The Ocean Liner

The Western Approaches

Servicing the torpedoes was a regular task which nobody enjoyed, least of all the crew who had to live in the company of the greasy monsters. It didn’t help that the sea continued to be very rough. U-113 pitched and rolled violently, causing even the nimblest sailors to lose their footing and slide into metal projections which seemed designed to imprint the human body with a rich diversity of bruises.

In the forward torpedo room, the torpedo mechanics were hauling the long, heavy ‘fish’ out of their racks, using the hoists installed for that purpose. The things were twenty-five feet long, weighing three thousand pounds, eight hundred pounds of which was high explosive. They were complex beasts, with tails and fins and brains and teeth, and they could swim at a speed of forty knots.

The few ratings who had chosen to remain watched the torpedomen unbolt the access hatches of the torpedoes and work in their tangled entrails. The rest were squatting along the passageways, some with miniature chessboards between them: Rudi Hufnagel, in an effort to combat the tensions bred by boredom and fear on board, had organised a chess tournament.

He had drawn up a league table with considerable care. Out of forty-eight crew members, twenty-three were chess players. All of them had signed up eagerly. Somewhat to Hufnagel’s surprise, Todt put his name on the list, and as luck would have it, the commander drew Hufnagel for his first match. They played in the captain’s quarters, wedged around his fold-down table. Todt wore his white captain’s cap, perhaps to remind Hufnagel who was boss.

‘Chess,’ Todt said, inserting his pieces into the little holes on the board, ‘is an intrinsically Aryan game.’

‘I thought it was Persian.’

‘Exactly so. The Persians are descended from ancient Aryan races. It is from the very word “Aryan” that they draw the name of their country, Iran. The meaning of the word “Aryan” is free, noble and strong.’ Todt made his first move and scratched at an ugly red rash that had spread around his groin. Despite the cold, he was wearing shorts so as to air the inflammation.

‘That’s very interesting,’ Hufnagel said, making his countermove. He was wondering whether to try to win his match or whether it would be more diplomatic to allow the captain to beat him.

‘Do you know that I found recordings by Vladimir Horowitz in the crew’s music collection?’ Todt said.

‘That is very serious,’ Hufnagel replied gravely.

Todt did not pick up the irony in his tone. ‘The difference between music made by Aryans and music made by Jews is the difference between healthy air and poison gas. Any contact with Jews spreads an infection, insidious but deadly, which eventually overpowers the strongest organism. The danger of Jewish infection is something you ignored when you took one of their females to your bed.’

Hufnagel had a memory of a night at the opera, of a soft body in his arms, of soft lips on his. He moved a pawn, saying nothing.

‘And this is not to mention the case of negro music, which although different, is equally dangerous. Negro music attempts to excite the worst passions in man, to drag man down to the level of a jungle ape. It drives the listener to sexual excess of the worst kind. And in the United States, of course, the Negroes have been given a dominant place.’

‘If you say so,’ Hufnagel replied dryly.

‘They are allowed to dominate in music and sport, to name but two areas.’

Hufnagel hid a sour smile. No sooner had the Nazis banned Aryans from frolicking to the rhythms of Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington when along had come Jesse Owens and his Negro teammates to sweep past pure-blooded Germans at the Berlin Olympics – and that under the nose of the Führer. ‘Shocking,’ he murmured.

‘Shocking indeed. This worship of the savage is the surest sign that the American culture is doomed.’

Half-listening to Todt’s high-flown analysis of what he called ‘nigger-music’, Hufnagel tried to disguise his boredom. Unlike Todt, he had visited America, albeit briefly. Their training ship had docked at Baltimore, Maryland, and a group of them had caught the train to New York to do some sightseeing.

They’d been careful not to show swastikas or other emblems, knowing that Nazism was already held in opprobrium by many people. He remembered the first Negroes he had seen, their lively grace, their seeming good-fellowship, mingled with a certain humorous cynicism.

They had strolled around Harlem, looking at the dark folk and listening to their music spilling out of shabby doorways, along with the smell of spicy cooking. He’d been struck by the difference between them and the hard-faced, thrusting, white New Yorkers who bustled like ants from one skyscraper to another.

He studied the board. Perhaps in his enthusiasm for the topic, Todt had made an unwise move. Hufnagel capitalised on this quietly, bringing up a knight which had been previously held back, strengthening his command of the middle of the board. As they played, they could hear noises from the bows of the U-boat, where the torpedomen were working, the rattle of chain winches and the clank of tools on metal casings.

Todt continued. ‘This war, Hufnagel, is not being waged for profit or land. We are Teutonic knights, going to war against an enemy who spreads his tentacles right around the globe. If we allow infection to spread here, under our very armour, then, Hufnagel, we are beaten before we begin.’ He scratched his crotch, looking more closely at the board. ‘I see I have made bad moves.’

‘One or two, Captain. All is not yet lost,’ Hufnagel said, contemplating making a bad move of his own so that Todt could recover the initiative.

‘You still have not answered my earlier question.’

‘What question was that, Captain?’

‘How you could have brought yourself to have intercourse with a Jewess.’ Todt raised his hollow eyes to Hufnagel’s. ‘It’s the most disgusting thing I ever heard. It makes my gorge rise.’

‘Yes, you said as much before.’

‘Was she very hirsute?’ Todt’s lean cheeks flushed as he asked the question. ‘I have heard that Jewish women have an abnormal quantity of bodily hair, particularly in the reproductive regions. It reaches to the knees in some cases. It’s said that this can be used to identify a Jewess, even if she attempts to conceal her race.’

‘I am unable to comment on that,’ Hufnagel said icily.

‘But surely your experience—’

Hufnagel cut in. ‘My experience is not one which I choose to share. It is a private matter.’

Todt’s eyes flicked from the board to Hufnagel’s face. ‘You still entertain feelings for this Jewess, then?’

‘I refuse to discuss it.’

‘Then you are not to be trusted, Hufnagel. You have been corrupted, as all are corrupted by contact with Jews.’

‘That is nonsense,’ Hufnagel replied tersely.

‘In the moment of crisis, you will fail the Fatherland. That is inevitable.’

Todt moved his queen, another bad move. Hufnagel now had his opponent in his sights, and victory was more or less inevitable. Todt, if he was any sort of a player, could see that. And Hufnagel now had no intention of losing the match.