Snow Woman

by Leena Lehtolainen

  “What? Why would I hate Pertti Ström?” I asked innocently. It was only in storybooks that shared sorrow permanently smoothed over conflicts. Since our brief moment of grief at Palo’s death, Ström had been just as big a bastard as before. I was relieved he was tied up with Taskinen on another case today, leaving me with Pihko for a partner.

  Slipping and sliding, the car somehow made it up the hill to Rosberga. Strangely, the gate was open. Why? I thought Forensics was done investigating at Rosberga. Glancing at the wall where the bear statue once stood, I tried to estimate how high it was. I definitely wouldn’t have been able to reach the statue without standing on something. But for anyone over six feet tall, it wouldn’t be too much of a stretch. What did that mean?

  The courtyard was deserted, but someone had recently shoveled the drive and a path to the door. The Russian-made Lada I was driving suddenly slid nastily on the slick ice in previous tire tracks in the snow. Fortunately I managed to get the car stopped six inches from a snow bank.

  “Want to bet the snow tires on this thing wouldn’t pass a safety inspection?” I said with a sigh as I climbed out of the car. The front door of the house wasn’t standing ajar like the gate. I had to ring the doorbell three times before Johanna answered it.

  “I’m sorry it took so long. I was on the phone,” she explained, but there was none of her old shyness in her apology. “Canceling all of these courses is such a mess. But someone has to handle it with Aira in the hospital.”

  I had always been fascinated by the makeovers women’s magazines did, changing a plain-Jane into a beauty queen. Johanna was now the “after” version. She was wearing jeans and a sweater instead of a frumpy old lady dress, and her curly locks cascaded down her back, looking somehow blonder than before—maybe Johanna had risked highlighting the color the Almighty had chosen for her. Even her posture was different.

  “I met your family yesterday,” I told Johanna. “Anna is a wonderful girl, and the little ones are so cute.”

  Sadness flashed across Johanna’s face, but anger quickly swept it away. “Yes, they are, and I’m sick of waiting to get them back. I’ve filled out rental applications with the housing offices in Espoo and Helsinki, but both say they only have a few apartments as big as we need and they’ve all got huge waiting lists. We could fit in a two-bedroom if we had to, but some stupid law won’t let us! I don’t have the money to pay a deposit on the private market. Then there’s the problem that I’m still listed as a resident in Karhumaa. I have to change my permanent residence to Espoo before anything can happen. Until then I can’t apply for welfare here, and I probably won’t be able to get unemployment anyway as long as I’m married to Leevi because of the income limits.”

  Johanna’s words poured out in a flood much like her daughter Anna’s had. Had the Johanna I met at Rosberga before Christmas been crippled by depression? Had she been medicated? What had changed in her? Or maybe the quiet Johanna had been the real one and now we were seeing the manic murderer.

  “Where are you getting money from now? Do you have savings?” I asked, although it really wasn’t any of my business.

  “Elina loaned me five thousand marks. I haven’t had to spend anything. I don’t pay rent here, and Aira buys the food. But I can’t live like this forever. As soon as Aira’s well again, I need to start kicking ass,” Johanna proclaimed.

  Once I recovered from the shock of hearing Johanna swear, I changed the subject to Aira, asking Johanna the same questions Ström had asked her the day before and receiving the same inconsequential answers. Johanna had apparently been watching Law & Order, which was completely new to her, as was every other television show. She hadn’t seen or heard anything. She didn’t know who Aira had spoken to most recently, but the phone had been ringing constantly with questions about the future of Rosberga.

  Meanwhile Ström and Pihko had already questioned the two former coworkers Aira had met the night she was assaulted. Those results had been scant as well. According to the women, Aira had been quieter than usual, but they assumed it was a result of Elina’s death.

  The attack on Aira was just as mysterious as Elina’s killing. Trying to make some sense of it, I walked into Elina’s and Aira’s rooms again. Aira’s bedroom had bare walls and only a few framed photos on the bookshelves, including one of Elina and another of a man and woman approaching middle age and dressed in World War II-era clothing, who I assumed were Aira’s parents.

  Elina’s sitting room seemed frozen in time. I pulled a photo album off a shelf. Inside were pictures of Elina posing with high school friends, with her parents abroad in London and Paris, and with Aira somewhere with sandy beaches and palm trees in the background behind Elina, who looked exhausted. That picture was probably twenty-five years old. In it, Aira looked very much like Elina before her death.

  The last photo in the album was an enlargement from some sort of company party. A teenage Elina wore a light-blue evening gown and posed on her father’s arm, looking every bit the precocious belle of the ball. Several men in tuxedos stared at her as if she were carved out of marble. I went through the album a couple of times trying to find pictures from the India trip, where Aira claimed Elina had come down with a uterine infection, and this made me remember I still hadn’t called her gynecologist. I had considered myself to be working as fast as ever after returning from sick leave, but now I saw how many things were slipping through my fingers. Maybe the boss was right. I needed more time off. But only after the Rosberg case was solved.

  Even after several passes through the album, I didn’t find any pictures from India or a single one of Elina as an adult. Why? Maybe she’d just stopped putting her photographs in albums. Not everyone wanted to remember their lives that way. For them, their memories—those flashes of experience engraved in the mind—were enough.

  I looked out the window at the clearing that led down the hill. The trunks of the willows glowed red, and blue tits flitted around the yard, searching for food. But the peaceful landscape felt fragile. More than one ghost was haunting Nuuksio now.

  I went back into the hall. “We’re not getting anything here. Let’s go,” I said to Pihko. “Can you drive? I have to make a few calls. Do you have to get back to the station or can you come with me on some other interviews?”

  “I have a meeting at two, but that’s not for a while.” Pihko avoided my eyes. “I actually prefer not being in our . . . in my office with Palo’s stuff still there.”

  Pihko slammed the car door shut as if to show he wasn’t a sissy even if he did admit to having feelings. Fastening my seat belt, I called Information and asked them connect me to Dr. Maija Saarinen, Elina Rosberg’s gynecologist.

  Elina had only been Dr. Saarinen’s patient for a few years, switching practices after her previous gynecologist retired. Dr. Saarinen had noticed the shape and scarring of Elina’s cervix too, and had been given the same explanation about questionable gynecological surgery performed in India.

  “Although I did wonder . . . I’m not sure if I should say this, but . . . I wondered if it might be something else entirely.”

  “What? A pregnancy?” I asked.

  “Yes . . . Before abortion was legalized, women sometimes did it themselves or found a quack to do it for them. That would cause similar scars. But there was no mention of anything like that in her old records, and a woman of her generation could have a legal abortion. She wouldn’t have had to find someone in a back alley.”

  “Where can I get hold of your predecessor?” I asked.

  “Unfortunately you can’t. She died a year ago.”

  Dead end after dead end! That’s all this case was!

  When had Aira said Elina was in India? About twenty years ago? Wasn’t Elina dating Kari Hanninen around that time? What if Elina had aborted their baby on her own . . .

  Hanninen’s answering machine picked up after one ring. I didn’t bother leaving a message.<
br />
  “Where are we going anyway?” Pihko asked. We had just reached the Turku Highway intersection.

  “I don’t know. Drive over to that gas station while I make another call.”

  It wasn’t even noon yet, so it was no surprise that Milla Marttila sounded irritable.

  “Didn’t I say not to call me so early?” she snapped.

  “So why do you keep your phone plugged in? It’s easy to unplug, you know,” I answered.

  “What the fuck do you care?” She paused. “So what do you want?”

  “Where were you the night before last between ten and midnight?”

  “Why?”

  “Someone tried to kill Aira Rosberg.”

  “Aira! What the hell! How?”

  “Hit her over the head. She’s still in the ICU but out of the woods now. Where were you?” I asked again.

  “I was at work from eight until four. Go ahead and ask anyone at Fanny Hill. They open at seven. If that’s all you want, I’m going back to sleep.”

  “Will you be at work tonight?”

  “Yeah,” Milla replied and slammed down the phone.

  I had better luck with Niina Kuusinen. She was at home in Tapiola, and she wasn’t planning on going anywhere. So we headed south. Another gas station along the way advertised a burger called the Hawaii 5-0, made with slices of ham and pineapple, so we stopped to wolf down a few and then continued to Tapiola.

  The Kuusinens lived in an upscale apartment complex designed by a famous architect. It seemed strange that a twenty-five-year-old woman still lived with her father, but apparently he was retired and spent most of the winter in southern France. Niina didn’t ask why we’d come. Dressed in thick violet tights and a black sweat shirt, she opened the door and stared at us for a moment with her large, almond-shaped eyes before motioning us into the living room.

  When light was streaming through the tall windows, the room was probably more cheerful, but now the silver-gray drapes were pulled shut and the overall effect was gloomy. The same silver-gray color was repeated in the rococo furniture. I hoped Pihko and I hadn’t tracked any slush onto the light-gray rugs.

  An arrangement of flowers, candles, and photographs sat on a lace tablecloth on a baby grand piano. The largest picture showed a frail woman with dark hair, smiling weakly. Next to this were a couple of childhood portraits, probably of Niina. The almond eyes were impossible to mistake, even though Niina’s hair was much lighter when she was a child. The man in the pictures had to be Niina’s father. Niina clearly took after him more than her mother. They had the same tall, slender frame, high cheekbones, and almond-shaped eyes.

  “Do you know why we’re here?” I asked.

  “Probably because of Aira.” It was obvious Niina was fighting to keep her voice steady. “Johanna called me yesterday. I just got back from the flower shop. I sent Aira some roses. She’s going to get better, isn’t she?” Niina asked breathlessly.

  “She should,” I said. “She’s in and out of consciousness. What do you know about what happened to her?”

  “Me? Only what Johanna told me. Someone attacked Aira on her way to the house. Maybe it was a robber who read about Elina’s death in the paper. I don’t know.” Niina shook her head, causing dark strands of hair to slip over her face like a glossy veil.

  “Where were you the night before last between ten and midnight?” I asked.

  “Me? At home. I was doing readings, the ones for pay I told you about. I went to sleep right after twelve. Why?”

  “Do you have a car?” I asked.

  “My dad’s Volvo. But I hate driving in the snow,” Niina blurted. She looked at Pihko as if seeking support. “I got my license in France, but they don’t have ice like here.”

  Apparently unable to endure more questioning, Niina stood up, walked to the stereo, and put on a CD. The piano music that trickled from the speakers was unfamiliar to me. It seemed to calm Niina down.

  “How are you doing, Niina?” I asked. The empathy in my voice wasn’t completely fake. Even if Tarja Kivimäki had claimed Niina exaggerated her problems, I sensed Niina wasn’t doing terribly well.

  “I have a really bad square between Mars and Saturn right now,” she said. “But since I saw it coming, I’ve been able to prepare for it. It will pass soon, and then I’ll have an easier aspect starting.”

  “Well that’s good,” I said dryly.

  “And you’re a Pisces! Kari told me you asked him to make you a chart. He says you have a moon in Aquarius. That was the only thing he told me about your chart though,” Niina added quickly.

  “Are you seeing him as a client again?” I asked. I was amused to hear the new life in her voice when she talked about the astropsychologist.

  “No. I was just asking him for help with a difficult chart.”

  “So you were alone on Tuesday night? Can anyone confirm that you were here? Did anyone call you or anything like that?”

  Niina didn’t seem to like that the conversation was shifting from astrology back to what happened to Aira.

  “No one called me,” she said irritably and then added in a softer voice, “But I called Kari about that horoscope at around eleven thirty.”

  “And you’re claiming you made that call from home?”

  In reply, she stood up and motioned for us to follow her.

  If Milla Marttila’s bedroom resembled a bordello, then Niina’s office was like a magician’s cave. Constellation-patterned fabric covered the walls and windows, and behind the desk hung a huge round diagram that Niina said was her own astrological chart. The shelves were crammed with astrology books, mostly in French and English.

  Niina turned on her desktop computer and loaded an astrology program. I didn’t know anything about astrology, so I couldn’t follow her when she began explaining how it worked, but Niina’s intent wasn’t to give a demonstration. She said she just wanted to show us that she couldn’t do her charts anywhere but in her office. From what little I could understand, I had to believe her.

  “How long did you live in France?” I asked as she switched off the computer and led us back into the hall.

  “From when I was born until I turned eighteen. Mom and I moved here after I passed the matriculation exams. I thought the Sibelius Academy seemed like an interesting place to go to school, and Mom wanted to come back to Finland, as if . . . as if she knew she didn’t have much time left.” Tears appeared in her almond eyes. When Pihko noticed them, he opened the front door as if to escape.

  I was more callous. “Why did you stay in Finland after her death?”

  “I was still in school. And anyway . . . I get along better here than in France.”

  “Even though your dad spends most of his time there?” I asked.

  “Maybe because of that,” Niina snapped, but then instantly realized she had revealed too much. “Dad drinks a lot,” she said more softly. “It’s a typical reaction for a Cancer to the death of a spouse. I understand, but I can’t stand to look at him.”

  Outside, the roads were still deadly slick. I was driving again. I drove a lot for work, rain or shine, and I usually had no trouble handling a car, but the Lada was like an ice skate. Even my Fiat was safer.

  “And these are supposed to be designed for Siberia,” I muttered as I tried to take off from an intersection and the tires just spun. I was so soaked with sweat by the time we made it back to the station that I had to towel off in the ladies room. Thankfully I always kept an extra shirt and bra in my office. As I changed, I noticed my nipples looked strangely dark. I remembered reading somewhere that this was part of pregnancy too.

  At two thirty the hospital called. Aira Rosberg was conscious and doing well given the circumstances. There was only one problem: she couldn’t remember a single thing since Christmas Eve.

  14

  According to Dr. Wirtanen, short-term memory lo
ss resulting from a head injury was nothing out of the ordinary, especially given that the events she had forgotten were so traumatic. He thought it was likely her memory would return with time, at least partially.

  “Pressuring her won’t help,” he said to me on the phone. “I’d prefer you didn’t question Ms. Rosberg until next week at the earliest. The officer you sent is guarding her, but we aren’t telling her that.”

  “Good. Supervision could be necessary if any of the following people come to visit.” I reeled off the names of Milla Marttila, Niina Kuusinen, Tarja Kivimäki, Joona Kirstilä, and Johanna Säntti.

  “Mrs. Säntti? She’s here right now. Do you really think she could be a danger to Ms. Rosberg?”

  I sighed. I didn’t know how to answer. The Hawaii 5-0 was giving me heartburn, and I had a strange craving for buttermilk.

  Finally I said, “Please ask the guard to just keep an eye on Ms. Rosberg and any visitors. It’s an unusual situation.”

  After I hung up I sat in my office thinking about the case. I wanted to bug Aira’s room, but there was no way I’d get permission. Too bad the guard couldn’t actually sit in her room and listen in. Maybe we could recruit a few of the department’s young female officers to dress up as doctors and nurses? I could pretend to be an orderly . . .

  Ström barged in to remind me that we had an interrogation in five minutes, interrupting my increasingly crazy train of thought. The new case was just a drunken brawl, depressingly familiar and mostly harmless—no one had died. Plus it was obvious that the guy who had whacked his buddy over the head with a bottle already had a huge hangover, and even with a few stitches in his head, the victim was still riding his buzz, as were most of the witnesses gathered for questioning.