“I’m not a gentleman.”
I hadn’t had many days like that, even though the work of a detective is more colorful than that of your average accountant. I’d headed out that morning with a wicked hangover to investigate the murder of the bank manager I had met the previous day, wrangled with the NBI, and negotiated the end of a siege between the police and a drunken subordinate who had run away from them. To cap it off, I’d discovered that a medical examiner I’d known and trusted for years had been implicated in the theft of a body. All I wanted was a shower and my own bed.
On the way home, I picked up some tandoori from the local Indian joint. The aroma tickled my nose as I walked down the street; I could already taste the spicy chicken in my mouth. Chase it down with a cold beer… I’d already forgotten the pain of the hangover the way a mother forgets the agonies of childbirth and is raring for a new round before she knows it.
“Ariel!”
I turned in the direction of the shout to see a hand waving from a light-colored car I had just walked past. We were no more than a couple hundred yards from my place. I moved closer, because the voice sounded familiar. The man in the car reached across to the passenger side, and the light from the streetlamp struck his face. Despite the baseball cap I immediately recognized him. He looked a lot older than he did in the photographs. It was Laurén. He had rolled down the window far enough for me to hear him, no more.
“I didn’t kill Halme.”
I’d left my firearm at HQ and had no interest in using force. Besides, I was exhausted and had my dinner dangling from one hand. So I decided to listen.
“Open the door and I’ll hop in.”
“No.”
I saw the sticker of a car rental agency on the side window. A description of the vehicle wouldn’t be much use.
“How did you hear about Halme’s death? Who warned you?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“Yes, it does, because the only ones who knew about it were the police and the killer.”
“It doesn’t matter, believe me,” Laurén said obstinately.
“So what happened in Marjaniemi?” I asked, leaning in until my face was nearly up against the window.
“Halme called to tell me you’d been in touch and wanted a list of members of the Sacred Vault. He also wanted to know why you were looking for me.”
“And why is that?” I asked.
Laurén looked surprised. His surprise surprised me. “Because of the theft and the funeral pyre.”
“Nothing else?”
“What do you mean?”
“In my view, and not just mine, your letters gave the impression you know who killed Anteroinen, assuming you didn’t do it yourself, and that more bodies are on the way.”
“I don’t know who killed Anteroinen, and I don’t care. It was a good deed. The way he’d lived his life meant an end like that was inevitable.”
“Headmaster Kivalo was also killed.”
“I can’t say I’m very sad about that either. And I didn’t mean to threaten anyone. I just repeated what it says in the Bible: God will wreak his vengeance upon evildoers.”
“Did you need to steal a body for that? Well, that’s a matter of opinion. Anteroinen molested children; Kivalo was worried about Daybreak’s reputation and turned a blind eye… what about Särkijärvi?”
The name made Laurén start. It was like he had slammed on the brakes.
“The Bible requires us to forgive our enemies. I love that book, but I can never forgive… if you knew how many souls that man has destroyed…” Laurén’s movements became compulsive, as if he were no longer in control of them. I saw him clench his fists.
“Let’s get back to Halme. So you met him last night. What time did he leave?”
It took a moment before Laurén was aware of my question.
“He never showed. He was supposed to come around eleven, but I never saw him.”
“He didn’t call to tell you he couldn’t make it?”
“No. I tried to call him, but he didn’t answer.”
“Who knew where you were hiding out? Except Sotamaa.”
“No one.” The tiny delay in Laurén’s reply told me he was lying.
“Someone had to know, otherwise the killer wouldn’t have known to expect Halme.”
“Maybe he and Halme came together.” Laurén’s reply indicated that he might be crazy, but he wasn’t stupid.
“What reason would anyone have to kill Halme?”
“Maybe he ran into some nutcase. It might have something to do with me, or it might be completely unrelated. Maybe he slept with the wrong man’s wife. He’s been that way ever since he was young. I’ve lied to his girlfriends for him dozens of times. The killer might be one of the women or husbands he screwed over.”
Laurén’s words threw me. Jealousy had been the farthest motive from my mind.
“Give me names if you have any.”
“Say, the current headmaster at Daybreak, Hätönen. He’s a former student. He went into education, and Halme and I used to run into him at parties during college. He had a fiancée; I think her name was Kristiina. Halme hit on her, and that was it for Hätönen and Kristiina.”
“Was he also a member of the Sacred Vault?”
“Hätönen? Not on your life. He wasn’t involved in anything that would have put his relationship with Daybreak’s administration in jeopardy. The Vault was way too radical; the administration didn’t look kindly on it.”
Laurén clearly didn’t care for people of Hätönen’s ilk. But when it came down to it, who did?
I steered the conversation back on track. “A husband who had been cheated on would otherwise fit the bill, but not now, because we’re talking about the location and timing of the crime. Halme was killed as soon as he got in touch with you.”
“There’s nothing more I can do for you.” Laurén looked past me, not in distance, but in time.
“I’m becoming more and more interested in knowing who the members of the Sacred Vault were. You can help me with that.”
“I only know the ones who were in it at the same time I was. The Vault is much older.”
“Let’s start with them.”
“Now isn’t the time. I just wanted to tell you it wasn’t me. You can count on that. I’ve made a vow to God to stick to the truth.”
I glanced at the meal in my hand. I lifted it up. “I want to eat this while it’s still warm.”
“Indian?”
“Tandoori chicken. Why don’t you come into HQ tomorrow and we can go through the whole mess again?”
“No, not yet.”
“When, then? There’s an APB out on you.”
“So keep searching. I’ll come in as soon as my labors are finished. There is much to be done, but the laborers are few.”
“You’re not planning on avenging yourself on Särkijärvi in any way, are you?”
“I never said that. What I said was I wouldn’t kill him… and I’m not doing it for myself, but for a lot of other people…” Laurén’s voice started quivering. “Tonto, my best friend from Daybreak, is lying in a coma… at least three people have killed themselves. Isn’t that enough of a reason?”
“I’ll have to tell my superiors that we spoke.”
“Go ahead. Good night, and God bless.”
“Wait a minute. Someone has killed three former Daybreak employees and now one student, a member of the Vault. If it’s not you, you might be next in line.”
“For he shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways. Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night; nor for the arrow that flieth by day.” Laurén rolled up the window and drove off.
I wrote down the license plate, even though I doubted it would do any good. The car would turn up somewhere, the driver wouldn’t. But I still called the plate in and asked all patrols to keep an eye out while going about their duties.
At home, I opened up the plastic takeout container and set the naan out on
a plate next it. The food had cooled so much that the aroma’s pungency had already dissipated.
The worst of it was, I wasn’t the least bit hungry anymore.
20
Simolin was like a well-trained bird dog. At a command, he took off after the scent, sniffing through the woods and alder brush and returning only when he could drop the bird he’d pointed at his master’s feet. Then he’d lunge off in pursuit of fresh prey.
I could instantly tell from the look on his face that he’d made another discovery. Nevertheless, he calmly seated himself across the table from me. I was in the canteen, with the salad of the day and a glass of kvass in front of me. The busiest lunch rush had passed, and there was no one in earshot.
“Well?”
“I think I figured out why that reporter named Moisio from Ilta-Sanomat is so well-informed. According to the student roster, a Heikki Ilmari Moisio was one year ahead of Laurén. After Daybreak, he got into law school and became a lawyer, first in Oulu and then Helsinki. Not quite two years ago he was stabbed to death in a building entryway in Kallio. The assailant was never caught.”
“Is he related to the reporter?”
“Big brother. Four years’ difference. The dad was a widower who owned a fur farm. He was religious, but the boys had gotten feral without a mother around. The older one had a conviction for narcotics possession, and the younger one was a troublemaker in school. Dad sent the older one to Daybreak Academy to break him in. The younger one was sent off to live with relatives in southern Finland; when the old man died, he inherited the farm, which was in debt.”
“Where did you get this information?”
“I called a fellow Native American enthusiast who lives in the same town. The Moisio brothers have a reputation there. My guess is Ilta-Sanomat Moisio got to know Laurén through his older brother. Which is also why Laurén picked him as his trusted reporter. Maybe the younger Moisio sees himself as being part of a joint revenge plan.”
“The older Moisio brother’s death doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with the case. It’s not as if he’s the first person to ever be stabbed in Kallio.”
“There’s no evidence, of course, but at least it gives a plausible explanation for the collaboration between Laurén and Moisio.”
Simolin’s hunch was probably more accurate than mine.
“Good work. Find out who investigated the Moisio stabbing and talk to them. I’ll be out of the office for a couple of hours, and my phone might be on silent. Leave a message if there’s anything urgent.”
I watched the woman’s hands as she set down the coffee cup in front of me. I could see they were shaking. I thought I caught the sound of cup clinking against saucer.
Saimi Vartiainen was a petite, uptight woman, and not just psychologically, but physically uptight, too. She was like a mummy that had been wrapped so securely that her rib bones creaked.
“I stand by what I wrote,” she said, seating herself at the table. At the same time, she pushed a plate of chocolate cookies in my direction. I took one out of politeness.
Ms. Vartiainen’s living room was surprisingly youthful and breezy for an old woman’s home. The furnishings in her Oulunkylä apartment were few, and tastefully chosen. The building was on an arterial; I distinctly heard the sound of buses rumble past. No wedding picture or high-school graduation photos of children or grandchildren. All signs pointed to Ms. Vartiainen being an old maid. I took a bite of the cookie and, since I had been raised to mind my manners, swallowed it before I said: “I don’t doubt it. I just want to make sure you know what you’re in for. I’m not trying to intimidate you, either, but if we decide to launch an investigation, we’ll have to interrogate you officially – or we won’t, but our colleagues from Espoo will.”
“So it’s not a clear-cut case?”
“Is anything ever? There’s also another if. If the prosecutor decides to press charges, the matter will go to court. In all likelihood, the case will be of interest to the media, which means reporters will want to interview you, too.”
“That sure sounds like intimidation to me,” she said dryly. “What’s your relationship to him again?”
“I’m his boss.”
“Of course.” Ms. Vartiainen managed to load the two words with an incredible amount of implication.
“Isn’t it natural that, as his superior, I want to be the first to hear what my subordinate is being accused of? Don’t worry, there’s no way I can make this go away, even if I wanted to.”
“Do you want to?” She looked at me, her neck rigid.
“No. You promised to provide us with more evidence.”
She passed an unsealed manila envelope lying on the table across to me. “I’ve kept a record of all of the visits Detective Oksanen and that other man from the Ministry of the Interior made to our company. You can have the diaries where I made the original notations if you want. In addition, I always made myself a note on those occasions when I was made privy to what they requested from Mr. Berg, for instance if they asked the company to sponsor a foreign trip to some police rally competition. There are at least three such instances. The company sponsored those trips to the tune of €3,000. Or when they asked for spare parts for cars. Of course I didn’t hear anything close to everything, but after each visit Mr. Berg generally told me to handle the matter. To inform the sales floor about the discounts and the accounting department about funds that needed to be paid to the rally club’s account. I’m sure you’ll find evidence of the transfers in both the company’s and the club’s bank records.”
“Have you informed Mr. Berg regarding your request we open an investigation?”
“Of course not, but I believe he will approve of – or at least understand – my decision. He mentioned on several occasions how awkward he found the situation.”
“Didn’t you ever question him as to why he continued sponsoring the club?”
“It’s not an administrative assistant’s place to ask such questions.”
I looked over Ms. Vartiainen’s head. Three colorful oil paintings hung on the opposite wall. One, a portrait of a young woman, I recognized as the work of Unto Pusa, and another as that of Sam Vanni. The painter of the third was unknown to me. The arrangement was relatively mundane, but the work had personality.
Ms. Vartiainen noticed my gaze. “Do you like those paintings?”
“They’re superb. Pusa and Vanni; who’s the third?”
“Gösta Diehl. I inherited it from my father. Are you fond of modern art?”
I admitted I was. But as interested as I was in postwar modernism, I didn’t pause to discuss the topic, nor could I have.
“Of course, we’ll have to question Mr. Berg as a witness. He’ll be subpoenaed to provide testimony in court. If he thought things were awkward before, this will be a whole new ball of wax.” I instantly regretted my words. I had instinctively taken sides, not necessarily Oksanen’s, but that of a fellow police officer.
Ms. Vartiainen paid no attention, though. It seemed as if she were considering the matter from this vantage point for the first time.
“Won’t my testimony suffice?”
“Unfortunately, the allegations are of such a serious nature that we’ll need all possible supporting evidence. You mentioned that Oksanen was blackmailing your boss somehow. How would that even be possible?”
“That’s what I assumed, because Mr. Berg was clearly dismayed by Detective Oksanen’s requests but still didn’t refuse them.”
“Is that all?”
“Oksanen also spoke in hints, as if he knew something unpleasant about the company or could find out if he wanted to, thanks to his status as a police officer.”
“How did the other man who accompanied Oksanen behave?”
“What was his name again? He had a round face and a loud voice. I had no problem hearing him through the door.”
“Arto Kalliola. He’s the deputy national police commissioner, works at the Ministry of the Interior.”
&
nbsp; “A big fish, then. He left the begging to Oksanen and just sat there quietly, but when the deals had been cut, he’d blossom into a real glad-hander. Pat everyone on the back and be so convivial.”
I had suspected something of the sort. Kalliola was an old fox; Oksanen was just the errand boy.
“He’s not going to get off scot-free, is he?” Ms. Vartiainen asked, as if she could read my thoughts.
“If Oksanen is investigated, Kalliola will be investigated, too.”
Ms. Vartiainen started pouring more coffee, but I politely refused. One chocolate cookie was enough, too.
“Do you have any idea what Oksanen could have been using to blackmail or threaten Mr. Berg?”
Ms. Vartiainen shook her head; not a single strand of her gray hair moved. They were as disciplined as their mistress.
“Have you already told Detective Oksanen and this… Kalliola about me?”
“Not about you, but about the allegations.”
“How did they react?”
“It’s probably best if I don’t comment.”
“If the case goes to court, what will happen to them?”
“Depends on if they’re convicted.”
“And if they are?”
“They’ll probably be fired… but I don’t think that makes much difference anymore, at least in Oksanen’s case.”
“How so?” Ms. Vartiainen asked doubtfully.
I knew I was in murky waters, but for some reason I felt the need to defend Oksanen. I didn’t feel like kicking the guy when he was down. He was like a family member you’ll defend against outsiders even if you’d knock his block off when among your own. “Detective Oksanen was so upset by the allegations of bribery that he took sick leave and started drinking. Got caught drinking and driving at a police checkpoint. A DUI alone will be enough cause for firing.”
I didn’t expect such a strong reaction. Ms. Vartiainen looked horrified and nearly jumped out of her chair. “Excuse me…” To have something to do, she collected the empty coffee cups and carried them unsteadily to the kitchen sink. She lingered in the kitchen for at least a couple of minutes, clinking the dishes. When she returned, the mummy-like tautness was gone, as if the brittle wrapping cloths had disintegrated. She looked much softer.
Holy Ceremony Page 14