Little Siberia

by Antti Tuomainen

  ‘I can’t really see him having a cigarette outside the War Museum,’ I say. ‘He performs miracles, but to be honest I think this one would be far-fetched even by his standards.’

  Grigori’s hand remains in his jacket pocket. He’s not smiling now.

  ‘If it’s all the same,’ I say. ‘I was just on my way to the museum. I can walk, if you’re not going that way. You can drop me where you picked me up. It’s fine.’

  Grigori is silent.

  ‘You don’t want more money,’ he says eventually. It’s not a question, just a statement of fact.

  ‘I don’t want any money at all.’

  He doesn’t look disappointed per se, but something about his expression seems to indicate he’s been misunderstood.

  ‘So you don’t want Paradise either,’ he says. Again, a statement, not a question.

  ‘Maybe I don’t want to believe the snake.’

  Grigori leans back in his seat. The shift in position changes the way he looks at me.

  ‘You’re a pastor in a remote village,’ he says, his voice now less pleasant than before.

  ‘That is true,’ I say.

  ‘You have no power whatsoever.’

  ‘I don’t need power.’

  ‘I don’t need to pay you,’ he says. ‘I could simply take what I want. If I want that meteorite, I’ll take it.’

  ‘I don’t believe that.’

  Grigori looks at me. ‘And who’s going to stop me?’

  ‘A pastor from a remote village,’ I say.

  Grigori turns his head, looks straight ahead. The snowfall has paused. Large, individual snowflakes lie on the car bonnet.

  Grigori’s speed takes me by surprise.

  The pistol is made of gleaming steel, probably a Smith & Wesson .375 Magnum. Grigori pulls it out of his jacket pocket, the same pocket from which he was supposedly going to produce his wallet. Which, of course, begs the question as to whether the wallet existed in the first place. I don’t have time to give the matter much thought. The barrel of the pistol is at my temple, Grigori’s hand pressing it against my skull. I can sense the weight of the metal, sense the strength and determination behind Grigori’s movements.

  ‘Out,’ he says. ‘Slowly.’

  I slide my right hand towards the handle. My movements are slow. I open the door, push it wide. With my left hand I unlock the seatbelt and it rolls back into its holder. The air inside the car lightens, the temperature plummets. Grigori continues to press the pistol against my head, the barrel almost boring through my skin.

  ‘Down on the ground, slowly,’ he says. ‘Take one step forwards.’

  I do as he says. I slowly lower myself to the ground, move one step closer to the main building of the Teerilä museum. A solitary lamp high on a pillar lights the yard.

  And now I realise what Grigori has in mind. He is watching me closely; he slides over onto the passenger seat and steps out of the car behind me, keeping the pistol tight against my head all the while. It isn’t the first time he’s done this.

  I’m standing in the freezing night with a gun at my back.

  ‘Forwards,’ he says.

  I take a few steps away from the car, then Grigori tells me to stop. He is still very close to me, but now not touching.

  ‘Turn around.’

  I begin turning to the right. When I have rotated almost ninety degrees, I pretend to stumble, as though I were about to fall on my right flank. I spin round to the left, drop down and dive towards him.

  The trick works.

  Grigori fires a shot at the spot where my chest should have been. I almost reach him, but he has moved a fraction further back. I grip his gun hand just as he starts spinning round. We turn 180 degrees – and the gun goes off again.

  The bullet would have hit me in the chest if I hadn’t tackled him and grabbed his arm. The movement that follows my lunge and the gripping of his arm continues. And when the bullet exits the barrel of the gun, the gun is pointing at Grigori’s chest.

  A long, black-and-red flare bursts from the back of Grigori’s jacket and sprays across the fresh snow.

  Grigori dies instantly. He falls to the ground silently, and the gun slides half a metre across the snow. Grigori is lying on his back, staring up at the sky. His blue eyes are as open as they could possibly be. The scent of gunfire is strong in the pure winter air.

  I try Grigori’s pulse. It’s gone. I pull back his trench coat. There’s a bullet hole in his suit jacket. There’s surprisingly little blood. The bullet has travelled through his heart, which has stopped pumping blood instantly. I stand up.

  My thoughts are whirling, swirling. Most emphatically – and to my great surprise – I find myself thinking of Krista, of how much I love her, how, above everything else, she is the most important thing. She is what really matters.

  I take a deep breath.

  I raise my eyes from Grigori to the stars. They are so bright that it almost looks as though they are connected with strands of filament. I blink my eyes, the filaments disappear. The universe expands at an ever-increasing rate. I am clearly in shock. I lower my eyes. Around me is the nocturnal forest, the undulating, snow-covered landscape…

  And further in the distance, a figure walking along one of the paths leading to the museum yard.

  7

  I think about things for a second, a second and a half at most.

  In my mind I see Krista’s face. She is everything. The thought is as bright as the brightest stars above.

  I grip Grigori beneath the armpits, haul him almost upright and pull him towards the car. The door is still open, and I manage to drag him inside. Once Grigori is in the seat I zip up his trench coat and attach the seatbelt. He sits there staring ahead, his eyes wide open. I wrap a dark scarf a few times round the headrest to keep him upright. Grigori is in the passenger seat and looks like a passenger – not someone who’s just shot himself through the heart. I fetch the gun from the ground and kick some snow over the bloodstains, then press the gun into Grigori’s pocket. His fingerprints are all over it, it’s been in his hand, it belongs to him, and fortunately, I’m wearing a pair of black gloves.

  Something on the dashboard begins to flash. A phone; a text message has arrived. In the upper corner of the large screen a blue bar glows brightly: the phone is sharing its location data.

  Again I glance down to the pathway. Yes, the person I saw has chosen the trail leading towards the yard. Thankfully the path dips slightly before leading up to the museum. The rolling hills give me some cover. I guess I still have a few seconds to get round to the driver’s side, slip into the car, start the engine and drive off, albeit with Grigori in the passenger seat. Then I’ll have time to think about things…

  But no. There is no time, not even a few seconds. I can already see the woolly hat bobbing beyond the ridge. Whoever this is, is walking at quite a pace. I dive inside the SUV, pull the door shut. I am about to jump behind the wheel but glance up to the path once more. I see the top of the head, then the face. I last saw that face this morning. There’s no way I could drive towards him without him recognising me. I jump into the backseat and curl up in the footwell.

  And not a moment too soon. I can hear the steps; they are heavy and determined. There is a tap on the window on the passenger side. Grigori, naturally, doesn’t answer. The steps move round the car. A moment passes. I can’t see what is happening outside. Then the door on the driver’s side opens. I hear a familiar voice.

  ‘Grigori,’ says Tarvainen. ‘My friend, I saw your car heading up this way. Stroke of luck I ran into you, eh?’

  Tarvainen’s voice and the rhythm of his English reveals that his state of inebriation is profound, acquired over an extended period of time. He climbs into the car. I see a slice of the back of his head. He sits down in the driver’s seat.

  ‘I’ve been thinking,’ he says. ‘A lot. I invite you out here, promise you a million euros. Together we start up a rally team. I get back to the top of the profession. T
hen you decide you don’t want to. I think about what went wrong. Then I understand. You don’t believe in me, and I wonder how I can make you believe in me. And I’ve got a solution. I’ll show you. I’ll show you how I can drive.’

  I hear Tarvainen opening a screw-top bottle, hear him taking great gulps. He grunts, puffs. I can smell the alcohol. His general scent is a mixture of petrol station and a bucketful of garlic.

  ‘Koskenkorva?’ he asks.

  I knew it. He offers the bottle to Grigori.

  Grigori needs to answer.

  I reach my right hand as far as I can between the seat and the door, careful to keep it out of sight behind the headrest. I find the end of the scarf round Grigori’s neck and grip it. Thankfully the scarf is made of flexible material. I gently pull the scarf to the side, once, twice, trying to make the movement look as much like the shake of a head as possible.

  ‘You don’t talk,’ says Tarvainen. ‘I know that. Leonid does the talking. You make decisions.’

  Tarvainen screws the top back on. The bottle rattles against the dashboard. The engine starts. The back of Tarvainen’s head disappears from view.

  ‘I’ll show you,’ he says. He is speaking so loudly that it feels as though he is shouting right next to my ear. ‘I’ll show you how to drive a car. Then you can decide. That’s what we’ll do. Is that fair?’

  Again I stretch out a hand. I try to think of my options. What if I refuse? I mean, what if Grigori refuses? I don’t believe for a moment that Tarvainen will back down. There will only be more discussion, more awkward questions and even more awkward answers. Maybe letting him drive is the lesser of these evils. It’s a step forward. It has to be. I’m doing this for Krista, I tell myself. I pull Grigori’s scarf lengthways. The stretchy scarf returns his head to its original position. Grigori gives a decisive nod. Twice.

  ‘Yes,’ Tarvainen yells, in a voice that resembles the sound a man makes when his favourite team scores a goal. ‘Five, four, three, two, one.’

  The engine starts to rev as Tarvainen does something with his feet. I hear a thud, then the car leaps forwards.

  Tarvainen might well be so drunk that he can’t tell the difference between the living and the dead, but he certainly knows how to drive a car. That much is clear within the first minute.

  Even to me, lying in the footwell in the back.

  I can feel and hear the snow and ice scraping against the bottom of the car and can only assume our speed must be well over the legal limit. At times we seem to slide almost sideways, but our speed remains the same. Then suddenly – we are flying.

  The car’s tyres release from the surface of the road and the motor howls. I feel a sense of weightlessness. Then the entire chassis rattles as we hit the ground again, and Tarvainen slams his foot on the accelerator. I hear him switching between the accelerator and brake pedals, slamming them to the floor in turn, like he’s hitting a punchbag.

  I press my feet against the door and hold on to the runners beneath the seat in front, gripping them for dear life.

  Tarvainen gives a shout. ‘Hold on, Grigori. This is just the beginning. The motor still has to warm up. The driver has to warm up.’

  The engine seems to complain, almost scream at the very thought.

  We pick up speed.

  The vehicle begins to shake in a way I’ve never experienced before. The car must be at the very limits of its abilities. I assume the German SUV’s abilities are already quite substantial, and in extracting the last remaining drops of horse power from the engine, the speed along the narrow lanes of Hurmevaara must surely be approaching suicidal dimensions.

  ‘We’re halfway there,’ shouts Tarvainen. ‘Then you can decide.’

  So Tarvainen is still planning on asking Grigori questions. The main thing is to avoid hurtling into a rockface or the trees. Down in the footwell, my ears ache from the noise. When I am on the verge of begging for mercy, the car suddenly turns into an aeroplane again. It’s a long-haul flight. Tarvainen howls above the sound of the engine.

  ‘Grigori, the meteorite is my million bucks! Another million from you. That’s the original plan. Imagine – an international rally team!’

  Our return to solid earth feels like an explosion. Tarvainen slams his foot on the accelerator. I guess we must be over halfway now. I can cope with the rest, if the car can cope. If Tarvainen can cope with his state of drunkenness and doesn’t make the kind of decisions that a man drunk on the idea of instant riches can make. Again the car takes flight.

  ‘Don’t say anything, my friend. A bit more, then we can shake on it…’

  The flight is just as long as the previous one. The crash landing hurts me to my kidneys.

  ‘Surprise!’ Tarvainen shouts.

  So it is possible after all: the car begins to pick up speed. The chassis rattles as the bottom of the car smashes against the snow and ice with such force that I can feel the impact through my body. I hold on. I can’t speak. I wouldn’t be heard anyway, because I can’t get up. The car seems to be floating in a purgatory between sky and earth. For a moment, nothing happens.

  Then Tarvainen simultaneously stamps on the accelerator and the brake, does something with his hands – I can hear him rattling the gearstick and thumping his hands on the dashboard. The car launches into a wild spin. I press my legs in one direction and my hands in the other.

  The SUV is like a food blender. It spins, the world around it spins. Tarvainen makes the motor wail, revs the engine more and more, letting it drop, then revving it again. The spinning seems endless – but somehow we manage to stay on the road.

  At last the speed seems to die down. It slows gradually until we are gliding calmly across the ice like a speed skater after crossing the finishing line. And finally, finally we come to a stop. My arms hurt. Though I’m lying down, I feel dizzy; but at least I’m alive. Inside the car it’s quiet. After a while I hear the sound of a bottle-top being unscrewed.

  Tarvainen stretches his head back, takes a long gulp and finally hisses. ‘World champion,’ he says.

  I’m unsure whether he’s referring to what just happened or to what might happen in the future – the future he and Grigori seem to have been planning together. A future in which, for one reason or another, cracks have started to appear. I’m in such a state of shock that I don’t comprehend what’s happening. Tarvainen says something and, after a moment, repeats himself. Naturally he offers the bottle to Grigori. I reach out my hand, only to pull it back at the last minute.

  Grigori’s scarf has disappeared.

  It must have loosened during the rodeo-ride a moment ago. Of course, Grigori’s head is now drooping down towards his chest. My theory is confirmed when I hear Tarvainen scream. It is a scream of terror, and he starts shouting out apologies. A few drunken words confirm the matter. Tarvainen thinks his reckless driving has caused Grigori’s death. A heart attack, maybe, or a stroke. To Tarvainen’s mind this looks like yet another lethal driving mistake – exactly the kind of misjudgement that sent him and his map-reader hurtling into an Alpine river. The map-reader drowned, but Tarvainen managed to survive – drunkard’s luck.

  The door opens. Tarvainen clambers out of the car. I hear his feet thudding to the ground; he starts running the moment he is back on terra firma. The footsteps disappear into the distance.

  I try to climb out of the rear door, but the child lock is on. I have to get up, haul myself between the front seats and crawl out via the driver’s door. I don’t so much as glance at Grigori. Finally I manage to extricate myself from the car.

  I vomit as soon as my feet touch the ground, hurl out everything inside me. I can’t remember the last time I felt this terrible, physically and mentally, or when the nausea has been this powerful and lasted this long. Perhaps it was in the field hospital in Afghanistan.

  For a moment I support myself against my knees, then take a few steps away from the car and look around. At first I can’t work out where I am, then I recognise the T-junction and see the fa
miliar road sign.

  We are a few kilometres from the centre of Hurmevaara. Tarvainen is nowhere to be seen. He has disappeared into the frozen night.

  The car has come to a stop in the middle of the deserted intersection. Behind us is a steep rockface. A set of deep skid marks reveals which direction we slid from. Tarvainen brought the car to a standstill about a metre and a half from the rocks. Admittedly a tour de force. But that’s as far as my respect goes. I vomit again.

  I don’t know what to do. I have no plan. In fairness, I didn’t have one before either. I realise that until now I haven’t needed one. All I had to do was trust in life and divine providence, whatever that means in my case. But in this situation, in this situation right now, I need a clear plan of action. There doesn’t appear to be one. Nothing can prepare you for something like this. Not to mention…

  Krista.

  She is the one I should be thinking about. She is the one I’m afraid of losing. Everything else seems to be in flux, in doubt – but not her. I love her. I want to live my life with her.

  The thought is, at the very least, conflicting, because it doesn’t change the fact that she is still carrying another man’s baby and I am in the middle of an intersection with a dead man in the passenger seat.

  8

  The site is located slightly above the rest of the terrain, the rockface provides shelter from the eastern winds. But a cold wind has started gusting from the north, and at this particular location and at this time of night it is biting cold. My hat and gloves have disappeared. I take the thick, red scarf from around my neck and wrap it round my head and across my face, leaving a narrow slit for my eyes.

  This is Hurmevaara on a frozen January night: it will take the police at least three quarters of an hour to get here from Joensuu, and I don’t much like the thought of sitting in the car and keeping Grigori company.

  I take my phone from my pocket. I don’t know what I’m about to say or where to start. Maybe I should just inform them of the situation, of what I see in front of me: an SUV, a dead man. Then once the police arrived I could start taking the story to pieces and tell them about the events leading up to this: Grigori’s self-assassination, the rally driving, Tarvainen. It doesn’t take military training to know it doesn’t look too good when two people have a disagreement and one of them ends up shot to death – even when the one left alive is a man of the church.