The Hummingbird

by Kati Hiekkapelto

  ‘Yes, I suppose so. Fuck it.’ Jere clenched his fists so hard that his knuckles turned white.

  ‘We found old bruises on Riikka’s body. They were quite large and in strange places, so they couldn’t have been caused by bumping into the table. The forensics officer suggested she might have fallen from her bike, a few weeks before her death. Were you somehow involved?’ Sari asked.

  Jere seemed to swallow the word yes, so quietly that it was barely audible.

  ‘Speak up,’ Esko commanded.

  ‘Riikka came round to my place to pick up the last of her things. There was a dress and a pair of trousers, and she needed them. I asked her if we could give it another shot. That’s how it started.’

  ‘Tell us more. Tell us everything.’

  ‘She was wearing some sort of summer dress. She looked so nice. It was a really hot day. I must have tried to hug her or something, but she shoved me away and said it was too late. I told her I’d found a group online called MANagement, that they had a branch in town and that I’d start attending their sessions. If only she’d take me back. I even showed her their brochure. I’d printed it off.’

  Jere took a breath, plucking up the courage to continue.

  ‘I had such a wonderful girlfriend, and yet I was such an idiot I managed to ruin everything. I turned into just the kind of man I swore I never would. But I never laid into her the way my dad used to beat Mum.’

  ‘So how did you lay into her?’ asked Esko.

  ‘I’ve only done it once before, and even then it was more like squeezing and shaking than anything; I never hit her. Then I hurled her to the floor and ran outside. I was shit scared of myself. It was after that that Riikka started thinking about splitting up. And that’s why she eventually left, though I didn’t behave like that any more. I walked away if I could feel myself losing control. Except that one time last summer.’

  ‘We’ll talk about that in a minute,’ said Esko. ‘So, you’d printed off the brochure for this MANagement support group? Then what?’

  ‘She just kept saying it was too late, what was done was done. Then I asked if there was someone else. She didn’t answer, but I could see it in her face. That’s when I really lost it. I hit her and shoved her against the wall but she fell backwards and hit the coffee table. I’m surprised it didn’t break. That’s where the bruises came from. It was then that I realised I’d never get her back. There went my last chance. I was at rock bottom. That’s why I took off to Lapland, to calm down and think things through.’

  ‘But in the meantime, you’d started fooling around with Virve,’ said Sari.

  Jere looked embarrassed.

  ‘Yeah. She turned up, started throwing herself at me and I thought, what the hell.’

  ‘And you hit her.’

  ‘I lost my temper, once, when she said Riikka was seeing someone else. I didn’t hit her; I shook her. I managed to control it. And unlike Riikka, Virve forgave me. She believes that I want to change.’

  ‘You realise that a tendency for jealousy and violence doesn’t look very good in the eyes of the police,’ said Esko.

  ‘I know. I’m not exactly thrilled with it myself. But you know I was in Lapland when Riikka died. And anyway, I wouldn’t have killed her. I loved her. And I’ve never had anything against Veli-Matti; he was a cool teacher. And I didn’t even know that other guy!’

  ‘What about Virve?’

  ‘What about her?’

  ‘She doesn’t have a decent alibi for the first two murders.’

  ‘She was at my place on one of those evenings.’

  ‘I said a decent alibi. You could be protecting her and lying to us,’ said Esko.

  ‘Why would I do that?’

  ‘I don’t know. Fear?’ Esko suggested.

  Jere began moving restlessly.

  ‘This whole thing is really frightening. I mean it. Listen, Virve, me and loads of our friends – we’ve all been shit scared since this all kicked off. Nobody so much as goes out for an evening walk any more. But Virve was with me in my flat when that guy was killed. I guarantee you.’

  ‘Yes, and you were in Lapland when Riikka was killed,’ said Sari.

  Jere sniffed, then burst into tears. Esko looked away.

  ‘It’s all my fault,’ Jere stammered. ‘If I’d been able to control myself, Riikka would have come back to me. She would never have left me. Then none of this would have happened. She would have been at my place, safe. Fucking hell, this is all my fault!’ he cried.

  ‘Still, make sure to get in touch with MANagement,’ said Sari. ‘Call them today. I’ve heard lots of good things about them.’

  Jere wiped his face on his sleeve and nodded.

  ‘I want to get better,’ he said. ‘I can’t deal with the thought of being like my dad. I’d rather kill myself.’

  Sari handed him a tissue.

  ‘And what about the Aztecs?’

  ‘What about them?’

  ‘Does anything come to mind? Does the word Huitzilopochtli ring any bells?’

  Jere stared at them, his eyes frozen.

  ‘What is it then?’ he asked.

  ‘I think you already know,’ said Sari.

  ‘It sounds familiar, as if I’ve heard it somewhere.’

  ‘Think back.’

  There was a long silence.

  ‘Virve’s tattoo,’ he said eventually.

  ‘So you do know,’ said Esko.

  ‘I’m fucking scared that it might be Virve,’ he said.

  Anna returned to Virve and took her back to her office.

  ‘Do you remember last time, we asked you what you know about Huitzilopochtli?’ Anna asked. She tried to sound as calm and friendly as possible. Interviewing someone who is afraid can be useful, because it often coaxes the truth out, but if the interviewee is too scared, they can shut down completely. You had to be able to treat a frightened interviewee with cotton gloves, but Anna was horrified at her own lack of experience. Back in Patrol, she’d never had to interview anyone, except if her patrol was the first responder on scene. The longer this case dragged out, the weaker she felt herself to be.

  Anna tried to hide her yawn. What impression would that give an interviewee?

  ‘I remember,’ said Virve and finally plucked up the courage to look Anna in the eye – a show of honesty. Sometimes, at least.

  ‘I remember it too. You seemed startled. Why was that?’

  ‘You saw my tattoo, didn’t you?’

  ‘Tell me about the tattoo. When did you get it, where and why?’

  ‘I got it done in May when I came back from Mexico, at a place downtown called Pink Ink. Why? Well, why do people usually get tattoos? It’s fashion, isn’t it? I think of it as a graduation present to myself.’

  ‘Why that picture in particular? The hummingbird.’

  ‘I’ve always really liked them; it’s nothing deeper than that. Then I designed the image – I’m pretty good at drawing, by the way – and I took it into the shop. They gave me a quote, and two weeks later it was there on my arm. That’s it. Honestly.’

  ‘Did you know that Huitzilopochtli means “the one with the hummingbird in his left hand”?’

  ‘Yes, I learned that when I was in Mexico.’

  ‘And you still wanted to get a tattoo like that?’

  ‘Well, it’s a fairly gruesome double meaning. Back then, I just thought it was really cool. Why do you keep asking about this? What’s my tattoo got to do with all this? I’m really frightened; I keep thinking there must be a skeleton in the closet somewhere, something that’s going to get me banged up for killing Riikka, Veli-Matti and that other guy.’

  ‘Do you own any Aztec jewellery?’

  ‘No. None whatsoever.’

  ‘You have quite a lot of jewellery.’

  ‘Yes, but no Aztec jewellery to my knowledge.’

  ‘Did you buy any jewellery in Mexico?’

  ‘Yes, this bracelet,’ said Virve and raised her jangling hand. ‘That’s the only
one.’

  ‘Do you belong to any religious groups?’

  ‘The Finnish Lutheran Church. I’ve been thinking of rescinding my membership.’

  ‘What about Jere?’

  ‘He’s not thinking of rescinding anything.’

  ‘Does he have any interest in the Aztecs?’

  ‘I doubt it. Who would be interested in a bunch of crazy serial killers?’

  Virve fell silent, as she realised the full implication of her words.

  ‘The victims all had some kind of Aztec symbols on them, didn’t they?’ she asked Anna.

  Anna nodded.

  ‘I knew it. I guessed this must have been it the first time you asked about them. What is it? Are you allowed to tell me?’

  ‘A necklace with the image of Huitzilopochtli.’

  ‘Somebody’s trying to set me up.’

  ‘Who would do that?’

  ‘No idea.’

  ‘And why?’

  ‘I really don’t know.’

  ‘Think. How many people know about your tattoo?’

  ‘Everyone’s seen it. Everyone who has anything to do with me, that is. During the summer it’s on display all the time. People are always noticing it; complete strangers come up and ask me about it. I’m sure the whole city knows about the weird girl who spends all summer on the terrace outside Café Penguin, the one with the hummingbird on her left arm.’

  ‘Huitzilopochtli,’ said Anna.

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘Jere knew the story about Virve’s tattoo. And he was afraid that Virve might be the killer, because we’d started asking about the Aztecs,’ said Esko when the team met for lunch at the station cafeteria. Grey cream-of-vegetable soup and liver steaks. I wasn’t supposed to eat here ever again, Anna thought. She noticed that nobody else seemed enthusiastic about the food either.

  ‘What the hell’s the matter with kids these days, when they won’t even tell the police the truth? If I suspected my bedfellow might be a crazed murderer, I’d go to the police and tell them everything,’ said Sari.

  ‘The first victim was their good friend, and they were worried they would be suspects because they had started fooling around with one another. So they already had a guilty conscience. Then they both started worrying that the other one was guilty. People have freaked out and started hiding things for far less. But their attempts to withhold evidence don’t seem particularly premeditated. I think it was more a panicked attempt at self-preservation,’ said Anna.

  ‘Still, we can’t rule them out just yet. They’ve got it all: the hummingbird, a weapon, a motive, everything. There must be a third accomplice,’ said Esko.

  ‘So what’s the motive for Ville Pollari’s murder?’ asked Sari.

  ‘He must have been a witness.’

  ‘And what about their former teacher Veli-Matti?’ asked Anna.

  ‘They needed another kill. Hutsilo commanded them,’ Esko muttered.

  ‘And whose is the red car, the one that’s been seen outside the Helmersons’ house all last spring and in the vicinity of all three murders?’ asked Virkkunen. ‘Neither Virve nor Jere owns such a car.’

  Nobody was able to answer.

  ‘Let’s keep these two here as long as the law allows. You two go and examine the Helmersons’ house. Talk to the widow again,’ Virkkunen instructed them. ‘We’ve got to move on this.’

  36

  ‘HERE AGAIN?’ said Kaarina Helmerson as Anna and Esko stood at her front door. She looked haggard: dark shadows beneath her eyes, her hair tied in a messy ponytail.

  ‘Hello,’ said Anna and showed her the search warrant. ‘We’ll need to have a look around, examine Veli-Matti’s things. You know.’

  ‘Of course. Knock yourselves out.’

  ‘If you could sit on the sofa for the moment, please. Technically you shouldn’t be here at all,’ Esko said to Kaarina, taking her by the hand, walking her into the living room and gently pressing her shoulders until she was sitting on the sofa. She didn’t resist. Her movements were robotic, devoid of any personal volition. Esko looked worried. He remained sitting next to Kaarina as Anna began examining Veli-Matti’s office.

  The desk and sofa bed, together with the shelving unit recessed into the wall, left just enough floor space to open out the sofa bed. Anna opened the cabinets. Three shelves filled with folders and piles of papers, student support, IT funding applications, forms, lesson plans, teachers’ curricula, history essays, English exam papers.

  Anna quickly flicked through each of the folders, but couldn’t find anything out of place in the teacher’s cabinet. Underwear, shirts, socks. What am I really looking for, Anna wondered. How can I find anything, if I don’t know what I’m looking for?

  Her phone rang.

  It was Linnea Markkula.

  ‘Hahaa!’ the coroner chuckled without any greater introduction.

  ‘Well?’ Anna replied impatiently.

  ‘I’ve just got the lab results.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘The substance found in Veli-Matti’s blood was haloperidol, good old Vitamin H. In Finland it’s sold under the product name Serenase. It’s used for the treatment of schizophrenia and delirium. In the States it’s been used to help sedate people being deported, to make the operation as peaceful and pleasant as possible for all parties. It’s quite interesting: the substance takes effect quickly, and effectively paralyses the subject, but it’s hard to get your hands on it and you have to be bloody careful when administering it. Professional stuff, I’d say. You can’t get stuff like this over the counter at your average chemist.’

  ‘So what does all this mean?’

  ‘Hard to say. Is the wife a doctor or something?’

  ‘No. She’s a head teacher.’

  ‘Well, somebody stuck that stuff into Helmerson’s arm. You should look for a phial of it. Small, brown, made of glass. Hey, fancy going out on the town on Friday night? You could bring that brother of yours along…’

  ‘Come on. I’ve got to find that phial.’

  ‘Hey, don’t hang up! There’s more. I’ve had my lab team working flat out.’

  Sari was sitting at the computer in her office, trying to concentrate. She had found a telephone number for the Helmersons’ neighbour who hadn’t been at home, but there had been no answer. Now she was writing up the accounts of the neighbours she had interviewed. She couldn’t focus. Her husband was away on business again. The children hadn’t been sleeping well, and in the mornings they’d been tired and sniffly. She was so worried about Rauno that she felt a tightness in her chest. Bihar’s disappearance gnawed at her insides; it was a huge failure on her part. Sari couldn’t help but blame herself. After all, she’d been initially convinced that something suspicious was going on. She should have believed Anna and demanded that they keep an eye on the girl. Now it was too late. What on earth had happened to her?

  Sari gripped the computer mouse, her knuckles white, and clicked open a new email. It was from her friend who had been looking into the mysterious messages. Not that again, she thought and felt a strong desire to destroy the message without reading it. She turned towards the window, where a light rain had started to patter. Then she forced herself to read the message.

  Her friend had established that one of the messages was sent from the Välikylä area of town and two others via the base station situated right next to the police station. He said finding out any further details would be impossible. The phone from which they had been sent was untraceable. But he told Sari to get in touch again if she received any new messages. Then they could try something else. Sari felt herself breaking out in a sweat. What did all this mean? The police station was situated on a busy street right in the city centre; thousands of people walked past it every day. That being said, Sari couldn’t help thinking that the person sending the messages was somehow following her, that these messages weren’t a teenage prank after all, that they were linked to the murder investigation – and she still hadn’t told anyone about
them. Had she made yet another irrevocable mistake?

  Sari looked at the clock; it was almost four o’clock. Soon she would be able to leave. Was everything okay at home? Sanna would surely have got in touch if the kids had developed a fever. She called Sanna. The mobile rang, but nobody answered. They’ll be outside now, of course, she thought and looked at the driving rain behind the windowpane. She tried to write her report, but it was futile.

  She tried calling again. Still no answer. Sanna was usually very conscientious and kept her phone with her at all times. She could easily have left it at home; either that or it was ringing quietly at the bottom of her bag, somewhere at the other end of the house. She would never hear it above the kids’ racket. Sari sent her an SMS: Call me immediately. Again she tried to concentrate on the files on her desk.

  This is pointless. Best get home right away, she thought as her telephone rang. For a fraction of a second she felt relief, but it wasn’t Sanna. It was Kirsti from Forensics.

  They had isolated a trace of haloperidol on Veli-Matti’s desk in his classroom. So Veli-Matti had been drugged at the school. Quite brazen, she thought – and risky. The killer had the audacity to break into the school, a building with over a hundred employees, and from there to take Veli-Matti to Selkämaa in handcuffs. Didn’t this guy worry the least about getting caught? And how had he gained entry? You’d have to go through several locked doors to get to Veli-Matti’s classroom, and yet there were no signs of forced entry. Sari shivered. If the killer was this sick, what was he capable of? She thought of her children. The feeling of worry pricked her skin like a sharp needle and its deceptive fingers closed around her throat. She saved her unfinished report, switched off the computer, took her coat from the hanger and pulled on her boots.

  She called home again.

  No answer.

  Anna sat down at Veli-Matti’s desk, took a deep breath. She wondered what to do next and decided to follow her original plan. She moved into the bathroom. The large mirrored cupboard was full of cosmetics. Designer brands flashed in Anna’s eyes as she lifted the various bottles and placed them on the edge of the sink.