Secret Passages in a Hillside Town

by Pasi Ilmari Jaaskelainen

  Olli felt sick. His stomach clenched and black spots danced in front of his eyes. He had to go lie down on the sofa.

  20

  That Karri has been such a strange boy lately.

  The breakfast table is set among the apple trees on a lawn still wet with dew. Olli and the Blomrooses are talking cheerfully. They’re waiting for Karri to join them so they can leave on their expedition. They often have to wait for Karri these days. When Aunt Anna suddenly says out loud what Olli has been noticing since the beginning of the summer, everyone stops talking and Olli’s cheeriness fades.

  The sky over Tourula is misty and the sun is a dull tenpenni piece. The sparrows are chirping noisily in the trees and bushes. Then the neighbour’s grey cat slips in under the fence and the birds go mum.

  The silence that has fallen over the group gradually deepens until it’s uncomfortable.

  Riku is the first to break it and try to lighten the mood. With mock concern and a shake of his head he says sombrely that if you ask him Karri Kultanen has always been a strange boy. A laugh escapes from Leo.

  Anne stiffens and looks at her brothers angrily.

  “Karri is not strange, he’s wonderful,” she says in a voice that mixes cold control with a hot fury. Olli almost expects steam to come out of her nose. Anne smiles patronizingly. “He’s so wonderful that not everyone can even understand him. While you two cretins are reading Tex Willer, the sports page and Riku’s sticky old porno magazine, Karri is reading books. Real books. Classic novels and plays. Philosophy, medicine, art history. Biology. He thinks about things and he knows more than a lot of teachers do. He has his own ideas, which is more than I can say for you two fine gentlemen.”

  Then she turns to address Aunt Anna. “Don’t worry about your son. Believe me, Karri is going to be something truly special. He’s going to surprise all of us, me included—although I already believe in him.”

  Riku smiles teasingly and the usually serious Leo shakes his head pityingly. Anne meets their gaze without flinching, but can’t hide the blush in her cheeks.

  It upsets Olli to realize that he’s still hopelessly infatuated with Anne, who obviously has feelings for Karri, although falling in love with her own cousin probably isn’t quite normal.

  Aunt Anna is lost in thought, staring emptily into the distance. Her usual liveliness is gone; she hardly seems like the old Aunt Anna. She looks like she’s having some kind of attack. Olli and the Blomrooses look at each other in alarm. They feel as if they’re sitting there with a dead person.

  When Anne finally bends to touch her aunt’s arm, Anna jumps and frightens them all.

  The familiar, cheery smile returns to her face. She thanks Anne for her words and smiles until her eyes squint. “Well, we’ll see how my Karri turns out. Maybe he will surprise us all.”

  The air is cool. Aunt Anna’s large breasts stretch the fabric of her blouse so tight that the buttons look as if they might pop off, and, as always happens in cool weather, her nipples press hard and dark against the cloth. Olli certainly notices them—a person couldn’t help noticing them unless he was “a hardened old homo” as Riku once said—but this time he can’t take any interest in the Blomrooses’ voluptuous aunt. He isn’t even interested in the treats set out on the table, which Leo, Anne and Riku have started to eat.

  He’s busy worrying about Karri, about the future of the Five, and especially about his own place among them.

  Karri has been strange for a long time. He’s becoming even stranger. There are little things that only Olli notices. For instance, Karri often watches Olli, and sometimes the others too, from under his hood, as if he were planning something having to do with them. And although Karri has always been shy, his shyness has changed to withdrawal and poorly concealed hostility towards the other members of the Tourula Five—though he does still seem to think of Leo as a sort of big brother figure.

  Olli has thought about this and decided that Karri may be planning to kick him out of Tourula and out of the group, or even planning to disband the Five altogether. Karri still comes with them on all their outings and takes them to the secret passages, but maybe he does it more out of duty and a desire to please Leo than from any enthusiasm.

  Maybe Karri hasn’t ever really accepted Olli. Now that he thinks about it, Karri has always treated him with a sort of edgy wariness.

  Leo is still the leader of the Five and in a way Olli is under his protection. But Karri is the only permanent resident of their summer place. It’s something they all have a habit of forgetting. The place that they think of as their own summer place is Aunt Anna and Karri’s home in the winter, too. And besides, Karri is the only one who knows how to find the secret passages. So if Karri wants Olli out, he’s out. In fact Karri has the power to end the whole thing.

  The Blomrooses don’t realize it, but the Tourula Five is in danger of breaking up.

  The first crisis came when Timi disappeared. That was when they realized that a lot of bad things could happen in the secret passages. What happened to Timi could happen to any one of them.

  This realization cast a shadow over their carefree adventures. That was why Anne was so serious after what happened to Timi, even though she had never liked the dog. They took a break for three weeks before they decided to go back to exploring the secret passages. What else could they do? Like Riku said, they weren’t brave adventurers, they were hopeless passageway junkies. As long as there were secret passages to find they would keep going back to them, no matter what happened underground.

  Karri has never been one to show his feelings or share his thoughts with other people. But once, when Timi had been gone for a week and Olli was sitting alone outside his grandparents’ apartment at the rifle factory, Karri appeared beside him in his dirty sweatshirt.

  He hesitated for a moment and then said, “Listen, I just wanted you to know… I’ve been looking for Timi every day ever since he disappeared. In the passages. I haven’t found him. I’m sorry.”

  Olli thanked him. He waited for him to leave.

  But Karri stepped closer, hesitantly took Olli’s hand, and looked out from under his hood straight into Olli’s eyes. It was disconcerting. Olli didn’t know how to react. Afterwards he realized that Karri might have never looked him in the eye before, at least not from so close. Something about his eyes surprised Olli.

  “I’m sorry about what happened to Timi,” Karri said. “He was the best dog I’ve ever met.”

  Timi had certainly always liked Karri more than the other members of the Five—except for Olli, of course—and Karri had warmed to the dog.

  Now it occurs to Olli that maybe Karri only put up with him because of Timi.

  And now there is no Timi.

  That can’t be good.

  The thought of future summers without the Tourula Five or Aunt Anna or the secret passages troubles Olli. At home in Koirakkala he doesn’t have any friends. In Tourula, everything is different.

  As Olli digs himself out of these thoughts of the approaching destruction of his paradise, Aunt Anna offers everyone boiled eggs, ham, toast, three kinds of rolls, raisin buns, apple marmalade, peanut butter, frosted cornflakes, tea and juice. Olli isn’t hungry but he dutifully eats a roll.

  Finally Karri comes out in his hood, grabs an egg from the table as deftly as a street thief, and goes back into the house.

  The Blomrooses chatter among themselves as if nothing has happened.

  Aunt Anna watches her son go.

  Then she turns to look at Olli and her eyes are dark with tears.

  *

  When they finally go on their expedition, they walk through Tourula, cross the bridge over the river, and continue to Puistokatu. On the other side of the fence, a coffin is being carried through the cemetery. The bells ring in memory of the deceased.

  As always, Karri follows a short distance behind the others. For a moment Olli forgets him completely and turns to look at the massive Goodyear tyre advertisement painted on the wall of a tall
building. He has always liked that ad.

  His glance meets Karri’s. Something flashes in Karri’s eyes that Olli can’t quite name, and then it’s gone and Karri looks away and his face closes up.

  Olli runs to catch up with the Blomrooses and walks with them the rest of the way.

  Summer’s colours have faded like a painting left out in the rain. The washed-out greys of autumn are coming. The wind has turned cold. Olli is wearing a polo shirt and a denim jacket that he bought yesterday on a shopping trip with his grandmother, but he’s still cold.

  The Blomrooses don’t notice the signs of summer ending. Olli likes them an awful lot, but they never notice things like that and it gives Olli a lonely feeling.

  They pass the Taulumäki church and there is a wedding party celebrating in the churchyard. They cross the street and come to the sandy foot of Taulumäki Hill.

  The north slope of the hill is high and steep. As they climb up, their shoes fill with sand and Anne almost falls and tumbles down the hillside. Olli grabs her hand just in time. She rewards him with a smile. Anne knows how to be nice when she wants to.

  When they get to the top they climb up on the rocks to enjoy the view.

  To the north-west is the lake, Tuomiojärvi. There’s no one at the swimming area. Olli’s not the only one who thinks summer is over. To the south-east is the city and the Orthodox church. Anne looks down at its gilded dome, her eyes glittering. “Just think if you could scrape all that gold off and keep it. That would make a lot of jewellery.”

  “Greedy little Anne,” Leo says gently. “My sweet criminal sister. Leave the church alone. Stick to swiping candy from the store. Some things are too sacred even for you.”

  Anne grins.

  The Blomrooses and Olli look at each other, fidgety and tense. Yesterday Leo asked Karri to try to find the entrance to the first secret passageway they ever found. The one that Timi crawled into without waiting for them. Karri promised to try. Olli forgets his doubts for a moment. Right now everything is like it was in the beginning. They all feel it. This is where it all began, the Tourula Five’s secret passage adventures.

  Leo, Anne and Riku think they know where the entrance is. They each go in different directions.

  “It’s over here, between these rocks,” Leo says.

  “No, it’s over there under that juniper tree!” Riku announces. “I’m sure that’s where it is.”

  “I think it’s somewhere over here,” Anne mumbles, peeping between some trees.

  Karri goes his own way. Olli doesn’t even try to find the entrance. Karri’s the only one who can.

  So Olli follows him, over roots, rocks and hollows, in the shadows of the trees, careful not to disturb or annoy him, and Karri doesn’t seem to mind. They look at each other and Karri even nods and gives him a friendly smile. At first Olli is puzzled and then happy—if there is something between them, it’s been put aside at least for a little while.

  Maybe everything will work out after all.

  As he relaxes, the memory of the first time the Five found a secret passageway begins to grow clear in his mind.

  21

  THE FIRST SUMMER OF THE FIVE they were just getting to know each other.

  They spent their days playing board games, hide and seek, and spin the bottle, or reading Enid Blyton books aloud—which was a lot of fun, though rather tame compared to their later adventures.

  They went into the secret passages the second summer.

  They had spent the first two days of holiday lazing about, playing old maid, sprawled on the lawn, until Aunt Anna had had enough. She came out of the house with a picnic basket.

  “Kids,” she said emphatically, “it’s summer. You’re on holiday. You’re children. This is no way to spend your childhood. It’s a waste. You would think you were as old as I am. Take this basket. Go on a picnic. Find a nice spot and stop hanging around here. There’s a great big city waiting out there for you. Enjoy it. You can play cards when you’re in the old folks’ home. Don’t come back here for the rest of the day.”

  They looked at her in surprise. She looked exasperated. “Go on!” she yelled, frightening them. “Have adventures! Go get lost somewhere. But find your way home before dark…”

  Timi had been hiding for hours. Now he smelt the food and appeared again, sniffing the basket.

  The kids sniffed at the contents of the basket, too. They were amazed at the abundance of food, and thanked Aunt Anna. She gave each of them a kiss on the cheek. Olli could smell perfume behind her ear. It smelt good. His mother never wore perfume.

  After half an hour of consultation they decided to go to the burnt-out house. Olli had seen it from the car when his parents brought him to his grandparents’ house. His description of the blackened boards, the belongings that had been dumped in the yard and the broken windows piqued everyone’s interest.

  Timi came with them. Olli’s mother had made him swear to keep the dog on a leash, but he decided to trust the dog and let him go loose. He wanted to please Anne, who said that they were all on holiday, which meant they were free, so why shouldn’t Timi be free, too? Freedom!

  They wandered for a couple of hours, until everyone’s feet ached and Olli admitted that he might not be quite sure where the burnt-out house was. Maybe it was in a totally different part of town.

  Anne and Riku gave him murderous looks.

  Karri didn’t say anything, he just looked off into the distance, thinking his own thoughts.

  Leo said that these things happen, and led them in the direction that looked right to him.

  They ended up climbing a wooded hill, and found a swimming area on the other side. Later they learnt that the hill was called Taulumäki.

  While the others sat down to enjoy their lunch, Karri explored the area. He paced about and said there was something peculiar about the place and that in some spots the feeling was particularly strong. He wanted to show it to them, couldn’t even be bothered to eat something first. Timi sensed it, too, or perhaps he just sensed Karri’s excitement. In any case he was jumping up and down around Karri and whining and barking, although Olli tried to order him to heel.

  “That leaves more goodies for us,” Riku said.

  “Don’t worry, Karri,” Anne said. “I’ll make sure we leave you some of everything.”

  Olli felt a twinge of jealousy. He had just got his leg positioned so that it touched Anne’s pale leg. It was a hot day. Their legs were sweaty. Their sweat was intermingling. Olli didn’t know why, but there was something exciting about it.

  He glanced at Anne. She noticed him looking at her and gave him a crooked smile that told him she knew what he was thinking, but for some reason she was allowing him to do what he was doing.

  Olli closed his eyes, enjoying the warmth and the touch and the fact that he was a member of the legendary Tourula Five, then he went back to eating his peanut butter sandwich with such concentration that he didn’t even hear when Karri yelled to them or notice when the others got up and left.

  A moment later, he became aware of noises in the undergrowth. Karri was explaining something excitedly. Timi was barking. Olli hurried to where the others were.

  There was a dark hole in the ground. The Blomrooses and Karri were gathered around it. It wasn’t easy to see the hole among the grass and roots. It just looked like a dark indentation in the dirt. But when you looked more closely you could see that it was a hole that reached deep into the ground.

  “Some animal’s burrow,” Riku muttered. “Is this why you called us over here?”

  Leo thought they should go back to the picnic basket before the animal who lived here found it. Olli, Anne and Riku thought so, too.

  “No,” Karri said, so firmly that they were startled. He was lying on his belly on the ground with his face in the hole. “This isn’t an animal’s den. This is something completely different.”

  “How about we leave it alone, though,” Leo said in his conciliating yet authoritative way. “Look at Timi.
He’s barking and staying away from it. There’s something in there with sharp teeth. A badger or something. Maybe a fox. And if you keep spying on it it’s going to bite your face off.”

  Anne said, “Come away from there, Karri…”

  Karri sighed, looked at Timi, who seemed to have gone off his rocker, and withdrew from the hole.

  “Maybe you’re right.”

  He stood up and shrugged.

  Them Timi sprinted past him.

  Before anyone knew what was happening, the dog had crawled into the hole and disappeared.

  They waited forever. Or for sixteen minutes, as Riku said later on when they talked over what had happened. “I know because I looked at my watch,” he said. “It was still working then…”

  They all squatted around the hole staring into the darkness, unable to speak, hardly even able to breathe. The sounds of the beach were from some other, happier world. A world where children didn’t lose their dogs in a hole in the ground.

  The day was growing brighter and hotter.

  Timi stayed under the ground.

  When you put your hand in the hole you could feel the unchanging coolness of the earth.

  The horrified spell over them eased. They started to speak again. Their voices were shocked, solemn. They each peeped into the hole in turn. They shouted threats and promises and persuasions to the dog. Now and then they thought they might have heard a noise.

  But there was only dark, impenetrable silence.

  Olli was trembling. If Timi couldn’t get back out, he would come to a cruel end underground. They couldn’t do a thing to help him. The thought of it tore him up. But it would have been crazy even to think of going in after him. He might get stuck and suffocate and die. The burrow might collapse.

  Olli wished he had kept the dog on a leash, regardless of what Anne said.

  He tried not to cry. The others looked at him with the silent, fearful deference instinctively given to someone who’s suffered a terrible loss.