It took him about a quarter of an hour to lay out the basics of what he had learned yesterday in the SCIF at Eindhoven.
“Sorry to break this to you now,” he said, “when there’s this whole other crisis happening.” He gestured back in the direction of where they had shot the video.
“Do you really think it’s a whole other crisis?”
“No. Of course not.”
“Because obviously all this is coordinated.”
“Yes.”
“The deepfake must have been produced some time ago. They—whoever made it—could have released it earlier. But instead they held it back until the day after the government had fallen apart on its own.”
“I hadn’t considered that,” Willem said. “You’re right.”
“Why would they hold it back? Because if it had been released earlier, before the government had fallen, then the fall of the government would be blamed on me. It really would lead to a constitutional crisis in that case. Deservedly so.”
Willem nodded.
“But,” Saskia went on, “if it is released after the fall of the government is a fait accompli, then I can’t really be accused of unconstitutional meddling . . .”
“Only of being blunt and outspoken. Saying out loud what ordinary sensible people are already thinking.”
“The voice of the people,” Saskia said. “Which I have never claimed to be. But it seems the role is being thrust upon me. Presumably by whoever sabotaged the Maeslantkering.”
“That thing was the pride of the nation,” Willem said. “A symbol of our engineering prowess. Its destruction a huge psychological shock. The kind of thing that makes people sit back and reconsider everything. Whoever did it is creating an opportunity to reshape the way our politics works for a generation. Setting you up. Not to take the fall. More the opposite.”
“Well, I’m afraid whoever that is is just going to have to be disappointed,” Saskia answered.
Someone knocked on the door. “It’s ready,” came Fenna’s voice. “A triumph!”
“We’re coming,” Saskia called back. To Willem she said, as she was getting up, “First things first. Let’s get this done and then we can continue this conversation.”
A few rooms down the hall, the video crew had patched the streamer’s laptop into a big flat-panel screen and cued up the edited video for their review. Like all the queen’s official videos it opened with a “bumper” depicting the royal palace, with the arms of the House of Orange superimposed. Then it cross-faded to Queen Frederika sitting in that chair. And then she said the words she’d said. Then it cross-faded to the “outro.”
Heads turned toward Saskia. In truth, she’d barely seen it. Her eyes had been open and aimed at the screen, but her mind had been all over the place. “It’s fine,” she said, “put it up.”
That command was aimed at the royal webmaster. An antiquated job title—“social media coordinator” would have been more up-to-date—but it was common in royal courts to have outdated remnants of a bygone age. If Saskia could be guarded by men in bearskin hats riding horses, why, she could as well have a webmaster.
Accordingly, everyone looked at the woman who bore that title.
She was oblivious.
She was staring at the screen of her tablet, completely aghast at some new horror. To be perfectly honest, that was the usual emotional state, and the customary facial expression, of anyone who worked in the social media industry. But even by those standards she looked shocked.
She finally became aware that all attention was focused on her. She tried to say something but couldn’t get it out. Instead she flicked her fingers over the surface of her tablet and spun it around so that everyone could see it.
It was playing a video. The same video they’d just finished watching, or so it seemed through the intro. When that cross-faded to show Queen Frederika sitting demurely in her special chair, however, she was wearing a different outfit. One she had, in fact, worn recently in front of cameras. But she had never sat in that chair and delivered a speech while wearing it.
Nor had she ever spoken the words that she now, on this video, appeared to speak.
“I come to you this afternoon with an apology and a promise.”
“Where did you get this?” Willem demanded.
“It showed up on YouTube fifteen minutes ago!”
Everyone shushed them.
“Earlier today, a candid video was posted in which I was caught on film expressing certain views concerning the prime minister and the cabinet that should not have been said out loud by a reigning monarch. For that I apologize. Regardless of the frustration that I—along with all other Dutch citizens—may from time to time experience regarding our political process, it is not my place to utter such words in public. I did so thinking that I was merely expressing private sentiments to a small number of family members bereaved by the loss of loved ones in the disaster at Scheveningen. I was naive not to realize that my words might be captured and put up on the Internet where they have now become part of the public record. Again, for this I apologize.
“In retrospect, the disaster we experienced that day was but a foretaste of the much more devastating events of the last week—events that have among other sad outcomes led to the fall of the government. We must now look ahead to a period of at least several months during which a caretaker cabinet will look after the day-to-day running of the country while a new governing coalition is organized. It is the tradition during such periods that the caretaker government should avoid making major policy decisions or budgetary commitments. That is all well and good—in normal times. These times, however, are not normal. The nation is in the midst of a crisis that cannot be addressed without decisive action. I do not believe that we can afford to sit on our hands for several months during the endless negotiations that, in normal times, are needed to organize a new governing coalition. I therefore give you my promise that I will do everything that lies within my strictly limited powers as a constitutional monarch to speed that process along and goad the bickering parties into action. To that end I am putting forth the name of Willem Castelein to serve in the role of informateur. While I lack the statutory power to fill that office, nothing in the Grondwet or the law prevents me from stating my personal opinion as to who is best qualified to serve in that role. I hope that the leadership of the political parties will agree with me and name him to that position without delay, as a way of getting the process off to a faster than usual start. With that momentum established, I believe that Dr. Castelein will be able to shepherd a new and effective government into office in a matter of weeks, or even days—not months. Thank you and good evening.”
Willem, aware that all eyes were upon him, took the risk of checking his phone. He had silenced it completely. But the sheer volume of messages was proof that they weren’t just imagining this. It wasn’t just a dream. Looking at the screen of the device was like staring into the chute of a slot machine that had just hit the jackpot.
“We have to release a statement—” Saskia was saying.
“To the effect that the totally convincing apology we just watched is actually a fake apology for the earlier totally convincing video that was also fake?” asked the streamer.
Maybe it was just his imagination, but Willem couldn’t help feeling that some of the eyes now upon him were less than entirely friendly. He had felt a bit of this yesterday in the SCIF. To some Dutchmen he would always be an inscrutable combination of American and Chinese. Being gay didn’t exactly help. His family links to China, his fluency in Mandarin, his recent interactions with Bo—which he had been at pains to put on the official record, to avoid the slightest hint of undue influence—all these could suddenly begin to look suspicious now that this second deepfake had been released.