Helsinki Noir

by James Thompson

  Mike Virtue, founder and director of the Queens Security Academy, had repeated that the greatest security threats often come from within organizations, from their trusted employees. The cosmetologist named Merja was one I resolved to watch. Santa could pretend to be interested in her. Flirting with women didn’t bother me, I’d done it before, both dressed as a man and as myself. Not likely I’d manage to break Merja’s heart.

  The Stockmann Department Store contained nine floors of dreams. It was a downtown Helsinki institution. Next I headed down to the basement-level entertainment and electronics department.

  The gender distribution of customers here was different than one level up: teenage boys playing hooky were at the game displays while middle-aged men focused on the phones. Santa Claus did not interest them. Real men don’t believe in fairy tales.

  I picked out the junkie instantly. The man’s age was hard to guess, could have been anywhere from twenty to forty. His nondescript brown hair hung to his shoulders and a black ski cap was pulled down to his eyebrows. He had last shaved a month ago. He’d wrapped himself in an oversized black wool overcoat he’d managed to grab from an Uff secondhand store or recycling center. His body twitched and trembled. I knew the symptoms from my Manhattan landlady’s body language. Mary had used every substance in existence that could screw with her head. I had saved her life a couple times, though I wondered why on earth I’d bothered. I was just postponing the inevitable.

  I slipped nearer to the man. The phone display was an open shelf where the devices were attached at the base with a metal coil that couldn’t be cut with ordinary scissors. The druggie was fooling around with the latest Nokia model. I waited for his next move. Not many addicts were clever thieves. They’d just pocket anything easy to snatch and then sell it cheap to pay for their next hit. The professional leagues were a different story: they calculated the potential supply and then created a demand for it. At Tallinn’s Mustamäe Market no one asked where the bargains came from.

  When I approached the junkie I saw that his left little finger was cut off above the top joint. So the chap hadn’t paid his debts. I slipped forward slowly, like a cat stalking a mole. The man kept looking around nervously. Both nearby salespeople were keeping an eye on him and I also saw one of the store detectives appear at the back left. Damn. I would have liked to see the man try to steal.

  He put the phone back on the stand and moved over to the next. I could smell the sweat of fear on him. Evidently he needed to get the next payment to the dealer ASAP. The store detectives didn’t know I was hunting the same prey they were. I tried to figure out how to warn them to stay back.

  I snuck over to the other side of the phone display, and this time the junkie noticed me.

  He lurched and bumped against the phone shelf, and a cell phone hurtled from his pocket and slid across the floor. I managed to grab it before he could, even though my fat suit made it hard for me to bend over.

  “I’m thinking you haven’t been a good boy,” I murmured as he tried in vain to yank the phone from my hand. He was my height, about five-nine, but seemed shorter, sunken down, as if his bones had been softened by the drugs. He didn’t have enough meat on him to feed a hungry dog.

  “Give me my phone!” he rasped. I noted that the guard had taken off. Evidently he had more important tasks.

  “Don’t even try. You swiped it, anyway.”

  “I did not! Just look at the screen! It’s mine! That’s Paula’s gravestone . . .”

  The phone was Nokia’s granny model. It wouldn’t have brought more than twenty euros on the street and the screen was cracked. I brushed the scroll key and a photo appeared. The gravestone was dark gray with an image of a swan flying away and a simple bit of text: Paula Johanna Salo, 1985–2012.

  “What business does Santa Claus have with my phone?” The man’s voice had a stronger ring now.

  “How else can Santa figure out who’s been naughty and nice? May I see your ID?”

  “You don’t have any right, you’re not the police—”

  “I can get the cops here in a flash if you want them. I’m guessing you’re an old buddy of theirs.”

  The man wiped the sweat from his brow and claimed that he’d left his wallet and papers at home. I asked him if he wanted me to pat him down right there in front of everyone or in the back room. He tried to whine something about me not having the authority, but I grabbed hold of his broken-off finger with a grip that a bit tighter would have dislocated the remaining stump. The junkie was right: I did not have any authority to do this. I just needed to act as if I did.

  “I guess my wallet is in my pocket after all. Hang on.” Fear was making him sweat, and the younger of the salesclerks, a girl of twenty-five at most, was gaping at me in astonishment. The forty-something male clerk was pretending not to notice the whole incident.

  The junkie’s wallet was as flat as a sick flounder. No sign of plastic, of course; the unfortunate did not even have a Stockmann loyalty card. The health insurance card had a photo and the name Veli-Pekka Virtanen. The birth date listed meant the man was twenty-eight years old. Place of birth, Vantaa.

  “Now listen up, Virtanen. If you’re hoping Santa brings you even one gift this Christmas, you’d better not show your ugly mug here again. Tell your boss that this source has dried up.” I let go of the man’s finger. “Looks like the white Christmas you wanted isn’t coming. You’re not getting money for snow from here, in any case.”

  Virtanen grimaced at me like a snared wolverine and vanished. He was such a pathetic case that he’d hardly have been capable of the thefts that had taken place, but at least I’d driven away one disturbance to the gentlefolk’s gift-purchasing orgies. That’s what they were paying me for.

  3.

  Virtanen was the most dramatic thing that happened in the store the first week of my gig. The Christmas crush grew worse each day and the sugary carols I heard dozens of times a shift hurt my ears. I tried to stay far from the guards as well as from the other Santas, because the child customers mustn’t see two redcoats at the same time. Might lose their belief altogether. My own I had lost at the age of five when I had seen my uncle, who’d raised me, leave to be the sports club’s Santa Claus. I had confronted him and he confessed that Santa Claus was make-believe. Uncle Jari said everyone needed miracles. But you couldn’t expect miracles on the slush-covered streets of early December.

  I did not place my hopes in anything but my own efforts. I had lost enough loved ones not to rely on anyone but myself, but to achieve my wishes I might disguise myself as anyone, even Santa Claus.

  Merja of the cosmetics department told me that the thefts from her shelves had stopped. She sounded relieved.

  “Must be Santa’s miracle-working powers,” she smiled, and then told me that some of the products were good for men’s skin too. Santa must need makeup remover, at the very least. I flirted back; it reinforced my identity as a man. Was Merja sharp enough to see behind disguises? Perhaps she sensed that I wasn’t an ordinary Santa Claus, but rather keeping an eye out for thieves.

  By Saturday evening I was so beat I decided to stop at a bar. I changed clothes in the secret room as usual. Security Chief Bruun had assured me no one knew of its existence besides the store management and him, not even the house detectives. It wasn’t even marked on the building’s official floor plan. I checked the security camera to make sure no one would see me leaving the secret room. I circled the parking garage so it looked as if I’d come by car and then I entered the elevator. I was myself again, a tall blond woman who looked like a white version of Grace Jones. My jeans and black suede jacket offered little protection from the wind that blasted in from the Mannerheimintie Street doors. I darted across the street to the Hotel Marski bar and ordered a tequila. That would get my blood flowing. There was old-time jazz playing, soothing as a bubble bath after listening to endless Christmas carols. I pretended to read the free newspaper while I played with my phone. I was used to sitting alone in bars and
chasing away any unwelcome company.

  A familiar-looking man was seated beside the window. He had an athletic build, and black hair cut very short and spiked with gel. The thick-rimmed glasses confused me for a moment before I realized that he was the Stockmann store detective who had been in the electronics department when I’d confronted the junkie. On the job, the guy didn’t wear glasses and dressed in bargain-basement jeans that bagged at the knees and butt and a sweatshirt with tattered sleeves. Finer ladies averted their eyes from him. The man’s civilian clothes were more stylish, and I noticed that the young women sitting at the table next to him were trying their best to attract his attention. He wore no wedding band, but I knew from experience how easy that was to remove.

  I shifted my position at the bar counter just enough to be able to watch the women’s attention-drawing rituals without turning. The man did not appear interested in them. He was nice-looking in a safe, ordinary way, and men like that did not turn me on. I didn’t look for bums, either, and had zero interest in wasting time on whiners, for I was not the sympathetic sort.

  To the pair’s disappointment, the store detective folded the paper, in which he had already finished the crossword, and rose. He had to pass me on his way to the men’s room. He smelled of musk and lemon, a pleasant scent. I noticed it again when he walked past me to the bar and ordered another Christmas ale. He sat at the bar to drink it. Since he had evidently not come to the bar in search of female company, I stayed silent. I ordered another tequila.

  “Outside of Mexican restaurants I’ve never seen a woman who liked those,” the store cop said.

  “To the best of my knowledge liquor bottles don’t state gender restrictions.” I looked at him scornfully. Moron. That had an effect.

  “Drink whatever you want. Just usually women drink sparkling wine or cider.”

  “I’m not any just usually woman.” I appended a small smile to my retort.

  The man asked if I had ever visited Mexico. I confessed never to have made it farther south than New Mexico, though I had spent several years in New York. I told him the same false story as usual, that I was in the restaurant field and had worked as a guard for the organic gourmet oasis Chez Monique, among other places. The man introduced himself as Petri and explained he was in the security business and could say no more about his work. I told him my name was Kanerva, which is actually my middle name. Petri thought the name lovely.

  The women on the hunt left. The dyed-blond boob bomb threw me a knife-sharp look and deliberately bumped my back with her bag. She didn’t even bother with what serves as the typical Finnish apology, O-ho! We both knew what was in question and I didn’t have the energy to teach the young miss her manners. It was best to conceal my true nature from my prey.

  Petri was talkative, which suited me fine. He mostly talked about his travels. He enjoyed windsurfing and snowboarding and his work appeared to be merely a means to fund his hobbies. He lived in a small rental in Kallio and owned only a bicycle. His whole salary went to traveling.

  By the time I’d finished my second shot I was mulling over whether Petri was attractive enough for me to take the risk of exposure and sleep with him. Of course I couldn’t take him to the place I shared in Käpylä, but what if I went home with him? In the end I nixed the thought—not because I was shy of one-night flings but because the danger of being caught was just too great. My security guard ID and driver’s license were both in my wallet, and I for one would riffle through someone’s wallet if given the chance.

  The man, in contrast, was ridiculously trusting. When he went to the men’s room he left his phone on the bar counter. The bartender was occupied mixing cosmopolitans for a trio of girls full of holiday cheer, so I took a quick peek at the gizmo, a simple Oyster Nokia no longer even sold.

  Not a single message. Just first names in the address book, like Mom and Boss. Maybe Petri had left the phone on the counter because it didn’t contain any secrets anyway.

  Almost by accident I opened the picture gallery. The first shot showed a snow-covered mountain scene. The next was considerably darker. It showed a gravestone. A swan flying away, and the words, Paula Johanna Salo, 1985–2012.

  Santa Claus must indeed have magic powers.

  4.

  Although I didn’t have to, I went in to work on Saturday too. The temperature had dropped to minus 14° Fahrenheit during the night, and pale stars still strove to be seen on the horizon when I awoke at six. Petri had not given his last name, but I’d get that from the Stockmann employee directory. I had two guesses: Virtanen or Salo. The night before I had pleaded exhaustion and when I left I had given a false Facebook address with the name Kanerva Hakkarainen.

  I pulled on a sweat suit and walked to Stockmann. The sun had not shown itself for weeks, but now it rose over the Vanhankaupunginselkä Bay to the east, red as a Christmas tree ornament. The world was silver white, dogs lifted their paws quickly in the snow and tried to fluff out their fur against the biting cold. I tightened my parka hood, pulled on an extra brown ski hat over it, and donned sunglasses to hide my face from the cameras when I punched in the alarm code. I walked behind the Old Student House to reach the elevator to the parking garage. It was always possible that Petri was watching the security cameras.

  A store detective and a junkie—was that the team of thieves? Though a burglar alarm deactivator was not part of a store cop’s regular equipment, it would have been easy enough for Petri to obtain. Maybe he had also gotten his colleagues to see Veli-Pekka Virtanen as harmless. Or had the men perhaps figured that a junkie was too obvious a suspect to fall under suspicion?

  In the secret room I opened the employee directory Bruun had given me. Petri’s full name was Petri Ilmari Aalto, address Pengerkatu Street, as he had said. Military rank, reserve second lieutenant; age, thirty-one. I googled Paula Johanna Salo but didn’t find anything to help with the gravestone woman. It would have been useful to have access to the police database.

  Fortunately, I had connections. Tommy H. and I had been in the army together and in our spare time we had trained together for the police academy entrance exams. Tommy H. had been in love with me and imagined we’d build a career together, but in the end I didn’t apply to the police academy. They’d hardly have accepted a murderer’s daughter. On our last long march, Tommy H. had sprained his back, but he wouldn’t let himself quit. I had carried his pack as well as mine for the last part of the trip, and the resultant debt of gratitude had already provided me with some information I’d needed. Tommy H. had gotten married a year ago, so I could no longer repay his services au naturel. His marital status wouldn’t have stopped me, but for the time being Tommy H. had shown himself to be the faithful type.

  “Hello, Tommy H.!” I tried for a syrupy voice, though I doubted I could bullshit my old buddy. After a minute of small talk I got straight to the point: “I have three names I need data on fast: Veli-Pekka Virtanen, Paula Johanna Salo, and Petri Ilmari Aalto.”

  I’d barely gotten into the fat suit, Santa coat, and beard when Tommy H. called back. Petri was totally clean, nothing on him in the police files. Virtanen had done two short stints for drug dealing, and before that there’d been a pile of fines for the same thing. Paula Johanna Salo’s charges stopped at one. She’d driven into a truck in the middle of the night on busy Kustaa Vaasa Street. The blood tests had found alcohol, benzodiazepines, and strong pain medicine. Salo had left behind a three-year-old daughter.

  “Who’s the father?”

  “The papers give only the mother’s name. The child is currently in her grandmother’s care.”

  “I’ll spring for the next round.”

  “We’ll see. Jenna’s pregnant and she feels lost without me.”

  I congratulated Tommy H. He’d been a satisfactory bedmate, if uselessly romantic at times. It was better for him to spend his emotions on his wife.

  Merja waved at me from behind her counter. I blew her a kiss and left to do my security rounds. Petri was nowhere to
be seen that day. I caught a pair of teenage girls trying to snatch some push-up bras. I threatened no gifts for the rest of their lives unless the young ladies straightened out their ways. Their response would have made gang members in the Kerava Juvenile Prison blush. Long live gender equality. I left them waiting for the police in the store detectives’ room.

  On Sunday the sleet blew horizontally. The storm winds brought down one of the Christmas light garlands over the store’s main entrance and it knocked a passerby unconscious. From the coffee shop window next to the cosmetics department, I watched as Petri called an ambulance for the old woman. After it had come, he stayed standing on the sidewalk even though the sleet had soaked his light-blue Oxford shirt so thoroughly his nipples showed through it. I turned away when he changed position. His profession required him to be able to distinguish one from another among us Santas. I drew back into the shadows beside the escalator and watched him come inside. He walked straight over to Merja’s counter and took some tissue.

  “Goodness, you’re wet,” Merja said. “Wait a minute, I’ll get you a whole package.”

  She turned and opened the case where jars were kept. The package of tissue was bulging; it looked as if someone had tried to stuff it with extra paper. Petri thanked her and began to wipe off his hair.

  “Don’t much want to be seen this way,” he said with a grateful smile to Merja. Then he resumed his path toward the watch department. I waited a short while before I walked over to Merja.

  “You’re cheating on me with that handsome youngster,” I teased. Merja jumped but recovered quickly.

  “Him?” she giggled as if delighted. “Don’t be silly. I’ve known Petri since he was a little boy. He was one of my daughter’s best friends.”

  “Was?”

  There was no time for an answer before I felt someone tugging at my coat.

  The child was at most three. Thick overalls and a sleet-drenched fur cap concealed the gender. The kid wanted a pellet gun because Julius at day care had one. The mother standing beside her shot me looks indicating that was not a present she favored. I told the kid we’d see what Santa could do. By the time the child was gone, Merja was busy showing face packs to a customer. Had she realized I’d seen everything? I couldn’t be sure.