Snow Woman (4 page)

The young woman playing the piano was so engrossed in her music that she didn’t notice our arrival. At first I could only see her back. Her straight brown hair extended to her waist and swayed with the rhythm of the music. A blue-and-white-striped shirt covered her slender back, and she was wearing jeans and combat boots. From the rear, Niina Kuusinen looked almost like a teenager, somehow too delicate and frail for the dark tones of the room. With its heavy furniture and walls of books, the 1920s feel of the space was broken only by the television in one corner.

“Niina!” Aira said loudly when the etude ended. “This is Sergeant Kallio from the Espoo Police. She’d like to ask you some questions.”

Niina turned on the piano stool so quickly that her sheet music flew to the floor and the piano lid banged shut. From the front, she seemed older than from the back. Her startled almond-shaped eyes and small mouth did seem childlike, but her nose was long and narrow, giving her otherwise doll-like face an adult appearance. I guessed Niina was around twenty-four.

“Have you heard anything new from Elina?” Niina asked anxiously. Her long fingers, which were adorned with several silver Kalevala rings, nervously twisted the tips of her hair.

“No. That’s why I wanted to chat. But this isn’t a formal interview. When did you see her last?”

“At dinner on Boxing Da
y . . .
around eight o’clock. When the rest of us came in here to watch a movie on TV, Elina insisted on going for a walk. After that, I didn’t see her again.”

Niina looked distressed, and she turned her eyes away from me as if to block out the possibility that something had happened to Elina. I imagined that as a police officer I represented a threat because law enforcement didn’t generally intervene in people’s lives when things were peaceful.

“You must have known Elina well since you were here for Christmas?”

Niina flinched, and I realized I’d used the past tense in referring to Elina. I didn’t correct myself though.

“Well, not really. I attended a couple of her courses, and I started therapy with her at the beginning of the month. I didn’t have anyone else to spend Christmas with. My mom is dead, my dad lives in France, and I don’t have any siblings.” Her voice trembled.

“Do you have any idea where Elina might have gone?”

“I tried looking at her chart, but I couldn’t quite make anything out,” said Niina.

“Chart, what chart?”

“Astrology chart. There are pretty strong influences from Saturn and Pluto, which would indicate self-destructiveness. And conflict with someone close to her, like a family membe
r . . .
” Niina glanced quickly at Aira.

Every once in a while during tricky cases we got calls at the station from astrologers, fortune-tellers, and clairvoyants offering to help. I always refused to take them seriously, and if the call reached me, I ended the conversation as quickly as possible with a few deprecating remarks. I didn’t actually know anything about astrology other than that my sign was Pisces, which meant I was supposed to be sensitive, emotional, changeable, and creative. Although newspaper horoscopes were amusing to read, I had a hard time seeing myself in them. Most of my boyfriends, including Antti, had been the same sign—Sagittarius. Perhaps that meant something after all?

I asked Niina for her contact information in case I needed to ask any follow-up questions. She didn’t know how much longer she’d be staying at Rosberga but gave me her address and phone number. I thought I detected relief in her expression when we left the library in search of the other women.

Milla was sitting in the lecture hall playing computer solitaire. Black and red cards swarmed on the screen, bouncing on top of each other as the mouse clicked furiously. I was glad my work computer didn’t have any games. I definitely would have turned into an addict. When I addressed Milla, she lifted her eyes from the screen in irritation and then shut down the machine with a sigh.

“Is it time for the third degree already? And I can’t even fucking smoke in here!” Milla sounded surprisingly similar to my colleague Ström—although both definitely would have taken umbrage at the comparison. Amused by this observation, I found myself softening toward her.

“You don’t have to answer my questions. This isn’t a formal interview. But if you liked Elina enough to want to spend Christmas with her, I’m sure you’ll want to help find her.”

“Blah, blah, blah! I don’t know anything about Elina. I wasn’t even here the night before last,” said Milla.

Aira seemed surprised. “Where were you then? There isn’t any way out of here at night.”

“No shit!” replied Milla. “I slogged through the snow and goddamn freezing cold to the road and hitched a ride into the city. I caught the first bus back in the morning. Everyone was still asleep except Johanna. I saw her in the hall, but she’s so afraid of me she didn’t dare ask where I’d been.”

Milla’s look was a challenge. Her eye makeup was, if possible, even thicker and blacker than the first time I’d seen her, and her lips were orange.

“What the hell are you staring at? I can leave, can’t I? This isn’t a prison camp.”

“Why did you want to go to Helsinki?” Aira’s voice was like a boarding school headmistress’s interrogating a problem child.

“I was starting to miss men and booze. And speaking of men, I did see Elina as I was wading toward the road. She was walking down the hill with that poet boyfriend of hers.”

“At what time? What was Elina wearing?” I asked.

“I guess it was sometime after nine. I wasn’t really paying attention.”

“And you didn’t come back until the next morning?”

“Yep. I was at this guy’s apartment in Kulosaari. I didn’t ask his name, but if I really tried, I might be able to remember where he lives. He wasn’t the kind of guy you’d want to have your morning coffee with, but he had money.”

“Nothing’s happened here that anyone needs an alibi for yet. But where can I get hold of you if we find a reason to follow up?” I said.

“I’m supposed to be at work tonight. Fanny Hill on Helsinginkatu. We put on a nice show. You should come watch. I live right next to the club on the corner.”

Milla added, “I can guess what happened to Elina though. She was going to dump her poet boy, and he couldn’t take it, so he lured her over to his place and then killed her and himself. Probably thought that would put him in the history books with all the other great poets. A little like Sid Vicious, you know?”

From the look on Aira’s face, the punk legend’s name was a total mystery to her, but Milla’s theory almost made me laugh.

“As far as we know, Joona Kirstilä is still alive. Where is Johanna, by the way?” I asked.

Aira was quiet for a second and then asked that I not interview Johanna quite yet, adding that she was sure Johanna hadn’t seen Elina after Boxing Day. I agreed, recalling how fragile Johanna had seemed the first time I met her. It would be kinder not to confront her unless I had a reason to.

But there were still two people I needed to find who might know something about Elina’s whereabouts. Tarja Kivimäki was the last of the women who had been at the house, and Aira had given me her phone number and address in Tapiola. I’d also have to track down the boyfriend. Aira had called him yesterday, but having a chat with him myself might prove more productive.

The old wooden sauna building was a grayish-rose color. It seemed to crouch near the wall to the west of the manor. Aira had said the key would be in the door. Aira had already been out to check it, so I didn’t expect to find Elina there—but maybe there was something else.

The air inside was rank with stale cigarette smoke. Maybe Milla had been coming here to escape the cold while she smoked. Inside, the dressing room was perhaps sixty degrees, but the sauna proper was only a few degrees above freezing. Apparently only part of the building had been wired for electricity. The furnishing was sparse, just a single chair and a small, cloth-covered table with an empty flower vase, a couple of wine glasses, and a half-full ashtray. There were also a narrow bed with just enough space that two lovers could manage to sleep the odd night away, a washed-out blue terry cloth bathrobe and a few towels hung over the chair, and in the drawers under the table I found a couple of toothbrushes, a tube of face cream, and an unopened bottle of red wine. The bed was clumsily made. I peeked under the blanket and found a single black hair on one of the pillows.

Maybe along with smoking here, Milla used the space to take naps.

After my brief inspection of the sauna, I returned to Elina’s room, where I looked at the calendar on her desk. The only meeting for next week was an entry marked “RFT,” which had been crossed out. I had heard of radical feminist therapy, but I didn’t really know what it entailed. I wondered whether to take the calendar and address book with me, but decided to leave them. Elina might return at any moment, and then this whole thing would seem like an embarrassing overreaction.

The dark road back to the highway was slick. The temperature had risen again. I decided to call the station from the car and ask someone to check the passenger lists for any flights or ships that had left the county, although the idea of Elina taking a sudden trip still didn’t seem very plausible. I thought of the old police rule of thumb: the longer a person was missing, the more unlikely it was they would be found alive.

3

After I called the station, I tried Tarja Kivimäki’s number, but she didn’t answer her phone. I was secretly relieved, because now I wouldn’t have to drive all the way to Tapiola. Since nothing particularly important was waiting for me at the station, I headed home to regroup before trying to track down Elina’s boyfriend.

Antti was still at the university. During the holidays it was quiet there, which meant he could concentrate on his research, which was good. Antti was working on a couple of articles he needed to publish in order to beef up his CV, and the deadlines were approaching. An assistant professorship was opening in the math department, and Antti intended to apply.

“If you get the job, I’ll be a professor’s wife. That sounds pretty damn fabulous,” I’d said teasingly when Antti told me about it.

“I don’t have a very good shot. Kirsti Jensen is the strongest candidate. But it’s good practice to at least apply.”

I was tired again. Maybe I had a vitamin deficiency. I felt like crawling into bed and calling Antti to cheer me up. But I’d promised Aira I would visit Joona Kirstilä. Boiling a pot of super strong coffee, I washed off my work makeup and changed my clothes. This refreshed me a little, although there was something strange about the coffee, a sort of metallic flavor.

I tried one more time to get Tarja Kivimäki on the phone. This time her answering machine picked up and announced that if I had urgent business, I could try to reach her at her work number at the Finnish Broadcasting Company. Then something clicked in my mind, and I knew why her name was familiar. Kivimäki was the political correspondent for the news on FBC. Unlike her colleagues, Kivimäki never appeared in front of the camera. Viewers only heard her husky, often aggressive voice, sometimes seeing a flash of a hand with long fingers and no rings thrusting a microphone at an interviewee. Kivimäki rarely let people off easy, and I always enjoyed watching her leave even slick operators like the Minister of Finance flustered and tongue-tied. I tried in vain to remember what Tarja Kivimäki looked like. I wasn’t sure I’d actually ever seen her.

I dialed the number the answering machine had given but still didn’t get through. According to the receptionist, Kivimäki was in the editing room working on a report that had to be ready for the evening broadcast. I left a request that she call me back at my work number in the morning, threw The Ramones’ debut album on the record player, cranked it up to eleven, and then started redoing my makeup. When Antti called, I told him I was going to try to find Joona Kirstilä downtown, and we agreed to meet for a beer at the Ruffe Pub afterward.

The thought of a strong, dark Belgian beer was inviting, but first I had work to do. I didn’t want to warn Kirstilä that I was coming. If for some incomprehensible reason Elina was holed up in his apartment, I wanted to surprise her there and catch her off guard in order to question her. Maybe the reason for her disappearance from Rosberga was simple. Maybe Elina had just grown tired of her flood of Christmas guests and wanted to spend the rest of the holidays in peace.

Wet snow dripped from the sky as I slogged to the bus stop. I nearly fell asleep in the warm bus. As I waited for the next one at the transfer station in Tapiola, the icy wind woke me up again.

Joona Kirstilä lived in an apartment above the Kabuki Restaurant, just east of the main Helsinki cemetery. He was home. I heard him pad to the door, and then there was a moment of silence as he looked through the peephole. Finally he opened the door just a crack, leaving the chain in place.

“What do you want?” he asked brusquely. Maybe admirers of his poetry banged on his door every night.

“Sergeant Kallio, Espoo Police. Good evening.” I flashed my badge through the crack. “I’d like to talk to you about Elina Rosberg.”

“Why are the police interested in Elina?” Kirstilä sounded incredulous.

“Elina Rosberg is missing. I thought Aira Rosberg told you.”

“Aira called me yesterday, bu
t . . .
What do you mean missing? What’s this all about?”

“If you let me in, I’ll tell you. Or if you’d prefer to talk somewhere else, we can go to a café.”

He hesitated but finally unfastened the door chain. “Ignore the mess. I haven’t had time to do much cleaning lately.”

Joona Kirstilä’s home was a small one-bedroom apartment. A partially opened door off the living room revealed a chaotic-looking bedroom. Next to the bedroom was the cramped kitchenette, with barely space enough for a hotplate, microwave, and an ancient, whirring refrigerator. But the high ceilings of the old building lent the main room, with its piles of papers and books, a certain charm. It resembled Antti’s old digs before I moved in. Only the piano was missing. A black typewriter, at least as old as the poet himself, sat on the desk beside a slick-looking laptop.

Kirstilä shifted a stack of papers off the couch and motioned for me to sit. He sat on the floor and lit a cigarette. When I’d seen him on TV and in the tabloids, I’d always suspected he played the stereotypical poet deliberately. His dark, wavy hair was worn below his ears and occasionally fell in front of his eyes, triggering a compulsive gesture to sweep it away. His skin was pale, and he had large, long-lashed brown eyes that seemed to burn intensely. His nose was straight and narrow, his lips slightly downturned at the corners. It was just the sort of face you assumed a poet would have. Although he was in his early thirties, Kirstilä looked younger. He was short, barely over five foot six, and very thin. His standard outfit of tight jeans and a thick black sweater—with protruding wrist bones poking out of the sleeves and small, artistic hands—heightened the impression of delicacy. His fingers were long and thin, as if made to hold a quill pen. I’d read some of his poetry collections and admired his unique use of language, although the general mood of the romantic poems was a bit too masculine for my tastes.

“What do you mean Elina is missing?” Kirstilä asked again, blowing streams of smoke at me. Before I could answer, the books on top of the nearest bookcase started shaking strangely. I just managed to get out of the way before they fell, nearly landing on my head.

“Pentti, stop it!” Kirstilä snapped at a cat with dun-colored stripes and a white breast. Pentti nimbly jumped from one shelf to another, bounced onto the floor, and rushed to sniff my shoes, probably smelling Einstein.

“His name is Pentti? I assume for Pentti Saarikoski?”

“Yeah. At least one of us should be a famous poet. I’m sorry. He’s too curious sometimes. But about Elin
a . . .
”

Kirstilä’s worry seemed genuine, and it increased when I told him that no one had seen or heard from Elina in days. He lit a new cigarette immediately after putting out the first, and Pentti retreated to the kitchen looking annoyed after receiving a face full of smoke.

“I don’t have a clue where she is!” Kirstilä stood and walked to the window. Stubbing out his cigarette on the wide windowsill, he leaned his forehead on the pane for a moment. His dark eyes shone in the glass’s reflection as if in a mirror.

“You don’t talk every day?”

“Not usually,” Kirstilä said, still leaning against the glass. “When I’m writing, I don’t want to know anything about the rest of the world. And Elina has her courses. We arranged to meet sometime before New Year’s. Elina’s coming over here the
n . . .
” Kirstilä’s voice faded again. I wondered whether he always left his sentences unfinished.

“When did you last see Elina?”

Kirstilä’s reply was surprising: “When did Elina disappear?”

“On Boxing Day. The night before last.”

“It was the day before Christmas Eve,” Kirstilä said. “In the afternoon, a little before I left on the train to see my parents in Hämeenlinna.”

I wondered why he was lying. Aira had been all but convinced that Elina had been out walking with him, and Milla had claimed she’d actually seen the two of them together. But I wasn’t investigating a crime, just trying to determine Elina’s location, so I didn’t accuse Kirstilä of lying yet. Instead, I asked when he had returned from Hämeenlinna. Kirstilä claimed he’d arrived home early the previous morning.

“So Aira Rosberg called right after you got home?” I asked.

“I’d just gone to sleep. I’d been up all night drinking with old friends. That’s probably why I didn’t even realize Aira was saying Elina was missing. Usually I’m the one who does the disappearing act.”

Despite his delicate appearance, Kirstilä was known for upholding the legendary boozing traditions of Finnish poets. He seemed an unlikely choice as a lover for a woman like Elina Rosberg, but I guess human emotions aren’t always about logic. If I’d let logic rule my life, I never would have married Antti—or anyone else, for that matter.

I left Kirstilä shaking his head in bewilderment and set off for the Ruffe Pub to meet Antti. I was annoyed. So far all I’d succeeded in doing was scaring people. I’d found no clues as to Elina’s whereabouts.

Antti was sitting at a table near the window trying to read by the light of a candle. The shadows cast by the flickering flame made his features look thinner than ever. When I knocked on the window above him, a wide, boyish smile spread across his face.

“What are you drinking?” he asked when I came in.

I looked with interest at the bulbous glass in front of him, which was graced by a red heart and a chubby little man.

“Belgian Oerbier,” Antti explained. “It’s a real winner.”

I tasted it but decided to stick with my standard, Old Peculier. The cigarette smoke in the pub seemed thicker than normal and made it difficult to breathe, and for some reason my beer didn’t taste as full-bodied as usual. We chatted about Joona Kirstilä’s poetry for a bit, but then I began to feel tired and asked if Antti minded heading home. Was I getting old?

At home I passed out, and the next morning I woke up with a hangover despite only drinking two beers the night before.

At work a new case was waiting for me: a restaurant break-in during the night looked professional enough that Palo and I got on the computer and started searching for backsliders. We had narrowed it down to a few possible candidates when Taskinen appeared at the door.

“Someone found the body of an approximately forty-year-old woman in the forest in Nuuksio. In a nightgown. Interested in having a look, Maria?”

Actually, the answer was no. I wasn’t interested in seeing Elina Rosberg or any other woman dead. After a moment, I rose wordlessly from my chair and started pulling on my warm outer clothes. Palo said he’d stay behind to fight with the computer.

“Ström’s downstairs checking out a car. I’ll get my coat,” Taskinen said as I went down the hall to tell Dispatch I was leaving.

Ström was just turning the ignition in the department’s most presentable Saab when I reached the motor pool garage. I climbed into the front seat—Taskinen could sit in back. Someone on the radio was calling Forensics.

“Nuuksi
o . . .
The same road that goes out to the nature center?” Ström asked.

“I don’t know where they found the body yet. Ask Taskinen,” I said.

Taskinen got in the car lugging a large duffel bag. “Nuuksio Road to the turnoff for Rosberga Manor. We can’t get anywhere close by car, so I brought boots. The ones I got for you are probably too big, Maria,” he said.

“What do you mean we can’t get there by car? Where the hell is the carcass then?” Ström growled in his usual sweet way.

“Next to a ski track about half a mile from the road,” said Taskinen. “A skier found her and called the police from the nearest house.”

“From Rosberga?” I asked. Aira and the others would have known immediately who the body was.

“No, another neighbor,” Taskinen said. “The skier rang the bell at Rosberga’s gate, but no one answered.”

“So it’s one of those goddamn lesbians who bunk there?” Ström angrily wheeled the cruiser onto the street, spraying slush on the sidewalk and onto an old man walking by. From the corner of my eye, I saw Taskinen’s mouth tighten. He didn’t like Ström’s driving any more than he liked his way of speaking.

“The owner of the estate, Elina Rosberg, has been missing for a couple of days,” answered Taskinen, his even tone betraying none of his irritation. Grabbing his phone, he dictated driving directions to Forensics.

“We should’ve brought skis,” Ström muttered. “Now we’re going to be wading up to our asses in goddamn snowdrifts.”

The skier who had found the body was waiting for us in the lane leading to Rosberga. In his bright-blue cross-country ski bibs and with ultramodern skate skis strapped to his feet, he looked like he’d dropped in from Mercury. I felt sorry for him. He’d obviously been sprinting and was now freezing just standing in the cold. And then Ström started taking his information in his usual friendly fashion. I turned away, disgusted, and surveyed the terrain. The sight of the deep drifts surrounding the skier’s tracks didn’t make me particularly happy, but there was nothing to be done about it. Ström was right—we should have brought skis.

“It’s easier once you move farther into the forest. The rain last night melted a lot of the snow,” the skier said, sensing my trepidation.