Wolves and Angels

by Jokinen, Seppo

  Koskinen was shocked once again by Harjus’ bitterness toward his bike riding. He looked at Harjus’ legs. They were bound with a wide fabric belt to the bench, and compared to his upper body looked like the roots of a withered tree. He wasn’t shocked any more.

  Harjus ripped a long strip of paper from the roll and began to wipe his face. He spoke in a muffled voice from under the paper, as if ashamed of his surge of emotion.

  “I know what Rauha’s life was like. She came down with polio when she was nine. Back then they called it infantile paralysis. Her little brother got it too, and his lung muscles were paralyzed. He suffocated to death.” Harjus sniffed loudly. “But Rauha survived. The disease had messed her up so badly that from then on she had to be pushed around by others and live on charity.”

  He crumpled the paper up in a ball and threw it off to the side. “I don’t believe in anything, but I’m sure that Rauha is in a better place now. Nothing could be worse than this… I’m glad she got out of here!”

  The last words made Koskinen think of Pekki’s mercy killer theory; how many others thought like Harjus?

  “Let’s get to the point,” Koskinen said, digging his notebook out of his pocket. “Did you hear anything last night?”

  “I had enough last night that I wouldn’t have noticed if an artillery shell had made a direct hit on the building.”

  “At the Cat’s Meow?”

  “There too.”

  “With Ketterä?” Koskinen asked, and thought with an acerbity brought by experience that the two men were sure to back up each other’s alibis.

  On the other hand, what did two disabled men need alibis for?

  “Ketterä was there too,” Harjus said. “But we only had a couple there.”

  “And a couple of beers was enough to make you deaf for the whole night?”

  “I had a bottle of vodka in my room. I downed that too.”

  “Alone or with Ketterä?”

  “Alone.”

  “Why? Did you have a fight?”

  “No, sometimes I just wanna be alone. Even though guys like me are blessed with an abundance of that particular luxury.”

  Koskinen put his notebook in his pocket. He hadn’t written a single word in it this time either. He glanced at his watch—it was already well into the day, and he still had unfinished business at the station. It was pointless wasting any more time with Harjus. He wasn’t going to let anything slip. Even if he did know something.

  “We’ll talk some more another time,” Koskinen said, returning the wheelchair next to the bench. He started climbing the stairs. As he reached the top, he heard the clanging of the metal begin again.

  Koskinen saw Anniina Salonen and Lea Kalenius walking toward the dining room side by side. He took advantage of the opportunity and strode after them.

  “I have something I want to ask both of you.”

  The two nurses turned and looked at Koskinen in exasperation. Both sets of eyes radiated concern and exhaustion.

  “We were just interviewed,” Kalenius said. “By a female officer named Lundelin.”

  Anniina Salonen pointed at the clock hanging on the wall. “The whole schedule is messed up, and we’re two hours late for breakfast. We just got finished distributing everyone’s meds.”

  “This won’t take long,” Koskinen said soothingly and indicated for them to follow him. They sat down on the sofa group in the lobby, Salonen next to Koskinen and Kalenius across from them. The women looked at the lieutenant with impatient expressions as they waited to hear what he wanted from them.

  Koskinen himself wasn’t completely sure what he wanted. The conversation with Ketterä was still rolling around as a nebulous blob in his mind. Especially the words “it did this to me” bothered him. It! What did Ketterä mean by that—fate or some higher power?

  Anniina Salonen grew tired of looking at Koskinen lost in thought, staring out the window. She shifted her heavy body in obvious irritation, making the back of the sofa creak.

  “You don’t seem to understand the situation,” Salonen said in a shrill, tense voice. “We’re on the verge of total chaos. The residents are afraid. Some of them are so terrified they don’t dare come out of their rooms.”

  “Why?” Koskinen asked absent-mindedly. At this, Kalenius’ emotions got the better of her. “Why? If someone can kill a kind, innocent person like Rauha, he can do the same to any one of us. Has your work really hardened you so much that you can’t understand why people are afraid here? We’re one step away from complete panic, and I doubt anyone will sleep tonight.”

  Koskinen shook his head—his job hadn’t hardened him. Sometimes he thought his life would be easier if it had.

  “We’re going to post a police officer here until we’ve solved the case and arrested the perpetrator. Also a group from Victim Support will be coming to assist you with working through the residents’ fears.”

  He saw noticeable relief on Kalenius’s delicately-featured face. However, this didn’t completely sweep the irritation out of her limpid brown eyes.

  “Get to the point already!”

  “How much does Hannu Ketterä talk about how he became disabled?”

  Salonen fluffed her hair with an angry gesture, making it emit a sickeningly sweet smell of hairspray.

  “Hasn’t anyone told you how it happened? Do you know anything about anything?”

  There was something contradictory in Salonen. Koskinen had noticed it on his very first visit on Wednesday when she had shown him Timonen’s apartment. It felt like her mood vacillated between happy and miserable so often that sometimes even she couldn’t decide which one she was.

  “I do know,” Koskinen replied. “Someone stretched a rope across a cross country ski track on the bottom of a steep hill, and Ketterä landed on his neck when he hit it. They never figured out who did it.”

  “What more do you want to know then?”

  “Does he talk about it often?”

  The two women glanced at each other. Salonen spoke first.

  “Hannu spent his first year deeply depressed. He didn’t start recovering until he spent some time at the Lahti rehab center. But he’s still more bitter than anything else.”

  “Who wouldn’t be?” Kalenius interjected. “I can’t imagine a more unnecessary injury. Luckily he has gotten music back in his life. Playing is the best therapy for him.”

  Koskinen remembered Ketterä talking about his hobby at the Cat’s Meow. But he still let Kalenius tell him about it.

  “Hannu plays the piano. He goes and jams a couple of times a week with a basement band. They play jazz. In July the Nokia Lions Club donated him his own piano. It’s in his room.”

  Kalenius nodded in Salonen’s direction.

  “Anniina picked it up and delivered it here. Too bad he can’t really play much here. So many residents sleep poorly and are so sensitive to the sound.”

  “Was Rauha Salmi?”

  “Yes,” Salonen said, looking at Koskinen in disbelief. “But you can’t mean… That’s laying it on a little thick, isn’t it?”

  Koskinen waved it off. “I was just asking…just part of the routine. That’s enough about Ketterä for now. But I still want him and Harjus to come down to the station one more time.”

  Anniina Salonen lost her composure. Her solidly-built face screwed up in a mass of wrinkles, and a piercing, catty look flashed in her green eyes.

  “What the hell for?” she snapped. “They’ve already been through that once!”

  The sudden explosion surprised Koskinen. It looked like she was having a hard time holding still, her ample bosom heaving violently and her legs twitching as if from sudden cramping.

  Koskinen nevertheless continued, with restrained sedateness. “I’d still like some clarification on a couple of open questions.”

  “Can’t you ask your questions here? Today has already been upsetting enough for them.”

  “Official interviews are conducted at the police station and are entered i
nto the official record. The interviewee approves the transcription with his own signature.”

  Koskinen glanced at his watch before continuing. “They don’t have to come down today. They can come tomorrow morning, even if it is Saturday. I’ll notify them and you of the specific time and arrange transportation.”

  He turned to Anniina Salonen, who was still flushed with anger.

  “You can go now.”

  Even though she had been complaining about what a rush she was in, now she looked reluctant to leave. Obviously she was interested in what Koskinen might still have for Kalenius. However, in the end she stood up and stomped off angrily toward the dining room.

  Koskinen leaned over closer to Lea Kalenius. “This is strictly off the record, but I wanted to ask about something rather personal.”

  An uneasy expression of insecurity flashed across her face. She awkwardly tried to conceal it, bending down to lighten the buckle of her orthopedic sandals.

  “Um, personal?”

  “Yes,” Koskinen said, lowering his voice. “I heard that a while ago you took an extended sick leave.”

  Kalenius straightened her back and sighed deeply. “I guessed I’d be asked about that eventually. You’re quite right. I was on leave for three months for a nervous breakdown. There’s no use trying to hide it.”

  “Would you tell me a little more specifically what led to it?”

  “I just couldn’t take it anymore. It wasn’t just the amount of work we do here, which has tripled in the last few years because of staff cutbacks. And it also wasn’t because my husband got sick of me being exhausted and stressed all the time and walked out last spring. The reason for my burnout was something else entirely.”

  Kalenius closed her eyes and continued in a quiet voice.

  “Most of the residents here are good, quiet people resigned to their fate. They need a lot more time than we can give them with this many nurses.”

  Koskinen leaned in even closer to hear what she was saying.

  “And then there are the few troublemakers. They take all of our time and attention. If they don’t get it, they kick up a huge fuss. We have to give in to them and then that means that the quiet, good-hearted ones are left without the care they deserve.”

  It wasn’t until this point that Koskinen began to understand how deeply Lea Kalenius was committed to her work, as were probably all of the other nurses. They weren’t indifferent to the well-being and safety of their clientele. They cared for the people they watched over, and didn’t leave them when they stepped beyond the doors of the building.

  Kalenius quickly glanced over her shoulder.

  “Not everyone is like Anniina,” she whispered.

  “What is she like?”

  “She gets along with everyone, even the trouble-makers. She would do anything for them, even giving up her rare days off so those guys can have a good time.”

  Kalenius stretched even closer so their foreheads almost met.

  “Do you know what?”

  “What?”

  “Sometimes I almost feel like she does it to get at us. When she’s so nice and loving to those jackasses, it makes the rest of us nurses look like we’re aloof and indifferent. Especially me.”

  Her speech broke off in quiet sobbing. Koskinen would have wanted to dig deeper about her nerves acting up, whether it involved more violent outbursts or depression. However, it was hard to pry that sort of thing out of a crying woman. It would have felt like he was tormenting her.

  “I’d like to talk to you about this a little more sometime. Preferably just the two of us.”

  Kalenius looked at Koskinen through her tears and nodded. “Okay.”

  The couches were grouped in front of a large window, with a good view to outside. A black hearse with a mirror wax was just backing up the walkway.

  “They’re coming to get Ms. Salmi’s body,” Koskinen said incautiously, causing Kalenius’ weeping to intensify.

  “It would be a good idea to keep the residents away for now.” Koskinen steeled himself. “Could you arrange for them to stay in the dayroom for the next ten minutes?”

  Kalenius nodded and stood. An inexplicably deep dejection shone from her eyes, and the tears made them look like copper-tinted, watery pearls. Suddenly she turned and jogged toward the dining hall, closing the double doors behind her.

  Ulla appeared in front of Koskinen out of nowhere. “Don’t you trust my skills anymore?”

  Koskinen was taken off guard and didn’t know what to say.

  “Why were you interviewing her again when I already did it?”

  “I was just clarifying a couple of small details and—”

  But Ulla wasn’t listening. “Everywhere you go you have to chat up every woman in the place. Isn’t it enough that you already have a date for tonight?”

  “Oh hell,” Koskinen yelped. “Is today Friday?”

  He had completely forgotten the date with Ursula Katajisto. The day had been an endless merry-go-round since the morning. Niininen’s brusque wake-up call, the announcement of the new homicide, the ride with the SS Patrol to Wolf House, then to the station for the meeting, and back again to Wolf House. He hadn’t had any time to think about little things.

  “What else have I forgotten?” Koskinen said, worried and not even noticing that Ulla had already gone.

  Two men dressed in black came in through the front door. One of them had a folded-up wheeled stretcher under his arm. The men nodded curtly at Koskinen; he had met the men before in similar situations. He pointed them toward Salmi’s room, even though it would have been easy to find with a uniformed officer standing guard at the door.

  The two undertakers disappeared into the hallway without a word. Soon a man with a glum face appeared from the same direction. Kaatio walked into the lobby with the bow-legged gait common to soccer players.

  “Figured anything out?” he asked.

  “Nothing.”

  “Same here,” Kaatio said, groaning. “Not a single fricking thing. The first thing any of the residents heard was around the time when the security guy showed up. Before then nobody heard or saw anything…not even the sound of Laine’s taxi.”

  Kaatio ran his eyes around the intersection between the wall and the ceiling.

  “Why don’t they have a security camera here?”

  “Who would’ve ever believed anyone would try to force their way in here?” Koskinen said, bouncing his keys in his palm. “I’m going to the station. My desk is full of unfinished paperwork, and I think the prosecutor is starting to get his panties in a bunch.”

  He traded a few more words with Kaatio about how to proceed. They would gather at the station at five o’clock at the latest to recap, and the meeting had to be over by seven. Koskinen omitted the fact that this was when he had a date with an occupational health psychiatrist. He doubted Ulla would have broadcast it either.

  In the hallway the wheeled stretcher rattled, and he guessed that they were already bringing out Salmi. Strapping the body to the stretcher could not have taken long. Even one of them could have managed it easily. Koskinen doubted that Rauha Salmi weighed more than a hundred pounds.

  Koskinen waved at Kaatio and slipped out. He jumped in the Toyota, and was so deep in thought that he started driving the wrong way. He drove around the nearby cramped residential streets for a while before finding his way back to the main road.

  Instead of heading directly for the station, he turned toward the Prisma superstore and parked the car right next to the front door. He marched straight to the clothing department, and, after briefly looking over the selection, he selected a black dress shirt. Emilia had said once that he looked his most handsome in black, and he still trusted that.

  After going through the checkout, he stopped at the flower shop in the vestibule. He picked a pink bouquet of roses—ten for ten euros. He threw them with the shirt in the back seat of the Toyota and continued on his way.

  Kuparinen was in the garage to meet him and looked
at the bouquet of flowers swinging in Koskinen’s hand. His expression revealed his thoughts about the use an official state vehicle for a personal shopping trip. Koskinen slipped into the elevator before Kuparinen had time to say anything.

  Koskinen looked at himself in the mirror and practiced his carefree playboy smile: “I just brought you a little something.” But almost as quickly he turned serious—was it even classy to give flowers on the first date? Ursula Katajisto might take it as a breach of etiquette or, who knows, maybe even some sort of Freudian innuendo, psychiatrist that she was.

  Koskinen stepped into the corridor, thinking about leaving the flowers on the windowsill in the elevator alcove. Someone without anything important going on could investigate where they had come from. But then he got another idea. He marched into his secretary’s cubicle and tossed the flowers on her desk.

  Milla shrieked with joy. “Flowers! What are these for?”

  Her unexpected exuberance surprised Koskinen.

  “Well, for this morning,” he said, unable to come up with anything else. “I was being a pretty big ass. You couldn’t have known how important that picture of the sailboat was to me.”

  “Oh, it was nothing,” Milla said, shaking her antenna hat. She ripped the packaging open and let out another scream of joy. “Roses! What a cool bouquet.”

  Koskinen had to laugh. He swung the Prisma bag in his hand. “Don’t come into my office for a few minutes. I bought a new shirt, and I’m going to go strip again.”

  He walked off toward his office, thinking along the way whether that had just gone wrong again. How could he know Milla, who dreaded sexual harassment so much, wouldn’t take his words the wrong way? She might take them as having a double meaning, and then the roses would just look like bait from a philanderer.

  Once again the old familiar thought came to mind: would he ever learn how to act around people?

  18.

  Koskinen ate the sage chicken. The meat was tender and was complemented by the herb-roasted potatoes. The portion was not particularly large, but it nonetheless filled his belly; he had enjoyed a Greek salad and several slices of wheat bread before the main course.