a naval base at Trapani, and, since January, the
Luftwaffe
is operating from an airfield in Taormina, in Sicily. Submarines don’t like airplanes, Captain, as I’m sure you know, and add the destroyers, which fly seaplanes from their decks, and you stand a rather good chance of losing your submarine.”
“And a commando unit.”
“That’s not really the thinking, I’m afraid. It’s the Andrew, the Royal Navy, wanting to keep what it has. You can replace commandos.”
And tramp freighters.
“I suppose you can,” DeHaan said. “Anyhow, we’re proud to do our part.”
“Your crew? I’m sure your officers are.”
“Hard to tell, with the crew. They always do what needs to be done, that’s just life in the merchant marine. I think the men with families in Holland like the idea of a raid. As for the rest, it’s probably different for each of them. We had six German crewmen in August of ’39, then, in September, after war was declared, four of them asked to sign off, including our second engineer, and we put them ashore in Valparaiso. But the other two stayed on. There was a time when we didn’t think about these things—nation of the sea and all that—but then the politics started, in 1933, and everything changed. Our chief engineer, Kovacz, was an officer in the Polish navy. He came aboard in January of 1940, in Marseilles. He’d been in port, up in Gdansk, when the Germans attacked. His ship blew up in the harbor.”
“Bombed?”
“Sabotage, he says.”
“Bloody war.”
“We had to sign him on as a fireman, but we lost our chief engineer a few months later and Kovacz was right there in the engine room. We’re lucky to have him.”
“And your two Germans? Still aboard?” He meant the question to sound like ordinary conversation, but there was an edge in his voice.
“Yes, and they’re good seamen. One’s an anarchist, the other didn’t want to die for Hitler. He’s young, nineteen maybe. They’ve had a few bad moments, fights in the crew quarters. Officially, I don’t know about it, and the men sorted it out among themselves.”
“It’s no different with us,” Sims said. “An officer can only do so much.”
Sympathy, DeHaan thought,
as commanders we all face the same problems,
and decided to take advantage of it. “What are you after, Major, on Cap Bon? I know I shouldn’t ask but I’m responsible for this ship, and for the lives of my crew, and on that basis maybe I have a right to know.”
Sims didn’t like it. Went silent as a stone, and, for a long minute, it was very quiet on the bridge. Then he walked over to the bulkhead, away from the helmsman. DeHaan let him stand there for a while before he followed.
“For you only, Captain DeHaan. May I have your word on that?”
“You have it.”
“Commando operations are meant to do many things: they upset the enemy, they help public morale—if they’re reported, they destroy strategic facilities. Communications networks, power stations, drydocks.”
Sims was just talking so DeHaan waited, and was rewarded.
“Also,” Sims said, “coastal observation points.”
“Like Cap Bon.”
“Yes, like Cap Bon. They seem to be able to watch our ships, even at night, in dense fog. We must get convoys through, Captain, to our bases on Malta and Crete, because the Germans are going to attack them. Must. Without these bases, as points of interception, our forces in Libya, all our
Noordendam
was laboring too hard, DeHaan thought, and had the helmsman come a few points west.
“Truth is,” Sims said, “where we’re going, it’s not healthy for submarines. Our side has the east and west ends of the Med, with Gibraltar, and the fleet at Alexandria, but, in the middle, that’s another story. There are French airbases at Algiers and Bizerta, Italian planes across the Sicilian Channel at Cagliari, and they have a naval base at Trapani, and, since January, the
Luftwaffe
is operating from an airfield in Taormina, in Sicily. Submarines don’t like airplanes, Captain, as I’m sure you know, and add the destroyers, which fly seaplanes from their decks, and you stand a rather good chance of losing your submarine.”
“And a commando unit.”
“That’s not really the thinking, I’m afraid. It’s the Andrew, the Royal Navy, wanting to keep what it has. You can replace commandos.”
And tramp freighters.
“I suppose you can,” DeHaan said. “Anyhow, we’re proud to do our part.”
“Your crew? I’m sure your officers are.”
“Hard to tell, with the crew. They always do what needs to be done, that’s just life in the merchant marine. I think the men with families in Holland like the idea of a raid. As for the rest, it’s probably different for each of them. We had six German crewmen in August of ’39, then, in September, after war was declared, four of them asked to sign off, including our second engineer, and we put them ashore in Valparaiso. But the other two stayed on. There was a time when we didn’t think about these things—nation of the sea and all that—but then the politics started, in 1933, and everything changed. Our chief engineer, Kovacz, was an officer in the Polish navy. He came aboard in January of 1940, in Marseilles. He’d been in port, up in Gdansk, when the Germans attacked. His ship blew up in the harbor.”
“Bombed?”
“Sabotage, he says.”
“Bloody war.”
“We had to sign him on as a fireman, but we lost our chief engineer a few months later and Kovacz was right there in the engine room. We’re lucky to have him.”
“And your two Germans? Still aboard?” He meant the question to sound like ordinary conversation, but there was an edge in his voice.
“Yes, and they’re good seamen. One’s an anarchist, the other didn’t want to die for Hitler. He’s young, nineteen maybe. They’ve had a few bad moments, fights in the crew quarters. Officially, I don’t know about it, and the men sorted it out among themselves.”
“It’s no different with us,” Sims said. “An officer can only do so much.”
Sympathy, DeHaan thought,
as commanders we all face the same problems,
and decided to take advantage of it. “What are you after, Major, on Cap Bon? I know I shouldn’t ask but I’m responsible for this ship, and for the lives of my crew, and on that basis maybe I have a right to know.”
Sims didn’t like it. Went silent as a stone, and, for a long minute, it was very quiet on the bridge. Then he walked over to the bulkhead, away from the helmsman. DeHaan let him stand there for a while before he followed.
“For you only, Captain DeHaan. May I have your word on that?”
“You have it.”
“Commando operations are meant to do many things: they upset the enemy, they help public morale—if they’re reported, they destroy strategic facilities. Communications networks, power stations, drydocks.”
Sims was just talking so DeHaan waited, and was rewarded.
“Also,” Sims said, “coastal observation points.”
“Like Cap Bon.”
“Yes, like Cap Bon. They seem to be able to watch our ships, even at night, in dense fog. We must get convoys through, Captain, to our bases on Malta and Crete, because the Germans are going to attack them. Must. Without these bases, as points of interception, our forces in Libya, all our
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