The Year of the Hare - Arto Paasilinna [15]
After coffee, the superintendent set off for the village to take up his duties. The sound of his car faded down the forest road and drifted out of earshot.
Hannikainen went into the cabin and came out with some lard, which he sliced into the frying pan on the fire. The fat sizzled, and he tipped a one-pound can of beef and pork into it. The food was soon ready. Hannikainen cut some long slices from a large loaf of rye bread, put the burning-hot fried meat on them, and presented some to Vatanen. It was delicious. In Helsinki, Vatanen usually had difficulty coping with breakfast, but now the food tasted marvelous.
Hannikainen lent Vatanen the superintendent’s fishing gear, rubber boots, and a fishing smock. Vatanen’s own shoes and suit were left hanging on a nail in the cabin. Probably they are there to this day.
The men loafed around the cabin all day, fishing, making fish soup, lolling in the sun, looking at the grassy lake. In the evening Hannikainen took a bottle of vodka from his rucksack, creaked the cork out, and poured them each a shot.
Hannikainen was already getting on in years, pushing seventy, completely white haired, tall, talkative. In the course of the day, the men got to know each other. Vatanen related the what and wherefore of his journey. Hannikainen presented himself as a lonely widower spending his summers as the young superintendent’s fishing companion. He was well informed on world affairs and thoughtful by nature.
What, Vatanen wondered, was so unusual about Hannikainen? So far nothing to justify the superintendent’s remark of the previous evening had appeared in Hannikainen’s lifestyle, unless quiet summer fishing was coming to be considered unusual nowadays.
The answer to this question was on its way.
After the second shot of vodka, Hannikainen began to lead the conversation around to government politics in a more serious vein. He spoke of the responsibility of people in power, their influence and conduct, and revealed that, after retiring, he had begun to do some research into these concerns. Even though he had spent his life as a police superintendent in a country parish, he was astonishingly well informed about the constitutions of the Western countries, the nuances of parliamentary law, and jurisdiction in the socialist countries. Vatanen listened with keen interest to Hannikainen’s pronouncements on these major international questions, which constitutional lawyers often have to deal with in Finland, too.
According to Hannikainen, Finland’s constitution gave the president far too great a power of decision in state affairs. When Vatanen asked if he didn’t think President Kekkonen had managed to make exemplary use of the powers devolved on him, Hannikainen replied: “Over several years I’ve been making a close study of President Kekkonen . . . and I’m coming to a most disturbing conclusion, disturbing to myself, too. I don’t mean I’m disturbed by his performance. I’m actually rather an enthusiastic supporter of his administration, but nevertheless ... All I’m doing is collecting information. I form comparisons, I sift, I make inferences. The result is extremely disturbing.”
“And what conclusions are you coming to?”
“I’ve kept this affair a careful secret. No one but Savolainen knows, and a certain carpenter in Puumala. Neither of them will reveal the results of my investigations. You see—the conclusions my research has led to would, if published, have a nasty backlash. I might well lay myself open to the law, and at the very least I’d be made a laughing-stock.”
Hannikainen stared at Vatanen fixedly. His eyes froze.
“I’m getting on in years, and perhaps a little senile . . . nevertheless, I’m not completely cracked. If you want to know what I’ve unearthed, you must give me your word that you won’t use your knowledge against me, or against anyone else.”
Vatanen readily