‘Protein, caffeine, creatine;’ Robin explained the contents of the bottle in front of him. ‘Before my workout.’
‘Workout?’
‘It’s hard work.’
Chico shook his head. ‘I don’t know.’
‘You said yourself: what if he doesn’t grass us up – ever? This is a preventative measure.’
Again. Another new term.
‘It’s a bit … final.’
‘Not for us. Nature will take care of the rest. We just … prepare the food and someone else will eat it.’
Chico looked at the man sitting across the table, a man he no longer knew at all. ‘That sounds even worse.’
Robin gave a melodramatic shrug. ‘I thought you wanted to be a rock star, I thought that was your dream.’
Chico drank his beer. It wasn’t nearly worth six fifty.
‘I want…’ he began but didn’t know how to continue – with anything. He felt like he’d already given everything. And now he was being asked to give more. ‘I’m just not sure this is the path we should…’
‘I bet Springsteen wouldn’t think like that.’
‘Springsteen is hardly sitting in a small-town bar, just shy of forty and with no money to his name, wondering how to take out his boss.’
‘Or maybe he is. And there you have it. You said it yourself. Bruce is the boss. He’s already got rid of all the other bosses.’
‘He didn’t kill them.’
‘How do you know?’ asked Robin and again sounded like a complete stranger. Chico recognised the rhythm of the speech, but couldn’t say who it belonged to. ‘Maybe Bruce saw an opportunity and grabbed it. Maybe he realised that sometimes you’ve gotta do what you’ve gotta do. And maybe Bruce hasn’t told the whole truth about how he got his career off the ground. Of course, he’s not going to blurt out that he was involved with the Jersey mafia, he’s not going to let on where he found the money for his first real guitar. They have omertà. The law of silence. How much do you bet Bruce is a hitman? Think about it. He’s got the perfect alibi. Constantly on the road, travelling from one town to the next. And nobody would bat an eyelid if they saw him moving around at night. Everyone’s, like, Hey it’s Bruce, everybody’s buddy, probably coming home from a gig. And he is – but it’s not the gig they think.’
Chico stared at Robin. Robin sipped his protein shake.
‘Robin, Bruce is not a hitman.’
‘You believe what you want.’
‘I’ve read his autobiography…’
‘Right, his autobiography. Who’s going to write, Oh, by the way, I killed a rival singer last week. Think about all the drug killings, the overdoses, a private jet falls out of the sky, a car plunges down a ravine, a rival rock singer dies inexplicably. Suddenly Bruce is in New York or Los Angeles at the same time, strutting around, muscles bulging, always ready to grab the mic. Coincidence? I think not.’
Chico shook his head. ‘This is…’
Robin leaned forwards. ‘This is your last chance. Guitar or no guitar. Do you want to spend the rest of your life roaming around that miserable beach?’
The final question was phrased in a way that Chico knew only too well. It hit the exact spot – the place that was the seat of all his frustrations and about which he had poured his heart out to Robin all these painful years. It was just about the only sensible thing Robin had said that evening, but it was the crux of the matter, the only reasonable question Chico could have asked himself.
Do you want to be on that beach for the rest of your life? Answer: no.
He wanted a fresh start, one last chance. The one he thought he’d already had, but which … he might be about to get again. Robin was right. He still had an astonishing ability to find clarity amid the confusion.
And there was another, more pressing factor at play too: Jorma Leivo was going to sell them out. So why shouldn’t they sell him out first? Chico finished off his pint.
‘Let’s get the spades,’ he said.
PART THREE
RESULTS
1
Jan Nyman had no other option but to interrupt the senior constable. Nyman raised a hand, slowly but firmly, as if to ask a question in class. The constable understood the sign, slowed his words and eventually stopped mid-sentence.
‘Yes?’
‘May I go to the bathroom?’ asked Nyman.
Nyman couldn’t imagine there was really anything to think about here. He was silent, and looked the senior constable in the eye.
‘Very well,’ he sighed eventually. ‘Leo can go with you.’
Nyman looked at the deputy. Leo seemed uncomfortable.
‘The more the merrier,’ said Nyman.
Leo’s already reddened cheeks now looked as if they were on fire.
‘Leo,’ said the constable. ‘Use the staff bathroom.’
They stood up. Nyman was first to walk through the door and remained standing in the corridor. Leo, the young constable, passed him and ushered him onwards. Nyman followed him. The old wooden floorboards creaked cosily with every step. Nyman noted that the sound was quite distinct. They arrived at a doorway at the far end of the short corridor. The staffroom ahead of them stank of stale coffee, and the bathroom was situated behind a round dining table. Nyman realised why the constable had told them to use this bathroom; the public bathroom was in the foyer, right next to the front door. This, however, was at the back of the building, with no possible escape route
Nyman stepped into the cubicle, locked the door and did his business. He flushed the toilet, washed his hands and dried them. He took his phone from his pocket. The battery had died. Nyman sighed. He placed his hands on the lock and the handle and rattled them back and forth in different directions. The door did not open, but the sound of the ratcheting was just right. Nyman paused. He was sure he could hear footsteps behind the door.
‘Leo,’ he called through the door.
‘Yes?’
Leo’s voice sounded like it was very nearby; he must have been standing directly on the other side of the door.
‘Leo, the door’s stuck.’
‘How?’
‘I don’t know. I’m not a locksmith. Go and get help.’
‘Help?’
‘Can you open the door from that side?’ Nyman asked and tightened his grip on the lock and the handle.
Leo tried the handle. ‘It’s locked.’
‘I know that, Leo. Fetch a screwdriver and open the lock from that side.’
‘I don’t know…’
‘The lock is jammed. I can’t stay in here.’
Silence.
‘I’ll have to ask Reijo.’
Nyman said nothing. He gave the handle another rattle and waited. Eventually he heard Leo’s footsteps walking away from the door. Then he heard the creaking of the floorboards. Leo was in the corridor. Nyman opened the door and stepped outside.
From the staffroom, the only possible direction was the way they had come in. Nyman quickly crept to the doorway, glanced into the corridor and saw Leo’s back at the door to the interview room. Nyman jumped across the floorboards to the door on the other side of the corridor and landed right on the threshold. The frame was made of strong material and didn’t make a sound. Leo remained where he was, and Nyman slipped into the room.
This was clearly an office for two people. There was one window. Nyman moved the framed photographs of children and teenagers from the windowsill, gripped the handle and carefully pulled the window ajar. The window frame made a noise that sounded like the dying gasp of an ageing opera singer. Nyman yanked the window fully open. He heard the creaking of floorboards, the thud of footsteps, shouting.
Nyman jumped. The rosebushes tore his shins. He clambered through the bushes, millions of tiny thorns lacerating him on the way. The thorns were strong and as sharp as tacks. The pain brought tears to his eyes.
‘Where do you think you’re going?’ Nyman heard Leo’s voice behind him.
Nyman thought better of saying
he had a dinner date with a potential murderer. He finally emerged from the bushes and broke into a run. He was an experienced runner, but the thorns had affected his legs. They were on fire. Nyman glanced behind him. Leo dashed out of the main door, and Nyman instantly saw that Leo could run too.
Nyman crossed the street, tried to get his bearings and choose the best possible route. The asphalt road turned into a dirt track. Even if his phone hadn’t been out of battery, he didn’t have time to check the map. Nyman realised he would be no match for Leo once they were on flat ground. Nyman ran as fast as he humanly could, and still it seemed as though Leo was gaining on him with every step.
This was an area of detached houses. Wooden houses with lush green gardens. Nyman headed off the path and into one of the gardens, ran between the rows of currant bushes and hurdled across a fence. Garden upon garden. A trampoline. A playhouse. A barbeque. A ride-on lawnmower the size of a tractor. A barking dog. A trampoline. A playhouse. A barbeque. A quad bike. A barking…
Just when he thought he’d managed to lose Leo, he heard the deputy approaching again.
Nyman dipped beneath a row of apple trees and arrived in yet another garden. In the garden was a wooden house – and Nyman saw that the porch door was ajar. He ran to the door, opened it, stepped inside and quietly pulled the door shut behind him, all the while keeping his eyes on the garden.
Leo burst from beneath the apple trees just as Nyman had a moment earlier. Nyman imagined that Leo would continue running, but he didn’t. He slowed before the next garden, stopped and looked around.
Nyman tried to steady his breathing. And, once he had, he heard it: he wasn’t the only one panting. He carefully turned around.
On the screen of the laptop that had fallen to the floor, a curvaceous blonde woman was engaged in what seemed like mortal combat with a black man of substantial endowment. The tempo was frantic, the voices of the actors ecstatic. But this X-rated Grand National wasn’t the only thing waiting for him in the porch.
Behind the computer, slumped in a cosy dark-blue armchair, a boy of about fourteen sat with a look of terror on his face, his right hand still clenched around his glistening fire-red joystick.
Nyman looked the boy in the eyes as calmly as he could and raised his right forefinger to his lips. Everything’s all right, he gestured to the boy with his left hand, let’s take it easy. Nyman couldn’t tell whether the boy registered any of his hand signals.
Nyman carefully peered out into the garden. Leo was standing on the spot, glancing back the way he had come, then to the sides.
He looked back at the boy. Nyman wished the boy would release his grip and maybe even pull up his trousers, but he seemed frozen stiff, in every possible way. Nyman hoped he hadn’t caused the kid any lasting trauma. Youth can be a delicate time. Nyman was about to whisper to the boy that there was a blanket within reach, but he didn’t have time. What the boy did next was utterly incomprehensible.
‘Mum!’ he screamed. ‘Mum!’
Nyman shook his head and looked out into the garden. Leo was approaching.
Nyman locked the door, ran through the house to the front door – and naturally couldn’t see a sign of Mum anywhere. He opened the door, closed it carefully behind him, and found himself on the street again.
He crossed the road, arrived at another garden: more currant bushes, a pile of firewood and a dartboard with a picture of an obnoxious celebrity pinned to the top. Nyman climbed over the mesh fence and tried to make his way forwards behind the bushes, trees and hedges, but realised almost at once that it was impossible.
He saw the police car on the street. It was moving slowly, gravel crunching beneath its tyres. The senior constable was driving.
Nyman had to change direction. He circled the house, climbed on top of a slatted wooden fence, and from his vantage point he saw the main road.
A few gardens, a dirt track and a narrow strip of thicket later, he was standing at the main road with his thumb in the air. Nyman was a typical Finnish man, and thus asking for help was the last thing that would normally enter his mind. But now his thumb had risen all by itself.
It was the eighth car that finally stopped. Nyman ran up to the small grey Volvo. He opened the passenger door and leaned inside. Behind the wheel sat a burly man in his fifties with a broad smile, his face so suntanned it had turned the bright red-brown colour of pine trees in the evening sun. The man had short hair, metallic-rimmed glasses, a brown waistcoat whose every pocket seemed stuffed to the brim, and a flannel shirt.
‘Where you heading?’ he asked.
‘I need to get to Shore Street,’ said Nyman.
The man clearly thought about this for a moment.
‘Yes, I’m driving down that way. But I’ll have to stop at the petrol station.’
Did Nyman have any choice?
‘That’s fine,’ he said. The most important thing was to get away from the road, to safety, and head in vaguely the right direction. He sat down. The car set off. There was a pungent whiff inside the car. Fish, he realised. Nyman glanced at the back seat. Boxes of lures, reams of fishing line, a detached reel. In the footwell was a net.
‘Where is the petrol station?’ he asked.
‘Just down the road, right by the police station.’
Nyman said nothing.
‘I’m Matti.’
‘Jan.’
‘Car break down, eh?’
‘I only got a lift one way.’
They drove back towards the area through which Nyman had just sprinted. The now-familiar gardens flashed past in reverse order. Nyman was going back to the starting line.
‘Listen,’ he began ‘I don’t mean to be rude, but I’ve got a very important meeting and…’
‘I understand,’ said the man. ‘I’ll take a shortcut.’ And straight away he turned the car.
Nyman recognised the street. It was the one with the house he had just run through. Maybe the teenage boy had finally managed to release the grip on his crank. If not, he really would need his mother.
The police car came into view at the other end of the street. It must have either reversed or driven round the block.
‘Can I put the seat back?’ asked Nyman. ‘I’m a bit allergic to fish.’
‘To fish?’
‘I think so. I feel dizzy. Anyway, I think I’ve eaten quite badly today.’
‘Fish?’
‘No, I don’t eat fish. With my allergy and everything…’
‘Even trout? You allergic to trout?’
‘Even trout.’
‘Herring?’
‘And herring.’
‘What about grilled perch?’
‘That too.’
‘Fillet of whitefish?’
‘Whitefish is a … fish too.’
‘Smoked salmon?’
‘Can I just put the seat back?’
The police car was getting closer. Nyman pulled the lever at the side of the chair. The mechanism reacted painfully slowly. It felt as though he was in a slow-motion film while everything else was speeding up. Nyman decided to slide down the seat as far as he could. He realised Matti was more than a little bewildered.
‘You must be feeling pretty rough. Never seen a man squirm like that. Shall I drop you at the doctor’s? It’s right opposite the police station.’
Was there anything round here that wasn’t in the immediate vicinity of the police station? thought Nyman.
‘No thanks,’ he said. ‘I’ll be fine, if I can just rest a little.’
The passenger seat was finally as far back as it would go. By now Nyman was almost crouching in the footwell And not a moment too soon. As he slid below the dashboard, he could just make out the interior of the police car. All he could do was stare at the car ceiling and hope for the best.
‘Well,’ said Matti. ‘Looks like Reijo Pitkänen in that squad car. I could ask him—’
‘I’m really in a quite a hurry. Very important meeting.’
‘Of course.’
In some respects, thought Nyman, this was the longest car journey he had ever undertaken. From his hideout in the footwell, he saw Matti wave a hand and guessed they must have passed the police car. A moment later, they turned. Nyman remained where he was.
At the petrol station, Nyman raised the back of the seat, not fully but just enough to see out of the window. If anyone noticed him, he hoped he might look like a child. At least at a quick glance. Matti took an age to fill up the tank. What were the odds that the one car to pick him up was almost out of petrol? He sat facing the police station. He could see the spot in the rosebushes he had jumped into and then struggled his way through. His legs were still sore. Eventually Matti replaced the petrol nozzle with a clank. Nyman imagined they would finally set off. Matti knocked on the window. Nyman rolled it down.
‘Something to drink? If you’re feeling woozy?’
‘No, thank you. I’m a little late…’
‘That’s right.’
Matti walked round the car and sat in the driver’s seat. He fastened his belt and looked as though he was gradually getting used to the idea that he was in the car again, taking back control. Eventually he started the car and they got under way. Nyman didn’t dare say anything. He wanted to keep a low profile.
‘What’s your line of work, then?’ asked Matti.
‘I’m a maths teacher.’
‘You’re joking?’ Matti exclaimed. ‘Me too.’
Nyman looked at Matti. What were the odds that he’d get in a car that was almost out of petrol and whose driver was a real maths teacher, a profession Nyman was doing his best to fake?
‘What grade?’ asked Matti.
‘What do you mean?’
‘What grade do you teach?’
‘Primary…’
‘Primary school, right. I’m in high school myself. Further maths is my thing. What do you think about the new curriculum?’
Palm Beach, Finland Page 21