‘Yes, I suppose you’re right,’ Marbach sighed. ‘One has to be pragmatic.’
They discussed the war and mutual acquaintances, and then made small talk. Marbach invited Pullman to dinner at his townhouse and casually dropped into the conversation that Helga would be there that night. He was pleased by Pullman’s response. ‘And I must show you my latest acquisition,’ he continued, ‘an exquisite album of Viennese street portraits taken around 1902.’
Later that morning Pullman walked back to the ministry and discovered, to his great relief, that he was not required to attend a social function that afternoon. An engagement had been arranged but due to unavoidable circumstances the dignitary he was due to meet had had to cancel his visit. For the first time that week Pullman was left to his own devices. The fact that, so far, none of his U-330 photographs had been very good was preying on his mind. He was eager to develop the last two rolls in the hope that he would find a few images of merit.
When he had finished in the darkroom his mood was much better. Most of the pictures on the last two rolls had turned out to be rather good. There were several compelling portraits of the crew. Only one image was spoiled. It was the photograph that he had taken of Lorenz in the torpedo room. Lorenz was standing in front of the doors and looking directly into the camera; however, he must have moved just at the wrong moment. There seemed to be another commander standing next to him, a man of identical build with the same, intense expression. Pullman looked at the photograph more closely. He was unsure how the image had been produced. There was no blurring, no evidence of motion linking Lorenz and his ghostly double. It was rather irritating, because in all other respects this particular photograph was extremely effective. The camera had really captured Lorenz’s character. With some regret, Pullman screwed up the image and allowed the ball of crumpled thick paper to fall from his hand and into a bin.
SOURCES AND ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I would like to thank Wayne Brookes and Geoff Duffield for their encouragement when I initially proposed writing a novel about a haunted U-boat. I would also like to thank Wayne Brookes (a second time), along with Catherine Richards, Clare Alexander, Steve Matthews, and Nicola Fox for their comments on the first and subsequent drafts. I am indebted to Lieutenant Colonel Michael Pandolfo, USAF (ret.) for reading through the second draft, offering advice with respect to a host of technical matters, pursuing military contacts with specialist areas of expertise, and responding with saintly patience to my follow-up questions that were so numerous as to almost constitute harassment. Thank you also to Colonel G. Knox Bishop, USAF (ret.) for providing information on British and American Air Force activity around Iceland from August 1941 to January 1942; and finally, Kapitän zur See Jurgen Looft (Federal German naval attaché, Washington, DC) for resolving the thorny linguistic issue of whether or not German sailors refer to their ‘neuter’ boats using the feminine pronoun, and advising on naval ranks and titles. Needless to say, any errors are entirely my responsibility.
Writing in English about people who are speaking in German is fraught with difficulties. Nautical terminology complicates matters even further. I’ve tried to get the best fit with respect to the tone of exchanges and the technical vocabulary, but this has necessitated a certain amount of license.
The Passenger was inspired by the story of U-65, a ‘real’ haunted U-boat launched in Hamburg on June 26, 1917. The best known account of the haunting of U-65 was published in July 1962 in Blackwood’s Magazine and the author was G. A. Minto. The sea is the perfect metaphor for the unconscious. Ernst Simmel (as remembered by Hebbel) was a German psychoanalyst who knew Sigmund Freud. He emigrated to the United States in 1934 to escape Nazi persecution and died in 1947.
The War Diary sections of The Passenger are almost literal transcriptions, and wherever possible I have based attacks, biographical details, and crew conversations on passages that appear in U-boat memoirs. The only fictional element in this book is the ghost. Everything else is — to a greater or lesser extent — authentic.
While researching The Passenger I made extensive use of Das Boot by Lothar-Günther Bucheim. Indeed, I think it’s probably fair to say that I wouldn’t have been able to write this book without it. Das Boot served as my essential model and I willingly confess to ransacking its detail-rich pages. In addition to being a matchless document of day-to-day life on a Type-VIIC U-boat, Das Boot is also an outstanding antiwar novel that deserves favorable comparison with works such as Remarque’s All Quiet on the Western Front. Unfortunately Das Boot has been somewhat overshadowed in English-speaking countries by Wolfgang Petersen’s impressive film adaptation. The novel, however, possesses all of the virtues of the film and a great deal more besides.
Other books that I found extremely useful were: U-boat Crews by Jean Delize, Type VII: Germany’s Most Successful U-boats by Marek Krzyształowicz, U-boat Attack Logs by Daniel Morgan and Bruce Taylor, The Official U-boat Commander’s Handbook edited by Bob Curruthers, Grey Wolf: U-boat Crewmen of World War II by Gordon Williamson (illustrated by Darko Pavlovic), U-boat Tactics in World War II by Gordon Williamson (illustrated by Ian Palmer), U-boat Crews 1914–45 by Gordon Williamson (illustrated by Darko Pavlovic), U-boat Bases and Bunkers 1941–45 by Gordon Williamson (illustrated by Ian Palmer), First U-boat Flotilla by Lawrence Paterson, Neither Sharks Nor Wolves: the Men of Nazi Germany’s U-boat Arm, 1939–1945 by Timothy P. Mulligan, Teddy Suhren Ace of Aces: Memoirs of a U-boat Rebel by Teddy Suhren and Fritz Brustat-Naval, Iron Coffins: a Personal Account of the German U-boat Battles of World War II by Herbert A. Werner, and Hirschfeld: the Secret Diary of a U-boat by Wolfgang Hirschfeld (as told to Geoffrey Brooks). In addition to the above, I also made use of: USN Confidential (declassified) report 2G-9C S14, Former German Submarine Type IX–C-40 (Portsmouth Naval Shipyard, Portsmouth, N.H., March 1946).
On the subject of Nazi mysticism, Unholy Alliance: a History of Nazi Involvement with the Occult by Peter Lavenda was highly informative. Wewelsburg, a Renaissance castle in Westphalia, was the ‘cult’ headquarters of the Schutzstaffel (SS). The marbled floor of the Obergruppenführersaal is decorated with a runic symbol known as the sun wheel (or black sun). It was supposed to mark the center of not only the castle, but also the entire Germanic world empire, and reflects the extraordinary significance given to runes (and their perceived power) by Himmler and his circle. Prior to the outbreak of war, Himmler had authorized missions to Iceland, the purpose of which was to search for pagan relics. Although such missions were carried out ostensibly as historical and racial-heritage research, many Nazi mystics were convinced that the acquisition of occult ‘tools’ would prove to have practical value.
‘Wir Alle’ is the SS battle hymn in which the phrase ‘inspired by runes’ appears. Runes used by the SS are tabulated in Hitler’s Elite: the SS 1939–1945 (edited by Chris McNab).
Adolf Hitler’s words, when quoted, are taken from Mein Kampf and a translation of one of his speeches. The translation of Ludwig Teick’s poem ‘Despair’ was taken from The Book of Lieder by Richard Stokes.