Ivari shook his head. “That was an experience, let me tell you. We never got any warning he was coming, but afterwards I thought about it and for the six months or so before he arrived we had a big spike in visitor numbers. Some Americans, but quite a few Brits too. Germans. Poles, lots of Poles.”
“Security,” said Rudi. “Scoping you out.”
“That’s what I thought, afterwards. And after he’d gone, three rangers who’d been working here for almost a year handed their notice in. No explanation, no reason. Just gone. Good people, too. Not easy to replace. We missed them.”
“What was his security like?” Rudi asked, out of professional interest.
“There wasn’t any.”
“You’re joking.”
Ivari raised his hand. “No lie. Just him and three other people. They drove up to the Manor one morning in a people carrier, got out, wandered around a bit, came into the centre and introduced themselves. I didn’t believe them. I mean, I’d seen him on the news and everything, but you see people out of context and they don’t look like themselves, you know?”
“I know.”
“So they showed me a whole lot of documents – and to be honest with you they could have mocked them all up with a laptop and a printer. Stuff from the Foreign Ministry. Stuff signed by the President – our President.” Ivari shook his head again. “What a farce.”
“Didn’t he have any identification?”
“The President of the United States doesn’t carry any.” Ivari saw his brother’s face and nodded. “Yes. But if you think about it, why would he need any? He’s driven everywhere, so he doesn’t need a driving licence. He doesn’t need a passport because everywhere he goes is American territory, however temporarily. He doesn’t need an identification card because, let’s be frank about it, when is anyone ever going to question his identity?”
“You did.”
“One of the other men with him was the American Ambassador. He had identification. Enough identification to choke a gorilla. Which, incidentally, the third man resembled. Big bloke with a big briefcase chained to his wrist.”
“Launch codes.”
“Well, yes, I figured that out. Tell me this, Rudi, what kind of world is it where the President of the United States has to go about like a thief in the night?”
Rudi shrugged. It was the world of GWOT, which had so far not shown any sign of a victory for either side. The Americans’ low-key tactics were interesting, but he was willing to bet there had been backup not more than a few seconds away, had the need arisen.
“Turns out he’s Estonian,” Ivari said. “Well, his great-great grandfather was. Wanted to see the ancestral homeland. He had a really strange accent. When I asked him about it he said he was from Minneapolis.”
“Oh, him,” said Rudi.
“Him. Long streak of piss.” Ivari took a drink. “Ach, he seemed all right. Asked a lot of good questions – seemed to have done his homework. Most of them don’t bother. We went up to the coast and the Ambassador took our photograph with me pointing towards Finland and looking intrepid. Then we all shook hands and they went away. About four minutes later this really beautiful woman turns up with a briefcase full of documents she wants us to sign. I mean, you’ve never seen a woman like her, Rudi. That line in Chandler about making a bishop want to kick in a stained-glass window? That was her. Jaan was standing there with his tongue hanging out; if Kaisa had been on duty that day and not visiting her mother in Rakevere, she’d have divorced him on the spot. So all these documents were non-disclosure agreements. If we told anyone, anyone at all, that the President had been here…oh, I can’t remember. They’d kill us and all our families and our pets and all our friends and burn our homes to the ground and salt the earth so nothing would ever grow there again. Something like that.”
“You’re telling me about it.”
“He lost the next election. Fuck him.” Ivari drained his glass. “Another?”
“I haven’t finished mine yet.”
“Anyway.” Ivari poured himself another drink. “A month or so later this big container lorry drives up and the driver and his mate unload this Humbly. Humboldt. Got me to sign for it. Gift from the President of the United States.” He shrugged. “We drove it around the estate for a while, but it was no use to us, so Liisu – her brother’s a surgeon – drove it to Tallinn and gave it to him for the hospital to use. I think they ferry old folks to and from day clinics with it.”
“But no photographs.”
“Ah.” Ivari gestured with his glass. “This is a good one. After he lost the election – about a year after he lost the election – I got an email. A huge email. From the US Embassy. All the photographs the Ambassador took of us. And a little note saying, it’s okay for you to display these now and the President would be proud if you did.” Ivari took a drink of Scotch. “As I said, fuck him. If he comes back now, when he’s not in power, maybe I’ll display them.”
Rudi looked at his brother and tipped his head to one side. “Are you all right?”
Ivari looked at him and sighed. He ground his cigarette out in the ashtray. “Paps.”
“Well, yes,” said Rudi.
Ivari shook his head. “He’s… he wants the park to declare independence.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“He wants the park to secede. Become an independent nation. A… what do you call it?”
“Polity,” Rudi said, feeling numb.
Ivari made a half-hearted gotcha gesture. “Polity. Yes.”
“You talked him out of it, though?” said Rudi. He saw the look on his brother’s face and put his hands up. “Sorry. Pretend I didn’t ask that.”
Ivari lit another cigarette. “A park in Lithuania did it a couple of years ago, I don’t remember the name.”
Rudi nodded, though he couldn’t remember the name either. But it included part of the great primeval forest he had been telling Frances about earlier. “It didn’t last long,” he said.
“Yes, well, the old man says they were a bunch of amateurs. He says he’s got it all thought out.”
Well, at least that would be true enough. Rudi rubbed his face. “He can’t possibly make it work. He needs a big percentage of the population to agree to his proposal in the first place, before he goes anywhere with it.”
“There aren’t more than seven hundred people living in the park these days, Rudi,” said Ivari. “Most of them are as pissed-off as he is that the Government keeps all our tourism revenue.”
“And gives it back,” said Rudi. “Upkeep of the Manor and the visitor centre. The tram-line. Maintenance of the roads.”
Ivari shook his head. “He’s right about that, at least. We only ever see a fraction of it. We get the absolute minimum that we need. We’re having to cannibalise one of the Humvees just to keep the others going. The rest of it?” He shrugged.
“It wasn’t always like that,” said Rudi, thinking back to when he was young and they moved here for the first time. “The Government used to hurl cash at us. You remember President Laar? ‘Estonia’s most precious natural resource. We will never neglect it.’”
“Laar was a long time ago. We were just kids, Rudi. Back then Paps could go to the Ministry and ask for anything his black little heart desired, and they’d give it him. Not any more. Now we’re a big tourist cash-cow, and most of the cash goes into someone else’s pockets.”