I didn’t want to humiliate Ursula by leaving her out of our interview with Sasha Smeds. We hadn’t really done any field work together, because I didn’t do that much anymore. But Ursula participated actively in our morning meetings, and according to her colleagues she was quite aggressive in interrogations.
I put one of the Annukka Hackman manuscript disks in my computer. A file list appeared on the screen. Introduction. Childhood. First Race. I opened the file labeled “Childhood.”
Alexander Johan Smeds drew his first breath on the rainy spring day of April 11, 1971. His parents, Rauha (b. 8/13/1938) and Viktor (b. 11/20/1938) were farmers. They had one previous son, Andreas (b. 7/2/1969). Rauha Smeds was born in Degerby on her family’s farm, which is today called Smedsbo. She lived there until the age of six. Then world events intervened: in September 1944, Rauha’s family, like many other Finns, was forced to leave their home when the Porkkala Peninsula, which includes the village of Degerby, was leased to the Soviet Union as a naval base for a term of fifty years.
The family didn’t move far, though. Rauha’s father, Albert, was a man of culture, a theosophist and pacifist. That may have been where his daughter’s name, meaning “peace,” came from. Alma, her mother, was an exception in predominantly Swedish-speaking Degerby because her first language was Finnish. They stayed as close to their former home as possible, in Innanbäck, and despite strict security, they slipped onto Soviet territory now and then to gaze at their old place. In 1955 Rauha moved, first to Kokkola and then to Stockholm. Following the early withdrawal of Soviet troops in 1956, the Smeds family were among the first former residents to return to their homes. In 1960 Rauha married her second cousin Viktor, who was from Kokkola, and the couple also took up residence at Smedsbo. However, their first child was nine years in coming.
Sasha had an idyllic country childhood surrounded by cows, horses, cats, and dogs. In the summer he rode his bicycle to school and in the winter he sometimes skied. Both brothers were interested in engines from an early age. For his third birthday, Sasha received a soapbox car his father had made.
Hackman had interviewed Sasha Smeds’s childhood friends and schoolmates. She’d done her background work carefully, and there was none of the sensationalism in this section that I had expected. It simply told of a normal, albeit bilingual, childhood in the southern Finnish countryside. She did argue that Sasha had a bit of an inferiority complex about his older brother, but that wouldn’t have surprised anyone.
Then at age nine, everything changed for Sasha when he got behind the wheel of his first go-cart.
Both Sasha and Andreas remember the immensity of the experience. Their mother wasn’t at all excited about motorsports because it clashed with her environmental sensibilities, but Viktor understood the boys’ innate need to drive fast and took them to the go-cart track. Once there, the Smeds boys’ phenomenal talent became obvious.
My phone started playing Eppu Normaali’s “Bar Fly,” which meant Antti was calling.
“Hi! Where are you?”
“At Heathrow. This place is awful. Is everything all right?”
“Yeah,” I lied, not mentioning Taneli’s head wound or Terttu Taskinen’s cancer. “Is your flight on schedule?”
“More or less. Should I pick up the kids? I’ve missed them.”
“Let’s get them together. I’ll see you just before five at the day care. And hey—bring me some Laphroiag!”
“Already bought it. See you soon.”
The call left me feeling warm inside. Only a few more hours.
Before we left for Degerö, I went down to the cafeteria and had a salad for lunch. Puustjärvi and Ursula were sitting behind a large potted plant and didn’t seem to notice me. I didn’t want to eavesdrop on their conversation, but unfortunately I didn’t have anything to read to distract me. Ursula was trying hard to get Puustjärvi to go out with her that night.
“You can go out for a beer. You aren’t going to be able to go anywhere after the babies are born. Say you have to work overtime. Come on. It’ll be nice to get to chat in peace for once.”
Puustjärvi’s wife was in the final stages of her pregnancy, and—surprise surprise—they were expecting twins. Puustjärvi had bemoaned the fact that he had to buy a new car since there was no way four kids were going to fit in the family’s old Subaru. Ursula seemed to be arranging more headaches for the poor man. I’d thought she was focusing her wiles on Puupponen, who was single. Apparently she liked the challenge of men who were taken.
As she and I were driving to Degerö, I didn’t comment on what I’d overheard, and Ursula wasn’t in the habit of talking about her personal life with me. Instead she told me everything she knew about Sasha Smeds. He was in his second season as Citroën’s number-two driver, and before that he’d been a relief driver for Toyota. His co-driver lived in Monaco, but to the delight of the Finnish taxman, Smeds had chosen to maintain his domicile in his home country. The family land had changed ownership from Viktor and Rauha to the boys about five years earlier, and now Heli and Andreas managed the farm and dairy operation.
“Sasha and Heli don’t have any children, but Sasha still spends as much time as possible at home. Andreas doesn’t have any family. Heli came to the farm about six years ago as a temporary worker and ended up staying. She doesn’t look like much, so she’s probably jealous of all the models who constantly hang around the star drivers.”
“Have there been rumors of any extramarital relationships?” Of course nothing interested readers more than sex and money.
Ursula shook her head. The day was overcast, and when we crossed the bridge over the bay into the forest, everything looked colorless. There were just a few leaves left on the trees, but somehow the lack of color was calming.
“This is really far out here,” Ursula said as the Degerby church tower came into view.
I laughed. “During rush hour, it’s faster to drive from the station to here than to the other side of Helsinki.” During the summer I’d spent long stretches at Antti’s parents’ cabin in Inkoo, which was only a little farther, while my father-in-law was having surgery and my mother-in-law was living with her daughter’s family near the hospital. Leaving the seaside to return to the White Cube had been painful. In November, though, it wasn’t so idyllic anymore: streetlights were unknown here, so after dark even going out for a walk was difficult.
I turned onto the road that led to Degerö. The landscape of rolling fields around us looked like something from the British Isles. The houses all looked comfortable, and the yards were well manicured. A lane lined with spruces led to Smedsbo. I wondered if the trees had managed to grow this tall in less than fifty years or if the Soviets had spared them.
The buildings on the property were arranged neatly around the barnyard. The main building was a red two-story house with white trim around the windows and doors. Surrounding the house were a barn, a hay shed, and a collection of smaller feed-storage buildings. Looking at the structures you could imagine you were in the nineteenth century, but the illusion was broken by a couple of cars and a tractor visible through the open door of the garage. Unlike many of the buildings in the area, these hadn’t been destroyed by the Soviets. Upon closer inspection, I noted that the garage was newer than the other buildings. As we drove up, a young man in coveralls stuck his head out. Pretending not to notice us, he went back to working on one of the cars, a fast-looking red Citroën convertible. I doubted they mass-produced models like that.
When we climbed the front steps, we found the key in the door lock: we were really in the country now. A German shepherd rushed to the door to meet us. It didn’t bark, though, and generally looked gentle. Behind the dog came a small woman with pigtails whom I recognized as Heli Haapala. She was wearing an apron and had smudges of flour on her cheeks.
“Sasha will be here soon. He’s just answering an e-mail. Come on in the living room. Would you like coffee or tea?”
“I’m always up for coffee,” I said as we enter
ed the house.
The house was built in the traditional farmhouse style, with the living room and dining space combined. In one corner stood a loom, and there was a baking oven in another. Close to twenty people could have fit around the table. Sitting down at one end of it, I looked out the window into a field with a few cows grazing. Seeing cows outdoors this late in the year was rare, but maybe it had something to do with Smedsbo being an organic farm.
Heli Haapala set out coffee and pulla sweet rolls and made a couple of trivial comments about the weather. Her movements were smooth and efficient, and her body had the wiry muscle of someone used to physical labor.
“How well did you know Annukka Hackman?” I asked her while we waited for Sasha.
“I didn’t. We just talked a couple of times there in the beginning before we realized what kind of book she was writing.”
“What kind of book was that?”
“The kind we didn’t want. Sasha happens to be a star driver right now, but the rest of us have normal lives and don’t need anyone talking about us.”
The living room door banged open, and I turned toward the sound of footsteps. Sasha Smeds was slenderer in person than in pictures or on TV. His smile looked unaffected and was reflected in his eyes.
“I’m sorry you had to wait. I just had to reply to a question from my racing team management. So are you Detective Kallio?” Smeds walked over to shake my hand, then he introduced himself to Ursula.
“I’m Sasha. It’s a pleasure to meet you both.” Apparently he wanted us to use his first name. “I’m glad this worked out this way. Take some pulla. Heli baked them today.”
I told Sasha that I intended to tape our conversation.
“So is this an official interrogation?”
“Yes. How did you meet Annukka Hackman? Whose idea was the biography?”
“Annukka did her first interview with me for Society magazine when I started driving for Toyota. Female reporters usually don’t know much about racing, but Annukka knew a lot about the technical side of things and clearly paid attention to the sport. Then she moved over to Iltalehti and they started sending her abroad to report on the rally circuit. Those press conferences are usually all men, so Annukka really stood out from the crowd. She asked tough questions too. It would have been hard not to get to know each other since we crossed paths so much every year. I wondered a little when she went freelance, though, since she was such a good racing reporter. Well, then she found Atro Jääskeläinen and Racing Stripe.”
I’d understood that the racing world was even more closed to women than other sports. The drivers were 98 percent men, and the woman’s role was to sit in the spectator seats being terrified or show off her legs next to the prize platform. I could imagine how Annukka Hackman might have felt at press conferences, since I was frequently the only woman at the meetings I attended too.
Sasha grabbed a pulla from the bowl and started to fiddle with it like a stress ball.
“The idea for the book started last fall when it looked like we were going to win the world championship. Annukka had just married Jääskeläinen, and we were at the wedding. When I danced with Annukka, she suggested writing a biography to be published in Finnish and English. I talked with my manager, and he approved the project. At first the idea was to have it ready for last Christmas, but when the championship didn’t go the way it was supposed to, they decided to put it off. Annukka said she didn’t just want to throw something together based on articles other people had written. She wanted to write a real book. So we decided it would come out this year in November for Father’s Day, just before the final rally of the season.”
Smeds spoke calmly, barely taking his eyes off me. He was used to answering questions and conversing with strangers.
“What was it like working with her?”
“Until this summer, it was great. No thanks,” Sasha said to his wife, who’d gone to get us more coffee. “But could you bring some apple juice?” Turning back to me, he smiled warmly. “Too much coffee isn’t good for your body.” His expression was boyish and charming.
“So what happened this summer?” Ursula asked. “Why did your working relationship change?”
Heli returned with Sasha’s juice, then quickly disappeared back into the kitchen.
“Of course I understood that Annukka wanted personal details for her book,” Sasha said. “Like childhood memories and my love story with Heli. But I didn’t think my brother’s problems with the law belonged in the book, or my manager Jouko’s divorces, let alone my father’s heart condition or my grandparents’ political views. And who would be interested in that anyway? When our disagreements got too big, I quit the project. Jouko has already been in talks with Finnish and foreign publishers about a different kind of book, but of course what Annukka was working on made that complicated. Did she manage to finish her book before she died?”
This question was directed at me.
“You’ll have to ask Atro Jääskeläinen about that. When did you last see Annukka?”
Smeds thought for a moment, then yelled into the kitchen:
“Heli, do you remember when Annukka last visited here? Was it the week before May Day? It seems like it was a little before the Safari Rally.”
Heli stuck her head through the door, and her cheeks reddened a little.
“No, it was later, in early July. We were leaving the next day for the French trials. Remember? It was the day before Andreas’s birthday and I was just baking his cake and . . .” Heli swallowed and turned back into the kitchen. Smeds stared after her.
“Heli always remembers everything. She’s right; now I remember too. Annukka was lucky she didn’t get that cake in her face.”
“So the meeting wasn’t particularly friendly?”
“In the end Heli threatened to call the police if Annukka didn’t leave. Jouko had told us to do that if she showed up. I didn’t want any trouble like that, but they were all talking about filing for a restraining order. I thought that was overkill.”
“Where were you on Tuesday afternoon and evening?”
Smeds snorted.
“I guess you have to ask that. I was home asleep. I got back from Australia early Tuesday morning. The jet lag was intense. I can sleep anywhere, but I get the best rest here at home next to my wife.”
Outside it had started to gently rain. A cow sauntered toward the barn, looking unconcerned. It was so quiet here that the whirring of the tape recorder sounded loud. Smeds worked surrounded by noise, so maybe he needed this sort of atmosphere at home. I found myself envying him for living in such a peaceful place.
On the table was a slip of paper full of incomprehensible letter combinations. LK 30, RK 20, OC, and so forth.
“Notes,” Sasha said when he saw me glance at it. “On the other side of the field I have a practice track about three kilometers long. The Swedes are here to film a practice run. I don’t need any pace notes for that track, but they wanted to see them. Annukka rode with me a couple of times, and once she even tried to read the notes for me. She did well for a first timer.” Sasha drained his apple juice.
“Of course we couldn’t stop Annukka from writing her book,” he continued. “So Jouko hired some lawyers. We made it clear to her that if she wrote a single word that wasn’t true, we’d sue. Jouko was handling it, but Annukka still tried to appeal to me to back down that last time she was here.”
“Did Annukka Hackman ever hit on you?” Ursula asked.
Smeds laughed but couldn’t hide a slight blush.
“I wouldn’t say she hit on me, but she was flirty. I think she caught on pretty quickly that I’m a one-woman kind of guy, though.”
A bang came from the kitchen as if Heli had dropped something. I made a mental note. Heli seemed to be protecting her husband; I imagined that everyone around Sasha Smeds did that. Rally racing might not have been quite on par with Formula 1, but there was still an awful lot of money involved. And it was a sport that ultimately depended not only on
teamwork but on Sasha’s ability to stay focused.
“Did you know Annukka Hackman carried a gun?” I asked.
“Everyone knew. Annukka thought I should too, at least abroad, like during the Safari Rally. She saw the world as being full of enemies.” Smeds smiled sadly. “And I guess she wasn’t wrong. Hopefully you catch whoever did it.”
Sasha Smeds was no stranger to the spotlight, so I knew we were dealing with a carefully constructed persona here: the affable boy next door, every mother’s ideal son-in-law, who just happened to be a top athlete. But you couldn’t build that profile without having the right material to start with. Sasha Smeds was impossible not to like.
The living room door opened. First a shadow appeared on the rag rug. Then a man stepped in. He was a little over sixty, with a hooked nose and high cheekbones that were even more pronounced than Sasha’s, as well as a leaner face. His walk was slow, like that of a much older person.
“My father, Viktor Smeds,” Sasha announced. “Dad, this is Detective Kallio and Officer Honkanen from the Espoo Police.”
At that the color drained from Viktor Smeds’s face. He staggered and collapsed to the floor.
6
“Dad!” Sasha made it to Viktor’s side before I did, but didn’t know what to do to help him. I turned Viktor into recovery position, loosened his collar, and checked his breathing. His respiration was fine, and only a moment passed before he opened his eyes.
“Rauha . . . Vad har hänt med Rauha . . .” Viktor said to his son in Swedish.
“Nothing happened to Mom. The police are here because of Annukka Hackman,” Sasha said. Then he turned to his wife, who had rushed in. “Heli, why didn’t you tell me Dad is still in such bad shape?”
Sasha and I helped Viktor into a bedroom to rest. Viktor felt brittle, even though he couldn’t be much older than my own father, who still radiated vigor and health.
“Dad had bypass surgery a month ago, and his recovery hasn’t gone the way they hoped,” Sasha said. “Mom went to the store in the village, and Dad always worries about her when the weather’s bad. Even a professional like me has to be careful on some of the roads around here. Heli, will you call Sandberg just in case? He’s our family doctor,” Sasha explained to me. “Those Swedes will be here any second. Did you have anything else for me?”
Below the Surface Page 6