Chapter 128: The Spark That Ignites the World (5)
Several months later, New York.
Two agents from the Internal and External Intelligence Department, both dressed in black trench coats, sat in the lobby of the Waldorf Astoria Hotel.
Astor, the man who had once amassed a fortune through information asymmetry, stared at the contract bearing his own name. The moment he finished reading it, all interest drained from his face. His lips trembled.
"Mr. Roman... then what becomes of me?"
"You need not concern yourself with that, Mr. Astor."
The taller of the two agents tossed a stack of candid photographs onto the table.
"Sell every share you still hold. This is a direct order from Berlin."
Astor lowered his eyes.
In the photographs were scenes of himself meeting with Jörg. The meaning was plain enough that no explanation was needed. If those images were ever made public, the consequences would be catastrophic. His hands began to shake uncontrollably.
"I... understand."
Friday, morning.
The New York Stock Exchange was as crowded and feverish as ever.
With the British review deadline drawing closer, the market had slowed somewhat over the past few days. But to Randor, a veteran stockbroker, such fluctuations were nothing unusual. He had seen uncertainty before, and each time the pattern had remained the same. The panic passed, confidence returned, and prices climbed even higher.
That was how it had been for years.
This time, however, something felt different.
"Three hundred ninety one point two!"
The ticker operator shouted yesterday's closing index across the hall.
Randor calmly erased the Dow Jones Industrial Average from the blackboard and replaced it with the new, higher figure.
Then, almost at the same moment, several sharp eyed investors noticed something wrong.
The shipbuilding stocks that had long supported the market's prosperity, the very pillars beneath its illusion of endless ascent, began to tremble.
Then they turned.
From rising to falling.
And once they started, they showed no sign of stopping.
Two full percentage points vanished in barely ten minutes.
"What is happening...?"
Faces turned upward in disbelief, staring at the board as though it were announcing the collapse of the heavens. Those stocks had made legends out of ordinary men. They had created fortunes, reputations, and the intoxicating belief that wealth was no longer earned, only claimed.
Now they were falling apart in full view of everyone.
For several long minutes, the exchange stood in a strange and unnatural silence.
Then the rest of the market began to fall with them.
The illusion shattered instantly.
The polished manners, the pressed suits, the dignified voices, all of it was thrown away in an instant. Men shoved one another aside, slammed into counters, and roared over each other in panic.
"Sell everything in my account! Now!"
"Quickly, damn you!"
"Get me out! Get me out of all of it!"
The entire exchange descended into chaos.
The terrified crowd dumped shares by the handful, then by the thousands, then by everything they owned. No one was thinking about profit anymore. They wanted only one thing, to escape before the floor gave way beneath them.
By noon, the speculative bubble had burst completely.
All the filth that had been hidden beneath years of blind greed came rushing out at once, surging across the United States like a black tide.
On the first day, the New York Stock Exchange fell by 15.26 percent.
On the second day, the figure worsened to 20.31 percent.
By the seventh day, the decline had reached a horrifying 35.31 percent.
Hundreds of stockbrokers climbed to rooftops.
Blood splashed across the streets of Wall Street.
And even that was only the beginning.
The mass withdrawals that followed drove bank after bank into panic. Soon, faith in financial institutions collapsed alongside the market. Then faith in paper money itself began to crack. In the end, under the tiny spell Jörg had cast with chilling precision, the United States was dragged backward into an age where precious metals mattered more than banknotes.
And for the rest of the world, the butterfly's wings did not summon a storm.
They unleashed a flood.
London.
The crowds queuing outside the stock exchange stretched through entire streets.
Every passing minute devoured more of their savings. Every fresh rumor hollowed out another sliver of hope. Men and women who had once spoken of stocks with shining eyes now stood pale and trembling, their minds fraying under the weight of vanishing wealth.
Fistfights broke out frequently.
So did gunfire.
At a time like this, no one had the leisure to care about Germany anymore. Not in Britain. Not for now. In the face of collapsing fortunes and public hysteria, foreign affairs had become a distant luxury.
And amid months of chaos, Poland saw its opportunity.
A chance to complete the Polonization of Danzig once and for all.
Warsaw.
Piłsudski stepped out of his car and strode into military headquarters. Walking closely at his side was the commander of the Second Cavalry Division stationed in Danzig.
"Mr. President," the officer said, his voice brimming with restrained excitement, "this is the perfect opportunity. Parliament is consumed with economic quarrels. Every major country is in disorder. No one has the spare attention to watch Danzig."
He allowed himself a hard smile.
"By the time they do, we will already have thrown those Germans into the sea to feed the fish."
Once inside the office, Piłsudski removed his gloves and asked plainly,
"Speak. What is your plan?"
The commander straightened.
"For the past year, the German residents of Danzig have held ten petition demonstrations, all demanding reunion with Germany. These people cannot be assimilated. They have no intention of becoming Polish. So long as they remain, Danzig will never be secure."
His tone turned colder.
"We must break their streets, extinguish their culture, hunt down the hardliners, and drive the majority of the Germans back into East Prussia. Only then will Danzig truly become a Polish Danzig."
Before, he continued, such a sweeping operation would have drawn condemnation from abroad. Foreign eyes had been too numerous. Even men in Parliament would have opposed it out of fear of intervention and scandal.
"But now," he said, unable to hide his fervor, "now we have been handed a golden opportunity by God Himself."
This was Leelandor's conviction.
In his eyes, the Germans in Danzig were vermin nesting inside a Polish city. Only by driving them out, only by crushing their roots and their will, could the city be made truly Polish.
Piłsudski studied him for a moment.
"How long?"
"One week."
Leelandor answered without hesitation.
"One week will be enough. Germany will not interfere. They are far too busy sorting through their own economic disorder. And even if they did notice, what then? With that pitiful military of theirs, they would sooner soil themselves than fight."
Piłsudski turned to the map and scanned it twice in silence.
Danzig was too important. If Germany ever stabilized and regained its footing, the city could easily slip from Polish hands. If there was to be action, it had to be now.
His decision came quickly.
"Do it."
Leelandor's eyes brightened at once. He saluted sharply.
"Yes, Mr. President. In one week, I will return to you a Polish Danzig."
Danzig.
Jeff Okas, an old war veteran who had lost one arm in battle, stood in the street and looked out across the city.
It was the same city he had always known.
And yet it was no longer the same at all.
Once, Germans had been able to walk every district of Danzig with the certainty that it belonged to them.
Now they were being squeezed tighter with each passing year.
In the eyes of the Polish authorities, they were little better than a disease. The city government was packed with cowards bought off by Polish interests. More than once, it had thrown German protest groups into prison. More than once, it had bent the law on ethnic lines and called it order.
Poles who stole from German homes or harassed German women swaggered out of police stations laughing.
Meanwhile, Germans whose only crime was demanding the return of their city were hauled away in chains.
It was unjust.
It was intolerable.
This city had been won with German blood.
Even so, Okas refused to leave.
Many German residents had already packed up and withdrawn into East Prussia, swallowing humiliation in exchange for safety. But he would not go. His home was here. His memories were here. His parents lay buried here.
He would spend the rest of his life fighting for this city if he had to.
With that thought firm in his mind, Okas once again led a group of fellow Germans into the streets. They marched toward city hall and shouted as one:
"Danzig was recognized by the League of Nations as rightful German territory! This is our land! Poles, get out!"
"Get out!"
Their cries echoed through the evening streets.
Under the setting sun, their figures looked sparse and stretched, long shadows cast over stone and dust. The city watched them in silence.
Some German residents standing at the roadside clearly wanted to join.
But fear held their feet in place.
Not far away, a tourist with a narrow scar running down one side of his face stood quietly among the onlookers. He had been generous at the tavern, spoken little, and watched much. Now he fixed his gaze on the one armed veteran at the head of the march.
Silently, he placed his left hand over his chest and offered a wordless salute.
Then he raised his camera and captured the moment, the veteran leading the procession, the German flag waving in his remaining hand.
The shutter clicked.
And almost immediately after, from somewhere in the distance, came the dense thunder of hooves.
.....
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