Читать книгу Golden Boy - Paula Astridge - Страница 14

CHAPTER SEVEN

Karl Hanke, thankfully, was a different kind of friend altogether. One, who as Head of Grunewald Nazi District Headquarters, had already come in handy. He was a cool headed go-getter whose flagrant disregard for other people’s needs marked him as a man of stark contrast to the deep and meaningful, undyingly loyal Rudolf Wolters.

That suited Albert perfectly. Right at the moment the cold, calculating Karl was just the type of chum he needed. A compliment that the expedient Hanke would have been quick to return seeing that Albert Speer was one of the rare few in the city, or country for that matter, who owned a car. Such a possession was gold these days when few had enough money to afford petrol let alone a shiny, new vehicle to pump it into.

‘It’s at your disposal,’ Speer volunteered the day he arrived in Berlin.

Before his new Nazi recruit had a chance to change his mind, Hanke quickly handed Speer a pen and with equal speed, Speer put his name on the dotted line, formally signing over his vehicle to The Nazi Party’s car pool. To turn his prized asset into communal property helped put him at the hub of the frenzied excitement that gripped the city. It was a sacrifice well worth making when he was determined and impatient to get results and prepared to do anything to secure the same for Hitler.

So far he, Albert Speer, was an unknown entity, but he rightly reckoned that offering up his car for The Party’s use would bring him up to speed pretty quickly; one stroke of a pen putting him in the fast lane, quite literally, with the men who mattered. Similarly, a few strokes of his paint brush had them sit up to take notice even faster. Speer made himself the focal point of their gobsmacked attention when he painted Karl Hanke’s office red.

‘Hell! You don’t do anything by halves, do you Speer?’ Hanke said, shocked when he saw the new interior design for his office. He had no idea that Speer would go out on such a dangerous, innovative limb, taking an artistic concept to such an extreme to make his point. But then he should have known that Speer was not the type to play it safe. Having been given his first real architectural commission, he would go all out to make an impact.

‘Would you want me to?’ Speer replied calmly, not moving his attention from the design plans sprawled over his desk. He was working hard to ignore the startled reaction he knew his friend was having to his controversial work.

‘Well, I suppose not,’ Hanke replied, sounding a little uncertain.

‘If you don’t like it I can change it and go safe and conservative, but I was under the impression that you wanted to make a statement.’

‘Well you’ve certainly made one for me.’

Hanke laughed uneasily as he looked up at the ceiling and around his freshly painted offices, trying to take it all in. It was very difficult to do when he had anticipated greys and whites with mahogany trim and now had to come to terms with strident red, white and black. Not only did Hanke have to brace himself to live with it, but had to explain the radical colour scheme to his superiors back at Berlin Headquarters.

None of this should have surprised him when he knew that Speer prided himself on being a little left of centre, always getting his kicks from shocking people out of their comfort zone. This time, however, he had achieved as much by booting Hanke out of his. For this, Hanke had no one else but himself to blame. Perhaps he should have been a little more succinct about his interior design requirements.

When he hinted to Speer that he wasn’t averse to a splash of colour, he had no idea that the man would take him at his word. That all four walls of the impressive foyer and adjoining offices would be painted a fire engine red. It was a floor to ceiling, confrontational colour scheme that was alleviated only by the contrasting black and white trims around the windows: a living, breathing, three-dimensional representation of the Nazi flag.

Whereas Hanke was more than happy to march under its colours, he wasn’t quite so prepared to live with them on a seven day a week basis and was not at all sure he had the courage or clout to sell this outrageous design idea to his superiors. At the moment they were a bit sensitive about The Nazi Party’s public image and were striving hard to throw a conservative blanket over its radical, rough and ready roots. Surely a good start would be to surround themselves with a little uncontroversial, conventional taste?

But when it came to Hanke having to make a second dip into Party funds to do it all over again, he suspected that his superiors may not be so delicate about the virtues of good taste versus the value of keeping cold, hard cash in their coffers.

Despite this concern, however, Hanke’s initial dismay was subsiding and he had to admit that the concept was beginning to grow on him. Maybe Speer had something here.

‘It’s certainly different,’ he conceded, his voice taking on confidence as he spoke.

‘It’s new and it’s powerful Hanke. Isn’t that what The Party’s all about?’

‘Yes, you’re right. By God you’ve got guts Speer. The whole thing’s bloody outrageous.’

Outrageous enough, as it happened, to win The Nazi Party hierarchy over completely. They approved of men with daring. And after getting over the vibrantly coloured culture shock, they all decided that they not only approved of the work, but of the young architect who had the audacity to step out of ranks and design it.

They rewarded him, not by calling on his architectural skills again straight away, but by requesting his car and chauffeuring services. It was a request that would have had Speer’s noble ancestors turn in their graves and his father drop into his with mortification at the thought of his son lowering himself to such a level.

But then his father could not have known that at this early stage in The Party game one could not pick and choose. It was all for one and one for all within its ranks, with no such thing as being a specialist in trade. Not when every member of the fledgling clique had to be a Jack-of-all, spreading themselves thin to help out in whichever way was needed at the time. It just so happened that on the day of the next political rally they were in need of chauffeurs rather than architects, which meant a short term slip down the entrepreneurial ladder for Speer. But then one had to remember that there were passengers and then there were passengers.

‘6.00pm at the airport Speer,’ Hanke instructed, handing him Hitler’s itinerary, ‘and do yourself a favour, don’t keep him waiting. He is not a patient man.’

For fear of sounding gauche Speer kept his mouth shut, but he could hardly hide his elation. He was going to actually meet Adolf Hitler face to face. It was an incredible stroke of luck. Meeting Hitler was usually reserved only for a select few in the upper ranks of The Party. He had no idea that he’d be handed such an opportunity so soon. Perhaps it was his chance to make that impact he was after.

‘The rally starts at eight. Make sure you have him at the stadium well before that. He likes plenty of time to psych himself up before each performance.’

‘Thanks Karl.’

‘Don’t thank me. No special favours here. We’re just short on manpower and wheels.’

That manpower and wheels (i.e. Speer’s car and the cavalcade that followed him to the airport) made an impact all right. Making it by arriving five minutes late.

It was an unforgivable slip up to Hitler’s way of thinking, despite the fact that it was not their fault. They were held up by a head-on, explosive collision between two trucks that blocked the road to the airport for an hour. It was a tense, perspiration-packed 60 minutes for all concerned. Perhaps even more so for Speer than for the dead and dying at the scene because he knew that having to stop and wait for their burnt and bloodied bodies to be dragged off the road was not a good enough excuse for running late. The crash and its carnage would be of no concern to Hitler other than the fact that it had interrupted his tight schedule.

Speer’s heart was in his throat when he finally drove onto the tarmac and circled to a stop in front of Hitler and his uniformed entourage: all of them tight-lipped and impatient for having been kept waiting.

‘But surely this wasn’t the same man?’ Speer thought as he caught sight of Hitler.

It was certainly not the same sedate person who, with his navy suit and dignified performance on stage had impressed him so much. This time, in full dress uniform, Hitler was much as Speer had originally imagined him. His face was white with rage as he paced irritably back and forward, slapping his dog-whip against his black leather boots, his voice shrill and close to screaming, as he cursed the staff for their disloyalty and inefficiency.

So Speer was not so overjoyed after all when Hitler suddenly curtailed his tirade and got into the car.

‘Move and move fast!’ came his order from the back seat. It was an order all the more frightening for its sudden, ominous and suppressed rage.

This was the first and last thing Hitler uttered until they reached the stadium. At which point Speer dared take a look in his rear vision mirror, hoping to catch an unobtrusive glimpse of the man himself. He did not expect to find Hitler’s eyes already intent on him, his compelling gaze holding Speer’s for a brief, brilliant moment before its intensity forced Speer to look away.

‘Well what did that look mean?’ he wondered.

The answer to which came through loud and clear when Hitler got out of the car and slammed the door.