Everything To Lose
Gordon Bickerstaff
© Gordon Bickerstaff 2014
Gordon Bickerstaff has asserted his rights under the
Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, to be
identified as the author of this work.
First published in 2014 by Endeavour Press Ltd.
This book is dedicated to Sadie and John.
Gone but not forgotten.
Table of Contents
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Notes
Extract from Deadly Secrets by Gordon Bickerstaff
Acknowledgements
Thanks to Richard, Matt, Amy, Charlotte and Tessa at
Endeavour Press for support, advice and insights into
good story-telling.
Special thanks to Natalie and Emily for all their advice,
corrections and contributions.
'The measure of a man is what he does with power'
Plato.
'Power was my weakness and my temptation'
Albus Dumbledore (JK Rowling).
1
Berlin, Germany
Preparations for the 1936 Summer Olympic Games in
Berlin started decades earlier when Berlin had been
selected to host the 1916 Games. Those Games were
cancelled due to World War 1 but much of the plans
including a grand Olympic stadium had been produced
by architect brothers Werner and Walter March.
When the Nazi Party came to power in 1933 the IOC
had already accepted in 1931 a bid by Berlin to host the
1936 Games. The March brothers supervised the
construction of a 100,000 seat track and field Olympic
stadium including, for the first time in Olympic history,
a closed circuit television system that could broadcast to
forty countries. The Reich Sports Field complex
covered 325 acres with four stadiums draped
extensively in Nazi banners and symbols.
Adolf Hitler saw the 1936 Games as a grand
opportunity to promote his views on racial supremacy to
the World. Hitler wanted sport success to strengthen the
German spirit, bond the German youth and weed out
non-Aryans. He wanted the Olympic Games to
showcase his blond-haired, healthy, athletic Aryan men
and women as true champions.
To ensure that non-Aryans would not share Olympic
glory he had a Nazi directive issued barring Germans
who were Roma or Jewish from participating in the
Games. Many were expelled from their clubs in the run
up to the Olympics. Even strong medal contenders were
barred including Lilli Henoch, who was four-time world
record holder in shot and discus and Gretel Bergmann
who had set a world record of 1.6 metres in the high
jump.
Hitler attended many of the events and personally he
was keen on rowing. He attended the Olympic regatta
on the Langer See lake, at Grünau, southeast of Berlin.
Of the seven Olympic rowing events Germany won five
gold medals and one silver medal and Hitler was
overjoyed with the rowing successes.
The last race was the men's eight-man team final.
Hitler confidently expected the race to be a formality for
his superior team and invited many dignitaries to bask
in the magnificence of the German rowing team.
Extensive celebrations had been prepared for the
winning team and it was expected to be a close race
between Germany and Italy.
On Friday August 14, 1936, Hitler, top Nazi officials,
Olympic Committee officials and other dignitaries
gathered for another glorious final and another
resounding rendition of the Nazi Party anthem
Horst-Wessel-Lied and Nazi salutes at the medal
ceremony. A steel-helmeted military band blasted out a
succession of music such as Kampflied der
Nationalsozialisten, and Deutschland uber Alles. Some
sections in the stadium sang out the lyrics with loud
fervour while others felt intimidated enough to mouth
the lyrics.
Eva Braun sat nearby excited by the spectacle. He
glanced sideways at her and their eyes met fleetingly.
Hitler was adamant they were not to be seen in public as
a couple.
Hitler felt the Führer had to be single and free of the
influence of a matriarchal woman for the nation to love
him. She felt he wanted to deepen her femininity by
making her jealous of the succession of females who
unsuccessfully tried to gain his favour. In fact he
distrusted women. He watched them change from
ignoring him, when he was nobody, to falling over
themselves to share his bed when he reached
prominence.
Eva was an accomplished gymnast and would have
become a champion like her sister if her life had taken a
different path. She encouraged Hitler's interest in sports.
He loved to watch her do her gymnast routines but was
fearful of her safety on the parallel bars so she gave up
competing for him. Before they took their seats she
passed a note to tell him she had a wonderful celebration
surprise to reveal after dinner.
The weather was perfect and excitement was electric as
Germany and Italy led the race neck and neck. Hitler
was beside himself with joy along with more than
twenty thousand spectators on the banks of the Langer
See for the entire six and a half minute race screaming
Deutschland! Deutschland! Deutschland!
Then in the final ten metres the eight-man team from
Washington University nudged in front by one metre to
defeat the Italians and Germans and take the gold medal
for the USA. Not more than a second or two separated
the three.
Adolf Hitler was furiously disappointed and along
with most of the spectators gave the Nazi salute during
the USA's national anthem.
Hitler ordered his advisors to his office. Repeatedly he
pounded his desk in anger, as he paced back and forth,
demanding explanations. His face was red with rage,
veins in his neck throbbed and his shouting was fiercely
intimidating.
The advisors were too frightened to tell Hitler the
truth. On the day the Americans were better athletes. So
they created a suspicion and hoped to divert Hitler's
anger away from their faces. They told Hitler they
suspected that the Americans had taken drinks fortified
to give them the additional energy needed to win the
race.
They reminded Hitler he had watched and
congratulated the American Louis Zamperini who
lagged behind in the 5000 metre final then clocked 56
seconds in the final lap to finish eighth. They told him
that in the 800 metre final the American John Woodruff
still won the gold medal after stopping in the middle of
the race to extract himself from being boxed-in by other
runners. Without any evidence Hitler's advisors
convinced him that the exceptional American
performances had been achieved with a mysterious
energy boost.
Hitler listened and absorbed their explanations as he
walked around the room deep in thought. The advisors
nodded confidently to each other. They felt they had
averted Hitler's wrath. They had no evidence, no proof,
so there was no basis for a complaint. They left his
office with great feelings of relief.
Later that evening Hitler and Eva Braun retired to a
sitting room after dinner. He drank tea and she drank
wine. She was a photographer and had taken many
photographs and home movies of Hitler and his inner
circle. They loved to watch movies and they admired
Clark Gable. With grand ceremony she unveiled her
promised surprise; a copy of Clark Gable's recent
movie, 'San Francisco'.
They liked to role-play with her as the leading lady
and him as the leading man. She felt certain he would be
pleased with this distraction but he was unmoved. The
disappointment of the rowing medals was still raw.
Instead he wanted to talk about how she and her
champion sister prepared for sport, how she managed to
maintain energy during the strenuous exertions and how
she could find the extra power for a final winning effort.
The following day Hitler ordered his advisors back to
his office. They expected his fury had abated and he'd
moved on to something else. They didn't realise as they
assembled in his office they had backed themselves into
a dark and dangerous corner. They had created a barbed
rod for their own backs. Hitler saw the importance of an
energy boost for German troops and German workers.
An immediate boost from elite to supreme. Battle
success that would destroy the resolve of any opponent.
Factory production records that would demoralise all
inferior countries. He ordered his advisors to discover
the energy boost that had stolen his rowing team
celebrations AND enhance its effect twenty-fold.
2
Cosham, Hampshire, England
The battered prisoner cowering in the corner of police
holding cell five sighed deeply as he wiped a stream of
blood from his nose onto his sleeve. The one day he
didn't have a handkerchief in his pocket. Still in shock,
his face and body felt numb from the knuckle punches
that pounded his head and body. His tongue probed the
gashes inside his cheek where his teeth had ripped into
the flesh. Pain and fear produced pitiful tears.
Robert E McSwann guessed the thugs who'd hit him
must be gym freaks because their fists were hard and
they never tired. He closed his eyes and palpated his
chest to confirm his fears; at least two cracked ribs. His
stomach felt as if it was tied in a dozen knots.
The room stopped swirling. He knew if he tried to
stand up he would fall over. His legs felt like old jelly.
He huddled in a corner of the police cell. A cell where a
small amount of natural light shone through three rows
of six glass blocks high up on the back wall. Even if the
door was open he couldn't run. His body would refuse
to move and if he escaped he knew the torture would
shift onto his wife and daughter. He didn't want that.
Robert wished the drunk in cell two would shut up. He
was slurring and mauling the first three lines of 'Danny
Boy', which he repeated over and over with a voice that
was croaked, failing and annoying. It's odd how an
irritating drone makes a headache worse.
At first Robert thought it was a mistake when the
policemen arrested him for not making a loan payment
on time. He'd just left work at four thirty in the
afternoon and was clearing some late January snow off
his car windscreen when a police car pulled up.
The uniformed officers were understanding, pleasant
even and told him not to worry it would all be sorted
out back at the station. He hadn't been in a police cell
before and he wasn't impressed with its basic facilities,
lack of heat and smell of stale body odour.
Then two sixteen stone muscle men rushed into his
cell. Men in black nylon bomber jackets so large it
seemed there was not enough space for them to move
around the cell. They started with loud aggressive
threats and demands for immediate payment. More
threats followed then a session of relentless punching.
They worked for the people who'd given Robert a
large cash loan. They stopped and left when they were
sure they wouldn't get any money from him. In fact
Robert had used the last of the loan capital to pay the
weekly interest and now it was all gone.
Robert worried about what this would mean for his
wife and daughter. He knew he had to keep them out of
this trouble. This was his problem and he had to make
sure they were left alone. He resolved to do whatever
the moneylender demanded.
He'd borrowed the money to pay a specialist Harley
Street consultant who promised he could cure Robert's
daughter of her curse. With hindsight it was stupid
taking money from a moneylender but Robert believed
the consultant when he said his daughter could be cured
if the treatment started before she got much older.
From his own horrible childhood, he knew how bad it
would be when she started school and he wanted
desperately to spare her that grief. School kids can be
very cruel at times. Robert McSwann was driven by
intense guilt because he knew he'd passed the dreadful
curse onto his daughter.
He thought about his happy, friendly and beautiful
daughter. She was a clever girl with a great future in
front of her. More than anything else in the world he
wanted to find a real cure for her. Anything to spare her
the pain and heartache the curse inflicted on him when
he was a boy.
When Robert signed the loan document the woman
processing the paperwork said the interest would be one
thousand pounds and he assumed she meant in total or
per year. No-one charges that amount of interest per
week, no-one who is legit anyway. As he stood waiting
in a queue at their plush loan office to collect the cash;
he assumed they were legit. They had been
recommended by a close friend. He went there because
his own bank wouldn't lend him sixteen grand for
private medical care. He was mortgaged up to the hilt
and already paying off a car loan.
The cell light switched on and the door opened. A tall
short-sleeved, bald-headed, uniformed policeman
entered the cell, keys jangling from his chain, while a
well dressed detective waited at the door. The
uniformed officer looked around the cell. Okay some
blood in the corner there, few specks on the wall, clean
that up later, nothing on the mattress, good he thought
as he nodded to the detective then left.
"Shut the bloody entertainment off," the detective said
as he flipped his thumb in the direction of cell two.
The detective sat on the bed and faced Robert. The
detective was also heavy build, bald and intimidating
like the men who beat him up. He looked unconcerned
at the bleeding and shivering wreck cowering in front of
him.
Robert McSwann opened his eyes to look at the
detective's socks, they were black silk. His shoes were
so well polished they could have been just taken off a
shelf. His dark grey suit was not the usual mass
produced variety but very fine quality, a rich thread
from a designer's house. Even his tailored shirt and tie
were of the finest quality. No need to wonder if the gold
cufflinks were real gold.
"My boys tell me you won't pay my family back what
you owe. Is that correct?"
Robert wiped more blood from his face onto his sleeve
and nodded.
"IS THAT CORRECT?"
"Yes," Robert said as he opened his blood-shot eyes on
the detective's face.
"Sixteen grand plus interest is a lot of my money and a
serious offence to my family. The sentence for that is
sixteen years. Do you understand what I'm saying?"
"Yes."
The men who beat him up told him that if he didn't
pay he would work off the debt. Work for nothing in a
factory to pay the people who loaned him the money.
He would become their slave.
"Or if you want to keep your feet on the streets you
can trade-in your wife."
"I'll do the time," Robert said as he sniffed the stream
of fluid back up his nose.
"You've actually got a decent job. With you earning
good money and her working for us, you could pay off
your dept in maybe, ten years. I'm told your wife does a
decent massage. She can make good money."
"No. I'll do the time."
"Sure?"
"Yes. I'll do the time."
"Okay work starts now. Get this mess cleaned up," the
detective said as he pointed to the blood dripping onto
the floor.
"Please can I see my wife and daughter before I start
my sentence?"
"Just remember this fact McSwann. You are property
bought and paid for. Just like the bed fixed to this wall.
Locked-up until you've paid your dues. But I'm not a
heartless bastard. You won't see them for a long time.
Say nothing to anyone or your next beating will be your
last and your wife will do your time."
"I understand."
"Be here tomorrow at seven a.m. sharp."
The detective handed Robert a small piece of paper
with an address and the name of someone to ask for.
Robert caught a whiff of the detective's aftershave. No
mistaking Brut aftershave.
"I'll be there."
"You'd bloody well better. Because if you damn well
run. My boys will hunt you down and beat you
senseless. The price for bringing you back will be life
for you, your wife and your daughter. Understood?"
"I'll be there."
"In fact the more I think on. Why don't you just leg it
up north? That wife of yours would be good for
business. Seriously I'll give you a couple of weeks
before I let the ferrets loose. You might find a rabbit
hole deep enough to hide."
"I'll be there at seven."
"I think you will. More's the pity. He can go," the
detective shouted along the corridor to the uniformed
officer.
The detective strolled outside and over to the car park.
He got into an antique silver coloured Range Rover
Sport with darkened windows. Inside his sister Lisa
waited with the men who beat Robert McSwann. He
saw she was annoyed.
"Where's my property?" Lisa McVickin asked.
"He'll turn up at the factory tomorrow morning," Jim
McVickin said.
"Are you stupid or just being an arse? Go and get
him," Lisa demanded.
"He's dripping blood everywhere."
"Pillock! Get him here now," Lisa shouted at her
brother.
"I'm giving him a chance to run. If he runs then we get
his wife. She's worth much more," Jim explained.
"Since when did you start deciding what happens to
my property?"
"Okay," Jim said with frustration and turned to leave
the car.
"It's done now, let it play. I'll wait and see what I get,"
Lisa said.