“You mean amputate a leg instead of kill it?” Milo asks. “You said it was a special dog. You shouldn’t eat a special dog like that all at once, and believe me, you’re going to fucking eat it.”
I say, “The threat was to amputate Kaarina Saukko’s limbs when she was kidnapped. If it was good enough for her, it’s good enough for your pooch.” Then: “Somebody get this asshole on his knees.”
Sweetness whips out his steel sap, flicks his wrist and telescopes it to full length, and hits Malinen hard in the back of his thigh with it. He screams, falls down on all fours. “You may think you’re an important man,” I say, “but we’re all subservient to the laws of pain.”
He grovels something incomprehensible.
“Do I need to repeat my questions, or do you eat Sparky?” I ask.
Malinen breaks, starts rambling. He sits up, but is afraid to stand. He gives me five names of members of the Facebook group. Heinrich Himmler, who rambled about gas chambers for Somalis, was none other than Veikko Saukko. Malinen was himself a member. His user name was the same as commandant at Auschwitz. Rudolf Höss.
Malinen rambles defenses. Neo-Nazis would like to firebomb mosques, but Real Finns keep them in check. With their numbers growing so rapidly, they’ll win a majority of seats in the 2011 parliamentary elections and maybe take the presidency in 2012. The right wing will take the country back through legitimate means and through the will of the people.
“Tell me everything,” I say, “so I don’t have to come back. Lisbet Söderlund. Who killed her?”
“I don’t know. A rumor started that whoever killed her would get enough support to guarantee winning a seat in Parliament and would take her place as minister of immigration. That wasn’t true. I’m going to be minister of immigration.”
“To take her place, the killer has to be known. Who is her murderer?”
“I swear I don’t know.”
“Who started the rumor?”
He doesn’t answer. I take this to mean he started it himself. That makes him accessory to murder.
“Kaarina and Antti Saukko. Who killed her? Where is he?”
His fear is passing. He grasped that answering my questions would truly stop the cruelty and beating. He looks up at me. “I don’t know those things. It’s true that Saukko lied to us but to my knowledge no one in our party had anything to do with it. I knew Antti. Topi Ruutio knows Saukko and introduced us. Saukko wanted to meet me because he likes my blog and I met Antti and I introduced him to other Real Finns and I know that through those other Real Finns he met neo-Nazis but that’s all I know except he hated his father.”
I hear a boat engine. His family is on their way home.
“More,” I say.
The sound of the engine instills panic. “The neo-Nazis sell drugs and they donate part of the profits to Real Finns. Please go now.”
We walk back out through the forest to the SUV. I take a last look back. He’s still on his knees, unable to move. He’s a piece of shit.
He finds his courage and calls after me. “I’ll get you for this!”
I answer. “If you do, I’ll burn down the cottage while your family is sleeping inside it.”
He has no recourse to “get me.” And I wouldn’t hurt his family. But it’s something for him to think about, to give him some nightmares, as he has done to so many immigrants with his hate tracts.
We get back in the SUV. “I’d like to conduct the business I told you I had to take care of now,” Moreau says. “You’re welcome to come along. In fact, that’s part of the point. I would appreciate it though, if you don’t arrest anyone you meet.”
“That’s fine. When we get back to Helsinki, I think I should meet Veikko Saukko. Could you arrange it? I get the impression he likes you.”
“I’d be happy to. I’ve killed many persons of color. I’m one of his favorite people.”
32
Moreau directs us to a shop, La Cuisine, in downtown Turku. It specializes in French food: Chaource and Époisses de Bourgogne cheeses, pâtés, fine fruit preserves, game and ham, beef from Charolais cattle, Géline fowl. Moreau claimed he hadn’t been to Finland for many years, but his explicit directions indicate either that he has the proverbial memory of an elephant, or lied.
The store has no customers at the moment. Two men recognize him, and their pleasure at seeing him is evident. They greet him with smiles and kisses on both cheeks, and the three of them converse in French for a bit.
Moreau introduces them to us as Marcel Blanc and Thierry Girard. They greet us in Finnish with accents much like Moreau’s. The three of them entered the French Foreign Legion together. Blanc and Girard gave up military life after ten years, and after their careers as Legionnaires came here and opened this shop together.
The store’s interior is attractive, obviously designed by a talented interior decorator. Soft new-age music plays. Sounds of chimes and rippling water. The proprietors are middle-aged, dress preppy. Marcel wears Nantucket Reds and a Lacoste shirt. Thierry, a button-down oxford cloth shirt and an argyle sweater. I picture the business model. They pretend to be French and a touch effete. Customers think maybe they’re a couple. Gays and bored, rich housewives come in for the tony eats and to chat with the high-brow owners. They sell foie gras, reveal their heterosexuality, act surprised that the women thought otherwise, and bang the boredom out of the hausfraus. Not a bad racket.
“Ten years,” I say. “Why didn’t you re-up, stick it out and draw your pensions.”
Marcel has black muzzle scorch scars on the left side of his face. Got a little too close to the barrel of a blazing machine gun. I wonder how he explains them to said fraus. “The Legion,” he says, “is all about marching. I must have marched enough to circle the planet. I just didn’t want to do it anymore.”
Thierry takes a couple steps to show me. “The marching wore out the cartilage in my knees. I just couldn’t take it anymore. So we came back here and retired. It’s not a bad life.”
Moreau unzips his backpack, takes out two plastic bags of white powder identical to the one he gave to me at my party. “It’s already cut to fifty percent pure. Don’t step on it. That’s all you get for a while. I won’t be back to Mexico. I suspect the next will come from Afghanistan.”
Marcel and Thierry eye me with fear and suspicion.
“Don’t worry,” Moreau says, “he won’t arrest you. But I promised him that in return, you would answer some questions he has for you.”
Moreau turns to me. “As former Legionnaires, they live pleasant lives here, but the boredom hurts them, so sometimes they play at crime. I supply them with heroin, out of friendship.”
The two young black men, known drug dealers, on the day they were executed by carbon monoxide poisoning, came to Turku. Jussi Kosonen, kidnapper of Kaarina and Antti Saukko, was executed with a bullet in the back of his head, on the riverbank here in Turku. And now here I stand, in a shop with a kilo of heroin lying on the counter, in Turku. Hmm.
I snap open the lion’s mouth on my cane, let the razor teeth press into the flesh of my fingers. “And what questions am I supposed to ask them?”
“Ask them who they sell heroin to and who they know.”
I don’t bother to repeat it.
Marcel says, “By far our biggest clients are neo-Nazis. We wholesale to them. We also sell Ecstasy from a source in Amsterdam, but have a different customer base for it.”
“Are you racists, selling to neo-Nazis for political reasons, or is it simply an economic issue?”
“I admit we are racists,” Thierry says, “and we are active in the racist community, but we are not rabid racists who commit our lives to the cause of hate.” He chuckles. “We are excellent haters, but we are smart haters. Hate is like a drug. It will consume a person if excessive. I wasn’t a racist until I served in Africa and lived amongst niggers, by the way, and discovered what vile creatures they are.” He gives a disgusted shiver.
“Because we have killed many peop
le of color, we are well liked by the racist community—hero figures, if you will. And so we have been shown off and introduced to many people.”
“I’m investigating the murder of Lisbet Söderlund. Who do you know that might have been involved?”
“Well, the Nazis, of course, and possibly Real Finns or members of Finnish Pride, or a person acting alone.”
“Do you know Antti Saukko?”
“Oh yes, and his father. It went like this. We already knew Antti. We were talking to Roope Malinen and he discussed the failure of the Finnish authorities to bring the persons who kidnapped and murdered his children to justice. We told him we knew one of the best policemen in the world, Adrien. Malinen told Real Finn party leader Topi Ruutio about Adrien, thinking that if Adrien found the criminals who violated the Saukko family, Veikko Saukko would show his appreciation in the form of a generous campaign contribution. Veikko asked to meet us, and our recommendation led to Adrien’s presence here today.”
He clasps Moreau’s shoulder. “It’s so good to see you, old friend.”
“I have a theory,” I say, “that the knowledge of who killed Lisbet Söderlund is an open secret. A sign of prestige. Tell the truth. Do you know who murdered her?”
“No, I do not. And neither does Marcel.”
“I have no interest in your drug dealing at present, and will give you a permanent free pass to sell limited quantities of dope if you tell me who killed her. If I find out that you lied to me and you know the identity of her murderer, I will heap suffering on you far beyond your legal punishment. Do we understand one another?”
“Yes, Inspector, we do. But we do not know and cannot help you.”
The prim racist dope dealers make delicacy samplers to take with us, give us the address of neo-Nazi HQ in Turku, and send us on our way.
33
An excellent basic rule of thumb for a policeman, or anyone for that matter, is never to anticipate. The reality of what we imagine seldom meets our expectations. I expect the neo-Nazi headquarters of Turku to be a run-down house with an unkempt yard with a couple of junk vehicles resting on concrete blocks rusting away in it. I anticipate a dwelling littered with empty beer cans and the air thick with marijuana smoke. Thugs passed out. Love pulp magazines with the pages stuck together.
The address Marcel gave us is an upscale and expensive apartment building. I was given no name, but don’t need one because on the resident list alongside the door buzzers, instead of a name, is a swastika on a red field. I ring it, and when asked my name, say “Hans Frank.” The front door opens. In the elevator, we all attach silencers to our Colts and pocket them.
I ring and the door opens. A young, well-dressed man with round wire-rim glasses answers. “May I help you?” he asks.
I show my police card. “I hope so.”
“Do you have a warrant, Officer?”
“No.”
“Please return when you have one.”
He tries to shut the door. I jam it open with my foot. “Warrant or not, you and I are going to have a conversation. What’s your name?”
“I don’t intend to give you my name,” he says, but relents, having little choice, and opens the door. We all step in and look around. Seven young men are in a well-furnished and spotless home. A bay window looks out on the river and beyond. There is no television. Only well-stocked bookcases.
He sits down. The other young men are equally well-groomed. Only one stands out, because of his size. He’s bigger than Sweetness. The only clues that these men are neo-Nazis are their skinhead haircuts. They’re all seated around a coffee table covered with cups and saucers and a plate of cookies. A large Waffen SS flag dominates one wall. I walk over and look at it.
“That’s a family heirloom,” the young man says. “My great-grandfather served in SS Viking and brought it home from the war. In case you don’t know, SS ‘Viking’ was the 5th Heavy Panzer Division, recruited from foreign troops. A number of Finns served in it with distinction.”
“We’re off to a bad start,” I say. “I only want to ask you a few questions and we’ll be on our way.”
“First, it’s extremely discourteous for you to walk around my home with your shoes on. I would request that you remove them, except you won’t be staying. Come back when you have a warrant.”
I sigh. “There are a number of things we could discuss, such as trafficking in heroin, but I’m investigating a murder and I’m not interested in your criminal activities at the moment. But I could become interested.”
“Warrant,” he says.
I cross the room and examine his bookshelves. No pop fiction to be seen. He reads philosophers with related beliefs: Heidegger, Descartes, Hobbes, Spinoza, Leibniz, Locke, Berkeley, Hume, Kant, Hegel, John Stuart Mill, Nietzsche, Schopenhauer, Ayn Rand, Plato, Aristotle. He’s educated in philosophy, but the education isn’t wellrounded.
I say, “It’s up to the judgment of an investigating officer to proceed without a warrant if a crime is imminent or in progress or causes peril of some sort. The officer must have reasonable cause. I’m told you have narcotics and suspect you have illegal firearms on these premises, and I view this as reasonable cause. We’re going to search this apartment.”
“I have no narcotics and my firearms are registered. I’m in full compliance with the law.”
“What’s your name?” I ask again.
He remains defiant. “Fuck you.”
“What is your name?”
“None of your fucking business.”
I didn’t want it to come to this, but Lisbet Söderlund was murdered, and it pleased people like him. Come mud, shit or blood, he will cooperate. I light a cigarette.
“I don’t allow people to smoke in my home,” he says. “Extinguish your cigarette.”
“OK.” I take a deep drag to heat it up, then grind it out in the dead center of great-grandpa’s flag. It leaves a nasty hole with scorched edges.
He shoots out of his seat, but then freezes, uncertain what to do.
The big man stands. “Jesper,” he says, “I will deal with this.”
He’s about six foot six, upwards of three hundred pounds. His build says he’s a power lifter. “You’ve gone too far,” he says to me. “Your position doesn’t give you the right to disrespect the homes of others and destroy their most precious belongings. I’ll sit my time for assaulting an officer before I’ll stand by and watch this.”
He’s about four yards away from me. I take the silenced Colt out of my pocket and aim it at his chest. In my peripheral vision, I see Sweetness take a swig from his flask.
“Shoot me, then,” he says, and takes a step toward me.
“Fight me first,” Sweetness says, and gets in between us. It’s Godzilla versus Rodan.
Big Man laughs. “Did you need some liquid courage, little girl?”
“Naw, it just relaxes me,” Sweetness says, and takes a fighter’s stance. He shuffles his feet, fakes, draws a punch from Big Man so his weight is too far forward for him to escape the countershot, then Sweetness splits his left eyebrow open with a jab. There’s a lot of blood. They circle.
A neo-Nazi starts to record the fight with his cell phone video camera. Moreau puts his Beretta to the man’s head.
Big Man is dumb, falls for the same fake and jab. Sweetness is fast. Now both eyebrows are split bad and his eyes are full of blood and flesh hangs down into them.
Moreau removes the memory card from the guy’s cell phone and hands it back to him.
Big Man is blind now. I count punches. One two three. Sweetness hits a little harder each time, to make sure Big Man can’t fight back, before throwing the big hard punches that will take Sweetness a little off balance and put him at risk. Four: nose breaks. Five: teeth come out and patter on the carpet. A glop of blood sprays the bay window. Six: jaw breaks and more blood and teeth fly. Seven: a right roundhouse crumples Big Man’s eye socket. He falls. His head bangs the coffee table. Cups turn over and spill. Big Man is on the floor, semi
conscious. The eye bulges because there’s not enough solid bone left to hold it tight in the socket.
I pick up a cookie, take a bite and turn to Jesper. “These are really good. Did you bake them yourself?”
The room is corpse silent except for Milo. The looks on the neo-Nazis’ faces have given him the giggles. He takes a cookie. “You’re right. These are really good.” He asks Jesper, “Have you got any coffee left? Don’t make a fresh pot on my account.”
Jesper, in a daze, doesn’t understand that Milo is teasing him and goes to the kitchen. “Do you take milk and sugar?” he asks.
“No, black is fine.”
Jesper returns with a cup and saucer and Milo thanks him.
I say to Jesper, “Now, either we have a conversation, or you become that.” I point at Big Man.
I take a seat on the couch and pat the cushion beside me, gesture for Jesper to sit beside me.
“My friend needs medical attention,” Jesper says.
“And he can have it as soon as we’re through here. So please cooperate. None of this was ever necessary in the first place. Where’s your gun safe?”
“There are three. In my bedroom. The keys are on top of the middle one.”
Milo goes to check them out. He’s looking for the sniper rifle that killed Kaarina Saukko.
I say to Jesper, “My question to you is: Who killed Lisbet Söderlund?”
“I don’t know.”
“You sell heroin. Correct? This conversation is off the record.”
“We’re performing a public service. We wholesale to people who only sell to blacks, in an effort to sedate the nigger—well, actually, the entire immigrant population. And the proceeds don’t line our pockets, they go to political causes.”
“Such as donations to Real Finns?”
He doesn’t answer.
“I’m curious,” I say. “You don’t want immigrants in Finland, but why Nazism?”
“Because it offers societal protection. Is it too much to not want cultural diversity, to want to preserve everything I hold dear? To live in a country with others who share the same race, values and beliefs that I do? Jews, Slavs, blacks, Arabs—they’re genetically and culturally inferior. They hold beliefs antithetical to our own and would destroy the fabric of this nation. In fact, I’m glad we’ve had our little experiment with immigrants, so that our citizens can see the havoc it carries with it on even such a small scale. Look at Belgium. Immigrants overran it and their culture and way of life is destroyed beyond repair. Given the relatively few immigrants we’ve taken in, we can still get rid of them and correct our error.”
Helsinki White Page 21