Greta Kara didn’t otherwise look familiar to him. Her hair was gold blonde, as he had thought—the same colour as Maura’s at Jyväskylä Umbrella. Her dress also corresponded with his expectations. But in a crowd, he wouldn’t have recognized her face. He dreamt about it every night, but now that he was actually seeing it, it was the face of a stranger. He was both saddened and relieved.
Now he was close enough to smell her perfume and trailing cigarette smoke. He was close enough to see her clearly. But he still hesitated, afraid he might be confusing her with someone else. Which was ridiculous. Who else could it be?
The woman was still looking at the view. That was how he knew that she was Greta. She wanted to punish him one last time. If it were someone he didn’t know, she would have already glanced up to see who was approaching. Olli said hello.
The woman’s head turned slowly.
Their eyes met.
“Olli.”
A cloud of smoke escaped from between her lips.
She put out her cigarette in the ashtray and smiled. Olli sat down, leant his briefcase against a leg of the table and smiled back. It was hard to look her in the eye.
“A pleasant evening,” Olli said.
“Yes,” Greta answered. “A good evening to sit together and talk about books and cities. And a good place for it.” She paused, then added dramatically, “The city is at our feet.”
She smiled ironically. Olli sensed that she hadn’t yet forgiven him for his earlier bungle. She was probably waiting to see how this meeting would go. Olli gathered his thoughts, ready to behave as he was expected to behave.
First of all he had to be an adult, dignified and self-confident, like the head of a publishing house, which was what he was.
Second, he should be a polite, friendly, respectful person; an editor who was meeting with a writer important to the firm, aware of his responsibility to make sure that she stayed with them, and aware that her sales could assure the daily bread of a large number of people.
Third, of course, was to be warm and attentive—they were, after all, old friends.
Olli remembered that they hadn’t hugged, or even shaken hands. It left an uncomfortable distance between them. It was too late to correct it. The next natural moment for it would be when they parted.
They started to chat about this and that, without really saying much. Natural talk. Light.
Good.
That was how this thing should progress. They both had their own lives, and new roles. This meeting was not between childhood friends and former lovers but between two middleaged, sensible professionals.
At the same time, it was a tragic irony that he could never tell this woman about the dreams he’d been having for months, dreams that had thrown his whole life into disorder.
You know, last night you were sucking me off and I came in your mouth and you said you would love me forever. We clung to each other and vowed that if anything ever separated us we would find each other again. And if in the meantime one of us forgot what we once meant to each other, the other person would make him or her understand by any means necessary.
The door of the restaurant opened and three people came out onto the terrace to smoke and look at the view.
The tall man suggested they climb the tower. The short man was excited at the idea. The woman laughed and said, “Don’t go up there. We can see well enough from here. Besides, I’ve been up there before. Going up again would show bad taste.”
“Let’s go anyway,” the tall man said, putting a hand on the woman’s shoulder. “Let’s go without this guy. I promise I’ll be a gentleman.”
The woman took a flask out of her bag, uncorked it and sniffed the contents, smiling knowingly.
“What’s in there?” the man asked.
“Sulphuric acid,” the woman said, her voice husky and dramatic. “For the eyes of men who tell lies.”
The short man laughed and poked the tall one in the ribs. “Did you catch that? She’s turning into Catherine again. And you, I assume, are the unlucky Jim.”
The man who would be Jim shook his head. “Whatever. I don’t watch those old black-and-white French movies. Life is too short.”
The woman smiled slyly, pulled the tall man by the arm to the railing and shouted, “Jules, watch us!”
The short man laughed. “Our Jules might not follow you so meekly if he had seen more old black-and-white French movies. At least he wouldn’t get in your car until you had thrown that insane guide to life of yours in the trash.”
Olli asked if Greta would like some coffee or wine or perhaps something to eat. Greta lit a cigarette, took a drag and said, “To tell you the truth, I feel like I’ve got mud in my stomach. I couldn’t possibly get anything down until I’ve heard what you think of the manuscript.”
“There’s no reason to be nervous,” Olli assured her. He opened his briefcase and took the printed manuscript out. “The first part looks good. I think it’s going to be a fine book. Though it needs polishing, of course. Here are my comments. Don’t be frightened. These are just my thoughts and ideas. Just suggestions that can, and should, be discussed. The main thing I’ve been thinking about are the references to secret passages.”
Greta’s brow furrowed. “Oh?”
“Don’t you think they might be a bit confusing for readers?”
“Confusing?”
Greta looked at Olli with such amused disbelief that he felt confused.
He thought frantically, hiding his struggle behind a professional smile.
The whole time he was sitting there he tried to find something familiar in the face he had watched, caressed, kissed thirty years ago. But the face remained that of a stranger. Not that the years had changed Greta—they had taken a toll on his memory. He remembered many things wrongly, including the face of his beloved.
“Yes, confusing,” Olli said. “It is a book of non-fiction, after all. A city guide. Everything but the secret passages is based on facts, a charming description of the city, which will help readers get to know Jyväskylä from a new angle. Why confuse them with this secret passage thing?”
Greta let her cigarette burn down between her index and middle fingers. She put it out, got up and went to look at Jyväskylä at dusk, where the lights were already coming on. She rested her left hand on the railing and lifted her right. She put her index finger to her lips.
The air had cooled. Olli went to stand next to her, thrust his hands in his pockets and waited for her answer.
Finally Greta closed her eyes, wiped her brow, and whispered. “How can you stand here beside me and pretend not to remember? Not to know that my heart is breaking for you? That your face is the wonderful light burning in all this darkness?…”
Olli stiffened.
Then he recognized the words. “Wuthering Heights. Heathcliff’s lines. Played by Laurence Olivier. Directed by William Wyler in 1939. I saw it at the film club. Very good movie. But Merle Oberon’s lines would suit you better.”
Greta’s mouth curled into a smile. “Did you know that they designed a new spotlight just for lighting Merle Oberon? She had been in a car accident in London and had scars on her face. Unfortunate for an actress. But the special lighting made it so that the scars didn’t show in the film. The cinematographer who designed the light was her future husband. It was true love.”
Then Greta turned and looked him in the eye and asked, “Have you forgotten Tourula?”
“Of course I haven’t,” Olli said.
A light blazed up in her sea-green eyes. Olli could see now that it was the same green that glowed in the eyes of the tousle-headed umbrella vendor.
“I do remember Tourula. The Tourula Five. Our game of secret passageways,” Olli said. “But let’s leave them out of Magical City Guide. It will be better without fairy tales.”
Greta looked away, as if she heard distant music.
Olli didn’t know what she expected of him. Before he could organize his thoughts, she took the manuscript, kisse
d Olli on the cheek and asked him to call her a taxi. “So. We’ll think about it,” she said, and shot him a strange look.
Olli’s stomach hurt as they rode down in the elevator and exchanged a squeeze of the hand at the anti-aircraft gun. Greta’s hand felt cool.
The taxi came.
Greta got in and rode away.
Olli walked home.
He ate some supper, brushed his teeth, went upstairs, put on his pyjamas and crawled into bed.
A disturbing feeling. Olli’s eyes open. Adrenalin starts to seep into his body. He raises his head and sees that a painting has appeared on the bedroom wall.
The Sleeping Girl.
Olli looks for an explanation. Maybe Aino has bought a copy of the Sleeping Girl as a surprise for him. Quite a coincidence. She also bought A Guide to the Cinematic Life without knowing that her husband and the author were once lovers.
Then Olli thinks of a better explanation: he’s dreaming. The girl in the pear-print dress herself steps out of the dark, takes his hand, pulls him up and leads him away.
His body follows hers as if weightless.
He looks behind him. The bedroom recedes. Aino is sitting on the edge of the bed swinging her feet and waving happily. She yells, “See you later, dear! Have fun!”
The soles of Olli’s feet lightly touch a wood floor and he realizes he is in the room in the old house next to the Touru River. Their secret meeting place. There’s the dusty piano and the bed.
Greta is still holding his hand. Olli can smell her perfume and the cigarette she just smoked. Every detail is precise and vivid.
“I couldn’t wait any longer,” Greta says. “Were you thinking you might not come?”
She flirts with him, circling him, touching and examining him, teasing, gathering impressions like seashells on the shore. The floorboards creak under her steps. Her dress rustles. Olli can see the pores on her face and the little cinnamon-coloured nuggets in the green of her eyes. Nothing could be more real. Her face and his feelings trace themselves into his consciousness as if the memories were drawn with a tattoo needle.
This time he will remember.
The girl stops and reaches her light, cool arms around the back of his neck. Olli’s fingers travel up her spine and feel her vertebrae, her shoulder blades, the hollow at the nape of her neck. Joy ignites on her lips and spreads to her eyes. She presses her mouth against his throat. Olli closes his eyes. Her tongue is hot and wet. She presses tighter against him. Olli breathes through her hair. This is what gold smells like, he thinks.
Then someone begins to shriek like a seagull.
Olli.
Greta is biting him.
He struggles.
Her teeth sink deep into his throat. The darkness sways. Blood floods over his skin. Olli grabs the girl by the hair and tears her away from him. Her green eyes are full of tears, her mouth dark with blood.
“Did I hurt you?” she whispers. She has turned cold and sardonic. “Forgive me, my love, but the pain you feel is but a hint of what I feel. Oh, yes, and give my regards to St Anthony.”
The girl steps forward and pushes Olli. He topples onto his back.
The floor gives way.
He falls.
Olli sat up in bed. It felt like an angry gorilla was pounding at the inside of his ribcage. He felt his neck and stared at the bedroom wall.
No bite.
And no painting. Just the mirror.
He pressed his head into his pillow and tried to go back to sleep. It was no use. Something wasn’t right. He’d had an uneasy feeling for days. Now the feeling was stronger. There was something he wasn’t noticing.
He was in bed alone.
He turned towards Aino’s side of the bed, scrambled across and looked over the edge of the bed at the floor. There was nothing there but a pair of striped ankle socks.
He got up and went through the house, looking into every room at least three times.
Aino and the boy were clearly gone.
19
OLLI TRIED CALLING Aino’s number, of course.
When he did, the Turkish March started to play in the kitchen. He followed the sound, puzzled.
He thought he was reacting to the situation with calm rationality—there was no cause for panic, after all—but the pale, pyjamaed man he glimpsed in the mirrors told him otherwise.
Olli found Aino’s phone on top of the refrigerator. It was a phone she’d bought around the time their son was born. Olli had offered to buy her a new phone but she didn’t want one, since the old one still worked. The phone kept ringing. That confused Olli, as did the message on the screen: Olli calling.
It took a moment for him to figure out how to make the Mozart stop.
He walked around the kitchen thinking that he should do something sensible. Clear this up.
No need to panic. At any moment Aino and the boy would come clomping in and she would explain what happened and Olli would wonder why he hadn’t immediately realized what was going on.
It would be best to wait in the kitchen. Olli made some cocoa and sat at the table sipping it, staring at the empty chairs. He tried not to worry, but worried anyway.
Give my regards to St Anthony.
Eventually the sun rose and reflected from the side of the toaster. In all the houses in Mäki-Matti coffee was being made, papers fetched, breakfast cooked. Dogs were tugging at their masters’ leashes, eager to get out to the street and take a crap. Children were waking up and running to wolf down their morning porridge. From somewhere nearby he heard the sound of a trampoline.
Olli’s head hurt. It had fallen onto the table sometime during the night. Also on the table was an empty package of honey cereal. Olli hated that cereal, his son’s favourite, but it had tasted good during the night, bowl after bowl. He took an aspirin, made some coffee and thought. It seemed his family was not here. His family was gone. But where? Why?
Maybe Aino’s aunt or one of her sisters was seriously ill, had been in an accident or had actually died.
Olli considered this theory. Maybe news of it had come during the evening when he went out to meet Greta Kara. Then Aino had frantically called a taxi, taken the boy with her and gone to Joensuu, Helsinki or Lahti, depending on who it was who had come to harm. She had intended to call Olli from the taxi, but she had left her phone at home and didn’t know his number from memory.
Olli called four numbers, without revealing the situation to Aino’s family members. They were all fine.
Maybe she had left him a note. He searched the house for a message. He didn’t find any.
He thought about the matter while he dressed and cleaned himself up. As he brushed his teeth he examined Aino’s phone. He didn’t find anything of interest in the numbers she had called. Her last call had been made several days earlier, to Olli. He remembered the call: she had asked him to buy the boy some new swimming trunks and a rubber ring, but Olli had forgotten.
He went through her saved numbers looking for clues. Acquaintances. Relatives. Fellow teachers. Most of the contacts were listed only by their first names, which meant nothing to him. Anna; Anna-Liisa; Anne; Anu; Eeva; Eila; Emma; Emmi; Hair Salon; Hanna; Health Clinic; Irja; Jaana K; Jaana L; Kaisa K; Kaisa R; Kira; Kirsi; Liisa; Laura H; Laura N; Laura S; Mom; Noora E; Noora K; Olli; Paula; Principal; Riitta; Raili; Roosa; Secretary; Taxi; Teacher’s Lounge.
It occurred to Olli that he ought to have listened more closely when Aino talked about people.
He hesitated before reading her text messages, but decided that in an emergency like this it was all right to infringe on her privacy.
There was nothing in her messages that shed any light on the situation.
The next thing that occurred to him was that Aino might have left him. It didn’t seem probable, or even possible, but on the other hand that sort of thing happened all the time. One person just got fed up and left, and the person who was left behind cried to everybody that they hadn’t guessed a thing.
Olli didn’t thi
nk Aino was the type of person who would leave her husband. But maybe he just didn’t know his wife. After all, she didn’t know him.
Aino and the boy’s wardrobe didn’t seem to have been emptied. One of the suitcases was missing. He didn’t see her handbag around. The only toothbrush on the bathroom shelf was Olli’s blue one. The red toothbrush and the dinosaur toothbrush were gone. Olli wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing.
He walked out to the yard.
It was going to be a beautiful day. The sky was dotted with fluffy clouds, some of them in weird shapes. The lawn was positively dripping with green. Bumblebees buzzed around him like fuzzy helicopters.
He looked at Aino’s flower beds. He was surprised how many there were, and wondered if he should water them if it didn’t rain within the next few days.
He went back in the house and watched television for twenty-four hours. The next morning he wondered if he should contact the police, and decided that he would eventually, but not now. Because at any moment the phone might ring or a taxi might pull up in front of the house, and everything would go back to normal again.
Olli called the publishing house and said he had started his summer holiday. Then he went into his home office and opened Facebook. Facebook helps you connect and share with the people in your life, the sign-in page said.
Olli had a new friend request. Aino added you as a friend on Facebook. We need to confirm that you know Aino in order for you to be friends on Facebook.
Olli accepted Aino’s friend request and went to look at her page. There wasn’t anything on it; it looked new. At the top of the page was the usual comment box. It said Write something.
Olli wrote: Where are you?
*
Aino had four other Facebook friends besides Olli. The first three were “mutual friends” of Olli’s: Leo, Richard and Anne Blomroos.
Contrary to what Olli had by some peculiar logic instantly expected, Aino’s fourth friend wasn’t Greta.
Secret Passages in a Hillside Town Page 12
