Here and there sections of the original paintwork were still in remarkably good condition. In spite of the slight list it was easy to imagine that this was a fully manned U-boat of the German Kreigsmarine, resting momentarily on the bottom before resuming a war mission.
We passed around and over the conning tower, and in the glow of our lanterns we could just make out the silhouette of the open hatch. The fuzzy glow of the lamps suddenly became sharp discs, as we dropped lightly on to the conning tower platform. The soft paintwork shed its skin under my hand, the flakes spinning upward like perverse seeds.
Holding the side of the conning-tower ladder with one hand I controlled my drop into the small oval room beneath. I shone the bright lamp around the interior. White circles flashed from the walls as the glass-faced gauges reflected the light back. My lamp shone up through to the hatch above my head, and Fiona’s outline was just visible as she waited on the platform outside. I signalled her to lower the sacks down. This didn’t take long as we had left them all tied together. Once the last one was inside, Fiona joined me in the cramped control room. Moving carefully we kept to the port side of the cluttered interior, passing the huge wheel of the hydroplane controls. The starboard side was choked with remnants of bedding, bunks and seaweed.
Above me, broken piping hung like strange stalactites, while the remains of chairs and wooden stools danced against the ceiling. I tried to imagine the final scene in this little space, crowded like a rush hour tube train, all those years ago. I half walked, half swam past broken crates, which a long time ago had held provisions.
My breathing became difficult. One bottle was empty. I switched to the full bottle and breathing recommenced.
Fiona’s lamp was moving around in front of me through the next bulkhead door. I moved on, noticing the pressure hull — well over an inch thick and able to withstand water pressures at over five hundred feet, I tapped it and the metal vibrated with a clang. The far side of the bulkhead was the torpedo stowage compartment. It was cavernous; the floor lay some ten feet below us down a ladder. On either side was rack after rack of inert torpedoes, greasy and silver like Cuban cigar tubes. We dragged the five sacks over the railing and descended to the deck below. Since coming to rest on the seabed much silt had been washed gently through the torpedo stowage compartment by year after year of tidal activity. After a little searching, I found what I was looking for, covered in silt and weed. A few inches away from my feet was a flat, rectangular slab. The silt flurried around as I ran my gloved fingers along the edge to define its outline. Taking my knife I managed to insert the tip under one corner. Eventually it shifted and we were able to lift it all the way up.
Shining my lamp down into the black hole, I motioned to Fiona to hand me the first sack, I lowered it, then the next and the next until they were all inside the chamber secured by the rope onto a hook.
Before replacing the steel plate. I took a small magnetic charge of the type that we’d used on the Gin Fizz, and attached it to the side of the chamber.
Once it was securely in place, I armed the device by setting the switch to remote, and the next second a red light started to glow brightly through the gloom of the murky waters inside the dark access pit.
Satisfied that everything was as we’d found it. I ran a forefinger across my throat and pointed upwards. Fiona nodded and swam off back to the bulkhead. We retraced our route, going out through the conning tower hatch and over the 37mm gun platforms: the ocean seemed vast after the U-boat interior. Staying together we floated easily through the dark water, using only our feet to propel us. As we neared the surface the hull of the cruiser became visible. Our heads broke through the ocean top; wind ripped into my face like a blunt blade.
The splash of the waves broke the silence and the cold biting into my head and shoulders made me suddenly aware of how frozen my body was in spite of the thickness of the wetsuit. Fiona kept a safe distance away from the boat, which swung and lurched on its anchor chain, the engines just barely holding their own against the swell.
After one failed attempt at reaching the dive ladder, I managed to grab hold of it, just as a wave struck lifting the boat into the air. Once I was safely aboard, Fiona followed shortly afterwards.
The warmth inside the cabin and a large brandy were welcome after the numbing coldness outside. I felt a lot happier now that the opium was safely hidden away one mile out and one hundred and five feet down on the seabed of the English Channel. It would take us an hour to get back to the boathouse, with time to spare before either of the Rumples returned to the house, if in fact they did return?
“How long have you known that the U-boat was down there, Jake,” Fiona stood next to me, a blanket wrapped around her shoulders, at the helm.
“So that’s what you’ve been pondering about. Well it was one of the first wrecks I ever dived on, but it seems like a long time ago. You see, that particular U-boat is not favoured by sport divers as it’s still got about seven live torpedoes on board and after sixty years or so they’re probably a little bit unstable.” I adjusted our course passing a fully laden container ship on our port side. Fiona was looking at me in disbelief, evidently horrified by the thought of having dived into a Second World War German submarine still having live explosives aboard. “Why the hell have they never been taken off or destroyed?” she asked, nervousness and tension in her voice.
“Well, for a start the wreck doesn’t officially exist — remember? It was a pure fluke that I discovered her all those years ago. But that area is not favoured by anyone, and that includes the Ministry of Defence as the current is very strong this far out in the channel. Also the sub’s in quite deep water and a good mile out from the coast, and therefore it was deemed as non-dangerous by the authorities at the time.”
“Anyway, one of the biggest problems was that at the end of the war the Germans were experimenting with many different types of firing mechanisms or ‘triggers’. There were acoustics, magnetic and electric eye. It was not uncommon for a boat as highly developed as that to have a mixed bag of weapons on board. But we were never really in any danger, I’ve swum through that sub many times, and as long as you don’t disturb the racks holding the torpedoes there’s no chance of a detonation. Of course, that isn’t the case anymore.”
I held up the remote detonator in my left hand. “This is the remote control for that explosive charge down there, I’m going to re-route the command to our mobile phones. That way either of one of us can destroy the opium by simply pressing nine and then send. Understood?”
Fiona nodded and then said. “No wonder you hid the opium there, it’s got to be the last place on earth that anyone would go — even if they did know about it. So what happens now Jake.” “Now — we go to a party, and see what happens next!”
Chapter 17
Sloping shoulders and a neck like a tree trunk. The young muscle-bound security guard eyed me up and down suspiciously as I handed him the invitation, eventually pushing open the heavy oak door for us.
Robert Flackyard’s spacious and elegant entrance hall was as I remembered it from my previous visit. Simply decorated in Mediterranean style and furnished with impeccable taste, yet strangely cold and clinical, like a doctor’s waiting room. We were immediately offered a glass of Champagne and shown through to the rear terrace, where a number of enormous marquees had been erected; the illuminated swimming pool was now the centrepiece.