The Nightingale Murder

by Leena Lehtolainen

  “And if you find Oksana, please let me know. Is that something I can ask you to do? Do you think I should hire a private investigator after all? Maybe Oksana’s coworkers would trust a PI more than a police officer.”

  “That’s your decision. But let’s make a deal: I’ll tell you if I hear anything about Oksana, and you’ll tell me if you hire a PI. Agreed?”

  To my surprise, Arto Saarnio extended his hand and said, very formally, that he agreed. After that he left, likely heading back to his corporate office. I stared after him as he walked out of the lobby, my head in a daze. He had just given me a motive for Riitta Saarnio. It was flimsy, but it was possible. Or had Arto Saarnio just used me? Could he not admit to his wife that he was cheating on her and was sending me to do his dirty work? Well, that’s what I got paid for, shining lights in the dark corners of people’s lives. I would have to set up a meeting with her as soon as possible.

  I arranged with my counterpart from the Patrol Division to send a pair of uniforms to downtown Espoo. I would be very interested in having a chat with Svetlana and Oksana Petrenko’s other colleagues. The women’s prison in Hämeenlinna had confirmed that Lulu’s former employee, Iines, hadn’t been in contact with her old boss during her time in their facility.

  Montonen called from Helsinki while I was about to leave to grab some lunch. Sulonen had a couple of broken ribs, but he didn’t need to stay in the hospital.

  “Should we bring him over to you? He’s sitting with Konkola in the van right now. He’s come down off his high, so he’s just sort of dazed and depressed. He keeps repeating that he didn’t do anything.”

  “If you have time to drive him over here, I’d appreciate it.”

  “We’re busy,” Montonen replied, “but this is the kind of job Konkola and me spend most of our time doing. Next week we’re headed to Turkey to deport some Kurds. We’ll be there overnight, and I doubt we’ll get any sun or see the beach.”

  Out the window I could see the shrinking snowbanks along the Turku Highway. There’d been pussy willows in the thickets since January, and now more of them were appearing. My stomach rumbled—a lot of time had passed since breakfast at Nordström’s.

  I knocked on Ursula’s door, but she wasn’t there. I found her in the cafeteria downstairs sharing a table with Assistant Chief Kaartamo. They seemed to be having a good time. Kaartamo’s face was flushed with enthusiasm, and Ursula’s eyes glittered. The neck of her sweater was open so that it revealed one of her nicely shaped shoulders. Fortunately, Liisa Rasilainen and Mira Saastamoinen waved at me from their table under the ficus, so I took my carrot soup over to their table and tried not to think about Ursula and Kaartamo. Liisa talked about a domestic violence case she’d been dealing with that morning: some day-care workers had filed a report about a three-year-old boy with bruises all over his body.

  “A mother and a stepfather, both unemployed. Apparently they’re big fans of visiting Estonia, and they had hundreds of cans of beer at home. We notified DCFS, and the case will be headed up to you,” Liisa said. “How’s the murder investigation going?”

  Time and time again I’d tried to lure Liisa and Mira over to my unit. Both were competent and assertive women with decent senses of humor. Mira had taken some time off for maternity leave, and now she complained about being out of shape.

  “When will the soccer fields thaw out? I’ve got to get some playing time in soon,” she said, and Liisa and I nodded. The department women’s soccer club was a lifeline I never missed unless absolutely necessary.

  Ursula was still giggling with Kaartamo when I walked past again. I told her that Sulonen was ready to be interviewed, and I wanted the job handled as soon as possible.

  “But Ville left for the dentist. He’ll be gone all afternoon. And I was supposed to . . . But yes, I’d be happy to take another pass at him. He tried to throw us off with all that Russian mafia garbage.”

  “Honkanen is an enterprising girl,” Kaartamo said. I thought about the half-finished presentation sitting on my desk and sighed. I told Ursula I could join her for Sulonen’s interrogation.

  “But I want to do the talking!” Ursula said testily. “I had a good rapport with him last time.”

  “Sure, you talk, I’ll listen,” I said, although I thought Ursula’s “rapport” on the video looked more like hectoring.

  We asked the officer on duty in Holding for Sulonen’s belongings. The cell phone was locked, and his wallet was little help. He had twenty-three euros, a bank credit card and another credit card, customer loyalty cards from a supermarket and a gas station, and a social security card. Two photographs, one of Lulu, which seemed like a passport photo, and another of Lulu and Sulonen in coats, apparently at the door of a restaurant. The paper of that picture was glossy, like it had come from a celebrity gossip magazine.

  “No library card,” Ursula noted. “Sulonen must not be interested in anyone’s poetry beyond his own. And it shows.” While waiting for the morning meeting, Ursula had recited some of Sulonen’s poems to Puupponen, and both had ended up doubled over with laughter. At which I’d pointed out to Puupponen that he should be more supportive of a fellow writer, which left him blushing and Ursula confused. The others didn’t know about Puupponen’s novel manuscript.

  We picked up Sulonen and escorted him to the interrogation room. He walked with difficulty—apparently his right ankle was sprained, and his ribs obviously hurt when he moved. He entered Interrogation Room Two tentatively. His hands shook, and his eyes were bloodshot, but he didn’t smell of stale booze like people usually did after a bender. He did, however, stink of sweat.

  He sat down slowly in the chair we offered and hiked up his trousers, which had no belt.

  “So how’s our poet doing?” Ursula asked. “You really loved Lulu. It must have hurt when she didn’t take your proposal seriously.”

  Sulonen blushed, and I tried to stifle a yawn. At some point, I’d have to do something about Ursula’s interrogation tactics.

  “Have you been reading my poems?” Sulonen shouted. “You have no right! Those were meant for Lulu!”

  “I really admire how in tune you are with your inner teenage girl,” Ursula said. “Now, why haven’t you answered any of our calls? Where have you been hiding?”

  Sulonen looked at me as if begging for help. I stared back, giving him my most maternal look. That would have to be my role in this discussion. The evil bitch and the kind mother figure. Sulonen’s sweatshirt had stains on it that looked like mustard. He shifted and groaned, his hand moving to his ribs.

  “Where have you been hiding?” Ursula repeated.

  Sulonen looked at the table. “I couldn’t stay there! The place felt so empty, and all of Lulu’s things were there. And the cops left a mess everywhere. I couldn’t clean, so I went out. To see some friends.”

  “Why didn’t you answer the messages we left?”

  “I turned my phone off because of all the reporters. I just wanted to be left alone. I went to see friends.” Sulonen groaned again. His face drained of color, and he grabbed the edge of the table as if he felt faint.

  “What friends did you go see?” Ursula asked, but I interrupted.

  “When did you last eat?” I asked Sulonen, and Ursula shot me an annoyed glance.

  “Eat . . . I don’t know. I haven’t felt like it.”

  “You can have a sandwich if you tell us who you got it from,” Ursula said. Sulonen clearly had no idea what Ursula was talking about—or else he was a good actor. “We found your little stash in the car. You were pretty careless.”

  Sulonen was so pale his skin looked almost blue. “I don’t understand what you’re saying,” he spluttered.

  “You were careless about what was used to kill Lulu. We found it.”

  Sulonen’s head dropped to his chest. The hospital had probably given him strong pain medication, and if he hadn’t eaten in days, it was no wonder he was feeling ill. Despite Ursula’s glare, I ordered a pause to the interrogation. I got
Sulonen two glasses of juice and a ham sandwich, which would raise his blood sugar. Sulonen stared at me suspiciously, but he began cautiously drinking the juice. When he grimaced, I remembered he had wounds in his mouth too.

  After eating, Sulonen denied hiding anything in the car.

  “I didn’t drive it very often by myself. It was Lulu’s car. Or, actually, the company’s.”

  “You’re a grown man, and you don’t even own your own car. Last time you bragged about how Lulu gave you everything you needed. But you didn’t even get your own car.” Ursula looked at Sulonen in amusement. “Which one of you drove to the studio?”

  “Me. Lulu wanted to concentrate . . .” Sulonen took a bite of sandwich, his movements still tenuous. He swallowed before continuing. “Lulu’d had a little to drink too, some wine or liqueur. Fernet Branca, I mean.”

  “Why didn’t you tell us before that Lulu drank Fernet Branca?”

  “I don’t remember everything! I’m so confused. Guess how much I’ve slept since Lulu . . . I wished I’d died in that jump, but no. I don’t care about anything anymore.”

  “Did you always have Fernet Branca at home? Do you drink it?”

  “Yeah, I guess . . . We had bottles of the stuff. I don’t drink it, though. A bodyguard can’t drink. Sometimes I have a couple of beers when we’re free and Lulu’s at home taking a break.”

  “Did you see Lulu take a bottle of Fernet Branca with her to the TV studio?”

  “No! She had a big bag full of stuff, makeup and hair spray and things like that.”

  Ursula then tried to squeeze Sulonen for information about Lulu’s guests over the days preceding her death, but Sulonen claimed he didn’t know any names. Lulu hadn’t mentioned anyone bringing her a bottle of bitters as a gift.

  “Did you think you were saving Lulu from sex with other men when you offered to marry her? But Lulu didn’t want saving. Right? And that’s why you killed her?”

  Sulonen’s intake of breath was so sharp he nearly choked on a piece of sandwich. These days men rarely played Prince Charming, so we women were usually the ones who thought our love could save the men, could make a new person out of the drunk, the wifebeater, or the murderer. The more brutal the violence the man had committed, the more torrid the fan mail received from women. Now I’d met two exceptions in one day: Arto Saarnio and Tero Sulonen. But, beyond that one similarity, these two men didn’t seem to have much in common.

  “Where were the car keys during the TV show taping?” Ursula continued, ignoring Sulonen’s coughing. Tears filled his eyes, and finally I slapped him on the back, at which he howled in pain, and I cursed my thoughtlessness. Whacking a person with broken bones! Fortunately the piece of bread came loose. Sulonen swallowed it and then washed it down with juice.

  “They were in my pocket, but the other set of keys were probably in Lulu’s purse.”

  I tried to remember the contents of Lulu’s purse. Yes, the keys were probably there. Would the killer have had time to deposit the cyanide bottle in the car after poisoning Lulu? No, because according to the security camera footage, no one had left the studio. What about Lulu herself? Could she have left the bottle in the car without knowing what was in it?

  “You didn’t tell us about your friends. Who have you been staying with?”

  “Pate Mustajärvi. I mean Antti Mustajärvi. But everybody calls him Pate because of the singer from Popeda, you know? He’s in Sörnäinen. I mean he lives in the town of Sörnäinen, not in the prison. I can give you his number, but he doesn’t know anything. He was at work. He’s a bouncer at the Helsinki Club. We go to the same gym.”

  Sulonen continued to deny his guilt just as doggedly as he had before, despite Ursula’s merciless hammering. I listened and wondered whether friendliness might work better. I was also concerned that Sulonen had been released from the hospital after receiving little more than first aid. He seemed physically and mentally unsound.

  Ursula placed a printout of the picture of Lulu and President Halonen on the table.

  “What do you know about this? Who took this picture?” Sulonen stared at it, looking bewildered.

  “I don’t know. I’ve never seen this. It’s strange. The background is just like our place, but the president has never visited. Lulu would have said something if the president . . . Is this a real picture?”

  “I’m asking you,” Ursula said icily, but Sulonen didn’t have an answer.

  After an hour and a half of ineffectual talk, I gave Ursula a questioning look and motioned for her to join me in the hall. I closed and locked the door behind us, even though I didn’t expect Sulonen to try to escape a police jail with a guard on duty.

  “I think he’s close to breaking,” Ursula said. “Let’s keep him here for the night.”

  “Sure, that’s fine,” I said. I had my own ideas, though. At the end of the day I could come talk to Sulonen informally, just the two of us. Ursula would be annoyed if she heard about it, but what did that matter? I was the boss.

  We ordered the guard, Officer Koskinen, to take Sulonen to a cell. Koskinen complained that they were full, because Narcotics had made a big bust the night before. “I guess we can find a spot for your guy, but tonight had better be quiet or we’re going to have issues.”

  I asked Koskinen to guard Sulonen well, because he was injured. He should take any complaints seriously. Then I returned to my office and looked up the pictures of Oksana. Even though it made my stomach turn, I enlarged them so I could see every detail. Blown up three times larger than normal, the genitals looked strange. The pubic hair was like a thick forest, with a deep gash cut through it like a hastily constructed logging road. The cut resembled a clumsily performed episiotomy. Now that I had the victim’s name, I could request assistance from the Ukrainian police. Maybe Oksana had gone back to Kiev.

  “I’d prefer to protect girls like Svetlana and Oksana” was what Lulu’s note had said. My impression was that Oksana was a common name in Russian-speaking countries, but this could easily be the same Oksana. Maybe Sulonen would know.

  I picked up a ruler and held it like a knife. I mimicked inflicting Oksana’s injuries on myself, slash by slash: face, breasts, stomach, groin. I shuddered. Arto Saarnio had meant well but had only caused more evil, just like he did in his professional life. Layoffs were always justified by the excuse that they allowed other jobs to remain in Finland. Which didn’t make much difference for the people who owned the bulk of the shares of Copperwood, since they weren’t Finns anyway. In twenty years, once wages in China had climbed too high, everything would be moved to the next country with the cheapest labor. The rich countries would make sure there were always places willing to undercut wages. Tonight, I’d have to call Jarmo and Eeva and ask how they were doing, but now it was time to tie up all the loose ends I could before the end of the day.

  Autio had promised that he and Puustjärvi would interview Oksana’s roommates, if they could track them down. That would be stepping on Nordström’s toes, but I didn’t care. If the National Bureau of Investigations couldn’t handle their cases, that was their problem. The patrol who’d gone downtown to look for the girls hadn’t reported back. I called the switchboard and had them connect me to Officer Haikala.

  “No one’s answering the door. We’ve been waiting in the stairwell, but there’s no sign of them. One of the neighbors was home, and she said there’s been a ton of traffic in and out of the apartment for weeks but that it’s been quiet for a few days now.”

  “Is there a building superintendent?”

  Haikala laughed. “What’s that? We’re in a rental building. I guess there’s probably a maintenance man somewhere, but we don’t have authority to go in anyway, do we?”

  That was true. I ordered the patrol to stand down and asked Autio to figure out who was renting apartment G 122. Then I went to talk to Sulonen. Holding was quiet. Officer Koskinen said he’d just checked on Sulonen, who’d asked for more juice.

  “I’ll take it to him.” />
  “And here’s the pain meds the doctor prescribed. There’s also an order to give him sleeping pills if needed,” Koskinen said. Koskinen’s cousin, Sake, was a detective colleague of mine in the Tampere Police Department, and we got along well. I always looked forward to seeing him at seminars.

  After his fifth sleepless night, Sulonen might be ready to talk, but it would be torture, and I didn’t want to sink that low or go against doctor’s orders. I took the juice and painkillers, and Officer Koskinen opened the cell door at the back of the hall for me. I’d only been in this particular cell once before, but I remembered it well because someone had tried to scratch a replica of Hugo Simberg’s Wounded Angel on the wall. The result resembled three drunks stumbling along, but that was a perfect fit for the wall of a holding cell. In addition to the drawing, the usual Bible verses, curses, and upside-down spiders decorated the walls.

  Sulonen lay on a bunk under a blanket, but when the door opened, he tried to sit up. It was slow.

  “Hi, Tero. You asked for something to drink. Here you go, and some pain meds. Why did you have to try to run away in the station tunnel like that? You could have really hurt yourself.”

  “I haven’t slept at all since Lulu’s death. It’s like I’m looking at the world through plastic, and I don’t understand . . . I don’t understand anything. What did they find in our car? I guess some kind of poison, but what?”

  “Does the name Oksana Petrenko mean anything to you?”

  Sulonen thought for a moment and then nodded. “She’s that blond chick from Russia or somewhere who got put in the hospital, right? Yeah, Lulu knew her, because she commented on the newspaper story.”

  “What did she say?”

  “‘Fucking bastards’ or something like that. She was even thinking about calling the pigs, but then . . . She was too afraid! But what if she did and they killed her . . .” Sulonen pounded his fist on the bed and then realized a split second later how much the motion hurt.