“I’d like to talk with the other members of the family too if they aren’t needed for the taping. Not your father, though. We’ll interview him later if the need arises. Does he speak Finnish?”
“Not as well as the rest of us, but he gets by. Dad’s from up north in Ostrobothnia in the Swedish area and lived in Sweden for a long time when he was younger.”
Through the window I saw a van drive up with the SVT1 logo on the side. The young man in coveralls we’d seen working in the garage came out to greet the new arrivals. Apparently he was more favorably disposed to television reporters than police.
“Heli, the Swedes are here! And the police want to talk to you too,” Smeds yelled in the direction of the kitchen. Instead of waiting for Heli, I went into the kitchen myself where I found her kneading a dark bread dough. Bread pans waited on the table, but instead of the traditional baking oven, she was preheating a fancy convection model. The kitchen was generally pretty modern—apparently Sasha had been willing to invest in proper equipment for his wife. Did Heli Haapala handle all the cooking for her in-laws too? In the modern world a mother-in-law and daughter-in-law easily working alongside each other in the same kitchen seemed rare, but maybe the Smedses were a more harmonious lot. I could barely stand even Antti being in the kitchen when I was making food.
“So this summer you threatened to call the police if Annukka Hackman didn’t leave,” I began. Heli stood with her back to me, forcefully kneading the dough. Her apron reached almost to her ankles, and her hair was pulled back in a ponytail.
“Annukka was trespassing. Sasha was really busy, and Annukka was just harassing us with her questions. Andreas almost attacked her . . . It was a horrible mess.”
“Andreas attacked Annukka?” Ursula had come into the kitchen.
“I said almost.” Heli slapped the dough into a bowl, then used a knife to scrape the rest off her right hand before washing up at the sink. “None of us had anything against Annukka. As a person, I mean. We just couldn’t accept her wanting to cash in on our lives.”
“Wasn’t Sasha promised a cut of the sales?” Ursula asked.
“I guess. Jouko handled that. But when we decided to quit the project, we told Jääskeläinen at Racing Stripe Publishing that we didn’t want a cent of his money.”
“I understand that in the book, Annukka writes about how you and Sasha met. Did she interview you as well?”
“Yes. Stupid me, I agreed, even though I’ve never wanted to appear in the press simply as Sasha’s wife. I have my own job. I’m a farmer,” Heli said as she tilted her head and her ponytail swung past her shoulders.
“So you’re not just a housewife?” Ursula quickly asked.
“What do you mean ‘just’? How is running a house not important? I own a third of this farm, and Sasha and Andreas own the other two-thirds. I’m a farmer just like the men. Now, I’m sorry, but I have to serve coffee to the television crew.”
Heli disappeared into the living room, then brought back our coffee cups and the plate of pulla, which she refilled. Entertaining interviewers seemed to be routine. I walked after her, even though it felt silly.
“Where were you last Tuesday afternoon and evening?”
“In Espoo at the fabric store. And no one was with me to testify about it.” Heli smiled quickly as if to show she knew we were looking for an alibi.
“How many cars are there here?” I continued.
“Six. One SUV we all use for bad weather and driving in the forest. Sasha’s Citroëns, a station wagon and a convertible, and my Picasso. The Hyundai belongs to Andreas; he won’t take a sponsorship car from Citroën. Rauha won’t either. The green Škoda that just drove into the yard is hers. Viktor isn’t driving right now. Sasha’s race car will be here until tonight, but it isn’t registered and doesn’t get driven anywhere but on the practice track.”
“Were you using your own car on Tuesday?” If so, we’d need to check whether there had been any sightings of a silver Citroën Xsara Picasso near Lake Humaljärvi.
“Yes, I was. But I don’t even know how to shoot. I don’t approve of violence of any kind, and neither does anyone else in this house. You’re going to have to look for your murderer somewhere else! Now I’m sorry, but I have to go feed the cows.”
We heard the Swedish TV crew tromping in. Sasha laughed with them. His voice sounded a little lower in Swedish than in Finnish. I’d noticed before how personalities could change from language to language, with characteristics appearing or disappearing. Antti had defended his dissertation in English, and I remembered how surprised I was by his self-confidence. Whenever I had to speak Swedish, I always started talking too fast, as if I found it irritating and wanted to get out of the situation as quickly as possible.
“Let’s talk to Andreas and Rauha Smeds too,” I said to Ursula. As we headed toward the entryway, the front door opened and a woman came in with her arms full of shopping bags.
She was even shorter than I was. Gray hair hung loose around her face and her eyes were filled with alarm. Maybe Sasha had told his mother about his father’s episode.
“Hello, Mrs. Smeds, I’m Detective Kallio from the Espoo Police. I’d like . . .”
“Like whatever you want, but I’m going to see my husband now!” Rauha Smeds set down the shopping bags. The contents of one of the cloth bags spilled out on the floor: organic wheat bran, ground beef, and vegetable bouillon cubes. Rauha Smeds ignored her purchases and disappeared through the door we’d taken Viktor through. I put everything back in the bag, then walked out into the yard to find Andreas.
Andreas Smeds had stopped working on the convertible and was now working underneath the older-looking white Hyundai. Only his shins and dirty black hiking boots were visible. The cheap Škoda and the Hyundai seemed to belong to a different world than the flashy Citroën and the large Land Rover.
“Andreas?” Since Sasha had wanted us to call him by his first name, I did the same with Andreas. Perhaps Swedish Finns did that with everyone, like the Swedes did.
Andreas’s legs twitched, then bent as he began to shimmy out from under the car.
“Oh, it’s the cops,” he said before his face appeared. “My hands are too dirty for shaking.” Andreas stood up. He was a little taller than his brother and blond like all the men in the family. He had deep-set blue eyes that avoided my gaze. I introduced myself and Ursula, who looked at the red streamlined convertible in awe.
“I don’t have anything to tell. I didn’t know Annukka Hackman. She was only interested in my DUIs, and I didn’t want to talk about that. I thought Sasha was stupid to ever start working with someone like her. But Sasha wouldn’t kill over his reputation. Headquarters handles all the unpleasant business.”
Andreas Smeds’s face was expressionless, and his voice was calm, but his fingers revealed his agitation. He rubbed them on his pants, leaving grubby streaks.
“What do you mean by ‘headquarters’?”
“Jouko, Sasha’s manager, and of course the Citroën people. And the Finnish people, who love their rally heroes, as long as they win. And a few scandals don’t hurt either. The people have to have something to read after all.”
“Were you concerned that there might be sensational revelations in Annukka’s book?”
Andreas laughed, but there was no joy in it. “There’s nothing sensational about my brother that doesn’t happen on the track. He’s a good man. He doesn’t drink, and he doesn’t sleep around. He really is as lily-white as they say in the papers. And he’s a hell of a driver. And he was at home asleep on Tuesday when Annukka Hackman was killed. I can testify that Sasha’s cars were here the whole time.”
“So you were home then too?”
“How else do you think I can testify for my brother, Detective? Dad was at a follow-up appointment, and Mom was with him. Look somewhere else for your murderer.”
“Where was this follow-up appointment?”
“At the Mehiläinen private hospital in Helsinki. Sasha Smeds�
�s father doesn’t have to wait in line for public health care.”
Antti’s father hadn’t either. His bypass was scheduled for just before Christmas. In the public system he would have had to wait nearly a year, and he probably would have died in the meantime. Luckily Tauno Sarkela had been able to earn and save enough to cover the surgery. We didn’t have the resources to help, and Antti’s sister didn’t either after buying out her ex-husband’s half of their house in Espoo.
Outside I started hearing people speaking Swedish and the rumble of a tailpipe. I hadn’t seen Sasha’s race car—apparently it had its own garage.
“The show is starting,” Andreas said with a snort. “Do you have anything else for me? I need to go see if Sasha needs me.”
We followed Andreas into the yard, where a bright-red Citroën covered in sponsor decals had appeared. Sasha had pulled on a racing suit, and a helmet hung from his hand. A member of the film crew was attaching a small video camera behind the driver’s seat of the car. I walked over because I’d never seen a rally car up close. First I marveled at the tires. The studs were less than half an inch long and they were much denser than those on a normal winter tire. These tires had no business on an asphalt road.
“Vem ska komma med?” Sasha asked his visitors, who all hemmed and hawed. I peeked in the car. There were no rear seats, but there were roll cage bars across the door openings. Multipoint seat belts went from the belly over the shoulders.
“Am I not going to have anyone be my map reader?” Sasha asked in Finnish. “What about our esteemed police officers?” he asked, turning to us. “Care for a ride? One lap around the track only takes a couple of minutes.”
I was sure Ursula would jump at the chance, but she avoided Sasha’s gaze. Maybe she was afraid the helmet would mess up her hair.
“I can’t turn down an offer like that,” I said. Annukka Hackman had been addicted to rally racing. Maybe I’d understand her better if I shared her experience.
“Excellent. Andreas, will you bring Detective Kallio a helmet?” Sasha opened the co-driver’s door for me. As soon as I sat down, Andreas was there, fastening my seat belts and putting on my helmet. It was massive but surprisingly light. For a moment everything around me sounded muffled, but then Andreas attached the headset cord, and I heard Sasha’s voice.
“They’re going to be filming me and the view out the windshield, but they won’t see you. I haven’t told the film crew that you’re a cop. You ready?”
“Let’s hit it,” I said and tried not to show how nervous I was. Of course I’d driven fast before for work, but this was different.
The car instantly accelerated to what must have been sixty miles an hour as Sasha raced down the lane through the field into the forest. I nearly shrieked as the car headed straight toward a snowbank, but Sasha turned at the last second. After the next curve I started to relax. Sasha knew every meter of the practice track and exactly how his car would react. Sometimes we skidded sideways, sometimes we were perpendicular to the narrow road, and we nearly flew over one hill. But Sasha drove confidently, obviously enjoying himself, and I couldn’t help but get caught up in the speed. When the lap was over, I felt like asking for more.
Still, I found that my legs shook when I climbed out of the car. Although my mind enjoyed the experience, my body disagreed.
“Were you scared?” Andreas asked as he opened the door for me. “Did you get her to scream?” he asked his brother, who was taking off his helmet.
“No, even though I got it up to a hundred and sixty-five kilometers per hour. Damn.” Sasha laughed and I joined in. Although the ride had only lasted a few minutes, I felt the same way I did after an hour of running.
We said good-bye to the Smeds family and walked past the outbuildings to our own car.
“Did you get anything new out of Sasha?” Ursula asked once we were out of earshot.
“Asking questions didn’t even cross my mind, and I don’t think this line of investigation is really going anywhere anyway.”
“No? I thought all of them seemed to have plenty to hide. The father passed out when he saw us, and Andreas hates his brother. Maybe he shot Hackman and hopes Sasha will be blamed for it. If he wants to he can undermine his brother’s alibi, and he could also stash Hackman’s pistol in Sasha’s things. What about issuing a search warrant for the house?”
“I can’t justify it. We don’t have enough evidence,” I said and opened the car door. “Do you want to take a turn driving? I have to write out some notes.” What I didn’t say was that my hands were still shaking from the adrenaline, and I wasn’t ready to get behind the wheel yet.
I’d never ridden with Ursula before. As she set out from the farm, she drove confidently and quickly. A dog watched us go, and the rain made the landscape look like a watercolor painting that hadn’t dried properly.
“I don’t think Andreas hates his brother, but why has he stayed on the farm?”
“He quit school after the ninth grade, just like Sasha. Maybe no diploma and three drunk-driving convictions make it hard to find a job.”
“Do you know if the drunk driving caused any injuries?”
“When Andreas got caught the last time, he’d broken his leg driving into a tree. Maybe that calmed him down.” Ursula turned on the radio and tuned it to Radio Nova. They were playing Phil Collins yet again. I wrote down a few thoughts that had occurred to me and things we needed to do. We had to get Suuronen in for an interview, along with Sini Jääskeläinen. We had to investigate all the usual gun dealers and fences, in case one of them had ended up with Annukka Hackman’s gun. Autio could handle that. I started humming along with Collins. His new single actually sounded OK. Was this a sign I was reaching middle age?
Suddenly Ursula slammed on the brakes and steered onto the shoulder.
“Oh my God!” she exclaimed.
Two cars came at us side by side, one in the opposite lane and the other in ours. We were near the village of Degerby, and both directions were no passing lanes. The speed limit was fifty miles an hour, but the passing car was doing at least seventy.
“Did you get the license plate?” Ursula asked, panting. “If I hadn’t swerved in time . . . If someone had been on the shoulder . . .”
“I’ll call Traffic. It was a blue Audi. This isn’t the first time someone has almost gotten killed like that on this road,” I said, trying to calm Ursula down even though my own heart was pounding. “Maybe the Audi driver thought he was Sasha,” I added, forcing a laugh.
Ursula continued driving, but I could see her shaking, and she didn’t dare go over forty-five. A line of cars started to form behind us. At the next intersection I told her to pull over.
“Let’s switch drivers. You had a real scare.”
“I’m fine!” Ursula snapped, but she stopped anyway. “I didn’t do anything wrong!”
“No, you didn’t. You did exactly the right thing and prevented an accident. It’s no wonder you’re in a little bit of shock.”
I took the driver’s seat, and Ursula moved to the back seat and leaned her head on the headrest. In the rearview mirror I could see the color gradually returning to her face.
“Of course you’re going to tell everyone at work about this,” she said after calming down.
“Why would I? I would have been just as scared as you were if I’d been driving. Will you promise not to tell my husband I took a ride with Sasha Smeds?”
I couldn’t interpret the expression that flashed across Ursula’s face. Then she opened her handbag and started touching up her lipstick.
I dropped Ursula off back at the station and was at the day care by around four thirty. There was still no sign of Antti. According to the teachers, Taneli had been calm and in a good mood all day, and Iida had been singing constantly about Daddy coming home. We waited in the yard—the children played and I forced myself to chat about the weather with a couple of the other moms. Then through the drizzle I saw a thin figure with a familiar loping stride.
/> “Taneli, look! Daddy!”
Taneli scampered off toward his father, and Iida sprinted hard to get to the gate first. I think I took a few running steps too.
“Big hug!” Taneli yelled, copying the Teletubbies. Neither Antti nor I paid any attention to the mud the children smeared on us as we all held each other.
That evening we ate pizza and played Star of Africa, with me and Taneli on one team. The previous spring Iida had learned to read, so she sounded out the foreign city names on the playing board, her mouth full of Scottish toffee.
The kids were over the moon about their dad coming home, and getting them to sleep was tricky. Antti had to read to Iida twice as long as normal, while I put his dirty traveling clothes in the laundry. Antti didn’t use aftershave, so his clothes only had the mild scent of his skin and shampoo, familiar yet provocative. I hoped Iida would go to sleep quickly. I poured myself a dash of whiskey from the bottle Antti had brought, but just a dash. I wanted to keep my senses keen. I thought of Atro Jääskeläinen and Hannu Kervinen, who had fallen in love with the same woman, and felt sad for both of them.
“I think she’ll fall asleep now.” Antti came out of the children’s room. “I feel kind of sticky. I’ll have to take a shower. Or should I wait for the sauna to heat?”
The sauna we had now was hardly better than none at all: it was barely the size of a large closet. Our family could just fit in it but wouldn’t for long. The steam from the electric heater was stifling and had a hard edge for someone used to the mellow heat of a wood stove. In the summer the sauna made the whole apartment sweaty.
“Go ahead and shower. I’ll join you,” I said hopefully. I’d always liked making love in places other than the bed: in the sauna, on the beach, on the entryway floor. Our shower was so cramped that getting frisky there required some acrobatics, but my longing generally made me forget the hardness of the wall tiles.
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