Kriegsluftflotte III, in addition to its twenty or so operational staffeln – squadrons – of modern fighters and medium bomber aircraft, also included several cutting-edge specialist units: the Hochgeschwindigkeitsflug Entwicklungsgruppe (the High-speed Flight Development Group) at Regensburg, the Düsenturbinenantrieb Experimentalflügel (the Jet Turbine Propulsion Experimental Wing) at Nuremburg, and the Rakete und geführt Design-Mitarbeiter (the Rocket and Guided Minitions Design Staff) at Augsburg.
The most organised, arguably the best-educated, certainly the most militarised continental European power had, practically overnight, begun to fracture.
Consequently, right now nobody in Germany gave a damn about a ‘piss pot concession’ like Guaynabo. Almost overnight, Von Schaffhausen and his fetid little fiefdom had turned from a sub-tropical paradise – of sorts – into an open-air prison at the mercy of the Dominicans.
The German Minister struggled to put aside his darker premonitions.
“My repeated requests that the Wilhelmstrasse be asked to arrange for the repatriation of Commander Cowdrey-Singh’s men have thus far met with no response…”
“What of the message from Philadelphia, Herr Minister?” The Anglo-Indian asked pointedly. So far as he was concerned the Germans could carry on shooting at each other for as long as they wanted. In fact, the longer the better!
Von Schaffhausen hesitated.
“In the interests of clarity, I must re-iterate that the message in question was actually sent to the Dominican Government. Its form was that of an unconditional demand that you and you people should be placed on board a ship and sent home by noon tomorrow. The communication spoke, apparently, of the severest repercussions for the leadership in particular, and for the Dominican people in general, in the event that any of you are harmed in any way, or are not returned as demanded.”
“Well, what are the fools going to do?” Wallendorf inquired.
“Nothing. They claim that our British guests are in fact our prisoners and that it is up to us to take them home.”
The German officer shrugged.
“Why don’t we, Herr Minister?”
“We don’t have a ship,” von Schaffhausen replied tartly, “and even if we did the Dominicans would never let it out of the harbour.”
Peter Cowdrey-Singh was unimpressed; wondering how long it was going to take his ‘hosts’ to join up the pieces and realise that they were in as bad a position as he and his men!
“How many German nationals are there within the Concession?” The question was asked rhetorically. “A thousand, perhaps?”
The German Minister nodded.
“There were about three hundred and fifty adults and seventy or eighty children and young people below the age of eighteen years, before the men from the Weser and the Emden came ashore,” Angela von Schaffhausen said, helpfully. “So, that’s around five hundred people.”
“And what,” Peter Cowdrey-Singh continued, “do you think is going to happen to you all when the Triple Alliance has got hold of all your ships and the Royal Navy starts to blockade the Greater Antilles and the Caribbean? Or when the first fifteen-inch shells start falling on their coastal cities in the middle of the night?”
The others were silent.
“I think it is high time we all put our cards on the table,” he went on. “I think you know exactly what those people across the bay and their Inquisitors will do. Dammit, there’s a bloody ironclad out there in the bay pointing its bloody guns at you!”
Still, the others said nothing.
“Up until now they’ve been waiting to get their hands on the Emden. In a day or two they’ll have looted her from stem to stern, and then they’ll warp her out into the bay and see if they can figure out which levers to pull and switches to flick, assuming they haven’t completely wrecked her, to get her back to sea. Then, what use will they have for you?”
“I’m sure it won’t come to that,” von Schaffhausen objected, without real conviction.
“They tried to disarm your men when they disembarked from the Emden!” The Anglo-Indian snarled. “Open your bloody eyes, man!”
“But what can we do, Commander,” Angela von Schaffhausen asked quietly.
“They sent out two destroyers to arrest the Weser because some religious nutcase over there,” he jabbed his arm to the east where the capital lay across the other side of San Juan Bay, “wanted, and presumably, still wants, to get their hands on me and my men, presumably to do whatever the bloody Inquisition does to heretics!”
“But you are safe,” the German Minister insisted. “We will not let them take you…”
“How would you stop them?”
Again, Peter Cowdrey-Singh gestured around them.
“I don’t see any castle wall, or artillery. Dammit, you’ve got less than a hundred firearms and probably, damn all ammunition. What are Kapitan Wallendorf’s people supposed to do if the Dominicans walk in one day and start arresting, or just killing, whoever they want? I’m sorry; but I don’t think relying on stern words and sticks and stones is going to cut it against several thousand soldiers with automatic rifles!”
The four of them had halted, not quite out of earshot of several Kaiserliche Marine officers and men; others around them were halting, pausing to listen.
“But we still don’t have a ship?” The German Minister’s wife reminded him.
“Forgive me,” Peter Cowdrey-Singh objected, genuinely apologetic to be gainsaying Angela von Schaffhausen. “We have two. The Weser and the Emden, neither in tip top condition, I grant you. But at least the Emden still has some shells in her magazines?”
He looked to Wallendorf, who nodded.
“Thirty or forty reloads per main battery barrel,” the German officer muttered, almost under his breath. “But the Dominicans plan to move the ship in forty-eight hours.”
The Royal Navy man was not telling them anything they had not thought about themselves. He had already decided that sooner or later he was going to have to get his men out of the Concession, with or without the help of the Germans. One option was to demand firearms from von Schaffhausen and to escape into the jungle, more attractive was the notion of stealing a boat, any boat, even one of the old sailing barques moored in neighbouring Catano Reach. Anything was better than meekly awaiting the pleasure of the religious maniacs who were prepared to arrest a friendly nation’s ship – the Weser – to get its hands on him and his men. It was a racing certainty that the Dominican regime had been plotting its revenge ever since the Weser limped into port.
Hans von Schaffhausen sighed, sucked his teeth.
“The authorities have issued an edict forbidding the sale of foodstuffs to foreign nationals. I suspect that from the gratuitously bad behaviour of many of the alleged new crew members of the Emden, that they are thugs, not seamen, sent into the Concession to make trouble. It is no longer safe for a woman to walk alone. I suspect the Inquisition is looking for any excuse to enter our territory.”
The German Minister’s wife touched her husband’s arm.
“There are still some of our people outside the Concession?”
It transpired word had gone out some weeks ago for all German nationals to report back to the German Minister. Many of these were individuals who had ‘gone native’, and chosen to live elsewhere. Among them were a small clique who had actually embraced the brutal Catholicism of the Church in Santo Domingo, and subsequently, been expelled from the Concession on account of their ‘disruptive’ conduct.