Before I Go

by Leena Lehtolainen

  “You’re right more often than you’re wrong, but we all make mistakes sometimes. How reliable do you consider Eila Honkavuori? Are you sure she isn’t harboring some sort of personal grudge?”

  I was having almost the identical conversation I had had the day before with Eila Honkavuori, but the difference now was that I was the one presenting the theories that the other party didn’t seem to believe.

  “Decisions this big can’t be made in secret,” Taskinen said.

  “No? Strange that you would say that, even though your wife is a city official. Hasn’t she ever complained about the leadership walking all over the professional planners?”

  “There isn’t any need to bring Terttu into this,” Taskinen said with sudden pique. “You haven’t pitched this theory to your unit yet, have you?”

  “No. I only asked Koivu and Wang to show Rahnasto’s picture to Suvi Seppälä.”

  “You need to rescind that order,” Taskinen said, looking out the window instead of at me. A patrol car sped off with lights flashing but no siren. When I didn’t reply, Taskinen turned to me, his face as gray as yeast that had just come out of the freezer.

  “Maria, did you hear what I said? I’ll check with Koivu to make sure. You aren’t going to make your subordinates lie for you, are you?”

  “Of course not.”

  I would rescind the order, but no one was going to stop me from going to Suvi myself. I looked at Taskinen’s carefully trimmed nails and the narrow arc of his jaw. I liked him very much. Why was he doing this to me when I most needed his support?

  “Who gave the order to terminate the Ilveskivi investigation?”

  “I’m not at liberty . . .” Taskinen cringed ever so slightly before continuing. “We decided together. The chief of police, the deputy chief, and I. It’s good you came to me first with your theory about Rahnasto. This could have caused a lot of embarrassment in the top ranks. You don’t have any evidence, so forget what Honkavuori said. Work with Narcotics and Organized Crime, and I’m sure you’ll get to the bottom of the Seppälä shooting eventually. I understand that things have been hard on you, and you want to see results. Have you seen the department psychologist about the bomb attack?”

  “I’m going this afternoon.”

  “Good.” Taskinen stood up and clearly expected me to do the same. I stayed sitting for a few more seconds. I wanted to say something, but I didn’t quite know what. Taskinen took a few cautious steps toward the window, his leg clearly hurting him. “I have to head over to the university. The police academy is sponsoring a seminar on immigration and refugee issues. Someone has to be there to represent a moderate perspective.” Taskinen gave a forced laugh.

  “So go to your seminar!” I shoved the chair out from under me, sending it sliding across the floor and into the coffee table. Taskinen walked over to me and set his right hand on my shoulder. He was nearly eight inches taller than me, so there was no way to avoid there being something patronizing in the gesture.

  “Come on, Maria. We all make mistakes sometimes. Don’t take this so hard.”

  I shook his hand off and headed for the hall. Bile rose in my throat, and my heart was beating like I’d just run up a hill. I had been such an idiot. Every boss had a boss, and the ones above Taskinen wanted to maintain a good relationship with city hall.

  Koivu was in an interview, but I got him on his cell phone.

  “So you don’t want me to go play flash cards with Seppälä?” he asked.

  “No. Where is the picture of Rahnasto now?”

  “On my desk.”

  Koivu gave me permission to look for it; his door was unlocked. Because I thought the room was empty, I rushed in without knocking. To both our surprises, Puupponen was sitting at his computer and nearly jumped out of his seat when he saw me.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t know you were here,” I said and grabbed Rahnasto’s picture. I felt like ripping it to shreds right there. I wanted to destroy something. If I hadn’t had the appointment with the psychologist, I would have gone downstairs for some time on the punching bag.

  “Are you working on Jarkola’s interview report?” I asked in order to seem like a concerned boss, even though I didn’t give a damn what Puupponen was working on.

  “What? “No. I was just checking on something . . . do you spell ‘recommend’ with one m or two?”

  “Two. And let me commend you on your newfound enthusiasm for proofreading reports,” I said and then turned on my heels and returned to my office. A new raft of e-mails had collected in my inbox, and answering them seemed to take the edge off the worst of my rage. Shame crept into its place, and I had a hard time going downstairs to the cafeteria to eat, even though I was hungry. I felt as if I had the word “failure” scrawled across my forehead in red lipstick. The detective who didn’t get up in the night to check on a suspicious car, even though she had received a death threat. The gullible idiot who swallowed any theory that came along if it fit her preconceptions. My mood was not improved by Detective Laine coming up to me in the line at the cash register and patting me on the shoulder.

  “I’m glad to see you at work despite that bomb incident. Have they caught the perp?”

  I missed my old enemy, Pertti Ström. He would have stabbed me in the back if he could, but at least he kept his weapons visible. Laine played by different rules, and I didn’t have a clue why he wanted me in the ring with him.

  Liisa Rasilainen was sitting at a table for two in the corner, so I joined her. She was shocked about the bombing and asked why I had disappeared from Café Escale.

  “Those two guys said that’s just how heteros are. Forget their friends and disappear after the first piece of tail they see,” Liisa said teasingly.

  “The redhead is part of a complicated case.” I felt like unloading the whole sob story on Liisa, but instead I saved it for the psychologist. He believed I was suffering from posttraumatic stress, and he was probably right. His statement let me give myself permission to sit in my office for the rest of the day crying on and off. I decided to wait until tomorrow to call Suvi Seppälä if I still felt like it.

  The weather had turned muggy as the day went on, and when I left work, the south wind was bringing tall black clouds. Thunderstorms in May. That wasn’t normal. Rain whipped in front of me in a fast-moving silver-gray curtain I had no way of avoiding. It thrummed an angry tune on the roof of the car and then was past.

  Helvi’s yard was sunny. Iida wore rubber boots, and as we walked to the car she jumped in one large puddle after another. Mud splattered our clothing. I was sorry to be wearing my work shoes, because some splashing would have done me good too.

  Instead I went out for a jog to vent my frustration. For a moment I stared at my service weapon but then locked it in its case. I didn’t want to feel like a prisoner to guns, and I didn’t want Iida to think it was normal that her mother didn’t dare go outside without a revolver. I kept to busy streets, even though they weren’t as nice as the roads through the fields. That was what women who were afraid of rapists did.

  The rain had brought out the perfume of the birches and lilies of the valley, which even the stench of car exhaust couldn’t ruin. Shame and rage washed out of me as sweat soaked my shirt, but the feeling that replaced them was worthlessness. I couldn’t fail. I had to be at least twice as good as any man in the department. Quite a brutal attitude, the psychologist had said. I had a hard time allowing myself any mercy.

  There were other people on the walking path, so I decided I was safe taking a shortcut. The path ended at a small but steep hill formed by an underpass for a busy road. At the top of the hill, I passed a woman leading two large dogs and a stroller. In the stroller sat a child about eighteen months old, who noticed a squirrel at the same time as the dogs and me. The dogs started pulling like mad, and the woman’s hold on the stroller slipped.

  The stroller started rolling diagonally down the hill, and I rushed after it. I managed to catch it a few feet before it got to the edg
e of the road, and I stood panting while the mother upbraided herself and the dogs.

  “Thank you! Thank you so much!” the woman repeated, and I bounded off exultantly. It wasn’t until half a mile later that I realized what was going on. I needed to be useful. That was the only way I could give myself mercy. That was what gave me the right to exist. This knowledge brought tears to my eyes.

  I had just gotten out of the shower when the phone rang.

  Antti was in the kitchen frying herring, so I rushed to answer, naked and dripping wet.

  “Hi, it’s Mikke Sjöberg.”

  “Hi. Wait just a minute.”

  I went to get my bathrobe and tried to quell the butterflies in my stomach. I couldn’t talk to Mikke, not today of all days. Iida had climbed up and grabbed the phone, and she was babbling happily, even though she didn’t have a clue whom she was talking with.

  “Iida, give the phone to Mommy. Go help Daddy in the kitchen.” After sending Iida on her way, I picked up the phone as if it were a poisonous snake. “What’s up?”

  “I know who put that bomb in your yard.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “I happened to overhear something in the weight room. Salo did a little asking around. He’s in the same unit I am.”

  “You should tell the NBI. Agent Muukkonen is handling the investigation. I can give you his number.”

  “No! I don’t want anyone thinking I’m a snitch. But I have a good excuse for talking to you.”

  “And what is that?”

  “The investigation into my family’s companies is still ongoing.”

  “Yes, it is, but I’m not handling it. So are you saying that Salo didn’t order the bombing?”

  “Exactly. Come here, and I’ll tell you more. I can’t talk long, and I can’t give any names. But I know. Believe me.”

  Mikke’s tone was anxious, as if he thought that someone was going to interrupt him at any moment or that I would hang up the phone. The sensible thing to do would be just that, and then send Agent Muukkonen to the prison.

  “OK, I’ll come. I’ll try to be there tomorrow.”

  “You damn idiot,” I said to myself after I hung up the phone.

  I really didn’t deserve any mercy.

  I went to the kitchen and poured anise vodka down my throat, straight from the bottle.

  19

  I drove to Sörnäinen Prison at noon. Everyone thought I was going to the dentist, which was my excuse for not joining them for lunch. I wasn’t hungry anyway. Actually, I felt a little sick. In the morning, as I explained to the prison officials why I needed to meet with Mikke Sjöberg as soon as possible, I felt as though I was listening to another person talk. When I merged onto the freeway, I realized I was like a junkie who knew she shouldn’t take another hit but couldn’t help herself. All at once I felt pleasure and shame, the moment of expectation like the euphoric effect of the drug overcoming the self-loathing. I tried to ignore the fact that Agent Muukkonen was only a phone call away, that he could go pick up Mikke and interrogate him, and I wouldn’t have to see him at all.

  I had slept fitfully the night before, dreaming of exploding boats and brains splattered on walls. Several times I got up to make sure Iida was still breathing and no one was outside. I tried not to wake Antti, who had taken a sleeping pill. He was afraid too, and was keeping it to himself just like me.

  Laajalahti Bay glinted yellow and blue, and a pair of swans floated near the shore, oblivious to the traffic. Did executives really want to live between the noise of two highways, or would they build noise barriers, enclosing the cars in the vapors of their own tailpipes? In terms of the western Metro extension project, building up the bay area made sense. Although I suspected that the only people on the Metro would be idealists, women, and the poor. The executives weren’t going to give up their company Mercedes. Even I was driving in my own car.

  All of Helsinki seemed to have noticed summer was almost here. Shorts, miniskirts, and sleeveless shirts exposed white skin that burned under the brazen touch of the sun. Meanwhile, I was dressed as unsexily as possible and only had on enough makeup to hide the dark bags under my eyes.

  I felt oppressed as soon as I entered the prison, as if the lack of freedom hung in the air. I didn’t pity the prisoners, since in Finland you had to commit some pretty serious crimes to end up in a place like this. I could always sense the feelings of a place, and there was no way to avoid sensing the rage and despair contained within these walls. Even the sparrows and crows fought over ownership of the yard like the human leaders of rival gangs. There was always some prisoner who liked feeding the birds and another who hunted them for his cat.

  Getting into the prison was easy. Because I was a cop, the guards didn’t perform even a superficial body search. Right away they took me to an interrogation room that reeked of sweat, with dented veneer furniture that could have been from the offices of any struggling business. The thought that I was only a few hundred meters from Niko Salo was dizzying. I hadn’t brought anything beyond my old notebook to record what happened.

  If Mikke really knew something, I would have to turn him over to Muukkonen.

  The guard opened the door and let Mikke in. He wasn’t wearing handcuffs. According to the assistant warden, Mikke Sjöberg had a reputation for being an easy prisoner but suffered from occasional depression. Mikke was even thinner than he had been the previous fall, and his face now lacked its former sailor’s tan. Instead of standing up, I just shook his hand over the table, but I noticed everything: the knuckles protruding through his skin, the light-brown hair darkened by the winter and growing down over his ears. At first his blue-gray eyes avoided my own. But once the guard left, Mikke looked at me.

  “Well, what do you know? Spill it,” I said, looking back.

  “Are you OK—and your family? The paper just said that no one had been injured in the explosion.”

  “Our cat set off the bomb and got hit by shrapnel. He’ll recover.”

  “You look tired. Has work been hard?”

  “Just the usual. And you?”

  Mikke shrugged, and his mouth went crooked. “I’m trying to keep myself together by going to the gym. Once I get out on parole, I should be able to go out on day trips, right? Do you have your boat in the water yet?”

  “Antti and my brother-in-law and his boys are going out next weekend to launch. Mikke, I’m in a bit of a hurry. What do you know about the bomb?”

  Mikke leaned forward, and for a moment I thought he might grab me, but instead he put his elbows on the table and put his chin in his hands.

  “Yes, OK. A couple of nights ago there was this guard in the gym who doesn’t seem to care much about what goes on. I was doing bench presses when Salo stormed in and started throwing dumbbells on the floor. The guard turned and walked out. I thought he was going to get help, but no. Suddenly it was just me and Salo’s main followers. I try to keep out of everybody’s business, but I started to wonder whether I had stepped on Salo’s toes by accident, and now I was going to get a beat-down. But they didn’t even notice me. I continued my set and tried not to hear what they were saying. The less you see, hear, and say in here, the better.”

  Suddenly Mikke grinned, and laugh lines spread around his eyes. They were deeper than the last time I had seen him.

  “Then I heard Salo mention your name. I didn’t know you were on his hit list. The newspaper story about the bombing didn’t mention it.”

  “That would only flatter Salo.”

  “I find him insufferable. He seemed to be mad that someone else got to you before he did. He talked about someone named Jani Väinölä. Do—”

  “What? Väinölä?” I nearly bounced out of my chair.

  “Just wait. Apparently this Väinölä guy already has a record and another conviction on the way. Salo said he could hardly wait for Väinölä to get back inside so he could teach him a lesson. At that point I decided to take a risk and ask if they were talking about you. I made it
clear that you were the one who put me in here. Were your ears burning the night before last?”

  “Not really. Or maybe a little.”

  I smiled involuntarily, but it was just from the excitement. Was Väinölä really behind the bombing? Was he really that angry I had stopped him from attacking the Somali boy at the bus stop?

  “Väinölä had bragged to someone about making big money doing a torpedo job. He was hired to put the explosive in your yard.”

  “Hired? So it wasn’t Väinölä’s idea?” I felt the adrenaline level in my blood surge, and my ears started ringing as if I had a fever coming on. I swallowed, and the roof of my mouth was strangely dry.

  “Not according to Salo. Väinölä was in a bar bragging to a buddy who’s also one of Salo’s men and said something about ‘giving that bitch something to think about besides faggot murders.’ Then the guard came back and Salo took off.”

  “Are you sure Salo mentioned the murder of a gay man?”

  “Yes. But isn’t that case already solved?”

  “Only according to the papers.”

  Leaning back, I closed my eyes and ran my hands through my hair. I had been trying to piece together the wrong puzzle. Of course Väinölä’s client was the same as Marko Seppälä’s. How many murders was he willing to commit?

  “Maria,” Mikke said, and his voice was like a hand shaking me. “That isn’t all. Yesterday morning I happened to be at a painting station next to Õnnepalu. He’s another one of Salo’s guys and a heavy addict. For a couple of Buprenex he was willing to tell me that Salo’s source was named Jarkola. I remember him, since he just got out. He’s supposed to be Väinölä’s pal, but when Salo wants to know something, Jarkola talks. You should have seen Õnnepalu’s expression. He’s so damn proud to be under Salo’s protection.”