Wreckers Must Breathe (10 page)

And as I lay there listening to the sounds of footsteps and voices from the galleries above, made hollow by the echo and barely distinguishable above the incessant hum of the dynamos, I felt more miserable than I think I had ever felt before. I had that lost feeling that one has as a new boy in a big school. Had Logan been all right, I think I should have been able to keep my spirits up. But in his present state he only contributed to my dejection. It was not only a question of loss of memory. It seemed to me that his brain had been rendered defective. He had become so childlike that I felt responsible for him, and I was fearful of what the Gestapo might do to him if they were not quickly convinced that he was really ill. I was under no delusion as to the sympathy he might expect from these men. I had spoken to too many who had suffered agonies in German concentration camps to be in any doubt as to what we might expect. The only consolation was that neither of us looked in the least like Jews.

The next day we were woken at six and set to work on the hull of U 39, which stood up, stained and dirty, like a stranded fish in the empty dock. I gathered from the conversation of the men working with us that she had docked the night before our own boat after a cruise on the north Atlantic trade routes. This accounted for the fact that her hull was coated thick with sea grass. Our job was to scrape it clean.

Our guard had been changed at three in the morning. It was changed again at nine. The petty officer of this guard was a real slave driver. To give him his due he had probably received instructions to see that we worked at full pressure all the time, but by the way he watched us and yelled at us as soon as we slowed down I knew he enjoyed the job.

Logan seemed to like the work. Perhaps it took his thoughts off the blankness of his mind. At any rate he went steadily forward with the work, never flagging and doing about ten square feet to my four. My muscles were soft with years of sedentary work and I quickly tired. By eleven the guard was making use of a bayonet to keep me at it. But the stab of the point in my buttocks was as nothing to the ache in my arms and back. We were allowed a twenty minute break for lunch at twelve. Then we had to set to again. The sweat streamed off me and my arms got so tired that I could hardly raise them and at the same time hold the scraper in my shaking fingers.

Sheer dogged determination, induced I think more by a desire not to make myself conspicuous rather than by fear, kept me going. But about two hours after lunch I blacked out. Fortunately I was only standing on the lower rungs of the ladder and the fall did not injure me. I came to with an unpleasant sensation of pain in my ribs. I looked up. The hull of the U-boat bulged over me, whilst very far away, it seemed, the petty officer was telling me to get up and at the same time kicking me in the ribs.

Then Logan's huge body came into my line of sight. He stepped down off his ladder and with quiet deliberation knocked the petty officer flying with a terrific punch to the jaw. Then, before the guard had time to do anything, he had climbed back on to his ladder and resumed his work.

I scrambled painfully to my feet. The guard was looking bewildered. Quite a number of men had witnessed the affair and they were making humorous comments to the guard. ‘Why don't you call the police?' asked one, and there was a howl of laughter. There was no doubt that Logan had made something of a hit with the men. From their tone I gathered that the petty officer was not popular.

As the petty officer remained quite motionless where the force of Logan's blow had flung him, one of the guard at length announced that he was going for the doctor. Logan continued with his work as if nothing had happened. It was not that he was trying to pretend that he had nothing to do with the business. He seemed completely oblivious to the fact that he had knocked a German petty officer cold. A crowd had gathered on the dockside above us. Everyone seemed to be talking at once and the sound merged into a low roar that almost drowned the roar of machinery. Men were attracted from other docks, and I could see that the crowd was growing every minute because the ones in front had to strain backwards in order to avoid being pushed over the edge of the dock. Some of them had jumped on to the submarine itself in order to see what was happening.

Nobody seemed to think of going to the assistance of the petty officer, so I went over to where he lay crumpled up against the side of the dock in a pool of water. His clothes were already wet through. I felt his heart, fearful that Logan might have killed him. But it was beating faintly and there seemed nothing the matter with him except for the punch on the jaw he had received. In falling against the side of the dock his head seemed to have been protected by his upflung arm.

I made him as comfortable as I could, and by that time the guard had returned with the doctor. The electric arc lights glinted on his pince-nez as he climbed down the steel ladder into the dock.

His examination of the man was brief. ‘He's all right,' he said in German, and ordered two men to take him to his bunk. As the petty officer was hauled up to the top of the dock, the doctor turned to me. ‘Vat 'appened?' he demanded. I told him. He nodded. ‘Your friend vill be in troble,' he said.

A sudden hush fell over the men on the dockside. I looked up. The Gestapo man—Fulke—had arrived. Like shadows the men seemed to melt away. He descended to the bottom of the dock. ‘I hear that man—' he indicated Logan—‘has knocked down an officer of the guard. Is that right?' He spoke in German, and there was a kind of eagerness in his eyes that it was impossible to mistake. The man was a sadist.

‘That is true,' the doctor replied. ‘But he did it because——'

‘The reason does not interest me,' snapped Fulke. He turned to the guard. ‘Take that man to the guard-room. Strap him to the triangle. I'll teach prisoners to knock down officers of the Fuehrer's navy. Get Lodermann. He is to use the steel-cored whip. I will be along in a few minutes. And take this man with you.' He nodded in my direction. ‘It will doubtless be instructive for him to see how we maintain discipline.'

The guard saluted and turned away, at the same time indicating that I was to follow him. They took Big Logan from his work and marched him along the dock gallery and up the ramp to the guard-room. I went with them, a horrible empty sickness in the pit of my stomach. Behind me, as I left the dock, I heard the doctor saying, ‘You're not going to have that man flogged with a steel-cored whip, surely? He's not well, mentally? Anyway, his action was not unjustified.' There followed a sharp altercation between the two, but I was by then too far away to hear what was said. In that moment I was thankful to know that there was one man in the place with some human understanding.

But I knew it was useless to expect that he would be able to prevent the flogging. The Gestapo's commands were law, and I was convinced that this man Fulke wanted to see Logan flogged. I had heard tales from refugees of floggings in concentration camps with this same steel-cored whip. It cut a man's back to ribbons and he seldom survived the full number of strokes to which he was sentenced. Something seemed to cry out with agony inside me. As I watched them strip Big Logan and tie him to the heavy iron triangle in the guard-room, I think I went through almost as much mental agony as Logan would go through physical agony later. I felt entirely responsible for what had happened, and it was pitiful to see Logan's docility. He did not seem to understand what was happening. Stripped, his terrific physique was even more evident. I felt that if he cared to let himself go, he could have killed every member of the guard with his bare hands, and I longed to call out to him to do so. But what was the use?

A big powerful seaman had taken the steel-cored whip from an oblong box. He had removed his coat and rolled up his sleeves. The bristles on the back of his thick neck gleamed in the electric light. He adjusted the position of the triangle so that the whip, which was short and knotted, would not catch the walls. The guard had been augmented to six men. The little Gestapo man whom we had first met had taken control. There was a deathly stillness in the room as the man with the whip made his dispositions. The clock on the wall ticked monotonously on as we waited for Fulke.

At length he arrived. ‘Close the door!' he ordered. Then he crossed the room and took up a position on the other side of the triangle. His narrow face shone with sweat and his eyes had a glassy stare. ‘Why did you strike an officer of the guard?' he asked in English.

Logan made no reply. It was as though he had not heard.

Fulke's hand shot out and he slapped Logan across the face. He did it with the back of his hand, so that a gold ring set with diamonds which he wore on his right hand scored Logan's cheek. ‘Answer me, you dog!' he shouted.

Logan's face remained completely vacant.

‘Geben Sie ihm eins mit der Peitsche, das wird ihn aufwecken,' he ordered.

The seaman measured his distance. Involuntarily I closed my eyes. The steel-cored thongs sang through the air and cracked down with a thud. Three red lines immediately showed on Logan's brown back. They broadened and merged together into trickles of blood that ran down his hairy buttocks.

‘Now will you answer me? Why did you hit the officer of the guard?'

Still Logan made no reply. In sickening anticipation I waited for the order to give the next stroke. But at that moment the door of the guard-room opened and the commodore came in, accompanied by the doctor.

‘Who gave the order for this man to be flogged?' demanded the commodore. There was an ominous ring in his voice that no one could mistake. A sudden feeling of excitement gripped me.

‘I did,' replied Fulke, stepping forward to meet the other. ‘Do you challenge it?' There was a veiled sneer in the way he put the question. He seemed very sure of his ground.

The commodore's only answer was to order the guard to release Logan from the triangle. Fulke advanced a step. For a moment I thought he was going to hit the commodore. A vein on his temple was throbbing violently. ‘He has struck the officer of his guard,' he said. ‘He is to be flogged. Order and discipline are to be preserved in this base. Heil Hitler!' He raised his right hand.

The commodore seemed quite unmoved by this display. He did not answer the Nazi salute. ‘I am in command here.' He spoke quietly but firmly. Then to the guard, ‘Take that man down.'

‘My instructions are that this man be flogged,' Fulke almost shrieked.

The commodore ignored him. ‘Take that man down,' he thundered, as the guard hesitated. At that the men jumped to it. In an instant Logan had been released from the triangle.

‘You exceed yourself, Herr Commodore.' Fulke was almost beside himself with rage. ‘That man is to be flogged. If you persist in your attitude my next report will be most unfavourable. You know what that means?'

The commodore turned and faced Fulke. He was completely unruffled. ‘You forget, Herr Fulke—we are now at war,' he said. ‘For three months you have bounced around this base, over-riding my orders, undermining the morale of my men by your schoolboy ideas of discipline. This is the submarine service, not a Jewish concentration camp. For three months I have borne with you because you had the power to hinder my work. Now we are at war. We have work to do—men's work. No reports, except my own, will leave this base.'

‘You will regret your attitude, Herr Commodore,' snarled Fulke.

‘I think not.'

‘I'll have you removed from your post. I'll have you discharged from the service. You will be sent to a concentration camp. I will see to it that——'

‘You will not have the opportunity. In any case, Herr Fulke, you must realize that men with long experience in the services are indispensable in wartime. On the other hand, the Gestapo is not indispensable. For instance, I cannot think of one useful thing that you can do. Doubtless we can teach you to cook. You will report on board U 24 which leaves for the Canary Islands tomorrow. You will replace their cook, who is ill.'

Fulke's hand went to his revolver. The commodore did not hesitate. His fist shot out and laid the Gestapo agent out with a lovely right to the jaw. I do not know how old the commodore was—at least fifty I should have said—but there was plenty of force behind that punch. His hand was raw after it, where the skin had split at the knuckles. ‘Guard! Arrest that man!' he ordered. The two nearest men jumped forward. He turned to the other Gestapo agent. ‘You are under arrest, Herr Strasser. Disarm him!'

When both men were disarmed, he turned to his orderly. ‘Fetch Commander Brisek here! You'll find him in the mess.'

The orderly disappeared. The commodore rubbed his knuckles gently. There was the beginning of a smile on his ruddy face. ‘I don't know when I've enjoyed myself so much,' I heard him whisper to the doctor. Aloud he said to the doctor, ‘You'll look after the prisoner?' He indicated Logan. ‘Have them both transferred to quarters on the other side of this gallery.' He stroked his chin gently, and there was a twinkle in his eye. ‘I think we might put Fulke and his friends in the wet cells that he insisted on having constructed. I wonder how they'll take to the U-boat service—do you think they'll be frightened?'

‘I have an idea they will,' replied the doctor with no attempt to conceal his smile. ‘What I know of psychology prompts me to the view that Fulke at any rate will be very frightened.'

The commodore nodded. ‘I will give Varndt instructions to stand no nonsense.'

The door swung open and a naval officer entered, followed by the orderly.

‘Ah, Heinrich, I have a little commission for you which I think you will enjoy. I have placed these men'—he indicated the two Gestapo agents—‘under protective arrest. Take a guard and arrest the other two.'

‘Very good, Herr Commodore.' Commander Brisek marched out with three men of the guard.

The commodore turned and went out of the room, followed by his orderly. The doctor went over to Logan and took him by the arm. As he led him towards the door, he nodded to me. I followed him. He took us to a small but comfortable little cell on the other side of the gallery, almost directly opposite the door of the guard-room. He sent a man for his bag and in a very short while he was easing the pain of the cuts on Logan's back. Almost immediately afterwards our evening meal was brought to us. It was six o'clock.