The Lavender Ladies Detective Agency: Death in Sunset Grove

by Minna Lindgren

  ‘It was one of those orphan dogs. They went by plane to Spain, and my grandson and his boyfriend had to fill out a lot of forms and applications to get to be the dog’s “parents”. They bring the dog with them everywhere they go. It’s been to my place several times and I always give it liver casserole, but they don’t like that because they feed it fresh pork liver from the market hall. A stray dog!’

  Irma laughed happily and Siiri started to feel nervous because Anna-Liisa seemed more interested in Irma’s grandson’s dog than she was in Mika Korhonen. Then Siiri remembered what Mika had told them about Pasi, the social worker. Mika had said that Pasi was well known to the police.

  ‘Is that what he said?’ Anna-Liisa said. ‘Did he mean that Pasi is a criminal, like this Mika of yours, or that he cooperates with the police?’

  ‘Hmm. That I don’t know. Pasi is somehow connected to the fact that Tero was held for questioning. And that’s where Tero died – in his jail cell. Does that make sense?’ Siiri felt unpleasantly shaky, and Anna-Liisa’s sharp interrogational style wasn’t helping. ‘As I recall, he said that Sinikka Sundström tried to appease the police by giving Pasi the sack. At least, I think that’s what he said.’

  ‘I’m sorry, who’s Sinikka Sundström?’ Irma asked.

  Siiri’s head spun like someone had struck her. She looked frantically at Anna-Liisa, who didn’t flinch in the slightest, just calmly explained who they were talking about, without teasing or taunting Irma, which was unusual for Anna-Liisa. She had obviously noticed the same thing as Siiri: Irma was having more and more frequent moments of confusion. Once she’d calmed Irma down, Anna-Liisa turned firmly back to Siiri and urged her to get in touch with Mika Korhonen soon, because surely he was a man who could help them.

  ‘But we don’t have his telephone number!’ Siiri shouted, horrified. How could they have been so stupid? And how could Mika have been so absent-minded? Or was it that he really was a criminal and was only trying to get useful information out of them? What if he ‘d made the whole thing up?

  ‘Calm down,’ Anna-Liisa said, in the stern tone she had perfected through years of addressing rambunctious preadolescents. ‘He couldn’t have made the whole thing up, because he knew a lot of things that are true. And if he is a criminal, we’ll have to intervene in his activities.’

  She was right, of course. Siiri admired her courage. Anna-Liisa seemed positively thrilled at the possibility of investigating organized crime at Sunset Grove. But there had to be at least ten Mika Korhonens in Helsinki alone, and they didn’t even know where he lived. Should they just go through the phone book and call every Mika Korhonen?

  All this guesswork was making Siiri feel like she should have had a career as a detective. But it was exhausting just investigating the mysteries at Sunset Grove. Thank goodness she hadn’t had to do it for her whole life. She might not have lived so long otherwise.

  ‘People don’t put their phone numbers in the phone book any more. You have to look up addresses and phone numbers on the Internet. Or you could look for him on Facebook,’ Anna-Liisa said, pronouncing the exotic word with a lilt, as if it were Italian.

  ‘What if we just started taking taxis?’ Siiri suggested. ‘Maybe one day we would get Mika for a driver.’

  She hoped this suggestion would bring Irma back to earth, but Irma was fast asleep in the uncomfortable institutional chair, her head hanging awkwardly, her purple handbag fallen to the floor. She was so quiet that for a moment they thought she had died. Then she breathed, thank heavens, but she wouldn’t wake up, even when Anna-Liisa gave her a sharp flick on the back of the hand.

  Chapter 17

  A couple of weeks after her doctor’s visit, Siiri received a report about her heart arrhythmia, two prescriptions, and a complete explanation of why this ninety-four-year-old, alert patient was not having a pacemaker installed. She particularly liked the phrase: ‘seems rational for her age’. The doctor had sent two copies of the report, which was very kind of him. Siiri went to find Irma to show her – not exactly a bill of health, but at least she was rational. The weight of an expert’s opinion would surely speed up the handling of their complaint to the Loving Care Foundation.

  But Irma didn’t answer her door. Siiri knew that Irma was in her apartment because she could hear Mozart’s piano concerto blaring much too loudly. Luckily, they had given each other spare keys. You never knew what might happen if you left your handbag somewhere or accidentally closed the door when you went out to get the post in your nightgown. Erkki Hiukkanen charged twenty-five euros to open a locked door, and they refused to pay that lazy caretaker such exorbitant fees. Virpi and Erkki Hiukkanen lived on the top floor of Sunset Grove in a large apartment, so it couldn’t have been any great inconvenience to come and open an old woman’s door. Many of the residents walked around with their keys around their necks like 1970s schoolchildren, including Anna-Liisa, but Siiri thought that a grown woman should keep her keys in her handbag, which she now remembered she had left at home on her kitchen table. So she didn’t have her own keys with her, let alone Irma’s. There was nothing for it but to pound on Irma’s door with her fist and crow loudly. She had to pound for a long time, and kick, too, before there was a pause in the music and Irma came to the door.

  ‘What in the world is all that racket? Have you gone out of your mind?’

  Siiri explained the situation with some embarrassment, and Irma offered to make them some instant coffee and dug some ice creams out of the freezer. Siiri sat in Irma’s old flowered armchair and told her about the doctor’s report and her hope that it would help with their complaint.

  ‘What complaint do you mean?’ Irma asked, and Siiri had an uncomfortable feeling. Her hands started to shake and she tried to shove the papers back in the envelope. They got all crumpled and she didn’t know where to put them. Irma’s table was a jumble of objects, including all sorts of folders, which was odd because her home was usually very tidy. Irma contentedly ate her cloudberry jam ice cream and looked at Siiri in wonder, but didn’t say anything.

  ‘Do you ever worry about your memory?’ Siiri said, finally finding the courage to bring up the subject after having rehearsed several times. She had to know whether Irma herself realized that she was sometimes very confused. They had always been honest with each other about everything, so she ought to be able to talk about this, too.

  ‘Oh, don’t be silly,’ Irma said, waving her hand as if a swarm of flouse-lies were buzzing around her. ‘Anyone can forget her handbag – even young people do it. What I’m starting to worry about is what Virpi Hiukkanen’s up to. Because I think she’s spying on me. Also, you’re sitting in my spot.’

  Siiri got up out of the armchair and moved obediently to the sofa. She remembered how they had often laughed at Irma’s husband, who’d had a sacred armchair and a place at the dining table and didn’t scruple to show his annoyance if some unwitting soul accidentally sat there. The yellow light of the lamp cast a strange glow on Irma’s face and she spoke in a quiet voice, glancing around uncertainly. She said she’d pulled the plugs on the surveillance cameras and even taken her telephone off the wall, because the people downstairs were listening in on her phone calls. She also claimed that some of her important papers had been stolen. That was why she had a pile of folders on the table.

  ‘All of my health-related records were in a green folder, neatly arranged. And somebody’s pinched them.’

  Siiri started going through the files on the table. None of them were green, and she switched to thumbing through the ones on the bookshelf. Irma had almost a metre of books by Eeva Joenpelto, twice as many Moomin books, Isaac Singer, Astrid Lindgren, Selma Lagerlöf, and a few random newer books, all in alphabetical order by author, as well as two shelves of photo albums. When Siiri had finished going through the bookshelf, she looked through the pile of folders on the telephone table, but she didn’t find any medical records or any green folders.

  Irma ate another ice cream, then got up, opened the
wardrobe door and rummaged for a time. After a moment she stuck her head out and said, ‘Hey! What was it we were looking for?’

  ‘What were we looking for!’ Siiri snapped. ‘We’ve spent half the day searching because you’ve got some silly idea in your head. As if anyone would want to steal your papers! What in the world was it that you needed this green folder for? Do you remember? Was it full of old recipes and doctors’ notes?’

  ‘Oh right, that. Boy, there’s something strange going on. Several months ago I asked Virpi Hiukkanen if I could look at my own medical files and any other files concerning me, but she refused to give them to me. Don’t you think that’s odd? After all, I have a right to read what they write about me – doctors’ reports and that sort of thing. Such strange things have been going on here lately that I’m starting to feel scared of the whole place.’

  Perhaps the green folder had been stolen. Maybe there was something shady happening with Irma’s files, probably false information about her, faked diagnoses. Irma was very agitated, and she stood there, blank-faced, holding two pairs of silk long johns in her hand. Siiri led her over to sit in her armchair, poured her a glass of red wine, put the long johns back in the wardrobe, and noticed that Irma had at least twenty identical pairs in boxes on the shelves.

  Irma drank a large glass of red wine, almost in one gulp, and began to droop. Her speech was laboured, and Siiri couldn’t make out what she said except that she wanted to go to sleep, although it was only three in the afternoon. She helped her to lie down on the bed and checked to make sure that she had taken her medicine. There was a pill box full of tablets on the bedside table. There seemed to be more pills than there had been on the day when Mika helped them count out the tablets at Restaurant Kämp. Irma had taken that day’s first doses – one of each pill in the morning and one at noon. But why in the world did a ninety-five-year-old woman who was as healthy as a horse need so many pills?

  Chapter 18

  Siiri sat in her usual seat on the tram and tried to see behind Eira Hospital. That was where Villa Johanna was, a whimsical work by her favourite architect, Selim A. Lindqvist, which you could see from the number 3 as it turned onto Tehtaankatu. She had a habit of concentrating on one building and trying to think of as many other works in Helsinki by the same architect as she could. Selim A. Lindqvist was easy: there were two buildings of his, side by side, on Aleksanterinkatu – numbers 11 and 13.

  The number 3B tram changed to the number 3T at Olympia Terminal, and Siiri decided to take it as far as the new opera house. Then she could get on the number 4 to get back to Sunset Grove. She had already ridden around for more than two hours, using any favourite tram route or building she could think of as an excuse to put off going back home, because the mere thought of Sunset Grove gave her a very unpleasant feeling. She didn’t want to see Virpi Hiukkanen, she didn’t want to think about Irma’s confusion and growing suspiciousness, and she didn’t know how to bring up all these worries with Anna-Liisa, who was always so logical and business-like that she sometimes made Siiri feel stupid. And she still hadn’t heard anything from Mika Korhonen.

  A talkative little girl was sitting with her mother next to the ticket dispenser, wearing a funny-looking hat with bear ears on it.

  ‘And that’s why I think the boys are stupid, except for Oiva. But guess what, I want one of those Monster High dolls, but I want it now, and not as a Christmas present because it’s boring to play with just one and I only have one. I want Draculaura. Can you remember that?’

  The mother had her arms full of shopping bags. She looked worn out and wasn’t paying any attention to the little girl. But the child didn’t give up.

  ‘Mama, why doesn’t everybody have kids? Why doesn’t Grandma have kids? Why, Mama?’

  ‘Your grandma does have kids. Otherwise she couldn’t be your grandma,’ said a wino across the aisle. The little girl took an interest in this new acquaintance and got up to stand in the aisle, but her mother continued to stare at the rain hitting the window.

  ‘My grandma is Grandpa’s girlfriend and she’s much younger than my mother, so she could have kids any time she wanted, but Mama wouldn’t want her to. What are your children’s names? Do you have a job? Why not? What do you do, then?’

  ‘I sit in the park and ride on the tram.’

  ‘Fun! I want to do that when I’m big!’

  The tram made Siiri’s beloved curve at Kamppi and the passengers pricked up their ears to hear the wino’s reaction to the little girl’s future plans.

  ‘What park do you go to?’ the girl asked. ‘I usually go to the one on Lapinlahdenkatu, but it’s pretty small.’

  ‘Me too. It’s a nice park.’

  ‘And Väiski, but only in the winter.’

  ‘I sometimes go and sit on the rocks at Temppeliaukio. There’s a nice view from there.’

  ‘I’ve never been there. Does it have swings? Do you like to swing?’

  At that point the girl’s mother came to life, gathered her bags, stood up, and tugged the child behind her off the tram. The wino waved at the little girl and the reflectors on the child’s dungarees glowed brightly. Siiri felt like waving, too, but she contented herself with watching the bear-eared child, to whom she was grateful, for the little creature had unwittingly brightened her day.

  The rest of the trip to Mannerheimintie was reverently silent. Then the number 4 didn’t come, although the signpost said that she had only two minutes to wait. Siiri, tired of standing in the cold, got on the number 10, and almost fell asleep, the carriage was so still and quiet. At the old customs gate she started awake and was confused when the tram turned onto Tukholmankatu instead of going straight like the number 10 should have. To her relief the other passengers were as startled as she was.

  ‘Isn’t this the number ten?’ a sensible-looking woman asked her.

  ‘That’s what I thought,’ Siiri answered with a smile. ‘Although this route suits me, since I live in Munkkiniemi.’

  ‘I have to get to Tilkka,’ the woman said worriedly. ‘My shift is starting.’

  ‘Are you a nurse? Isn’t Tilkka a retirement home now?’ Siiri asked with interest, but the tram stopped at the Aura building and the woman departed in a hurry.

  The driver smiled in surprise. Siiri recognized him as the young man who listened to classical music while he drove, as he was doing now. She had talked with him several times before. She went up to him and asked whether something was amiss.

  ‘Well, yeah, I accidentally went the wrong way. I was listening to Bruckner’s seventh and forgot I was driving the number ten.’

  ‘You shouldn’t listen to the seventh when you’re driving the number ten.’

  ‘True, but Bruckner doesn’t have a number ten, although he has ten symphonies. The first is symphony zero. Don’t ask me why.’

  ‘But what about Mahler? Doesn’t he have a tenth symphony?’

  ‘It’s unfinished. Just like today’s route.’

  The driver contacted headquarters. Siiri always found it exciting when instructions and announcements came to the drivers somewhere out of the ether. They only happened occasionally, but sometimes the police were summoned to some designated tram stop to pick up an old person who had escaped from the hospital, at other times an accident necessitated an alternate route. When he’d received his instructions, the driver bent over his microphone.

  ‘OK, passengers. There’s been a mistake. I’m sorry,’ he began. ‘I’m going to have to drive to Munkkiniemi. Anyone who wants the number ten can get off here. There’ll be one along there soon.’

  Siiri was proud of the driver for openly admitting his mistake, which wasn’t easy to do. He did make Munkkiniemi sound like some horrible place, though, where you would only go if you had no other alternative.

  ‘Well, I don’t, do I?’ he said with a smile. Siiri stood next to him. The trip continued and Bruckner played. Luckily, the seventh symphony was so long that the music wouldn’t end before they came to the end of the r
oute.

  ‘Yeah. Bruckner was quite a guy,’ the driver said with a sigh.

  Siiri thought at first that she would ride along with the driver all the way around the Munkkiniemi shore, just for moral support, but then she started to feel tired from standing there next to the door, and so she got off at her own stop.

  ‘Enjoy the rest of the trip, and thanks for the refreshing company,’ she said. ‘I’m headed for the terminal.’ She thought it was funny to call Sunset Grove the terminal. The driver laughed happily.

  ‘Right! I just missed mine!’

  Chapter 19

  ‘What’s the matter?’ Siiri asked worriedly when Irma didn’t want to read the paper, not even the obituaries. ‘Are you sick?’

  Every Sunday, after they’d drunk their instant coffee, Siiri and Irma would open the paper and Irma would say ‘Any fun dead people?’ Unfortunately, there were fewer and fewer fun dead people every day, since all the best ones had already died. If they didn’t find anyone they knew in the obituaries, they would read the memorial columns aloud and try to decide what kind of people the week’s dead had been. On a good Sunday they could spend a pleasant hour and a half at this, but today Irma didn’t feel like even looking at the page.

  ‘Irma, you’re depressed. Have you stopped taking your peppity-pills?’

  Irma didn’t answer. She had fallen asleep in her chair. Siiri couldn’t get her to wake up, or into a more comfortable position, no matter how she tried. She felt helpless and frustrated, and a sadness tinged with terror made her fidgety. She walked in a circle, moved objects around, and babbled to Irma about all sorts of harmless things that she thought would perk her friend up, because she’d read in the paper that the last sense a person loses is their hearing.

  ‘Döden, döden, döden,’ she whispered at last into Irma’s ear, before going back to her own apartment to finish reading the paper there.