Chapter 25
Alex entered Viru Hotel at the back of the group and immediately noticed a tense atmosphere in the foyer. A big coach with number plates from the Russian Novgorod region was parked by the door, and a large group of girls dressed in short leather skirts and fishnet stockings were being helped on board with their luggage. The tour guide, a man in his late twenties who had scant experience but knew how to make polite conversation, was trying to object, but two older gentlemen with moustaches didn’t leave him much choice: the bus’s destination was not going to be the Pirita cloisters, but the clinic for sexually transmitted diseases on Raba Street, where the whole busload was being sent for a week of treatment. The previous evening the entire group had descended on the hotel bars and restaurants looking for new male friends amongst the foreign guests, and for a while it seemed like they were going to be quite successful, but unfortunately one of them tried to pick up a KGB agent planted at the hotel, and by morning he’d compiled a list of the whole group and passed it on to his boss. Not out of concern for the hotel’s reputation of course, but because he’d already recruited a dozen or so Tanyas and Svetas of his own as agents, and he got a fair amount of useful information from them; he also took a cut of the earnings from their main activities. He didn’t want any competition.
I didn’t make that story up, by the way.
Alex didn’t bother trying to work out what the argument was about, assuming this was just the typical scene when a tour group departs. He was given a room on the seventeenth floor, and he glanced out of the window overlooking the town a few times. The decision of Lenbumprom’s management – to organise the paper production in cooperation with the Estonian branch of the Soviet Forestry, Cellulose, Paper and Timber Ministry, rather than in the Leningrad region as originally planned – had at first seemed a little unwise, but now he was sure that it was perfectly sensible. He had a view of the old town which was out of this world, although even the most ordinary things, such as the sea, looked somehow different.
This was his first time in Estonia, and he already agreed with those who had told him it was a clean and orderly place with quite a high standard of living.
His final conversation with Tapani was still bothering him a little. The last time he’d been in Finland, Alex had called Tapani and thanked him for arranging the interview. He’d probably done so in the spirit of defiance, after the conversation with Vladimir Vladimirovich, to demonstrate, at least to himself, that he wasn’t going to be pushed about by some fisheyed guy; and he’d been a little bit tipsy as well. He’d travelled to Helsinki with Svyatoslav Grigoryevich and the trip wasn’t strictly speaking necessary, but Svyatoslav Grigoryevich’s son was doing graduate studies at the Institute of Technology and desperately needed one of those new personal computers which were impossible to get hold of in the Soviet Union. That only became clear later, because when it was announced that Alex was going on a work trip, Konstantin Zakharovich and Olga Anatolyevna were terribly put out, both being higher up than Alex in the food chain. Svyatoslav Grigoryevich had evidently set things straight with them later, since they stopped making faces at Alex. Svyatoslav Grigoryevich promised to buy a bottle of Ballantine’s for Konstantin Zaharovich, and for Olga Anatolyevna, Alex had to go to Stockmann supermarket’s cosmetics department clutching a piece of graph paper with a brand of perfume written on it. That suited Alex fine since Tapani had invited him for coffee at a place just across the road, behind the Swedish theatre, and he had no reason to decline. But the perfume took a little longer than expected. Despite Svyatoslav Grigoryevich’s assurances that the brand in question really did exist, Alex had to have a long discussion with the shop assistant about whether “Mazhi nar” meant Imaginaire or Magie Noire. In the end they decided in favour of the latter, and Olga Anatolyevna later confirmed that this was the right choice. Alex was therefore a little late and stressed out when he got to his meeting with Tapani. Svyatoslav Grigoryevich had gone to a shop at Annankatu with a man from Karelia Trade to locate the right computer (he ended up with a very good model, a whole twenty megabytes of hard drive and two disk drives, as he later boasted), and they’d brought it back to the hotel on Kaisaniemenkatu by taxi. Alex had had to wait there to help lug two large boxes up to the third floor, which was after all the main reason why he’d been invited to come. Anyway, Tapani turned out to be very talkative, and told Alex lots of funny stories about the kinds of things which happened in joint ventures, and Alex had made a mental note of them so as not to bring shame to his country if similar things happened to him. But then he realised that he had to hurry back to the hotel, since he and his boss still had one meeting to go to, so he made his apologies to Tapani. Ahaa, of course, Tapani had said, gesturing to the waiter – but before you go I have a small favour to ask. Naturally Alex stayed seated. Tapani continued – they tell me that you are going to Estonia to do some business with one of the ministries, I’ve got an acquaintance in Estonia, would you be able to bring me a small package from him? Nothing too big, it should fit into your jacket pocket. It may be that I don’t need your help at all, I’m asking just in case. You agree? That’s great, someone will get in touch with you when you arrive.
When the big boss walks past, the wise peasant bows low and quietly farts.
At that moment Alex didn’t have any problem agreeing to Tapani’s request, particularly since he was in a great hurry. Fortunately he’d arrived back at the hotel room just a few moments before Svyatoslav Grigoryevich phoned from the ground floor. But now he was in Estonia, and after a short drive from the hotel to the ministry he was sitting at the far end of a long table, with a cup of weak coffee and a flaky biscuit with a dot of chocolate on top. By now he’d started to think that he may have agreed a little too hastily. Granted, no one had yet sought him out, but it did seem a little odd to be asked to deliver something from a complete stranger to someone else with whom he was only slightly acquainted. What if customs asked what it was? He didn’t even know himself. On the other hand, he now had a bit more experience of going through customs, and he hadn’t had any bother before. His blue official passport tended to have the desired effect on officials, especially if he was travelling as part of a delegation and his superiors were ahead of him in the queue. And anyway, Tapani seemed like a nice chap; surely there was no harm in doing a small favour for him.
They were sitting round the table, and a girl with dark bushy eyebrows handed out the folders containing the documents which explained what the Estonian side was proposing to contribute to the joint venture. When Alex arrived she leant down towards him and whispered into his ear: “There is a letter for you here as well,” and then hurried off.
She didn’t know for sure what was in the letter, but she was happy to carry out Uncle Valev’s request.
Alex had problems keeping up with what was being discussed at the meeting, but he still managed to restrain himself from opening the letter until he was back in the hotel room.
Written on a slip of paper was the following message: “Tomorrow at Kadriorg Palace, 1400, Oskar Meering’s Kalevipoeg statue.”
Is it not entirely natural that having arrived in Estonia from Leningrad, a Leningrad Paper Industry worker – and withdrawn bachelor – should be more interested in the local art museum and Peter the Great’s home than in Tallinn’s main department store? Even if he is the only one? At least that is what Alex was thinking as he left the Viru Hotel after the group lunch and boarded the tram. They’d already checked out of their rooms but there was still three hours left before they had to be at the port. It was a sunny day and there were plenty of people walking in the park, but once he’d entered the palace and bought a ticket he discovered that he was almost the only person in the exhibition rooms.