“Everything looks so small,” said Tommy. “How many guys get to scarf in here at a time?”
“Fifteen. Twenty, maybe.”
“I don’t know if I could’ve stood this shit.”
“Lot of guys can’t,” said Dex.
They drifted over the tables and benches, past the entrance to the compact, efficiently designed little galley.
“You ever sail in a sub?”
“Not as duty,” said Dex. “Had to be inside on a couple of rescue ops. Before they’d refined the DSRVs.”
“The whats?”
“Deep Submersible Rescue Vehicles.”
“Oh yeah…”
“I’m sure the latest ones are kind of half-assed classified.”
“Yeah, I’ll bet…”
Playing the beam of his torch on the next door, Dex could see it was sealed, and he hoped it would open as easily as the others. Despite its larger size, this U-boat had been laid out in similar fashion to its smaller, older siblings, and Dex figured the control deck would be the next chamber.
“Hey, guys,” said the familiar voice of Kevin Cheever. “We’re about halfway down the safeline. Sounds like you haven’t made the conning tower yet.”
“Just about there,” said Dex. “Be careful when you enter the bridge — watch out for the antenna and the snort, okay?”
“Got it covered,” said Andy.
The bulkhead door loomed in front of them. Its steel facade, encrusted in a thin layer of sea scum, seemed to absorb their torchlight. Dex gestured to Tommy to grab the wheel-lock on the door and give it a good, hard turn. But it was already in open position, the door ajar.
Now they were entering the heart and mind of the boat. Dex knew if there were any secrets to be found, they would probably be found here. He announced their entry on the Divelink’s open channel.
“We’re right above you,” said Kevin. “Looks like we have a clear path to the bridge.”
“You still with us, Donnie?” Dex said.
“I’m hanging in there,” said Don through the base unit. “Be careful, guys.”
The bulkhead door to the control deck swung inward, and Dex had the sensation of a curtain being pulled back as the beams of their torches passed the threshold ahead of them.
“You first,” said Tommy.
Dex nodded, leaned forward and lightly flippered through the opening. Above him the hull thumped and echoed the arrival of Kevin and Andy on the bridge.
“Okay, we’re in…” he said.
The control deck was wider and longer than any vintage sub he’d ever seen. The only thing similar was the low ceiling, crammed with piping, cables, and wires. The periscope array hung from the center of the chamber, but there was ample room all around it for a chart table, an instrument pedestal, and communication bay. The aft end comprised the helm and fire-control panels; the prow of the conning tower was dominated by a striking innovation — a viewing port.
“Look at that,” said Tommy as he played his light over the thick glass of the port. It was a horizontal slash in the conning tower, like the gun-port in a pillbox. The German engineers had obviously solved the problems of pressure and maintaining an efficient seal. Impressive.
“Dex…?”
“Yeah, Andy?”
“We’re right above the deck hatch. It’s locked down tighter than a crab’s ass.”
“We’ll give it a go in here.”
Motioning to Tommy, Dex directed him to the ladder leading to the bridge above their heads. He watched his partner’s red suit glow briefly as he passed through his torch beam. Floating up to the wheel-lock, Tommy muscled it open with little effort. As the lid peeled back, Dex saw Andy Mellow’s faceplate framed in the circular aperture.
“Trick or treat,” he said as he drifted back, positioning the videocam in the opening. “I’m gonna get a shot of us coming through.”
Dex and Tommy backed away, giving Andy room to maneuver his wide-shouldered torso through the hatch. He was followed by Kevin Cheever. They wore orange and lime green suits respectively, which flashed colorfully in the torchlight, and now with four outfitted divers in the chamber, the space did not feel in any way near as capacious or comfortable. As Andy slowly panned around the interior of the conning tower, Dex found himself imagining what it must have looked like with a crewman at every station.
“We have about twelve minutes,” said Dex. “Tommy and I are going to look for the captain’s cabin. You guys can see if they left anything in here that might tell us something.”
“Got it,” said Kevin.
“After that, it’ll probably be a good idea to get some video of the aft sections — engine room, crew quarters, and then if you have time, head on back to the rear torpedo room. If they scuttled this tub, they would have opened all the tubes to get it done.”
“Got it.”
“Let’s see… what else? Okay, then Tommy and I will exit from the control deck hatch to save time.”
“Okay, Chief,” said Kevin.
“Anything else?” said Andy.
“If you have time, see if you can get a look inside the hump-back.” That was the term Andy had come up with to describe the additional chamber on the U-boat, which ran the entire length of the hull’s aft section.
“Yeah, right.”
“We saw a hatch in the engine room leading up that way,” said Dex. “But don’t try anything risky. Don’t go up there if your air is low.”
“We won’t,” said Kevin.
And Dex knew he wasn’t bullshitting him. Kevin Cheever was one of those by-the-book kind of guys. He was polite and thoughtful and you just knew he was a highly moral person. He also knew the value of following procedure.
“Okay, Tommy, let’s see what we can find up this way.”
Dex drifted toward the bulkhead door leading to the bow, and was a little surprised to see it ajar. Pausing, he looked for signs of damage, but there was nothing apparent. The corridor beyond this door seemed more narrow than the others. Two doors flanked the passageway, the one to the right was a second room with stainless steel tables and benches — the officer’s mess. The one on the left was closed, but it swung inward as Tommy leaned into it. By submarine standards, the room beyond it was like a first class stateroom. A trundle bed, a wardrobe locker, private bathroom, and an expansive desk with a chair that, despite the corrosion and the rotted fragments of leather, looked somehow imposing.
“Captain’s quarters,” said Dex. “You copy that, Don?”
“Yeah, Chief. Sounds exciting,” said Don through the headset. “Glad I’m not there…”
“Hey, we might find somethin’ here,” said Tommy. “You want me to start diggin’ around?”
Dex checked his watch. They were running short on time and air. “Yeah, let’s just be careful. Stuff’s going to be real fragile after all this time.”
“Gotcha,” said Tommy as he drifted closer to the wardrobe and storage drawers built into the hull.
As Tommy eased open each door and drawer, trying not to disturb their contents, Dex fixed his attention on the Captain’s desk. There was a center drawer, which contained nothing but decayed and corroded stationery items, but there was file drawer that formed the right side of the foot well, which looked promising. It was locked, but Dex used a compact, flattened pry-bar from his tool bag to spring it open. Sixty-plus years underwater had defeated even Germany’s precise manufacturing specs, and the file drawer slid open to reveal a section of decayed files and a small, steel oblong box with a four digit combination lock.