Derailed

by Leena Lehtolainen

  “Where is your uncle’s van now?”

  “At a recycling factory somewhere. I took it to the scrap yard in the spring.”

  “Why are you telling us this now?”

  “So you won’t keep wasting your time on the wrong track! God!” Harju almost yelled. “I thought getting this off my chest would make things better, but you’re acting like you don’t believe me!”

  Harju must have known full well that there was no way to verify his story, and any lawyer would tell him to at least deny drinking before he drove or, preferably, recant the whole confession. A few times I’d run into criminals who’d found religion and wanted to confess their past misdeeds in order to atone. But it wasn’t as simple as they imagined or hoped it would be. In theory, driving under the influence and two counts of vehicular assault could result in jail time, but as a first-time offender, Harju wouldn’t serve long. Two or three months would be no big deal, if someone was paying for him to take the fall. How much would Harju charge for his incarceration? Would twenty thousand euros have been enough? And who would have that kind of money? Pentti Vainikainen might have, but he was dead.

  The investigation of the accident was still the responsibility of the Lohja Police Department, so Harju would have to repeat his story for them. His friends and his uncle could corroborate, but would Sakke, who’d helped him hide evidence by fixing the van, admit to anything? What about the friend at the cabin who’d scared Harju off with talk of knives?

  Part of me wanted to believe Harju’s story, though it didn’t simplify my investigation or negate the fact that Jutta had received death threats both before and after the accident. It was an amazing coincidence that Harju had ended up working at Adaptive Sports, although of course a poor sports-promotion organization would be happy to accept assistance from the state employment office. And if Harju had reason to assume that he might be found out, it would be in his best interest to confess and try to maintain his image as a decent human being.

  “The investigation of the accident isn’t my responsibility,” I told Harju. “I’ll send copies of our interview report to the police in Lohja, and they’ll contact you.”

  “Can I talk to Jutta before they do? And Toni too, of course. I have to apologize to them.”

  I wouldn’t reveal Jutta’s location to Harju, but he could do whatever he wanted in regards to Toni Väärä. Once more I asked how well Harju had known Pentti Vainikainen and received the same answer as before: he hadn’t known him at the time of the accident, and he’d only seen Vainikainen around the office later on.

  “You don’t believe me, do you? I was trained to save lives, not take them. Just like you’re trained to solve crimes, not commit them. I thought I was helping by telling you the truth about the accident.”

  Harju looked at each of us in exasperation, and Koivu gave him a crooked smile.

  “Were you expecting a pat on the back?” he asked.

  “No! But what happens now? Are you going to take me in, or do I turn myself in somewhere else?”

  “Now you go back to work. The Lohja police will be in touch. Your crimes haven’t passed the statute of limitations, and the maximum sentences for driving under the influence and vehicular assault are two years in prison. Those are the maximum sentences,” I repeated when I saw Harju flinch. He must have known that his confession might lead to prison.

  Harju remained seated, as if expecting the interrogation to continue. I asked him for contact information for his uncle, Sakke, and the owner of the cabin, even though that was really the Lohja police’s job. We were slated to become the same large police district soon anyway—the Espoo police would be, that is, since none of that had anything to do with me, I reminded myself, startled that my mind had gone there. It was so easy to slip back into my old role. Sweat broke out on my forehead, and I felt nauseated again.

  “Maria?” Koivu asked carefully, and I realized that both he and Harju were staring at me. I wiped my brow.

  “What? Oh, you can go,” I said to Harju, who stood up.

  “Stay reachable!” Koivu added, though saying that didn’t bear any force of law. It would be Lohja’s job to file his travel ban.

  “Will you ask Hillevi Litmanen to come in?” I called out to Harju as he opened the door. He stopped with his hand on the doorknob.

  “You can’t really suspect Hillevi! She wouldn’t hurt a fly. Once when we were leaving the office, we found a seagull that had been hit at the bus stop. She couldn’t even watch me put it out of its misery. And I don’t think she’s ready to be back at work either. She’s afraid of Merja, and Merja takes every chance she gets to put Hillevi down. This isn’t a nice place to work, and I’m glad I’ll be leaving soon. Don’t scare Hillevi any more than she already is!”

  With that, Harju left. Koivu rolled his eyes.

  “Quite the knight in shining armor. You think they’re in cahoots?”

  “Who?”

  “Harju and Hillevi Litmanen. With someone paying them. As Harju said, Hillevi is easy to frighten. Her husband broke her. Are you alright? Your face is totally white.”

  “I’m fine,” I replied and poured myself some water from the pitcher on the table. I felt the same way I had on the worst days of my pregnancies. But my IUD couldn’t have failed a second time. That would be ridiculously bad luck. Koivu must have had the same thought.

  “You aren’t having a third, are you? Hi, Hillevi,” he continued as Litmanen walked in. As usual, Hillevi stank of tobacco. It seemed she’d been outside having a smoke.

  “Hi.” Hillevi stood in the doorway. I asked her to sit.

  “How was your weekend?” I said and refilled my glass, because the smell of cigarettes made a new wave of nausea churn in my gut.

  “How do you think?” Hillevi’s voice was as shrill as a frantic three-year-old’s. “I heard about the explosion on the radio on Friday night and knew instantly that somehow it had something to do with me. You have to believe me. Jouni must have hired one of his prison friends to kill me, but first he wants to toy with me. I told you before: Jouni liked threatening even more than hitting. Now he’s killing people around me, and maybe I’m next . . . Number three. I don’t know who I can trust. On the bus today, this bald, tattooed man sat next to me. It was horrible. I couldn’t change seats because the bus was full, but I was afraid the whole ride that he was going to stick me with a poison syringe without anyone noticing. At least the guards keep me safe here, but what about at home?”

  Hillevi’s fear was familiar, as were her darting eyes. I tried to calm her down, but she seemed to trust Koivu more than me. She probably still thought of me in my role as an Interior Ministry researcher with no executive authority, whereas Koivu was a real police officer.

  Once again, we reviewed the previous Tuesday’s events—the making of the sandwiches and Hillevi’s trip to the grocery store—but she didn’t remember anything new.

  “Is Merja still blaming me for Pentti’s death?” Hillevi’s hands groped in the pockets of her cardigan, and she took out a packet of nicotine gum. “Merja keeps scolding me for smoking. She says it isn’t appropriate for a person working for a sports organization. There are plenty of other people in the building who smoke or use snuff, but in me it’s this huge flaw. I don’t understand how that woman can be so mean. Even her own child is afraid of her. She calls her daughter her ball and chain and tells us how fat and stupid she is. I can’t work here anymore! I’m going to move somewhere in Lapland where Jouni will never find me. I thought I might change my name to my grandmother’s last name, Sydänmaanlakka. Isn’t that pretty? Jouni never remembers things like that. He’d be lucky to remember his own mother’s maiden name.”

  Koivu and I had been at Hillevi’s apartment when the bomb exploded at the Sports Building. Her state at the time made it seem likely that she hadn’t left home in days, and I couldn’t believe she was just pretending to be so helpless. I asked her about Ristiluoma, but Hillevi didn’t have much to say. He’d always been friend
ly to her.

  We offered to take Hillevi home if she was free to leave work, but she declined. She had to finish some calculations by the next day, and she’d lost the whole previous week to the campaign launch and then sick leave. I remembered what Miikka Harju had said about paper pushing. Maybe Merja Vainikainen wasn’t very good at organizing their work.

  After we wrapped up the interviews, we stopped by the Athletics Federation to look over Pentti Vainikainen’s office, since Ursula and Puupponen’s investigation there on Friday had been interrupted by the explosion.

  Vainikainen’s office still looked as if someone had been rummaging through it: binders were spread across the floor, and the top desk drawer was open. A framed, full-page picture of a smiling Merja Vainikainen had fallen on its back. It was strange the cleaner hadn’t tidied up the room, or had he been unable to get into the building after the explosion? The secretary confirmed that the cleaner usually came at eight every weeknight.

  “My office has been cleaned, and no one else has complained. But our cleaner is some . . . well, an immigrant, from one of those Arabic countries,” the woman said coolly. “Maybe their kind don’t like going in rooms that belonged to dead people.”

  I called Puupponen, who confirmed that they had left Vainikainen’s office more or less in the state I described. So for some reason the cleaner hadn’t worked on that room.

  The binders contained business documents, including memos from sponsorship negotiations, notes from Athletics Federation board meetings, and archived e-mail correspondence. The spine of a green binder was labeled “Pictures,” so I opened it.

  Inside I found sports photographs, mostly of female athletes’ scantily clad posteriors. Was this how Pentti Vainikainen relaxed during tough days at work? The athletes were mostly from track and field or tennis, but a few figure skaters were included. Jutta’s article about the objectification of female athletes came to mind.

  I didn’t find anything more interesting in Vainikainen’s binders, although I only flipped through them superficially. Koivu was on Vainikainen’s computer, which was a sturdy, older desktop model.

  “Can you believe the idiot used ‘Merja’ as his password?” He pulled a USB drive out of his investigation kit and started copying files. Apparently Vainikainen hadn’t done much by way of extra security.

  Because Koivu had his hands full, I went to do some informal interviews with the staff who were still in the office. The CEO of the Athletics Federation was on a business trip, and the head of coaching was off training coaches. Life goes on. The board had met in emergency session on Saturday to find a new director for social affairs.

  “Pentti was a great colleague, and he knew how to do his job,” the chief financial officer told me. “He was especially good at networking; he must have known at least half of Parliament, all the most important ministers, and everyone who makes decisions about the economy in Finland. The CEO of Nokia answered Pentti’s calls himself. When Pentti died, at first I thought someone wanted to hurt the federation, but I guess it was just about that reporter. It’s kind of ironic—Pentti loved attending events and meeting new people, and that was his downfall.”

  After I’d briefly checked in with everyone present, I returned to Vainikainen’s office and sat down in the armchair next to the bookcase, while Koivu continued to slave away at the computer. I’d been forced into this investigation because Taskinen and company considered Vainikainen such an important figure that solving his murder took precedence over every other case. I’d initially assumed that Vainikainen wasn’t the intended victim—I’d thought it was Jutta, and the car bombing had only confirmed my suspicions. But what if I was wrong? Could blowing up Jutta’s car have been a diversion? Or was the target Ristiluoma after all? What connected these two men? Who would have wanted to kill them both?

  I repeated my questions for Koivu as we drove back to Espoo. We all needed a break to clear our heads, so I drove him home, despite his objections. I also called Puupponen and ordered him to knock off. I couldn’t reach Ursula, so I left her a message.

  I drove myself to the station. It was already gloomy, but I didn’t turn on the lights in my office, instead sitting in silence with my feet up on my desk and my hands linked behind my head. I tried to breathe slowly in and out, to get my thoughts flowing freely. I mulled over my conversation with Miikka Harju. It was possible that the poison and the bomb had been meant for Jutta, and the car accident had been a completely unrelated and random occurrence. But I couldn’t dismiss the possibility that someone wanted to get rid of both Vainikainen and Jutta. What if Jutta had seen something important during Vainikainen’s poisoning but didn’t realize it, because she thought she was the intended victim?

  My head started to hurt. I was fumbling for the bottle of painkillers in my bag when I heard the conference room door open and the click of high heels that could only mean Ursula. A man began speaking loudly as soon as the door closed behind them, and I immediately recognized the voice. It belonged to Kristian.

  “Ursula, listen to me! You can’t just leave me like this. Everything was going so well! Better than well! You’re the woman I’ve been looking for my entire life. I want to marry you and have children with you. I make enough money so that you could quit the police, and if you want to do something else, I have connections. Just tell me what you want, and I’ll get it for you!”

  “Don’t even bother, Kristian. We’re through.”

  I’d thought I’d heard Ursula’s voice at its coldest, but the rage she’d directed at me was nothing compared to the anger that radiated from those last two words. I heard her sit in her usual chair, followed by Kristian’s footsteps, then a sound like a kiss and what could only be a slap.

  “Don’t touch me! Get out of here! Do you want me to call for help? I don’t think that would look very good for you. A top lawyer attacking his ex-girlfriend at her workplace, which also happens to be the Espoo Police Department. Leave me alone. I gave you back your key. I can mail you the jewelry you bought me.”

  “Ursula.” Now Kristian was pleading. “I don’t understand what’s gotten into you. We were so good together. Did Maria say something bad about me? Don’t believe her. She’s just bitter I dumped her all those years ago.”

  “This doesn’t have anything to do with Maria. If you don’t leave now, I’m going to start screaming. Or do I need to get the pepper spray? Leave!”

  I heard steps again, and the door opening. Now Kristian’s voice was also hard with anger.

  “You’ll change your mind. You’ll be begging me to come back before you know it. Trust me. We’ll just have to see what I say.”

  The door slammed after him. I waited a couple of minutes, but Ursula didn’t leave. How long would I have to lurk as a prisoner in my own office? I didn’t want Ursula to know that I’d heard their conversation.

  Then I started hearing sounds from the conference room. Ursula blew her nose once and then again. Then she started to cry. I’d rarely heard such inconsolable weeping. It was like a small child being left at day care for the first time, absolutely sure that her parents weren’t coming back. I never would have imagined that Ursula could cry that way, because she’d always given the impression that she could survive anything and didn’t care about much of anything.

  When the crying didn’t subside after a full five minutes, I decided to go find out what was going on. I tried to stand up out of my chair as loudly as possible to give Ursula a chance to calm down or escape. I opened the door and stepped into the dark conference room, which was illuminated only by the streetlight outside. Ursula lay with her face buried in her hands on the table. When she heard the sound of the door, she lifted her face and groaned.

  “Maria! Were you here the whole time?”

  “I was. I’m sorry. I should have made myself known earlier. Can I help?”

  I expected her to tell me to go to hell and mind my own business, but instead she burst into tears. Her handkerchief was soaked through, so I got her some
napkins from near the coffee maker and looked in the refrigerator for the mineral water I’d brought with me in the morning. Crying makes you thirsty. I took the napkins and water to Ursula and carefully sat down next to her. I didn’t dare touch her, afraid she’d lash out at me.

  “Tell me that Kristian is a bastard. You have experience with him! Tell me it’s good to be rid of him!” Ursula wailed.

  “But you were the one who dumped him,” I said in confusion.

  “What else was I supposed to do when he wouldn’t shut up about having kids? I thought he wouldn’t want any more. He already has three from his last marriage. I guess he’s too young for me. I’ll have to stick to the sixty-year-olds. Like Assistant Chief Kaartamo or that vice president from Nokia.” Ursula burst out in what was either laughing or crying—I couldn’t tell.

  “Are you absolutely sure you don’t want children? Is that a red line for you?” I was still prepared to beat a hasty retreat if she lost her temper, and now Ursula did look at me. Her heavy makeup was smeared around her eyes.

  “It isn’t a choice I get to make! When I was seventeen, I had a tumor in my uterus. They had to do a hysterectomy, so there aren’t ever going to be any children! Of course, you can’t understand. You already have two beautiful brats. You can’t imagine how much I envy you!”

  At the risk of being shrugged off, I wrapped my arms around Ursula, because I couldn’t find any words of comfort. Ursula’s sorrow was catching, and my own eyes began to tear up. For a long time, we sat side by side in the darkness, listening to the hectic pulse of the police station slowing down. Cars pulled out of the parking lot, leaving only the bare-bones duty staff. Finally Ursula began to shift, and I let her go and stood up. Ursula uncapped the mineral water and greedily drank.

  “You aren’t going to tell anyone, are you?” she finally asked, her voice still lacking its familiar tone of defiance. “Especially not Kristian?”

  “Of course not. But don’t you think this might change his mind about having kids? Like you said, he already has three.”