The Hummingbird (20 page)

And thank God she had.

Sanna had proved to be worth her weight in gold. As the eldest child in a large family, she was excellent with the kids and knew how to look after the house. She was always in a good mood, had the energy to play with the children, to keep them occupied for hours – and all this without being too lenient with them. Sari felt that her children’s behaviour had taken a radical change for the better since she’d gone back to work and Sanna had entered the house. What’s more, Sari didn’t feel the slightest bit guilty about it. On the contrary, she was enjoying it to the full.

‘Siiri was a bit sleepy in the morning, so we didn’t go outside for a while,’ Sanna explained as she stroked the girl’s fair, angelic locks. ‘I let them play in their pyjamas until midday. What did we play?’

‘Magic forest!’ they cried in unison.

This girl’s superhuman, Sari thought.

‘In the afternoon we went out to the garden. The strap on Tobias’s dungarees broke.’

‘Don’t matter,’ he stuttered.

‘No, it doesn’t matter – we’ll mend it,’ said Sari.

‘All in all, a good day.’

‘Great. Thanks so much, Sanna. You’re amazing.’

Sanna smiled contentedly.

‘What time shall I start tomorrow?’

‘Come for nine. Teemu’s going to work a bit later tomorrow. You can lie in too.’

‘Great. See you in the morning,’ said Sanna, waving to the children.

Sari sat down at the ready-laid table, scooped a plate of macaroni
gratin for herself, poured some milk and looked at the clock: 3.30 p.m. Teemu would be back in an hour. She would have a relaxed evening at home with nothing in particular to do. Because of Teemu’s business trips they had cut back their hobbies to a bare minimum. They didn’t want to let hectic timetables spoil these rare chances to focus on the children and to spend time together as a family. It was a good solution; they enjoyed being at home. The children had no idea that things like stress and time constraints existed.

Her mobile made a gurgling sound. A text message. Teemu had changed the regular ringtone to a frog’s croak, and it took a moment for Sari to realise the noise was coming from her work phone.

U R so sexy. So sexy there. Yummy yummy.

Sari automatically peered through the window out into the street. There was no sign of movement. Then she went round the house, checking all the windows and looking out into the yard.

Were the swings moving? Had the wind picked up?

Have I got some kind of perverted stalker, she thought, and double-checked that Sanna had locked the door after her.

Rauno had remained at the station, again. He enjoyed the quiet that descended on the Violent Crimes Unit after six o’clock once the majority of the investigators had clocked off. The office doors were closed, nobody was running along the corridors, the photocopier wasn’t whirring, there were fewer lights on and there was no buzz of conversation. It was easier to concentrate, to get his thoughts in order. His work wasn’t being constantly interrupted and nobody disturbed him.

Rauno laid the pile of reports on his desk with a sigh and rubbed his exhausted eyes. Explanations and excuses; at least he could admit it to himself. He didn’t feel so passionately about this job that he wanted to spend every evening in his office. Far from it.

He didn’t want to go home. He knew that his absence was only making things worse, that when they were having their difficulties they should try and come closer to one another, try and grow
together instead of withdrawing. This was one way of losing his last opportunity to make things right, of making Nina despise him more and more each day. Still, he refused to be the only guilty party.

He didn’t know where it had all gone wrong. He had tried and tried, but he’d always felt as though nothing was ever good enough. He was sick of it all.

If it hadn’t been for the girls, he would have walked out long ago.

Or would he?

Despite everything that had happened, sometimes Rauno felt as though he still loved Nina. Perhaps the feeling was just a habit. They’d been together for seven years. Surely that should be long enough, he thought, and felt a wave of shame and failure. His own parents were still together after 35 years.

Rauno flicked through the reports one last time. There were still plenty of names on the hunting association’s member list. This is pointless, he thought, as he decided to call another few names. The killer could be anyone and could live anywhere. He might as well get hold of a list from the neighbouring hunting association and go through them too. What about the Rotary Club? The Women’s Institute? Rauno sighed again. Perhaps the bulk of the work was yet to come.

He called five numbers. One didn’t answer, and he scored through the other four with a pencil after talking to them. All of them could prove they were somewhere else on the night of the murder – one was even in Thailand. Rauno believed them; what reason did he have not to? It would be impossible to look any more closely into their alibis. He had to trust his own sense of judgement. That’s why Rauno had been assigned this task. Apparently he was a good listener. Nina would have disagreed. It was strange how a person could give such a different impression of themselves at work. Which is the real me: the Rauno from home or the Rauno at work? Is it someone else entirely? Someone waiting inside him to develop into the man he really was?

It was too complicated.

It was almost eight o’clock. Rauno filed the reports neatly in their folders and switched off his computer. He would get home just in time to read the girls their bedtime story. At least he still enjoyed that. He didn’t want to jeopardise his relationship with his daughters. The fact that it was already beginning to happen was too painful to admit.

When the girls were in their beds and he was reading their story, Nina switched on the television and disappeared into a blue haze of TV entertainment until the early hours. Once the girls were asleep, Rauno went to bed; he was utterly exhausted. Nina spent the night on the sofa, yet again.

When night had given way to morning and the paperboys had finished their morning rounds, Rauno awoke to the sound of his telephone ringing. The call was from the station.

‘Do you remember when me and Áron found that body in the Tisza?’ asked Ákos out of the blue over dinner.

After a moment’s deliberation, Anna hadn’t gone into town to eat by herself but had gone to the supermarket, then home to cook Ákos’s favourite dish –
bableves
, bean soup – and invited her brother for dinner. She had walked to the other side of the suburb, where blocks of flats identical to her own reached up towards the sky. If I hadn’t spent my childhood here, I would never be able to find my way around, she pondered. Everything looks the same, apartment blocks like grotesque skyscrapers as far as the eye can see. The sound of children playing didn’t echo from inside the courtyards. The place seemed deserted.

As Ákos opened the door to his messy bedsit, the stench of dejected loneliness had hit her in the face and Anna had found it hard to breathe. My brother, she’d thought. This is my own brother, thrown away and forgotten.

I’ve done this to him, but this is my chance to fix things. I promise you that. I’ve been selfish, thinking only about my own success without sparing a thought for you. All she managed to say
aloud was:
Gyere enni.
Ákos seemed excited at this surprise invitation and, as Anna had predicted, he was delighted with the
bableves.

‘No, I don’t remember. Remind me,’ she answered.

They had never talked about Áron, their eldest brother who had died soon after the Croatian war broke out in Osijek and whose memory was beginning to fade. Áron had been only two years older than Ákos, and as children the boys were inseparable. Always together, always getting up to something.

‘We’d been drinking down at the
taverna
and started walking home in the early hours, both a bit tipsy. It was a beautiful morning; there was mist hanging above the river and it was warm and quiet. That’s why we thought we’d walk back along the shore, though it would take longer. There was a fisherman out on the river in his boat. Do you remember Béla Nagy, the grumpy old man?’

‘Yes, vaguely. Réka and I were out there swimming once, and we climbed into the boats along the shore and jumped from their bows back into the water. We hadn’t noticed Old Nagy sitting further up on the quayside watching to see when we’d touch his boat. He went crazy when we tried to climb inside his boat, ran all the way down to the shore, shouting until he was red in the face.
Don’t you touch my boat!
A short man with a big moustache.’

‘That’s the one. He was crazy. Anyway, he was already out fishing that morning, and when he saw us he started hollering at us to come and help him, there was something really heavy in his net. Áron was a good swimmer and a bit less drunk, so he swam up to the boat to have a look.
A fene egye meg.
’

‘Who was it?’

‘Tibor Rekecski. Their family lived quite close, in Kőrös. Do you remember? The guy that drowned after coming down that big slide outside Békavár. He went into the water feet first and hit his head on the rocks on the way down.’

‘
A kurva életbe!
’

‘His mates tried to dive down and find him; the fire brigade was called and everything, but the river’s so muddy and the current is
too strong. They couldn’t find anything. He’d got caught up in Béla Nagy’s fishing net. Áron pulled him ashore. I called the police.’

‘I never heard about this.’

‘Nobody told you. You were too little.’

‘When did all this happen?’

‘In ’89.’

‘So you were 15?’

‘Yeah, and you were seven.’

‘And out drinking at the Taverna,
Úr Isten!
You were still kids; Áron was only 17.’

‘Nobody ever asked for ID,’ said Ákos and tried to avoid Anna’s eyes by flicking through the newspaper on the table.

When their brother had died and their mother had decided to try and save her other brother from a similar fate, what was left of the family packed a suitcase full of things and fled to Finland. They no longer talked about Áron. Nobody spoke about the conflict, though their mother followed the news carefully. They had stopped talking about their father years ago, so they already knew that it was best to keep quiet about difficult matters.

They had to try and protect their mother. And themselves.

Anna had learned the technique well, and she was perfectly happy not talking about Áron. As far as she was concerned there was no point going over painful things again and again. It was so much easier to let things go and forget about them. That’s another reason why the headmaster had been so concerned about her. You have to open up, Anna, let it all out. But Anna didn’t know what ‘it all’ was or how she was supposed to ‘let it out’. She had no words for it.

‘Have you ever thought of going back?’ asked Anna.

‘Only about a hundred times a day.’

‘Then why don’t you?’

‘Don’t want to.’

‘Mum would be pleased.’

‘I’d have to move in with her. Jesus, I couldn’t deal with that.’

‘You could rent your own place.’

‘And then what would I do?’

‘What do you do here? Live on the dole? You’re the worst example of what these swivel-eyed lunatics are always raving on about. They think we’re all like that.’

‘Someone’s got to prove them right.’

‘Come on.’

‘I don’t know. I’ve been away for so long. And there’s no work there either. Most of my friends have moved to Hungary.’

‘Then why don’t you go to Hungary?’

‘
Jebiga,
I’m not going there. Do you want to get rid of me? We’ve only just—’

‘Of course not.’

‘That’s not what it seems like.’

‘
Bocs.
’

‘So, are you going to Skype Mum?’

‘What about you?’ Anna asked, puzzled.

‘I thought I’d just listen. I don’t want to talk to her.’

‘Why not?’

‘She’ll just start complaining, saying I should come home. Go on, call her. But don’t tell her I’m here.’

‘She’ll want me to tell her how you’re doing.’

‘Tell her everything’s fine.’

‘
Hát igen
.’

But their mother wasn’t at home. Anna hung up once the answering machine began playing her recorded message. Shame. She was convinced her brother would have wanted to talk to her, after all, if only he’d heard her voice.

‘The guys are out in town this evening, said they want to see you again after all these years. They were really excited when I told them you’d moved back to town. They’re waiting for you,’ said Ákos.