behind the horizon trailing ragged scraps of glory, the dining room’s lights came on.
Lehmann approached their table and leaned over to whisper into Jakob’s ear. He left without greeting the others.
‘Our friend tells me those men are in the radio room talking to Berlin…’
Denham said, ‘We should move the dossier from the cabin and hide it elsewhere in the ship.’
After coffee, Denham and Jakob went down to the smoking room on B deck, which was deserted but for the barman.
Jakob ordered two glasses of Delamain cognac and two cigars.
‘San Cristobal de la Habana,’ Denham said with appreciation, running his nose along the leaf.
The old man leaned back, and for a few minutes they savoured the taste of the cigars, at peace with the world. The hum of the engines was quieter in this aft section of the ship.
The door from the pressurised air lock into the smoking room opened with a sharp suck, and the art dealer and his Nazi colleague entered. Without waiting for an invitation they seated themselves opposite Denham and Jakob. The barman came to attend to them, but the tall man with the dishwater eyes waved him away.
‘We want to talk,’ he said.
‘Yes, I thought you might,’ Jakob said. ‘Two more, please, barman.’
‘We don’t want a drink.’
‘They’re not for you,’ Jakob said with a chuckle.
‘And you can show some courtesy here,’ Denham said. ‘You’re not in a Bierkeller now.’
The man turned to Denham for the first time, and exposed a set of khaki-coloured teeth.
‘Your face is familiar,’ he said.
‘My name’s Denham, I’m a reporter. Who are you?’
The man pulled an impatient face. ‘I am Lothar Koch,’ he said with emphasis. ‘I am the Director of the Reich Chamber of the Visual Arts.’
‘Permit me…,’ said the other man, the art dealer with the twirled white moustache, in a manner more civil than his colleague’s. He was offering his card. Denham remembered seeing it on the table that morning they visited the Liebermanns.
‘Ah yes. “Gallerie Haberstock- German Dealership.”’
‘I am Karl Haberstock…,’ he said, ‘and our business is with Herr Liebermann.’ He gave a small, sour smile. His sagging cheeks drew up to the corners of his mouth like old theatre curtains.
‘I know the collection is on board,’ Jakob said. ‘And I have to tell you that I’m claiming it back in New York.’
‘That might be difficult,’ said Haberstock without blinking. ‘There’s the matter of the assignment of title to us, which you willingly entered into.’
Jakob said, ‘The assignment is a contract I was compelled to make with the National Socialist government. I’m certain any New York district judge would consider it void.’
Koch uncrossed his legs suddenly so that his potbelly rolled over his belt. ‘Listen to me, you kike, you can have your hideous collection-’
‘Ah, what Reichsleiter Koch wishes to say, Herr Liebermann,’ said Haberstock placing his hand on Koch’s shoulder, ‘is that there may be an arrangement we could make that would resolve the situation to everyone’s satisfaction.’
‘Really,’ said Jakob.
Denham folded his arms. Here it comes.
‘You have in your possession something which is of no value outside Germany. We’ve been authorised by Berlin to offer you a simple swap… If you give it to us, your art collection will be restored to you forthwith without the inconvenience of lawyers and proceedings. I hope you’ll agree that’s a fair offer.’
Jakob knocked back his second glass of cognac and stood up. ‘Gentlemen. Thank you for your proposal. I assure you I’ll give it my fullest consideration.’
‘We need an answer right now,’ said Koch.
‘I’m not given to making snap decisions in business. You may have my answer over breakfast. Good night,’ he said, smiling at them both, and left the smoking room.
Koch’s neck and face began to blotch with shades of mushroom and puce.
‘I’m curious,’ Denham said to them. ‘Did Berlin tell you anything of the nature of this item we have in our possession? I mean, its content…?’
H annah explained again to Captain Lehmann why they didn’t trust those two men. She told him she believed they would use force to recover some valuables from her, which they insisted should have remained in Germany.
‘Do you mean they’ll break into your cabin?’ Lehmann said, taken aback.
‘If they’ve got orders from Berlin, yes,’ said Eleanor.
He nodded, his lips pursed.
‘Does it need to be hidden now?’ he asked. He looked weary after a long day on the bridge.
‘I’m so sorry,’ said Hannah, gently taking his elbow, ‘would you mind very much?’
The captain blushed slightly.
‘Very well,’ he said to them. ‘I know the perfect place. But you’ll need warm coats.’
The air was biting cold in the long keel corridor that led to the cargo area.
Lehmann glanced only once at the strange package under Eleanor’s arm. She’d wrapped the filthy old dossier in sheets of tissue paper and tied the whole thing up with the only practical item to hand: a pink ribbon.
‘Poor Captain Lehmann,’ she said to Hannah in a low voice. ‘He’ll probably think these two crazy dames fear for the safety of their shopping…’
They reached a ladder at the foot of an air duct and began climbing.
‘This leads to the central axis corridor,’ he called down, ‘the spine that runs all the way from fins to nose.’ An occasional electric light, but otherwise the arduous ascent was in near darkness, with the temperature falling.
‘I can see my breath,’ Hannah said.
‘The southern tip of Greenland is down there,’ Lehmann shouted. His voice was indistinct, like a voice calling in a rock cavern.
Bracing wires creaked with the drone and movement of the ship, giving a sense of its surrounding vastness. Eventually they came to the horizontal axial corridor Lehmann had mentioned, and they followed him along it towards the stern.
Eleanor stopped and looked in amazement along the corridor’s length. Lit by widely spaced electric lights it seemed to reach into infinity, with far-distant stars twinkling on the aluminium struts.
On either side of them the towering gas cells vibrated. Eleanor put her hand on the trembling sac and felt a prickle of apprehension. She was surrounded by acres of hydrogen, in every direction. If there were some accident while she was standing here… She put the thought out of her head. Miss Mather’s nerves had spooked her.
‘Do they ever leak?’ she asked.
‘If they did, your nose would tell you,’ Lehmann said. ‘The gas is odorised with garlic to give it a distinct smell.’
A rigger coming from the fins passed them in the corridor, giving Lehmann a nod. It was Ralf, wearing a head-to-toe asbestos suit. An inhabitant of the hidden city.
Eventually Lehmann stopped at a small utility platform at the cross section with another vertical air duct. They were almost in the stern of the ship, near the great fins. The platform was surrounded by a rail, with gas cells to the left and right. Next to a stool for the duty rigger, a large metal chest was screwed to the floor. He opened it. Inside were yards of folded canvas covered in a silver doping agent.
‘This is spare sheathing. If we get a rip the sailmaker has to venture out and patch it,’ he said. ‘I promise you no one at all will look in here before we land. Those men whose faces you don’t like will never know…’
They lifted up several folds of the canvas and tucked the package with the dossier into one of them, then replaced the folds and closed the lid tight.
