The Nightingale Murder

by Leena Lehtolainen

  “All of you will be contacted first thing in the morning to schedule interviews,” I announced.

  “I’m supposed to be at home in Vesanto tomorrow,” Mauri Hytönen said. I glanced at Puupponen. It would be best to conduct Hytönen’s initial questioning immediately, and then we could ask the police in Kuopio to assist with any follow-up.

  “I don’t know who did it!” Länsimies yelled into his phone and then wiped his brow with a red checked handkerchief. I touched him on the arm and gave him another look.

  “I have to talk to the police now,” he said, obviously relieved that he had an excuse to hang up. Again he patted his forehead and neck with the handkerchief. “I’m sorry. That was the network president. This appears to be a first for Finnish television.”

  “Just a few questions, and then we can continue tomorrow. Can you tell me who met with Lulu Nightingale here at the studio?”

  “That’s easy: me and Riitta. We asked Lulu to come to the studio at eight thirty, and Riitta met her at the door. Then I popped in to say hello just before we began taping. I always visit each guest to get them warmed up to the topic.”

  “Who chooses the guests for the show?”

  “Same answer: me and Riitta. We are West Man Productions. My wife owns a quarter of the shares of the company, but she isn’t involved in the practical side of program planning. That’s been one of the nice things about doing this, that I can mostly determine the content myself.”

  “How many people knew Lulu Nightingale would be the final guest tonight?”

  “Once again: me and Riitta. Plus our makeup artist, Nuppu. I also may have mentioned it to the camera and sound crew, since Lulu is . . . Well, she’s the kind of woman men tend to be interested in.”

  “That bottle of Fernet Branca on the table in her dressing room . . . Was that provided by the show or did she bring it with her?”

  “What bottle of Fernet Branca?” Länsimies asked. “Maybe Lulu needed some extra courage. How should I know? We aren’t in the habit of liquoring up our guests.”

  “So you didn’t notice the bottle when you visited Lulu in her dressing room?”

  Länsimies shook his head. When his phone rang again, I let him answer. We’d have to go over all of this again in his formal interview anyway.

  Before getting tied up in another interview, I established that the camera and sound crew had been in the studio itself or the break room at the back of the building since four o’clock. They hardly could have snuck back to the dressing rooms during a live broadcast, and the same went for Ilari Länsimies.

  Mauri Hytönen had stayed put the entire time. “How about we go back to your dressing room?” I suggested. We walked back down the now-familiar hallway. His dressing room was the same as the others: small and cramped. Once settled in, Puupponen pulled a laptop out of his bag and opened an interview record template.

  “Hytönen, Mauri Sulevi, born the sixteenth of April, 1959,” Puupponen repeated after Hytönen.

  “So you volunteered for the program through the Secret Guests website? Why?” I asked.

  “To get my opinion out to the hypocritical masses. I wanted to make them look the truth in the eyes: there have always been prostitutes and there always will be.”

  “Was Lulu Nightingale one of the prostitutes whose services you employed?”

  Hytönen gave me a quick glare and then turned back to Puupponen.

  “No, I never had the pleasure. A while back I saw her show at the Sexhibition Fair, and it wasn’t really my style.”

  “But you knew who she was?”

  “Of course. I keep up on the industry.”

  According to him, Hytönen had arrived at the studio at six and sat down with the makeup artist immediately. Länsimies had visited him to buoy his courage, saying that it wasn’t just any man who would dare to talk about his dealings in the world of sex for hire. Hytönen still seemed pleased with himself.

  “I’ve already had calls from Look and Oho. I can give them interviews, right?”

  “Preferably not while the investigation is going on,” I said. Why did this case have to be so damn public? At least Lulu hadn’t died on camera. Maybe Mauri Hytönen was determined to get his full fifteen minutes of fame. But for now he’d have to wait until we were done.

  He reported that he owned an HVAC company, which also operated in Estonia. That was where his hooker hobby had started. Because Hytönen kept directing his answers to Puupponen, I let my colleague lead the questioning. And Puupponen was good at it. His hometown, Kuopio, was only fifty miles from Vesanto, and the two men quickly fell into their common dialect. Hytönen clearly hadn’t had the opportunity to say everything he’d wanted to on the show, so he began lecturing Puupponen on the joys of commercial sex. “Every man wants more than one woman. It’s in our nature. And every man will cheat if he has the opportunity. No healthy man can survive without sex, and why should he? We should admit that fact instead of moralizing,” Hytönen said. Meanwhile Puupponen continued to try to steer the conversation back to the crime, asking him whether he knew any of the guests before the show. The answer was no. He glanced at his phone.

  “I need to get going. I have a meeting at the Holiday Inn downtown at eleven,” he said, grinning to remove any ambiguity as to the nature of the meeting. I paused for a moment after we let him go, feeling empty inside. Something in what Hytönen had said bothered me, something that didn’t necessarily have to do with the case.

  I went outside for a moment to breathe some fresh air. That was a mistake. Lulu’s body was just being lifted into the ambulance, and beyond the police tape lurked a pack of reporters and photographers. A blond lock of hair had escaped the white sheet, and it was impossible not to notice the shape of her breasts protruding above the strap across her torso as only silicone implants can. The ambulance took off without lights or sirens.

  I yelled to the reporters that I would give a statement about the case later and then went back inside. Things were going according to routine despite everyone being tired and in shock and wanting to go home. These people had experienced a death, and it was my job to refer them to the proper crisis assistance resources, but I also had to remind them that they needed to do their best to help the police.

  “Are we suspects?” Anna-Maija Mustajoki asked. Pastor Terhi Pihlaja spun toward her, and from her expression it was obvious that this idea was new to her.

  “That may be too strong a word,” I replied, even though they were all suspects, every single person who had been in the building. They would all be under suspicion at least until we knew the cause of Lulu Nightingale’s death. Fortunately, no one had plans to go abroad immediately.

  Ilari Länsimies was still speaking in a steady stream into his phone. Liisa Rasilainen came to tell us that Riitta Saarnio’s husband had arrived to pick her up and arranged for a doctor to visit them at home. Liisa gave us the doctor’s contact information so we could find out when Saarnio would be ready for questioning.

  We’d have to interview as many of the crew and the guests as possible tomorrow. It was getting late, and everyone seemed to be too tired to be of any use, so I decided it was time to let them leave. Puupponen’s face looked gray once the studio lights were finally shut off. He would have to go back to the station to assemble everything he could find on Lulu Nightingale before our morning meeting.

  When I finally got away, the gaggle of reporters had thinned. Flashes still fired as I walked to my car. As I passed, I answered their questions, although I didn’t have much information to offer.

  “I’ll have more to tell once we have an initial theory about the cause of death.”

  “And when can we expect that?” asked the crime reporter from MTV3, whom I’d always liked.

  “Depends on the line at the morgue. Maybe as early as tomorrow. I’ll let you know. Now, good night, everyone!” I yelled as I got into my car.

  The car felt like a refuge, as if for a moment within its sheet-metal skin I was out of reach of t
he rest of the world. I didn’t need to listen to anyone else’s phone conversations or the babbling of drunks on the bus. Was that why everyone in Espoo had to drive everywhere, to protect their privacy? You could always find people on the bus or the train who wanted to shout their business for everyone to hear. If you couldn’t get into the tabloids as some celebrity’s secret lover, at least you could force people to hear about your drama until their bus stop.

  I scanned the radio channels and finally found one playing the Boys doing a cover of “Pet Sematary.” That reminded me of Venjamin, whose adoption had been the best decision I’d made in a long time. It was nearly midnight, and the city was already asleep. I passed the last bus in our neighborhood and a couple of taxis headed east. A dog walker on the sidewalk probably wouldn’t encounter any others of his kind. The moon and stars shone bright despite the city lights.

  In our building, almost all the windows were dark. Venjamin padded up at the door and mewed hungrily, even though I knew for a fact that Antti had already fed him his evening meal. Still, I tossed the kitten a couple of treats, which he began batting around the kitchen floor. I drank a glass of buttermilk, washed up, and headed to bed. Antti sniffed beside me, not quite snoring but still making noise. I’d noticed that I slept better when I was alone. Venjamin, done with his snack, jumped onto the bed and sat on my stomach. He quickly purred himself to sleep, but none of my usual relaxation techniques seemed to help me. I couldn’t stop thinking about my unit, about how we were going to manage the workload of this new investigation. At two o’clock I was still awake, but gradually sleep began mixing images from the day’s events into an absurd half dream about Oksana turning up in Mauri Hytönen’s hotel room.

  I woke up at six and decided that the best survival strategy would be to head out for a run. Antti opened his eyes just enough for me to know he was semiawake, so I told him I’d be home in half an hour. For an energy boost, I swigged some juice straight from the carton.

  Outside it was still dim. I tried to stick to paths with fresh gravel, but sometimes that was impossible. The snows hadn’t come until late January this year, and I’d enjoyed the cross-country skiing this winter, but now I didn’t have time to get to the well-maintained tracks in Central Park.

  After ten minutes of running, I finally felt myself waking up. Two cups of coffee and the morning headlines at home handled the rest. I was out the door by seven fifteen, leaving Antti to manage the kids’ morning routine. He didn’t bother to ask when I’d be home.

  In the car, I plugged in my hands-free and called Assistant Chief Kaartamo.

  “Hi, it’s Kallio. You’ve probably heard about what happened last night at the TV studio. I’d like permission to borrow some people from Narcotics and Patrol. Our unit can’t handle this case without backup.”

  I heard a yawn on the other end of the line. Apparently I’d woken him up.

  “Damn it. Can’t you just use your own people?”

  “I can, but not without breaking the overtime rules. I need someone to review all the TV studio surveillance tapes and someone for interviews so we can run three teams at once.”

  “There’s that nuclear power research conference in Otaniemi, so everyone from Patrol is tied up there. I’ll talk to Aaltonen, but I’m pretty sure Narcotics is up to their eyeballs too. I wish the goddamn budget bastards would come out in the field every once in a while! And then there’s our very own deserter, Taskinen, who should have known we wouldn’t be allowed to hire a temporary replacement for him. So, yes, I’ll see what I can do, but try to handle this with your own people!”

  I grimaced into the phone because I’d forgotten the nuclear power conference being held at the Helsinki University of Technology. The meeting was being held in Finland precisely because it was considered to be a safe country. The antinuke activists were planning a demonstration for Saturday, and Antti was planning to go. We’d have to figure some things out, since I was likely to be stuck at work all weekend. Usually these sort of event-related security operations went to our colleagues in Helsinki, but now it was our turn to share the wealth.

  Because of that, I had to assume I wouldn’t be receiving any reinforcements, not even to review the security tape. Puustjärvi and Autio would have to start with that and then move on to investigating Lulu Nightingale’s connections with other prostitutes. Ursula and Puupponen could conduct as many interviews as possible today, and Koivu could handle the searches. If we couldn’t get any help from Narcotics and Patrol, I’d have to go with him. For some reason, the idea of going to a sex studio revolted me. But why? I’d never balked at people’s sexual quirks before. My circle of friends included all different kinds of folks, and they’d introduced me to everything from gay bars to fetish clubs, and work had taken me to strip joints. I wasn’t usually the type to recoil from something like this.

  The parking garage at the police station was empty, so I cut across the other spots to my own. Inside the office I found a note from Puupponen on my door, which told me to look in my e-mail for Lulu Nightingale’s personal information. As my computer booted up, I grabbed my work shoes from the closet and applied some mascara. In a drawer, I found a couple of leftover car-shaped salmiakki candies, which I munched as I read.

  Lilli Julia Mäkinen, now Lulu Julia Mäkinen, born November 15, 1973, in Inkoo. Her parents still live in Inkoo, and I arranged for the local police to deliver the news. Her brother lives here in Espoo, her sister in Salo. Both are older than Lulu. Lulu’s current residence is listed as 6 Punavuori Street, Helsinki. Graduated high school 1992, au pair in Zurich 1993–95, restaurant worker also in Zurich 1995–97. (Maria, Zurich is chock-full of girly bars. I was there two summers ago, and I know!) Returned to Finland in 1997, worked at the Mermaid Restaurant in Helsinki, founded the Blue Nightingale in 1999. Charged for procurement in 1999, thrown out for lack of evidence, conviction for accessory to assault in 2003, fined €500. The perpetrator in the assault was Lulu’s bodyguard, Tero Sulonen, who was fined €1000. Both claimed the victim attacked them first. This happened at the Mikado. Apparently, the plaintiff was one of Lulu’s old johns. I’ll look into that more tomorrow. No children or marriages. Who would know about her friends? No known drug connections, likewise with white-collar crime. Now this little boy’s headed for bed. I’ll come in tomorrow before the meeting to answer questions. Ville P.

  The timestamp on Puupponen’s e-mail was 2:00 a.m. He lived in Kilo, a five-minute bike ride from the station. I wondered about the comment about girly bars. Puupponen didn’t talk much about his private life. A few years earlier I’d read his mystery novel manuscript, which played with the chauvinistic imagery of hard-boiled detective novels. From it I’d gotten the impression that in his private life Puupponen was completely bewildered when it came to women. At work, he got along with everyone. Only our bad-tempered former colleague Pertti Ström, who’d killed himself a few years ago, had been too much for him. But Puupponen didn’t speak ill of Ström after his death. I guess we were all still dealing with the guilt of having failed to interrupt our colleague’s downward spiral.

  I’d sent a request for a record of all calls into Jorvi Hospital on Wednesday night and was halfway through reworking our unit schedule when there was a knock on the door.

  “Morning. I noticed that my note was gone and concluded that you must be here already. I’ll get you some coffee. Do you want it with milk or without?” Puupponen said.

  “Black, thank you. I imagine you’re more in need of it than I am. Did you get a chance to sleep?”

  “About three hours. That’s all a real Finnish man needs. I’m going to go do some more research into Lulu’s background,” Puupponen said and then yawned. I smiled after him. I didn’t like demanding that my subordinates work such insanely long hours, but there was nothing I could do about it at the moment. It was the same everywhere. The Working Hours Act only protected certain groups, mostly the male members of big unions who enjoyed levels of pay incommensurate to their education. Every
one else did part-time or freelance work, or simply weren’t protected by the law. At worst, they’d have to put in fifteen-hour days. If they couldn’t, the boss would just find someone else who could. No wonder many mothers with small children opted to stay home if they could afford it. But not everyone had that choice.

  All five of my subordinates were in by eight. Aaltonen from Narcotics had hysterically screamed at me when I asked him about borrowing some manpower. They were in the middle of an important case that involved multiple simultaneous sting operations, and if they pulled it off the metro area drug underground would have one fewer big fish. Once he’d calmed down, he did promise to ask his people if the name Lulu Nightingale had ever come up in any of their investigations. I’d have to settle for that.

  Per usual, I started the meeting with our easiest and most complete cases, since I knew that this made us feel like we were succeeding at something.

  “OK, the Räsänen case can go to the prosecutor. Good. What about Oksana? Koivu, what did the folks on the hospital switchboard say?”

  “It’s hard for them to remember individual calls, since they get thousands every day. Finding the right operator took me a while. When I really pushed her, she remembered that the caller just asked to be connected to Oksana’s room. Usually they only have two patients sharing a phone, but there was an extra person in Oksana’s room.”

  “Was the caller a man or a woman? Did he speak Finnish?”

  “It was a Finnish-speaking woman. Do we have a warrant to open the phone records?”

  “It’s in process. Autio, have we received any new tips about Oksana’s movements?”

  “Yes, and I’ve checked them.” Autio picked a hair off his suit. He was the only one I didn’t feel comfortable calling by his first name, perhaps because the name—Gideon—was so unique. “Nothing yet. My guess is Sergei and Ivan picked up their meat and now she’s swimming with the fishes.”