She wanted a gold medal.
No, she needed a gold medal.
Without one, she was nothing.
With numb fingers, she dug her starting position into the cinder. Small pools of water immediately appeared in the divots where she needed to place her feet. Stella lowered into her crouch. The people in the stands, yelling and screaming, appeared immune to the weather.
The starting official took his position and signaled for the women to take their places. She crouched and rocked back and forth, stretching her shoulders. Her fingers dug into the clumps of wet cinder. Helen followed the starter’s commands and let everything and everyone drop away, her mind clear and ready. She inhaled and felt the breath travel easily as if reaching every corner of her body. Her shins no longer hurt. Everything seemed to quiet as the rain eased into a drizzle and the wind died.
The gun fired.
Helen sprang from her starting crouch and leapt into the lead. Her body moved as if in a dream, effortlessly, as if her feet barely skimmed the red cinder. She was alone on the track and all she could hear was the steadiness of her own breathing in and out of her lungs, her heart pounding in her ears. And before she knew it, the ribbon snapped across her chest and she raised her hands. She had done it. No one else was even close.
Her final time: 11.5 seconds.
Though Annette and the officials were congratulating her, Helen turned to find Stella standing several feet away, bewildered and small, her shoulders hunched against the drizzle. Helen reached out and took the other runner’s hand in her own. Though disappointment pooled in Stella’s eyes, her face relaxed into a shy smile.
Helen allowed herself to be guided by several young girls in white dresses adorned with flowers in their hair to the medalists’ podium, but kept Stella close to her side. Together they climbed onto the steps and joined Germany’s Käthe Krauss, the third-place finisher. An official took his position with the medals. Once the laurel wreath was placed on her head and her gold medal looped around her neck, Helen smiled at the sea of flags waving in the distance, all different colors, a blurred rainbow in the gray landscape. Music played, but it was hard to hear over the yelling. There was little time to savor anything. As soon as the anthem finished, the officials and her teammates pulled her apart from Stella and towed her toward the sidelines. Dee pushed through the runners and officials and pulled Helen into a tight embrace.
“Well done! Now we need to get you to the telegraph office for a radio interview,” she said, thrusting Helen’s track bag at her.
A young aide clad in a khaki-colored army uniform moved into their path. “Sieg Heil! Fräulein Stephens, the Führer would like to meet you.”
“The Führer?” She gazed up to the Führer’s special viewing box and there he was, looking straight at her, the little familiar dark-haired man in his double-breasted trench coat, his hand outstretched in that awkward Nazi salute. All the heat that had suffused her since winning vanished and she felt every drop of the cold drizzle pelting her shoulders.
“Kommen Sie.” The aide gestured for her to follow him.
“No!” Dee took Helen’s arm and tugged her away. “She has a radio interview with CBS now.” She leaned into Helen and whispered, “Start walking.”
Helen did exactly that. She stretched out her famously long stride and marched alongside Dee to the press office. The attendant hurried along beside them, shaking his head in disbelief.
“I tell mein Führer no? You must kommen. Kommen Sie mit!”
He reminded Helen of a small dog yipping and leaping along at her heels, an ankle biter. Her vision shrank into a pinhole as she bored her way through the throng, trying to ignore the entreaties of the Nazi official and the calls for attention from the crowd. Dee wrapped one arm around Helen and used the other to push through the people in front of them. They made it to the press office and the young man followed them, watching as Helen was perched in front of a large microphone and earphones were placed on her head.
She forced herself to smile widely, laughed and accepted congratulations, but felt as though she was watching herself from a distance. Her chest seized into a rock of anxiety and she could barely force air into her lungs. Where was Ruth? Although she answered the interviewer’s questions and even made a few jokes, she had no idea what she was saying, but it didn’t seem to matter—everyone looked delighted. She pulled her autograph book from her bag and handed it around for signatures. All the while, her stomach clenched into a tight fist, equal parts anticipation and fear. She knew the Nazi attendant was watching her every move. There was no way she could sneak out of this invitation.
Someone handed her autograph book back, and when the interviewer bade her farewell, she glanced at Dee. The two women locked gazes, resignation in both of their expressions.
They followed the attendant from the press office and down a flight of stairs to a small room. A group of black-shirted men entered, each one circling the space, blocking off the doorways, staring through Helen and Dee, their gazes cold and calculating.
The man at the center of it all, Adolf Hitler, marched into the room and stopped in front of Helen so close she could see the smooth skin of his cheeks, the gray hairs bristling his temples and strange little mustache, and the deep furrows between his clear pale blue eyes. He had taken off his trench coat and now sported a military dress uniform, huge swastikas blazing on each sleeve. He smiled at Helen, eyes bulging with delight, and she looked down at
