“I’d love to tell you, just to piss him off, but that would be dangerous for both of us.”
Wertz nodded his understanding.
“Go have your shower,” von Dattenberg said. “There’s fresh clothing on the bunk, and while you’re doing that, I’ll order your breakfast. Ham and eggs?”
[FOUR]
Wardroom
MV Ciudad de Cádiz
0915 11 September 1943
SS-Brigadeführer Manfred von Deitzberg, now attired in an ordinary seaman’s blue shirt and trousers, was eating—wolfing down—his breakfast of ham steak and eggs and fried potatoes at the master’s table in the wardroom.
“You were hungry, weren’t you?” Capitán de Banderano asked, smiling.
Von Deitzberg, obviously making an attempt to pour some oil on what he recognized as troubled waters, smiled at both von Dattenberg—who was sitting across from him at the table—and de Banderano, who was tilted back in his chair at the head of the table.
“Obviously, I am not cut out to be a mariner,” he said. “I haven’t had much to eat but crackers and tea for days.”
“So Capitán Wertz said,” de Banderano said. “Well, you can make up for that now.”
“You have a dry cleaning facility on here? The steward said something . . .”
“There is a dry cleaning machine aboard,” de Banderano said. “And a laundry. And stocks of uniforms for the men from the Unterseebooten. Unfortunately, no SS uniforms. We don’t see many SS men.”
“And the food! This is marvelous ham! And fresh eggs! Where do you get all this?”
“Either in Montevideo or Buenos Aires. We enter those ports, usually alternately, every two weeks or so. We top off our fuel tanks and take on stocks of fresh food.”
“With which you replenish the Unterseebooten,” von Deitzberg said.
“We do.”
“And you have no trouble getting into and out of those ports?”
De Banderano shook his head.
“Let me ask you this, Kapitän. Could I leave your ship in either port without being noticed?”
“My orders—you gave them to me, didn’t you read them?—say that I am to land you and your men and that crate at Samborombón Bay in the River Plate estuary.”
“I’m not talking about the SS men. I meant just me.”
“I’m not saying it would be impossible, but I don’t think I want to take that risk. The authorities watch me pretty close in both places. They suspect—know—what we’re doing. But so long as I don’t violate their neutrality, they leave me alone. If I was caught smuggling something ashore—you, for example—they wouldn’t let me into their ports again. That would mean there would be no fresh food, and, more importantly, no diesel fuel for the Unterseebooten.”
When von Deitzberg didn’t reply, de Banderano went on: “And then we have our orders. You and your men are to be put ashore on Samborombón Bay.”
“Orders are subject to change,” von Deitzberg said. “Presumably you are in radio contact with Berlin?”
“Let me explain how that works,” de Banderano said, a touch of impatience in his voice. “With rare exceptions, we do not communicate with the station. It’s in Spain, by the way. It used to be in North
Africa, but now the Americans are there. There was such a transmission today. One word. The code word for ‘shipment received; proceeding.’
“We don’t want anyone finding us out by triangulation, which they would most likely do if we sent long messages. We receive our orders, which are encrypted by an Enigma machine, from the station in Spain. The enemy cannot locate a radio receiver by triangulation.
“Tomorrow, when you and your men are aboard U-405, and she has sailed for Samborombón Bay, and U-409 resumes patrol, I will transmit a two-word message. One will be the code word for U-405 proceeding according to orders, and the second the code word for U-409 resuming patrol.