Rolf Hartmann closed his eyes and inhaled deeply as his audience clapped, as his enemies squirmed in their front-row seats, fear flashing in their eyes.
They were afraid of him, were in awe of the extent of his reach, of his domain, of his power—of the inconceivable way in which he had created this global empire in less than two decades.
And this was just the beginning, the start of a journey his father had begun many years ago on a desolate beach on the coast of Argentina, where he had taken Hitler’s loot, the gold, diamonds, and other precious stones confiscated by the Third Reich from all conquered territories, inspected by the Führer’s finest jewelers and goldsmiths to ensure they were of the finest quality before being allowed in Hitler’s most secretive coffers.
And it was Hartmann’s visionary father and his friend who had inherited that fortune, who had sat on it for decades, using just enough to live in isolation, to buy themselves the seclusion and anonymity that would guarantee their safety until the commotion of World War II ended, until the world stopped looking for German fugitives.
Slowly, Ernst Hartmann and Manfred Deppe converted a portion of their precious stones and gold into other assets, like properties, stocks, bonds, and cash in all major currencies. But while they kept the origin of their fortune a secret, they kept their friendship even more secretive, figuring they increased their chances for anonymity by remaining apart. By the early 1960s they were among the wealthiest, most eccentric, and most reclusive men on the planet. Ernst Hartmann eventually returned home, settling in Frankfurt, the banking capital of Germany, where he married the daughter of a powerful banker. Manfred Deppe chose the British Virgin Islands, soon marrying a Swiss businesswoman on holiday. They both had sons, roughly the same age. Although the wives and their respective families never suspected it, over the years arrangements were made so the boys attended the same schools, so they would become friends. Eventually the boys became men, graduating from the finest universities, until the day Ernst Hartmann and Manfred Deppe brought their offspring to a very secret vault in a secluded mountaintop mansion overlooking West Berlin. They had revealed to their sons their past, showed them the priceless fortune—valued in the trillions of dollars—that would empower them to one day steer the future of Germany, and perhaps even the world.
But not yet.
At the time, Germany was still divided, was still restricted by the shackles clamped onto it by the victorious allies, especially the Soviets. But then the day came when the Berlin Wall finally fell, the day when Germany started the long-awaited reunification process, the day when a new company named CyberWerke appeared on the nation’s radar screen, creating jobs, prosperity, hope. That was the day when Rolf Hartmann became known around Germany and, soon thereafter, the world. Rolf Hartmann, the entrepreneur, the visionary, the role model for the German of the future. And following a prior arrangement, Christoff Deppe remained operating behind the scenes, closing the shadowy deals that made the conglomerate grow like no other company in history, smartly using their secret funds to defy gravity, rising when others fell, and then acquiring the firms when they were at their lowest, including mining operations for diamonds in Africa, emeralds in South America, and gold on every continent. CyberWerke acquired jewelry dealers in Amsterdam and Bangkok to help move their mined precious stones and metals as well as those from their secret coffers. Over the years they legitimized most of their original gold and jewels into global assets deposited in banks around the world, from Zurich to Grand Cayman, from Frankfurt to Tokyo, from Singapore to San Francisco. No one knew exactly how large their fortune was, except for Hartmann and Deppe, the ultimate controllers of their conglomerate’s purse strings. Rolf Hartmann sold himself to the world as the ultimate businessman, powerful but with a soft spot for the poor, for those in need, generously contributing significantly to all major charity organizations. Christoff Deppe, on the other hand, ran the underworld, forcing companies out of business, bringing them to the edge of financial ruin, making them prime candidates for Rolf Hartmann to rescue, to save jobs, to bring hope to communities depending on those local industries.
And here we are today, he thought, on the eve of making the same bold move made so long ago by Adolf Hitler to consolidate his power. Parliament was meeting tomorrow to vote on the future of Hartmann’s company, and he would use this Reichstag meeting, attended also by the chancellor, to consolidate his power. The German people loved Hartmann as a technology leader, as a powerful economic force, as a savvy businessman, and also as a folk hero, one of their own rising to amazing heights on his own. All he needed was a venue to create the right political climate, the right opportunity to make him the obvious choice to lead the nation during the second decade of the new millennium.
As he waved to his guests before inviting them to join him in the banquet room two floors below, Rolf Hartmann silently thanked his father for having the vision and the boldness to take that risk on that night in Argentina long ago.
Soon, Father, he thought. Soon, Germany will once again be in a position to take its rightful place as the most powerful nation in the world.