Roskov, Book 8, page 2
Oleg and family placed flowers, as did Henrick and family in turn, the nearby flower-seller doing brisk business.
Back at Rolf’s house - our Israeli visitor waved goodbye till Monday, we sat to eat, and to discuss the strange set of events that now surrounded us. As well as the global politics that was creeping into the family narrative, whether we liked that or not.
Interpol
A knock at the door, the police attending the door, and badges were flashed, two tall men in their thirties coming inside, both well built but fresh-faced.
The first began, ‘Sir, we are Interpol, and the EU assigns us to protect you, even in Britain - a signatory to the agreement, but Luc Haas said we must not enjoy ourselves or look at the models.’
I smiled. ‘Can’t help that, they all walk around naked.’
The local police were thanked and dismissed but would be close by, the two men soon chatting to Rolf about how Luc had tortured them in basic training.
Sat back down, the two Interpol men in the front room, Rolf explained, ‘They have permission to operate in most countries of the world, but they are EU Interpol. One man is Swedish but speaks many languages, one is Danish but he was raised in Germany mostly.’
‘They can carry guns in all EU countries?’ I asked.
‘No, and in Britain they need special permission.’
‘Britain has an Interpol branch?’ I asked.
‘Not as in other countries, yours is in Manchester and is concerned with trafficking of goods, drugs, weapons and people smuggling mostly. In the EU, Interpol agents provide information; few ever carry guns or leave the office.
‘Luc Haas worked with protection, and the investigation of attempts to kidnap or kill important people in the EU, and he has special permission to carry a weapon in certain countries only.
‘These men will apply for special leave from your government to carry concealed weapons, which may not be granted – it is not common. But the EU has issued a request to your government, and your Prime Minister will be pressured.’
I told him, ‘He’s already under pressure because they can’t protect me. But I can’t live in a cave, I have to go out, go shopping. I’m going to pay towards my own security, that way no one can complain about the cost. And I have the money now.’
‘It will be tax deductible,’ Rolf noted. ‘But in Sweden, and here in Denmark - as well as Germany and probably Italy, these men can be armed.’
‘And Corsica?’
‘The French should grant licence, but it is not common. The men could be with you unarmed of course, all over the world, as Carter was some of the time.’
I sighed out and exchanged a look with Henrick and Elsa. ‘Will I need protecting for the rest of my life?’
They all exchanged concerned looks, my parents especially.
Rolf began, ‘Someday … you retire and live in a safe country with an armed guard, and relax. Singapore would be safe, South Korea, here in Denmark, but not against a foreign assassin who is determined.
‘And gun crime in Britain is very limited, you have just been unlucky up to now, and … you destroyed a sex ring that involved some powerful men, men with friends and families. They may want back at you, as you have suggested before.
‘But if you are Ricky Roskov or Donny Osmond, you need protection always, the price of fame.’
I held up a flat palm to Rolf. ‘If you ever … compare me to Donny Osmond again we’ll fall out.’
They smiled.
‘Sorry, a bad choice,’ Rolf quipped. ‘But singers and musicians and you … you all need to keep the crazy fans away, that comes with money and fame.’
‘What are the new men called?’ I asked Rolf.
‘Bill and Ted.’
‘Bill and Ted?’ I loudly queried.
‘Willhiem, hence William hence Bill, and Tedulow, hence Ted.’
‘Are they time travelling cool dudes?’ I asked. ‘Are they excellent to each other?’
Rolf smiled. ‘I am sure that they are bored of such jokes by now.’
I faced my father. ‘Go visit Singapore for me, have a look around.’
‘Love to,’ he enthused. ‘Heard it’s great, and it boasts just about the lowest crime rate in the world.’
‘You can do some scouting for me, for when I need a safe place to stay,’ I told him. ‘But living in Sweden might not be too bad, apart from the winters.’ I faced Rolf. ‘Find me an apartment to buy, a good investment, close to the club.’
‘You … would not wish to live at the house?’ he asked.
‘Some of the time, yes, but I don’t know how we would get along, me and the twins full time. We’ve never been full time, and I may shout at the twins for always being late.’
‘That is a stress I deal with,’ he sighed out. ‘I will remind them about when they need to be ready by, but I will not shout. And they are better these days, diligent about work. And besides, Ingrid will shout.’
My father put in, ‘We never needed to shout at Ricky, he was out the door before we noticed him gone, keen to get to school – and most kids are never keen to get to school.’
‘The chance to learn,’ I told them. ‘I loved it.’ I faced Rolf. ‘An apartment would be an investment, and a place for our guests and models.’
‘I will find a place, several bedrooms.’
‘Not a posh place, because if a few models stayed there they’d wreck it. Girls are worse than boys,’ I told him.
‘This you tell me, a father of girls,’ he complained. ‘I know already.’
I smiled. ‘Girls are messy, boys break things. At least you don’t have broken things.’
Henrick put in, ‘This is true, and my friend’s sons - they break everything, but not intentionally.’
Carter called, and he had just arrived at the hotel in Corsica, a room in the main villa for now, but he didn’t want a villa to himself anyhow.
‘Kick back, relax, have a life,’ I told him. ‘You’ve used up some of your nine lives.’
‘You in Denmark?’ he asked.
‘Yeah, Copenhagen, Rolf’s original house, celebrations on Monday. Today we visited my grandfather’s old house and the grave of the original Katerina Mary.’
‘Was she actually in it?’ he quipped.
‘To some she was resurrected, yes. Get some swimming in, then a cold beer, not the other way around. How’s the weather?’
‘Nice sunshine, but a cool breeze off the hills today.’
‘First day of the rest of your life. So enjoy it.’
Back at the table, I told them about Carter in Corsica, and my parents planned on visiting Corsica again very soon, a good holiday taken.
Rolf took a call, and he reported that my father’s documentary would be shown here in Denmark tonight, so we could either watch it or record it. It would be shown in the UK at about the same time, my mother terrified to watch it.
Henrick and family set off to the family home, to meet us tomorrow, and my parents would be getting a tour of Copenhagen in a minibus – a friend of Rolf’s acting as tour guide. At 5pm I set out with Rolf to the new club.
The new sign was up, blood red but not flashing, and the same manager invited us in, two dozen workmen hard at it, the finishing touches. It looked to be mostly ready, decorated and equipped, still a few chairs in plastic.
The downstairs wine bar looked great, a huge display of bottles up the wall and backlit. The restaurant on the top floor was just about ready, the disco area on the middle floor mostly made up of empty dancefloor anyhow, tables and chairs positioned around the edges.
Many of the tables on the top floor would enjoy a good view of the city and the business-district street below, a definite advantage – apart from when the weather was terrible. It would be nice in the summer.
The rear fire escape’s metal stairs had now been painted and they looked good as new. I had invited along the TV crew, and they now filmed the top floor and the view, as well as workmen hard at it getting our club ready, and the club might be ready for opening next weekend, not this weekend, so we had missed the chance to host a few EU leaders.
I spoke to the TV crew about the facilities here and I invited them back to the grand opening, planned for next weekend.
Back at the house, my parents were already back and they detailed what they had seen, liking the waterfront areas and the canals here, plus the old buildings; it was a world away from Leicester.
At 8pm, and with my parents nervous, we sat and watched the documentary, much of the detail unknown to me, and the documentary makers had not tried to trip-up my father; it was a serious programme, the final part being my grandfather’s suicide.
Rolf asked my father, ‘You do not know what affected him?’
‘Some have suggested that he was guilty about surviving, conflicted about his Jewish heritage as well, angry at the loss of his family to the death camps. It’s a long list of issues unfortunately.’
‘Many reasons to be depressed,’ I agreed.
When the Danish TV news came on they detailed the documentary, plus my visit to the graveyard, our visiting Israeli seen, and then the preparations for the celebrations. Oddly enough, they had my interview at the airport last, and with subtitles.
Sat with just Rolf at 10pm, my parents off to read in bed, I began, ‘I think the British Prime Minster was hinting at what I might say if I was asked to talk at the celebrations.’
‘You will be asked to talk for certain,’ Rolf told me.
‘To the cameras, or to the crowds, or to the crowds with the EU leaders sat behind?’
‘To the crowds and the TV cameras, EU leaders sat behind you.’
‘Oh.’ I nodded as I considered that. ‘I’ll use the opportunity to nag at the EU leaders about a few things, I may never get the chance again to talk directly to them.’
‘If you kick them up the arse … that is OK, you are seen as speaking for the younger generation and not the older generation.’
‘It’s the fucking older generation that still talks about who did what in the war!’
‘Of course, they remember some of it, and they remember the hard post-war years. Even I remember the shortages, and as a boy I went to bed hungry sometimes.’
I took in the old clock on the wall. ‘I wonder why my grandfather killed himself…’
‘Many reasons, not least the loss of his family. He was young when he was taken, but old enough to have formed a bond. These things affect people in later life, the human mind a complex machine.’
‘And when you’re old … and sat here alone, what unresolved issues will you have?’ I posed.
‘I … cannot think of anything specific. My father was a good man, my mother was great, we were happy. I made money and travelled, met Ingrid – who was way too good for me.’
I smiled widely. And nodded.
‘You’re not supposed to nod to that,’ he complained. ‘As to issues … the twins were the issue, now resolved, and Ingrid and I luckily decided to support them this past year. But if the twins went off to America and never visited I would have issues in later life maybe.’
I told him, ‘They’re not the type, and they would hate America. Here they’re famous, but they walk the streets and stop for lunch. In America they would be pestered in public.
‘America would be fun for them for a few months - shopping in New York and Los Angeles, then they’d think like Alicia before she was gunned down, and being gunned down is an issue for all celebs in America.
‘And although the twins are friendly when it comes to meeting people … they’re not crazy about celeb parties and doing drugs, so we don’t have to worry about them. They’ve never wanted to go to glitzy parties in Paris and get drunk.’
‘Thankfully no.’
I stared into my tea. ‘Driving to the airport this morning, I … was ready to quit, to run away and go hide somewhere, the Gun Room maybe , maybe for six months and … not come out.
‘I think I’m doing some good for my home town, but … then someone tries to kill me, and … that’s not easy to accept. All the money I have, it doesn’t make up for being shot at.’
Rolf considered that. ‘You chose to be in politics before you were accidentally thrust into modelling and advertising, and in politics it is a struggle always, a fight, a plan to do the right things for those you represent and – hopefully – care about.
‘If you were an ordinary British politician you would get little respect from the people, and you would not be able to just go to a restaurant with your wife for a meal – there would always be opposition supporters wanting to throw a bottle at you.
‘Now you have the money and the fame yet your heart is still in local British politics. And breaking-up the sex ring was the right thing to do, yet you pay a price from the bad men still out there.
‘But I envy you, since you are the modern day Robin Hood, the champion of the poor fighting against the system.
‘Unfortunately, you make the mistake of thinking that good work is well rewarded, when there are many people in the world who care nothing about your good work and will attack you because you have what they want – and what they don’t have.
‘If you were politically neutral yet still very rich you would still need protection and to live behind high walls, because the world we live in is … less than perfect, and you only need a small number of idiots to make it bad for everyone.
‘I remember Stan, when he married a younger woman. He was sixty, she was thirty, and she married for the money obviously, but I met her many times and she was a good woman, now with two kids and she is a fantastic mother.
‘After their wedding he was attacked in a hotel in Italy, for being an old man with a beautiful young bride, and he spent a few days in hospital.
‘I learnt then … that there will always be people with strong opinions. And that if you put a hundred people in a room … one will want to kill you for being rich, one will want to kill your for simply being tall or having a nice wife, some will want to hit you for having what they don’t have, half will not care, and half will love you.
‘In any population there will be a small number of people that are bad, and nothing that you say or do will alter their opinion of you, because they were damaged as children.
‘I once heard a man in England say to me – why should you have a nice house and car, I don’t have one. I was shocked at the time to hear it because it is the language of a child, a child that is jealous of the toys of the other children.
‘What you must realise, and keep realising over and over again and … every time that someone attacks you, is that in the room of a hundred people ninety of them love you, and two were damaged as children.
‘Nothing you say or do will ever affect the damaged child, the damage was done long ago, yet when that damaged child shoots at you it affects you because you think logically: I do good work therefore they should appreciate me.
‘No. That damaged child appreciates nothing and no one, he is in pain, and nothing short of a bullet to the head will stop the pain.
‘He should be in prison with the other dangerous crackpots, but for now he’s walking free – and attacking you for a reason you fail to understand nor could ever understand.
‘Your parents did a good job raising you, and as a kid you were popular and you helped others, so for you it is hard to empathise.
‘You once told me about the boy in your school who turned gay and became a mass murderer. That boy, he was damaged as a kid, nothing anyone could have done - unless we bankrupt the nation and assess each child every six weeks with a panel of ten experts.
‘You must look at society as an average, and the average person loves you and wants a photo, a handful want to kill you, but we all focus on those loud and violent few that want to harm us – of course we do, it’s a shock to us.
‘You need to focus on the ninety percent approval rating for Robin Hood, not the small percentage of idiots who hate themselves as much as they hate you, the small percentage that can never be fixed or helped by society.’
He studied me. ‘You could be a nobody, a dead end job in Leicester, a small apartment, a second hand car, getting married, getting divorced, driving to work in the rain.
‘Or you can do something good with your life, make a difference, get into politics as you want to do and make the world a better place for the ninety percent.
‘And, as you are already planning, you can help with the safety net that catches the idiots before they fall, and when they fall, and hopefully before they kill someone in their local pub.
‘I envy your power and influence, and I envy your ability to see what is needed and to do it - when I fail to see and do it. I look after my family, you fight to look after your home town and … you make me look small in doing so.
‘Ingrid and I are proud of you, very proud of what you do, and you are the son we might have wanted to have, strong and brave and being Robin Hood.
‘And if you were my son, and doing what you do, I would hope that you continue to be Robin Hood, even with the risks and the worry for your parents, because being a nobody would be a terrible waste of your talent.
‘You have world fame now, and you should use that fame to try and make the world a better place, not hide away.’
I stared up at the old clock as it ticked away the seconds of my life. ‘We’re all born with a finite amount of time to do something useful – or something bad.
‘Most can’t do anything till they’re past forty and established, and when they get to sixty they retire, so … it’s twenty years of doing something useful at most.
‘And most politicians reach a climax and then fade, two terms in office at most, eight years to make a difference -’
‘Unless you comment from the side lines, like your radio show,’ he insisted. ‘Then you can have influence for much longer.
