Fatal Headwind (11 page)

The trill of a cell phone interrupted Holma’s narration. I almost burst out laughing because the phone played the Toreador Song from
Carmen
, and it sounded idiotic. Escamillo the bullfighter was a baritone, so was that one of Holma’s preferred roles too?

When Holma turned the phone off instead of answering, I asked him about the night of Juha Merivaara’s death.

“We already talked about this once. I didn’t notice anything strange about that night. Juha gave a very nice speech about Anne and we raised our glasses. Jiri was sulking, but that wasn’t anything new. He wanted to be in Turku protesting a fur fashion show, not on Rödskär eating cake.”

Holma hadn’t heard anything strange during the night, but he usually slept soundly. He had woken up at seven fifteen to Mikke pounding on their bedroom door.

“What did he say?” I asked curiously.

“Mikke? He was white as a sheet and said that Juha had fallen off the cliff and that he needed a phone so he could call for help.”

“Are you sure about the word ‘help’?”

“What do you mean? No, I’m not sure of anything. I’m not at my best in the morning, and of course Riikka and I were both in shock.”

If Mikke Sjöberg would have said something about calling the police, that would have meant he suspected Juha’s death wasn’t just an accident. If he was trying to protect himself, he would have wanted to give the impression that Juha had fallen accidentally. How had Sjöberg reacted to having his clothes confiscated? I would have to get a report from Puustjärvi before heading home.

“Why did you go with Sjöberg to where the body was to make the call?”

“He didn’t want to go alone. He was confused, as we all were. Katrina Sjöberg was the only one in control of herself. She told Seija to make tea and tried to calm down the Merivaaras. Anne wanted to rush to Juha, and the rest of us had our work cut out for us convincing her there wasn’t anything she could do anymore.”

After Holma left I pulled up the criminal records database again. Besides Jiri, everyone who had been on Rödskär was clean. Finally I pulled up Juha Merivaara’s record. His list of speeding tickets was as long as my arm, but that didn’t interest me. In December seven years ago, Juha’s sailboat had collided with a small outboard, killing the driver. Juha Merivaara’s blood-alcohol level had been 0.12.

6

On Tuesday morning Antti announced he was taking Iida to the city, which in Espoo-speak meant downtown Helsinki.

“I thought we’d go to the bicycle demonstration this afternoon,” he said. “On the first Tuesday of every month, nonmotorized vehicles and pedestrians block Mannerheim Street.”

I had heard of the event, which the Helsinki Traffic and Patrol Divisions monitored closely. There hadn’t been any serious blowups yet, but some drivers were more than a little frustrated. They grouped the protesters, who opposed unnecessary solo driving, with more violent environmental extremists, and so they felt justified in spitting and throwing rocks at the demonstrators.

“Wear your best smile and make sure Iida’s hair looks nice. The SIS is sure to be there with its cameras,” I said and kissed them both before I left. Our cat, Einstein, slipped out with me. Mice had been scratching around under the floorboards all night, trying to flee the autumn chill. They’d made Einstein restless, and he wanted to see whether he could get at his quarry from outside.

It wasn’t raining, so I biked to work. Antti had suggested that we sell our rattletrap Fiat because my new position earned me a brand-new Saab from the department. Ethically there wouldn’t be anything wrong with me stopping by the supermarket on the way home from work. Although I couldn’t have survived maternity leave without a car, Antti had no problem making small food purchases and shuttling Iida to activities at the library using the bus and his bike. I guessed it was a matter of principle for him.

The first person I saw when I reached our unit was Ström, walking stiffly down the hall. When he heard me coming, he turned slowly, but a little coffee spilled from the cup he was holding. His “hi” was even more spiritless than usual.

“Are you really ready for work?” I asked cautiously.

“Not really, but what damn choice do I have? My cases are moving slowly enough as it is. Is there any word about that junior-detective position?”

“It’ll be months before they fill it. Next they’re hiring someone for White-Collar Crime.”

Our unit had been down a junior detective for three years, even though Taskinen and Ström fought to fill it during their tenures. The latest budget had lacked funding for any supplemental appropriations, so the position would probably stay unfilled for the foreseeable future. The only good side of the staffing shortage was that I could get away from paperwork to help conduct interrogations.

“If those goddamn politicos would come out in the field, they’d see what this work is like! Why isn’t anyone in the media talking about how strapped for money the police are? They sure whine enough when a cop shoots some nutcase who’s randomly popping off shots.”

This was Ström’s favorite topic of conversation. Over the last year and a half, ever since an escaped convict abducted one of our colleagues and held him prisoner in a secluded cabin in the woods, everyone in our department had been forced to answer questions about when police had the right to use deadly force. Our fallen comrade, Palo, and his kidnapper, “Madman” Malmberg, were both killed in the standoff. The leaders of the operation and the SWAT team members who shot Malmberg were still facing charges as the investigation dragged on. I had been called in for questioning myself more than once during my maternity leave. Ström thought charging the officers involved was a travesty and that Malmberg had caused his own death.

“Be careful with your back so you don’t make it any worse. And go see a doctor,” I said.

“What’s a doctor going to do? Shove some pills down my throat and send me back to work. Last time they prescribed the same thing my old lady used to take for menstrual cramps,” Ström growled and then disappeared into his office.

The officers I was taking to interview the employees of Merivaara Nautical had gathered in the conference room. Along with Koivu, Puustjärvi, and Wang, who had been on the case from the beginning, were Puupponen and, from White Collar, Kantelinen, who would be able to evaluate the financial situation of the company.

“But doesn’t it look pretty likely that someone on the island did it?” Puustjärvi said doubtfully. “Is there any point going to the company’s offices?”

“I want to know what kind of person Juha Merivaara was, and this is going to help with that. Besides, one of our initial interviews indicated that someone might have come to the island during the night. Has the Coast Guard given any new information?” I asked Puupponen.

He shook his head. Rödskär wasn’t near enough to the territorial water boundary that they would have regularly patrolled the area. It was possible that another boat could have visited the island without being noticed. I still didn’t consider Katrina Sjöberg’s observation very reliable. The story about another boat could have been an attempt to protect someone.

The offices of Merivaara Nautical were located in a small industrial park near a major retail development. From the police station, the fastest route was a narrow, winding road that cut south from the Turku Highway. It was hard to believe the fields we passed were only a mile from the center of the second-largest city in the country. The fields were quickly being filled in by construction sites on which rows of nearly identical town houses would be erected. People would move there thinking they were going to live surrounded by nature, but that wouldn’t be the case. In the years we had been living in our house, new construction had been popping up like toadstools after a rain.

The Merivaara Nautical building represented typical 1960s boxy industrial architecture; later attempts to spruce it up involved three different shades of blue paint. But the result was strange rather than classy.

Evidently Anne had received word that a police car had arrived, because she was waiting for us in the lobby. Her black pantsuit made her look even more fragile, but her voice was firm and businesslike.

“Hello, Lieutenant Kallio. Welcome to Merivaara Nautical,” Anne said, as if we were here for a building tour. “Let’s go upstairs to our conference room, and you can tell me what it is you want.”

Anne Merivaara moved confidently, but she was fiddling with something in her left hand, and she kept clenching her hand into a fist around it. We followed her to the elevator. The building had three stories, and part of the upper story was a large, open space. From the corner windows there was a view north to the remaining fields and meadows.

“Of course you may interview all of our staff if you wish. Juha’s secretary, Paula Saarnio, will be happy to help,” Anne said, introducing a tall woman with dark hair and a look of efficiency.

“That sounds fine. Sergeant Kantelinen here would also like to see your latest financial report and have a look at your books.”

“Very well, but why?” Now there was confusion in Anne Merivaara’s voice.

“I’m sorry, but your husband’s death was most likely a homicide.”

I’d never learned to soften blows like this. Now I should have at least tried, though, since Anne immediately collapsed into the nearest chair. She quickly opened her left hand, revealing a blue stone about two inches long, and then clenched her hand around it again, as if drawing strength from it.

“Homicide? You mean that someone killed Juha? But there wasn’t anyone on Rödskär but . . . Who of us would have wanted to kill Juha?”

“Maybe we can think about that together,” I said and then issued assignments. While Kantelinen was looking into the business’s finances, Wang, Puupponen, and Koivu would interview the employees. Merivaara Nautical wasn’t a large company. Twenty people worked on the production side, and there were five in research and development. Seven people ran the office.

As I gave instructions, Anne Merivaara sat still. She looked thunderstruck and continued to fiddle with the blue rock. When the door closed behind my colleagues and the secretary, her eyes lifted and she offered the rock for me to inspect.

“Azurite. I got it from Seija. She says it’s supposed to give strength in making decisions.”

“Is that hard for you?” I sat down at the conference table across from Anne.

“Sometimes. I’m a Libra. I evaluate things from too many different perspectives without coming to a conclusion.”

“Do you believe in horoscopes and crystals?”

“I do. Just like I believe that Juha is continuing his life in some other form,” Anne said seriously. Luckily Puupponen wasn’t around, because he would have been sure to suggest that was true—as worm food.

“It gives me comfort. Maybe Juha will be reborn as a seabird. They were always important to him. I’m sure Harri turned into a sea eagle.”

A sea eagle—Harri would have liked that. I remembered how one morning he showed up on my doorstep glowing with enthusiasm. He had just heard confirmation of a sighting of a sea eagle nesting with two chicks on a wooded island south of Hanko Peninsula. Harri had been shocked by the losses in the sea-eagle population as a result of environmental contaminants and clear cutting, and had written a very pointed, un-Harri-like article about it for
Finnish Nature
.

“What bird would Juha turn into?” I asked, even though the conversation felt inane. I wanted to try and put her at ease because I had to ask her questions that would be hard to answer.

Anne looked at the azurite and shook her head. “Something big and loud,” she said. “The kind of bird that drove smaller birds away from the rock it was nesting on.” Anne said this neutrally; she knew that in business you had to have broad shoulders.

Although I had drunk a huge coffee that morning, I wanted more already. Could I ask for a cup, or was Merivaara Nautical going to be one of those places that only had herbal tea? Just then the door opened and Juha Merivaara’s secretary came in with a tray in her hands. There was coffee and tea. As Paula Saarnio filled my cup, I had the thought that I’d like to interview her myself. Secretaries knew different things about their bosses than wives did. Saarnio told me that the pastries were carrot-cake scones and then left.

The coffee recharged me. After quickly drinking the whole cup, I glanced at Anne, who was forcing herself to nibble on a scone.

“What was the mood like at your birthday party?”

Anne swallowed before answering.

“Nice. Relaxed. Juha did his best to make everyone feel good and to keep me from thinking about Harri. But that wasn’t easy. Sometimes I couldn’t even look at Mikke because I knew he remembered too. Of course the wine helped the mood a bit.”

“There was quite a bit of alcohol in Juha’s blood. Did he usually drink a lot?”

Anne thought Juha had drunk more than was good for him. He was rarely drunk, but he had loved three-course dinners, which in his mind demanded the accompanying aperitifs, wine, and cognac. He used beer to quench his thirst in the evenings after work and in the summer when he was boating.

“Alcohol wasn’t a problem for him, though,” Anne said defensively. “And I don’t think Juha drank particularly much last Saturday. I’m sure the memory of Harri’s death bothered him too, though.”

“What did Juha think about Riikka’s relationship with Tapio Holma?”

“Tapio is a pleasant man and a wonderful artist.” Anne took another bite of carrot scone and then washed it down with tea that smelled of peppermint.

“As a possible son-in-law?”

“Their romance isn’t going to last that long. As soon as Tapio gets his voice back, and Riikka recovers from her hero worship, it will be over.”

Had Anne Merivaara said the same thing to her husband to calm him down? When I asked again, Anne admitted that Juha didn’t particularly like that his daughter’s boyfriend was almost his age. But apparently they hadn’t fought about it. Riikka was an adult and could date whomever she chose. Juha had opposed them moving in together mostly because they had only known each other for six months and Riikka had never even lived alone.

“Juha thought a girl should learn to be independent, not rush straight from her mother to a man.”

That didn’t sound the least bit unreasonable.

Next I asked about Jiri. Anne Merivaara had indicated before that Juha didn’t approve of Jiri’s involvement with the Animal Revolution movement.

For a while Anne didn’t say anything.

Then she asked, “You said this was a homicide, but Mikke said Juha fell off the cliff. What really happened? How did Juha . . . how was Juha killed?”

“Unfortunately we can’t share any of the details.”

“Because my children and I are suspects too, is that right?”

“Exactly.”

Anne stood up and walked to the window. Putting the azurite stone in her pocket, she folded her arms across her chest. Wind rustled the willow trees beyond the fields, and crows chased each other. The leaves of the aspens were yellow and red, but the rest of the forest was still green. The next nighttime frost would turn the birches and willows too, and then the autumn storms would strip them bare.

“It’s bad enough that Juha is dead. But the idea that one of us killed him . . . Things like that don’t happen!” Anne turned back to me. Today she wasn’t wearing glasses. The skin around her eyes was still lighter than her forehead and cheeks, probably from sunglasses. Her thin lips were colorless, and small wrinkles ran around her mouth. Although Anne Merivaara had a slender, almost boyish figure, her facial features were not sharp. Her cheeks were high, her nose narrow and well shaped. She looked like the kind of person who would be a perfect fit for a health-food commercial if she wore just a little makeup and more cheerful colors.