The Schwabenland looked like an unpacked steamer trunk, its holds popped open and Antarctic supplies strewn on the Hamburg docks. Crates, canvas bags, tanks, tubes, and coils of rope and wire were heaped as if in anticipation of Christmas. Wooden skis were bundled like firewood, tents came wrapped in their own ropes and pegs, and cargo sleds machined in Bavaria were precisely lined on the creosote dock timbers as if on military parade. Pallets of canned food shone dully under the gray German sky, freshly filled and without rust. There were ice axes, crampons, fur parkas, boots, nets, carboys, buoys, snow shovels, backpacks, camp stoves, a case of Scotch whiskey, and a box of Spanish oranges. Be prepared, Hart quoted to himself.
Perched on the vessel's stern were two twin-engined Dornier Wal seaplanes, mounted to catapults that stretched for one hundred and forty feet along its deck. "So these are the birds," the pilot whispered to himself. The flying boats were big: sixty feet long with a ninety-foot wingspan. Struts held the wing and engine housing above a narrow, boatlike fuselage that nested on enormous floats. On the tail was a swastika. The Wals looked a bit ungainly but Hart knew they were famous for dependability and endurance.
The Schwabenland itself was a seaplane tender of workmanlike appearance, the point of its bow descending vertically into the water and its rounded stern overhanging a huge rudder. Two cargo masts were busily employed swinging cargo aboard. There was a low bridge superstructure, a mid-deck with a single towering smokestack and lifeboats, and then a long stern deck dominated by the catapults. The ship looked twice the length of the tender Farnsworth had taken to the Antarctic. The Germans seemed to be sparing no expense.
Hart was met on the pier by a short and wiry master's mate, with curly hair and wry manner. "You the Yankee?" he asked, not waiting for an answer. "Yes, of course, I could see it a quarter mile away, the walk, the manner. Americans! God knows what possessed you to show up here."
"I was hired," Hart said.
"The universal excuse. Well, my name is Fritz. Eckermann's the surname, but it's just Fritz to you, right? Because you're going to be Owen to me, I'm afraid, no Herr this and Herr that. Ach, don't bother shaking hands with yours so full, you can kiss me later, here, I'll take that seabag… God in heaven, are you hoarding lead? No, I'm just kidding, I've got it, but Christ, you've packed enough for The Afterlife… Ah, it's books I suspect, you're a secret intellectual! Some are dirty, I hope? No? Well, it's a long voyage, pilot, you can borrow mine… This way! Will you look at this mess? Damnation, who ordered all this stuff? Not the people who have to put it away, you can bet on that!… Albert, move that massive ass of yours, we're coming aboard…!" And Hart was led up the gangway and through a hatchway to the initially bewildering warren of companion- and passageways typical of any ship.
The manifest assigned him a tiny stateroom to himself. "I'm impressed," said Fritz, giving an exaggerated groan as he dumped Hart's seabag on the floor. "Your own bunk and porthole. One more pooh-bah, right? Well, no bowing and scraping from Fritz Eckermann, I'm afraid. When the revolution comes, we'll all be equal." He winked. "Come on then, you can sort your socks later. Captain Heiden wants to meet with you." He turned and led the way toward the bridge.
The expedition leader sat in a high leather swivel chair from which he could survey the city's harbor, meeting a steady stream of officers and sailors who had questions about the voyage. Heiden usually answered with a curt sentence or two but with Owen he took a bit longer.
"Welcome aboard the Schwabenland, Hart. Not quite as luxurious as Karinhall but I think you'll find her a good ship. A range of twenty-four thousand miles and a host of recent improvements. Fritz here will show you about but I must warn you: don't take his prattling too seriously."
Hart smiled. "It's bigger than I expected."
"It's no battleship but we've made some modifications. There's a meter-wide belt of reinforcing steel around the hull to fend off ice. The bronze prop has been replaced by a stronger steel one. We've added nine cabins- you have one of the new ones- and to make sure we don't suffer the fate of the Titanic we've added thousands of welded steel casks in the lowest hold for emergency flotation in case we're breached. We're trying to think of everything but I'm sure your experience will be most useful, so don't hesitate to suggest improvements. If there is a question or decision, I'm the ultimate authority. Understand?"
Hart nodded. "Then Jurgen's role is advisory?" he asked, taking the opportunity to satisfy his curiosity about the political liaison.
The captain frowned. "Drexler represents the Reich Minister," he said obliquely. "The state. He is in the Allgemeine division but this ship is mine. Now. You must meet our pilots; Fritz will introduce you. Please inspect the airplanes and equipment. And you'll dine in the officer's mess, as will the people you met at Karinhall. There will be a rotating watch once we're at sea. If there is a problem, see me. This is satisfactory, yes?"
And with that Fritz ushered him away. "This is satisfactory?" the seaman mimicked as they descended from the bridge. "As if we have an alternative. You have no ticket back to America yet, yes? And no pay yet, am I right? That's what I thought. Ha! Welcome to Germany, Mr. Pilot, you may have signed on for more than you wished. Of course I never said that. Heil Hitler, blah blah blah."
"Where's your Germanic respect for authority, Fritz?" Hart asked.
"I lost it when I watched workingmen tremble before bosses who couldn't find the crack of their ass with both hands," he said. "Nazi big shots! I've seen more pompous fools and self-important blunderers the last few years than a toilet swabber in a Berlin ministry. Though to tell you the truth, pilot, this Heiden seems all right. Just don't you strike any airs with me."
In actuality, things were satisfactory. Hart found himself useful soon after his arrival in Hamburg. The voyage gave him purpose; he'd gone from self-imposed exile to foreign expert. He specified the airplane fuel-oil ratio Lufthansa was supplying for Antarctic cold and began prowling the cargo and comparing it to his experience on Snow Hill Island. He suggested substitution of wooden for metal runners on the sleds to make them less brittle, and seemingly primitive leather lashings in exchange for machined screws for the same purpose. Dehydration is a surprisingly severe problem in dry polar air and so he made sure there were sufficient canteens. He proposed canvas hoods that could be slung over the airplane engine casings until their oil pans could be warmed by portable kerosene heaters. And he inspected with misgiving the troublesome bubble sextants used to help estimate position in a high-latitude region where compasses became unreliable. "These will be hampered by the cold," he warned the German pilots, Reinhard Kauffman and Seigfried Lambert. "The bubbles will distort. You'll have to use them in conjunction with compass and dead reckoning, and above all keep an eye on the weather so you can use landmarks. It's easy to get lost down there."
The men nodded. Their initial wariness at meeting the American had given way to the international fraternity of fliers. "Tell Heiden as well," Kauffman requested. "Your own caution will make him understand ours."
Quickly bonding into a team were Fritz, the irreverent German, and Hart, the amused outsider from America. The pilot was a safe and reliable audience for Fritz's observations on Germany and Fritz exhibited a wry candor the other Germans didn't share.
"Hitler is a want-to-be," the little sailor psychoanalyzed blandly while sucking on a cigarette under soggy Hamburg skies. "The little Austrian who wants to out-German Germany. He's seized on our worst traits, Owen. Everywhere there are rules now: do this, do that, papers please, stamp stamp stamp. His father was a customs official, you know, and now the whole nation is a fucking post office. Oh, Hitler is smart all right, he's a shrewd one, I grant him that. Look how far he's come! And he has the fault of all clever men: he believes his own speeches. Like our earnest Jurgen Drexler."
"Jurgen hasn't given any speeches to me."
"Give him time."
Hart smiled. "And do you understand his role aboard?"
"To out-Hitler Hitler, I suspect."
"The captain said he's in the Allgemeine division. What's that?"
"What all the Nazi pooh-bahs must belong to. The civilian branch of the SS, the Fuhrer's elite. Drexler's a major. So be careful with him, Owen."
The political liaison never wore a uniform or referred to his rank. Yet when it came time to seek additional supplies his role became more obvious: his whisper of Goring's name sufficed. Hart judged him reflexively competitive, but also competent and seemingly straightforward. On the docks the young Nazi was all business, listening judiciously to the pilot's suggestions, asking intelligent questions, and acting quickly once a decision was made. He seemed a man of serious intent who assumed others shared that intent until they revealed otherwise. He also appeared to respect Hart's experience. Twice Drexler went out of his way to find the pilot and introduce him to visiting functionaries from Berlin, including a reporter from Goebbels's Propaganda Ministry. "This is Owen Hart, our American consultant," he would say. "Mr. Hart is intimately involved in planning the success of our expedition."
Drexler's candor was limited, however. The pilot was puzzled that some of the crates were labeled only by number and stamped with a German eagle. His inquiries as to what they contained brought bored shrugs from the sailors. Cargo net after cargo net was slung into the hold.
"Fritz, what's all this gear?" Hart finally asked. "The Schwabenland is going to sink if we put much more aboard."
The mate considered a moment, then elaborately looked first one way, then another. "The German glance," he explained with a wink. His voice fell to a conspiratorial whisper. "Well, if you ask Heiden, he'll tell you it helps ballast the boat to keep the propeller below the ice. If you ask Drexler, he'll tell you it's peanuts for the elephant seals. But since you asked me… I've peeked at a bit of it and it seems to be field equipment, construction supplies, even guns. Yes, bang-bang, don't be surprised. I'm not sure all these things are going to come back off the ice. These Nazis don't like to be tourists, you know. They look for places to stay, room to grow. So it looks to me we've enough to start a research camp. Or a whaling station. Or a fucking Hamburg shopping arcade. But that's just me. I'm not a big shot. They tell me less than they do you."
Hart decided to pursue the question with Drexler. He found the blond German sitting alone one evening in a corner of the galley, looking weary but satisfied. Jurgen lifted his glass of cognac as the pilot came in.
"So, Hart," he greeted, "do you think we're ready for the southern continent?"
"As ready as anyone can be," the pilot said, taking a chair. "I can't fault your preparations. The rest is up to Antarctica."
"Well put. And do you feel at home with us?"
Hart considered. "I'm comfortable. It's a much larger ship than the one I was on before."
"It must be strange sailing on a foreign vessel. Do you get homesick?"
"No. My home is wherever I am. My parents were lost in the big Spanish flu epidemic of 1918. I have no other relatives, no house, no job, no plane. I'd have a hard time filling out an employment form, I'm afraid. It's a miracle you hired me."
The German laughed. "Unattached is one of the best credentials for an explorer."
"I suppose so."
"And no sweetheart back in America either?" The question was meant to be light, but it had a slight edge to it.
"No, not much luck in that department, I'm afraid. Or skill." He grinned ruefully. "But what about you? I sensed a relationship with Greta Heinz."
The German sipped his cognac. "Greta? She's a good friend. Maybe more someday, who knows? She's also a professional, like us. Tied up in her work. She's coming aboard because she's very, very good in her field."
"How did you meet?"
"Through her… well, Otto introduced us."
"Otto seems to introduce everyone."
Drexler laughed again.
"And what's your background, Jurgen?"
He grew serious. "I grew up in the German nightmare. You have no idea how disastrous for us the Weimar Republic was, how huge a failure democracy was. Money worth nothing, morality worth nothing, honor worth nothing. I was alone too, my father dead in the war, my mother… ill. In an institution. And then came the Party. My new family. My new father. My new hope! I know it looks strange to you outsiders, the torches, the marches, but the Fuhrer has touched the very soul of the German people. The soul."
Hart nodded, considering. He searched for the right question. "Jurgen, I'm puzzled by so much cargo. Boxes and boxes of it. I don't know what it is, where it goes, the sailors keep mum."
"Well, we're going to a place far away, thousands of miles from resupply. It's better to be over- than underprepared. And if we find a site for a future base, we may cache supplies."
"So this is more than just an aerial survey?"
"In essence this is an opportunity, the dimensions of which none of us can guess as yet."
"I just feel I could be more help if I understood more."
Drexler took another sip. "I understand your American curiosity, Owen. But it's best not to ask too many questions. You'll be told everything you need to know to perform your job, and believe me, it will be easier not having to worry about what you don't need to know. I mean no disrespect by this. It's simply the way we Germans prefer to do things. I trust you understand."
Hart didn't but decided not to press the point. He had to live with these people for the next three months.
Later he asked Fritz to come to his cabin, presenting some bottled beers he'd liberated from the officer's mess. "For our philosophic musings," he explained.
Fritz pulled out some schnapps from his coat. "For our philharmonic bitching. You can tell me about Alaska and I'll tell you about this ship. Unfortunately for you, I have opinions on everyone and everything: loud and obnoxious ones if we toast enough times."
Owen summarized his conversation with Drexler, including the German's admonition.
"You should be flattered. If you were a German he'd simply tell you to shut up. They spoil you, Owen. Are you tired of it yet?"
Hart took a swig. "It's a cozy ship," he assessed. "And I like Germans. They're enthusiastic, energetic. Like Americans."
"Ha! As if that were a compliment!" Fritz tilted the schnapps bottle. "Well. Heiden is okay. He knows his seamanship, I'm told. Had some problems on an earlier voyage up to the Arctic- lost a ship- but the story is that it was ice and bad luck. We learn from our mistakes. Drexler I'm more suspicious of. Ambitious, the kind of ambition that gets other people hurt. The type of arrogant young prick they seem to stamp out of some Reich factory by the thousands these days. I tell you, Hart, the Party has put people to work- I grant them that- but they also attract the biggest collection of self-important pig-heads I've ever seen. And I never said that, by the way!" he shouted at a vent opening.
"Jurgen simply strikes me as serious. Committed."
"Or pretentious." Fritz stood stiffly, trying to comb his curly hair to one side with his fingers to approximate Drexler's straight blond cut. "We sail for the glory of Greater Germany! Crap. I sail for three months' good wages and to get out of this lunatic asylum, and you sail to erase your past. Drexler to curry favor, Heiden to make up for the ship he lost in the Arctic in 1912, this woman Heinz I bet to find a husband, or escape one. Ach, we all have one reason and pretend another, we lie so desperately we believe ourselves. We look for chance and call it purpose. What a lot of pompous asses all people are, Hart-all of us." He belched. "Probably me no better than him."
At lunch the next day Hart asked Drexler about his enthusiasm for a leader many Americans regarded with apprehension.
"Adolf Hitler has succeeded for one simple reason," the political liaison replied, pointing with his fork. "He's extraordinary. A man of vision who is above common appetites, but who recognizes those appetites in others. There is an oft-told story: Hitler goes to a small village inn and the mayor and notables assemble at a table with him. When the waiter comes, Hitler orders mineral water. All the others hastily do too, except one absentminded fellow at the end of the table who orders beer. The other men look aghast, but Hitler smiles. 'It seems you and I are the only two honest men in this village.' "
Feder barked a laugh.
"So why is the world so uneasy with him?" Hart asked.
"Because he represents change. Or, rather, correction. Hitler seeks only to correct the errors in the treachery at Versailles that followed the Great War. The Allied politicians, seeking their revenge, put Germans in France, Germans in Austria, Germans in Czechoslovakia- a bastard creation of a country that didn't even exist!-and Germans in Poland. Christ, Poland! Another geographic monstrosity! Another historical aberration! And that's supposed to solve something? Give Germany Germany. That's all Hitler is asking. Can't you agree?"
Hart was cautious. "European history is confusing to Americans, I'm afraid."
"Justice is not, I hope."
"And flags are irrelevant in an Antarctic storm."
The German smiled thinly. "Then why does every nation take them there?"
The docks were beginning to empty and the ship to settle lower in the water. Departure was drawing near. One night a gray military truck pulled onto the dock and a dozen muscular young men leaped off, shouldered seabags, and bounded up the gangplank to disappear without a word into the forecastle. They wouldn't appear on deck again until the ship had entered the North Sea, went the rumor around ship. Drexler was closeted with them.
"Naval marines, I'll bet," Fritz offered. "Or something worse."
Marines had never been discussed in conversations about the provisioning of the expedition, so Hart mentioned their sudden appearance to the political liaison. Drexler looked faintly disapproving.
"Those men are not your concern."
"But why marines in the Antarctic?"
"I didn't say they were marines."
"Then what are they?"
Drexler sighed. "Those men are simply security, Hart, specialists from the Schutzstaffel, the SS. Elite troops."
"Then they are your men?"
"They are my responsibility. But I'm a civilian in the SS, not a soldier. An advisor, not a general. They take guidance from me."
"Why soldiers in Antarctica?"
"They're mountaineers trained for extreme conditions, a precaution against rash action by Norwegian whalers or anyone else we might encounter. You know better than I how far we'll be from civilization. It would be imprudent not to include such protection to ensure the safety of our mission."
"We won't encounter anyone. There's no one down there."
"That's not true. Half the world is ahead of us down there. Really, Hart, this is exactly the kind of situation we discussed in the galley. Our polar flight is your business. The makeup of our complement is not." And with that he walked away.
Greta arrived a day later, only one day prior to sailing. Hart encountered her in a passageway, trailing another seaman who was carrying a seabag to her cabin.
"Ah, so I see they let the other oddball on board," she said brightly. "First an American horns in, now I arrive. What do you think- is there room enough on this ship for a woman?"
"Oh, I'm sure you'll have no problem," said Hart. "They'll soon be admiring your gumption."
"Gumption?" She was puzzled.
"Guts. Courage. It takes a lot of both to be going where you're going."
"Oh, I have my chaperon. Jurgen is determined to look after me." She laughed, but Hart wasn't sure she found that idea unappealing or ridiculous. "And a pilot guide from America!" she added. "You won't let me get lost, will you?"
He smiled uncertainly. "You seem to know your way."
"Hardly!" She laughed again and was off down a passageway, calling over her shoulder, "I can barely find my way around this ship!"
Women are bad luck, he reminded himself as he stared after her. Remembering her smile.