Synopsis
What lies entombed in a ship laying at the bottom of the Norwegian Sea, of so great a significance, that a neo-Fascist organisation is willing to massacre the total crew of an oil drilling rig about to disturb the sleeping wreck?
Steve Craig, an ex-Special Boat Service Marine, still haunted by traumatic events from undercover action in Iraq, is determined to find out and travels to Norway to get answers.
Craig is thrown together with Karen Olsen, the daughter of a murdered informant. Pursued by the authorities, the couple embark on a journey to the north of Norway aboard a coastal ferry in search of the mystery ship. They enter into a close and physical relationship but Craig is knocked unconscious and thrown overboard.
Rescued from the water and revived by an enigmatic character calling himself the Oberst, a liaison is established to hunt down those responsible for the attack on the Rig and release Karen.
The elite members of the New Aryans, a neo-Fascists group arrive on the scene; among them Annelise Raven, claiming to be the daughter of the infamous Nazi puppet Vidkun Quisling and rightful heir to and Fuhrer of a new Reich.
With the key players assembled, the pieces start to fall into place. Craig takes on the New Aryans and soon discovers treachery and the secret of the wreck, which leads him on to the bank vaults of Zurich and the discovery of a Nazi testament and an immense fortune
Chapter Seventy five
'I think it is high time you finally departed the scene, Mr Craig? You've caused enough trouble.'
Freya Quisling levelled the Glock at my chest and was about to fire. But, at that same instant the launch slewed violently to port. With nobody at the wheel and the twin engines racing full ahead, the rudder had become locked hard over and the boat was virtually attempting to spin on its own axis.
'Get the wheel, Otto!' Freya Quisling screamed the command at Klensch. He scrambled to obey and glared at me as he moved past but made sure he stayed well out of my reach on route. Grabbing the wheel he spun it round and slowly the launch began to straighten up.
In the few seconds that Freya Quisling had taken her eyes off me to check on Klensch, I had acted. When she returned her attention to me, she froze as she recognised what I was holding in my hand. Not the gun - I'd had no time to retrieve the one tucked into my belt. What I held up in my hand would prove a far more effective weapon.
Her eyes widened in disbelief.
'Where did you..?' she started to question looking around her at the side coaming seat where she thought she had last placed the baton.
She was wondering how it could be possible that I was standing in front of her waving the thing. For a second I could see she was still intent on shooting me. But, she quickly changed her mind as I swung my arm, the one holding the baton, out over the side of the boat. My intention quite obvious.
'Kill him,' Klensch called out straining round from his position at the helm. He had managed to steer the launch back on something of a level course; well at least the boat was no longer spinning around in circles.
'I can't,' Freja called back, 'he's got the Baton.'
'And, if you don't drop the gun, I promise you I most certainly will return this thing to its most recent resting place at the bottom of the ocean. Together with its contents.'
She knew I meant what I said but I could see in her eyes that she was beginning to question just how valuable Hitler's Baton would be to her if her reign as Fuhrer was going to be prematurely terminated; with her probably spending the rest of her days behind bars. On further analysis, she probably came to the conclusion that saving Adolf Hitler's sceptre may just turn out to be too high a price to pay. So, if it got rid of me
There was no such doubt in Klensch's mind.
'Shoot him!' he shouted again, releasing the steering wheel this time and swinging round to face Freja. Klensch never intended it to be a command to his Fuhrer but it had to be said. If they were going to survive, Freya Quisling was going to have to pull the trigger.
I witnessed the instant she made up her mind to shoot me and acted instantaneously. Hand still locked firmly around the baton I heaved myself over the side of the launch and, hitting the surface, immediately pulled myself down deeper into the water. I knew I had to remain submerged and as deep as possible in the first moments after hitting the sea. I knew also that Freja Quisling and her Reichsleiter would already be spraying the surface of the water above me with gunfire. The longer I could stay under, the further away the launch carrying them would travel. In just a few seconds I would be out of range. And, as good a marksman that Freja Quisling had shown herself to be with a rifle up on the Hardangervidda, I knew she would be unlikely to match such shooting skills with a handgun, while trying to balance upright on the deck of a swaying boat that was rapidly opening up the range between her and the target.
I was right. When I eventually broke the surface, I could see the launch speeding well out of range, about forty metres into the distance. I could also make out Freja Quisling and Otto Klensch standing in the stern of the boat - still firing off shots in my direction.
The view of the sea beyond the bow of the speeding boat told me they should have been paying more attention to steering the launch rather than continuing with the remote chance of putting a bullet in me. They were heading directly for the marker buoys of the Highlander wreck site. Nobody was at the helm of the boat and now it was running true and straight - towards disaster.
I believe that when the pair finally gave up in their attempts to eliminate me and finally turned back to the business of handling the launch, it was already too late. In fact I don't even think they realised themselves that they had cut clean through the marker buoy lines and were soon deep in very dangerous waters.
The Highlander was resting in an almost upright position on the seabed. The height from the pontoon bottom to the top of the drilling mast was some 70 metres - the water depth there, was not much more than that. If not protruding above the water, the top of the rig's gigantic mast could only be just below the surface.
Whether or not Otto Klensch managed to get back to the conning position in time to take the wheel again, in a last minute attempt to steer away and avoid the collision, no one will ever know. Whether Freja Raven nee Quisling, the third Fuhrer of the Reich, realised exactly what was happening, in those last moments, is also in doubt. I for one didn't care either way. The Quisling dynasty would be, once and for all, terminated.
The explosion and subsequent inferno from the launch was witnessed, as I found out later, over ten nautical miles away across the ocean. One of the squadron of small Royal Norwegian naval ships assisting the damaged Kong Haakon at the scene of the Panther sinking, broke away to investigate. That ship picked me from the water twenty minutes later. I still had the Fuhrer's baton in my hand.
As we pulled away from the mangled and still smoking wreck of the launch, I could not resist raising the Fuhrer's Baton and waving it at the smouldering wreck .
'Sieg Heil!' ...