Death Spiral

by Leena Lehtolainen

  The door to the interrogation room opened and a legal aid counselor I knew vaguely—we’d been in some of the same lectures at law school—came out and asked Ström irritably when the interrogation would continue. His client was tired.

  “I’m fucking tired too,” Ström said to me and headed back into the room.

  Grabbing Koivu by the sleeve, I asked him if he had any time to meet that night.

  “I want to do a little brainstorming with Taskinen and Silja if Taskinen agrees. We could pick Silja up from practice at seven and go over to their house.”

  “Silja? Then I have time . . . I was going to work out in the weight room here, but that can wait,” Koivu said, grinning. Back in my office, I called Taskinen and arranged everything. Then I brushed my teeth in the women’s restroom, locked my office door, and crawled under a blanket on the couch. For once being short did me some good because I could stretch out all the way.

  The nurse had told me to rest, and I didn’t have time to go home. I started doing relaxation exercises, and even though the Creature was kicking up a fuss because my movements weren’t rocking it anymore, I fell asleep in under a minute.

  12

  I dumped the dregs of chamomile tea down my throat and rocked my hips back and forth. I was trying to get the baby wriggling in my womb to calm down before it put a foot through my rib cage. The Creature was bored: it was after ten and we had been rehashing Noora’s case and all the associated oddness for almost three hours. We were getting close to something, though.

  “I’m starting to feel there’s a lot more going on in the background than we thought at first,” I said, and explained my suspicions about Teräsvuori’s connections in Russia, Tomi Liikanen and Anton Grigoriev’s friendship, and Grigoriev’s strange death.

  This wasn’t a formal meeting, and even Silja had been helping us. Although she had a hard time imagining Elena could have had anything to do with Noora’s death, she knew a surprising amount about Elena’s family life. Koivu suggested all sorts of imaginative theories, probably trying to seem funny and intelligent in front of the girl he liked. Now and then Taskinen and I just sat back and let the two of them speculate.

  We would have to investigate Tomi Liikanen and Vesku Teräsvuori’s connections to Russia. The suspicions about links to the drug trade weren’t implausible—according to Silja, Tomi Liikanen visited Saint Petersburg almost every month. I remembered Teräsvuori’s inquiries about shipping karaoke equipment to Russia and the Baltic. Silja thought it was likely Noora had got the diet pills from Tomi Liikanen.

  “Elena could have ordered Noora to take them even though she denies it,” Silja said a little reluctantly. “They were all worried about Noora gaining weight. For the last couple of weeks, Janne had been complaining about lifting her. Noora just screamed at him that he should spend more time in the gym if he wasn’t up to it. But in the dressing room she would cry even though she didn’t want me to see.”

  Noora’s relationship with Silja had been conflicted. On one hand, Noora had been jealous of Silja’s beauty, and she competed with her for Janne’s attention. On the other hand, she couldn’t help liking Silja because she was generous and took figure skating just as seriously as Noora did. Maybe becoming star athletes as teenagers had turned both girls into adults before their time. Although I had been an adult at seventeen too, oh so mature and serious and knowledgeable about how the world should be. Nowadays I was sure of much less.

  “There are some pretty weird people who go to Tommy’s Gym,” Silja said. “Tomi always takes the biggest ones into his office. Who knows what he’s selling them.”

  “Damn, I wish I’d had a better look around that office,” I said. “So it doesn’t surprise you Noora was taking appetite suppressants? Were you ever offered anything illegal?”

  “I doubt anyone would dare give me anything like that, since they know my dad is a policeman,” Silja said with a smile. “I think Janne might have tried something a few years ago . . . that would have been around the time Elena started coaching us. Everything was a little topsy-turvy back then. I think Rami realized Janne was taking something, because it caused him to break out so bad, and he talked some sense into him. Ask Rami.”

  “Elena has never even hinted that Tomi might know Vesku Teräsvuori,” Taskinen said pensively. “Rami and Elena were both interviewed when the police gathered evidence against Teräsvuori, because they could testify he had been hanging around outside the ice rink waiting for Noora. Maybe Elena really didn’t know.”

  It felt good to talk about the case in such a comfortable environment. Usually I spent too much time in my head, often because I felt my questions were too stupid to ask anyone else. We agreed that Koivu, whom Teräsvuori wouldn’t recognize, would keep an eye on him for a couple of days. Taskinen had some old acquaintances in the Moscow militia, so he would look into Tomi Liikanen and Anton Grigoriev’s relationship. Even though Taskinen wasn’t a card-carrying anything politically, in the early seventies he had stumbled into the Finland–Soviet Union Peace and Friendship Society. I wondered if that was still considered a mark against him in terms of his prospects for promotion.

  The next morning I drove to the Nieminens’ house. It was as gray as a squirrel’s winter coat again, and raindrops crisscrossed the windshield. The dandelions that had brazenly broken the surface of the ground were closed up tight, and a wagtail in a tree looked as if he’d been cheated.

  Hanna answered the door. Her makeup was just as smudgy as on the previous days, and her eyes looked at me through a haze.

  “Oh, you again . . .” she said absentmindedly. “I don’t have time to talk right now. Ulrika is here. We’re planning Noora’s funeral.”

  Hanna marched toward the kitchen. Today she was wearing a gray knitted dress, which she had tried in vain to make look fitted with the aid of a narrow black belt. Her black heels were high enough to be awkward, her rear end jutting out and her gait unsteady. Ulrika Weissenberg sat in the kitchen, and her carefully plucked eyebrows went up when she saw me. Catering brochures and recipe lists were piled on the table. Under one I could see a hymnal.

  “Hello,” I said to Weissenberg, whose presence didn’t really fit with my plan. Hanna certainly wasn’t going to speak openly with her around.

  “Have the police finally made some progress? It’s been a week already,” Ulrika replied brusquely.

  “We’re learning more every day.” My voice sounded strong and confident, and I asked Hanna if we could speak privately.

  She shifted uncertainly, picking up a glass from the counter and looking at the bottom of it as if an unseen world might open up through it. It was as if she hadn’t heard my request at all. After a moment she sighed, opened the cupboard, and put the glass away with a trembling hand.

  “I’ll add up the total while the two of you talk,” Ulrika said to Hanna reassuringly, and for the first time I considered whether she might really be helping the Nieminens out of friendship rather than a simple desire for control. It was apparent that Hanna was in no shape to arrange a funeral by herself. She seemed to be slipping into an increasingly incoherent state with every passing day. She was obviously taking sedatives, but maybe what she really needed was a psychiatrist.

  Hanna took me to Noora’s room. Nothing had changed there since my previous visit: the purple sweater and black tights were still lying on the couch, the black-and-orange sweater collecting dust on the coffee table. I sat down on the couch, careful not to move anything. Hanna hesitated for a moment and then sat down on Noora’s bed. She stroked the pale-violet satin blanket that peeked out from under the edge of the white bedspread.

  “I wanted to talk about Vesku Teräsvuori again. Last time you mentioned all the different people he knew. Did he ever mention knowing Tomi Liikanen?”

  The flesh around Hanna’s fingernails was raw and red, her right little finger so swollen that it must have hurt terribly when Hanna started picking at it again.

  “Tomi . . . Elena’s husband? No
. . . or, yeah, I guess they met a couple of times when we were picking Noora up from the rink and Tomi was getting Elena.”

  I nodded. Of course it was perfectly possible that the two men had met that way, but now they were definitely more than passing acquaintances.

  “Vesku has to travel quite a lot around Finland for work, right?”

  Hanna nodded. “Sometimes he hosts karaoke on the Tallinn ferries too.”

  “Does Vesku do any sports? Does he visit a gym?”

  “Not when I knew him. He said that singing and working with people kept him active without having to work up a sweat. Vesku thought exercising was sort of strange. He said it was ridiculous to work so hard for no money.”

  For a second Hanna stopped to think and an odd, amused smile crept onto her lips.

  “I’ve always thought Kauko and Vesku didn’t have anything in common. But they do. Kauko says exactly the same thing about exercise. That it doesn’t make any sense. He only drives Sami to hockey practice so he can play in the NHL and be a millionaire someday like Teemu Selänne. ‘If the girl is good at figure skating, then the boy must be talented too,’” Hanna said, imitating her husband’s voice. “Why are you asking about Vesku again, though? You said he had an alibi for the time Noora was killed. Doesn’t he?”

  The haze was starting to disappear from Hanna’s eyes, and a bright, grim gaze flared in them. I didn’t answer because I didn’t want to drive her into a new rage, but not saying anything was enough of an admission for her.

  “Why don’t you arrest him already! What are you waiting for? Do you want him to kill my son next? Or me? I saw the other side of Vesku, the one that didn’t hesitate to hit a woman or threaten people. Why don’t the police believe me?”

  “We believe you,” I said, although my assurance sounded feeble.

  What had Teräsvuori meant when he said that he and Liikanen knew who had killed Noora and why? For some reason I had the feeling that it would be easier to get Tomi Liikanen to admit their acquaintance than Teräsvuori.

  “How well did Noora and Vesku know each other? Your children lived here with your husband while you were with Teräsvuori, right?”

  “Yes, of course. I’m sure you think I’m a monster for leaving my children and thinking about myself for a while! Do you think it’s been fun for me all these years, living as Kauko’s secretary and his children’s maid? Mom this and mom that, where is the cereal and where are my socks? Of course I could never dream of saying that sometimes I hated Noora’s damn prima donna routine. Our little diva never had time to think about everyday things like washing dishes or ironing her own clothes, since she had to concentrate on finding just the right position for her little finger during some spin. Playing ice princess is easy when someone else has been driving you to the rink since you were four! She never said thank you for anything and just talked about how wonderful her coaches were, but never her mother, not even by accident . . .” Hanna’s voice began to tremble, the light gone from her eyes again, replaced by a flow of tears. “But now I can say whatever I want. I don’t care what anyone thinks! I’ve already been punished for it . . .”

  Hanna burst out weeping, which called Ulrika Weissenberg to the door of Noora’s room.

  “Are you trying to drive her out of her mind?” Weissenberg snapped at me. “Can’t the police at least show a little respect to a grieving mother and not barge in like this with no notice? You should—”

  A crash from the direction of the kitchen cut off Ulrika.

  “Vesku is outside! He’s going to kill us all!” Hanna shrieked. She also said something about getting the rifle from the living room, but instead of hanging around to listen I rushed into the kitchen as quickly as possible, given my belly. I was ready for a scene from a Rambo movie, but there was no Teräsvuori. All of the windows were unbroken, but shards of glass covered the floor. Apparently Hanna had left the cupboard door open and the glass she had placed on the shelf had fallen, taking with it a couple of empty vases that had been sitting on the counter.

  “Nothing to worry about!” I yelled back toward the wailing. “A glass just fell.”

  But the vases breaking was a catastrophe for Hanna, who became completely hysterical. From the screaming I deduced they had been awards Noora had received. Ulrika and I barely managed to keep Hanna away from the shards of green and clear glass because she wanted to reassemble the vases.

  “Where are the broom and dust pan?” I yelled to Ulrika over Hanna’s howls. Ulrika moved with familiarity around the Nieminen’s house, instantly opening just the right cupboard, but instead of cleaning, she handed the tools to me. So I started sweeping. This wasn’t the first time I had done this during this investigation. Ulrika tried in vain to calm down Hanna. Finally she used the old-fashioned method: she slapped Hanna hard across the cheek. This just made Hanna shriek even worse.

  “Do you know if Hanna has been to the doctor since Noora’s death?” I yelled to Ulrika, who seemed furious that she wasn’t in control of the situation anymore.

  “Kauko didn’t think it was necessary.” Ulrika hissed.

  “But she’s taking sedatives?”

  “They’re probably left over from Teräsvuori’s trial.”

  Sidling up as close to Hanna as I could, I grabbed her by the shoulders and tried to catch her wandering gaze.

  “Hanna, calm down! Nothing’s wrong,” I said as if talking to a child who had had a bad dream. After a bit more coaxing, I managed to stop the shrieking and even got her to go look for her lorazepam and take a tablet.

  “If you care so much about this family, then you need to get Hanna some help. Slapping isn’t going to help, and she only has two pills left,” I said to Ulrika when I got back.

  “Shouldn’t you be concentrating on catching Noora’s killer? That would be the best therapy for Hanna,” Ulrika said antagonistically and nearly shoved me out the door. I felt like kicking the gold BMW standing in the backyard, but I settled for making a face at the closed door.

  But Hanna’s distress had caught hold of me like an airborne infection. The Creature was going to add so many new worries to my life. Of course people were built to expect their children to outlive them. And no, it hadn’t been very smart asking Hanna about Vesku Teräsvuori. That only provoked her fears. But now it was looking possible that he had actually killed Noora. I hoped Koivu’s stakeout would yield some evidence.

  In order to get my mind off things, I turned on the radio, and fortunately Die Toten Hosen’s “Bonnie und Clyde” was playing. Immediately I felt better. Apparently the Christian Conservatives were right when they said punk music was corrupting the youth or our country, because I instantly felt like having a whiskey in a smoky dive bar. According to the baby books, expectant mothers were supposed to listen to Mozart and Vivaldi.

  I was just crossing an overpass when I noticed a car below me on the Turku Highway speeding wildly, a Black Maria with lights flashing in hot pursuit. At the same time my police radio crackled into life: “Red Nissan Micra, license number AZG-577.”

  The number sounded familiar, but it took me a few seconds to realize it was Janne Kivi’s car. What had the boy gone and done now?

  Even though charging after my colleagues down the Turku Highway wasn’t even a little bit smart, I did a U-turn just before the road that branched off to the police station and took the on-ramp. Janne and his pursuers would already be a mile ahead of me. Even so I managed to make contact with the patrol, Haikala and Akkila.

  “This driver’s out of his mind!” Akkila yelled. “He hasn’t gone below a hundred and forty the whole time. Must be a stolen car, or he’s drunk. OK, we’ve got a straightaway. We’re pulling up alongside. Haikala, give me the megaphone!”

  The connection went dead as I passed a Lada and two vans crawling along. I tried not to press on the gas too hard, even though a feeling of panic had overtaken me. Maybe Janne was trying to kill himself. Maybe he was flooring his little Nissan hoping it would go out of control under a logging
truck or into a rock wall. I didn’t quite trust Akkila and Haikala’s ability to handle the situation. I could easily imagine them chasing Janne, thinking they were on the heels of a dangerous drug dealer in Los Angeles. Both of them were new to the force and far too enthusiastic about using force—Akkila carried a pistol constantly. Haikala was a kickboxing expert and more than happy to demonstrate his skills during arrests even when it wasn’t necessary. Keeping them together was a mistake in my opinion; both of them needed someone older and calmer to partner with.

  I realized I was driving dangerously fast myself, but I didn’t bother braking or moving out of the left lane. I had to find out what had happened to Janne.

  I had just reached the hill before the downtown Espoo exit when Akkila announced that they had managed to make the stop. From the top of the hill I could see the police van pulled over on the shoulder, almost concealing the smaller red car. Moving into the right lane, to the irritation of everyone behind me, I braked and pulled up behind the other two vehicles. Even while I was concentrating on parking, I saw Haikala roughly drag Janne out of the Nissan. Janne resisted as much as he could. When Akkila slammed him against the hood, Janne tried to kick Akkila in the groin, but he dodged. Haikala leaned all his weight on Janne’s back and started handcuffing him.

  “What the hell is going on here?” I yelled, levering myself out of the car.

  “Hey, Kallio,” Akkila said, looking irritated. “We’ve got this. OK, kid, let’s see your ID.”

  Haikala turned his head toward me, showing off the red scrape on his jaw. Had Janne punched him? That would explain why they were being so heavy handed.

  “Show us your driver’s license—or do you even have one?” Akkila said. “And your registration. Or isn’t this your car?”