Fatal Headwind

by Leena Lehtolainen

  The woman who had been browsing the numerology book came over to Seija and said it seemed terribly interesting.

  “That comes to two hundred and thirty-two marks,” Seija said, and the woman counted out two hundred and fifty without batting an eyelash.

  “Pretty expensive,” I said after the woman left the store.

  “Definitely. People are willing to pay almost anything to find inner peace, or a savior, or whatever. I don’t believe in numerology, but I imagine it works for some people. Crystals work better on me, so that’s what I use to heal myself. What would work on you? What’s your sign?”

  “Why did Harri bring that dead duck inside?” I asked, interrupting.

  “Because he thought there were too many of them around Rödskär, both ducks and clams, which was the ducks’ local nutrition source. He was going to take the body to the mainland for testing.”

  “Why? Did he suspect the animals were dying from poisoning?”

  “He didn’t tell me, as if he didn’t trust me. I forgot about the whole thing, since I never heard about it again. I only remembered when Mikke said you suspected Harri’s death might have been a murder too.”

  Just then a gaggle of teenage girls flooded into the shop, coming to admire the crystals and test the natural cosmetics. This felt like a good opportunity to change the subject.

  “Have you always used the name Seija, or did you used to go by Elvi? Elvi Koponen?”

  Seija set down the pliers as if they had suddenly grown hot.

  “What do you mean? I’ve never used the name Elvi. I’ve hated it ever since I was a little girl.”

  “Why didn’t you tell us your ex-husband died in a boating accident Juha Merivaara was also involved in?”

  “There wasn’t any reason to tell you.” Seija picked up the pliers again and started wrapping wire around an amethyst. “Aaro and I had already been living apart for five years before the accident. My ex-husband had serious problems with alcohol. The accident wasn’t Juha’s fault.”

  “Juha was drunk at the time of the accident too.”

  “His blood-alcohol level didn’t exceed the limit at the time for boating. Maybe he would have been able to move in time if he had been sober, maybe not. Maybe Aaro steered in front of Juha on purpose. None of that ever mattered to me. Aaro was my son’s father, but otherwise he was a complete stranger.”

  Angrily Seija grabbed another amethyst and continued her work. One of the girls came to buy some arnica lip balm. I considered whether I should take Seija down to the station immediately, but I didn’t have any real evidence against her.

  “Are you claiming that your friendship with the Merivaara family was just a coincidence?” I asked once the lip-balm purchase was complete.

  “Is there such a thing as coincidence? Maybe it was meant to be.”

  “So you’re saying you didn’t know Mikke was Juha Merivaara’s brother when you met him?”

  “Half brother. No, I didn’t. And by the time I found out, we were such good friends it didn’t matter.”

  “Do Mikke and Anne know about your ex-husband’s accident?”

  “Mikke does, but I’ve never told Anne. She was miserable enough about all the things Juha had done.”

  The girls now made their way over to the chest of rocks, so for a moment I moved behind the shelf.

  “This amazonite is totally fab. I’ve gotta have it,” one of the girls said, and the others started picking out rocks too. There was no way to talk to Seija because more customers kept coming into the store. I told Seija that I wanted an official statement, and that someone from our unit would set up a time for an interview early the next week.

  On a whim I asked Seija to find me an amazonite too. I remarked on the name, but Seija said it didn’t actually have anything to do with Amazons. Apparently a long time ago someone had confused this mineral with nephrite, which was found near the Amazon River. Even if the rock didn’t have anything to do with warrior women, I still liked the feel of it in my hand as I walked down the stairs. Somehow it was cool and warm at the same time. When I put it in my jacket pocket, I noticed that there was another rock already there: the piece of red granite with stripes of quartz I had picked up one day on Rödskär. Next to the smoothness of the amazonite, the granite was rough and dull. The quartz parts felt warmer.

  For lunch I bought a double-scoop cone of Mövenpick Swiss chocolate ice cream, which probably had at least as many calories as the dietary recommendations for a full meal. After finishing it, I headed back to the station, where my brain kept getting stuck on Seija Saarela and dead ducks.

  I could only think of one solution: time crunch or not, I was going to take the hour in the gym our labor contract allowed. That was sure to clear my head. I put on the yoga pants and tank top I had stashed in the closet. I also had an old pair of running shoes for just such emergencies. Once I pulled my hair back in a ponytail, I headed to the basement for some self-flagellation. The one concession I made was that I left my cell phone on. Koivu and Puustjärvi might be calling any minute with the word on the owners of Mare Nostrum. Could the company have connections to Animal Revolution? And what if Juha Merivaara had been funding the movement’s activities through a shell company? Or what if Juha Merivaara hadn’t known that the people behind Mare Nostrum were the same ones funding Animal Revolution?

  I spent fifteen minutes on a stationary bike and then moved on to boxing. Smack, smack, smack—I imagined the punching bag was Ari Väätäinen. Ström was usually the target of my pummeling, but my husband had also taken a few hits. Boxing made me want music; some early Eppu Normaali or Dead Kennedys would have fit the bill nicely. But I had to satisfy myself with bloodthirsty growls as I threw punch after punch. The group of patrol officers practicing throws on the tatami mats cast odd glances my way. Next I spent some time working on my legs and abs, which still hadn’t recovered fully since my pregnancy.

  After sweating for an hour, I was ready to return to the grind. I grabbed Harri’s file first thing. I didn’t have time to open it, though, before my desk phone rang. It was Wang, who told me that our mushroomer had been seen with her presumed lover, Toomas, in downtown Pärnu, a vacation town in Estonia, on Monday afternoon. The Estonian police would continue their search.

  “Should I go tell the husband?”

  “I’m sure he’ll be overjoyed to hear than instead of being eaten by wolves in the woods, his wife is just on a little spa vacation. Do we know anything about this Toomas character? Is she in any danger?”

  “He doesn’t have a criminal record with us, but he spent six months in jail for aggravated fraud at home.”

  “Light a fire under the Estonians. Our mushrooming economist may have made some mistakes in her calculations about Toomas’s intentions.”

  “Why are smart women always falling for players?” Wang asked, and I couldn’t help myself.

  “Well, Koivu isn’t a player. If anything he’s usually the one who gets played. Hopefully that won’t happen again, though.”

  When Wang slammed the phone down in my ear, I realized how idiotic it had been to say that. Koivu’s lady troubles weren’t any of my business unless he asked for my advice. Until then I needed to keep my big-sister instincts in check. And what reason did I have to poke at Anu Wang?

  I opened Harri’s file. Spreading out the pictures of his body, I read the pathologist’s report again. Nothing indicated that Harri’s death had been anything but an accident. But it still could have been murder: pushing someone off a cliff didn’t always leave any evidence. But how could I ever prove that a year after the fact?

  I read through the list of Harri’s belongings found on the island. Telescope, binoculars, camera, laptop computer. Sleeping bag, two sweaters, long underwear, wool socks . . . wait.

  A computer. An Olivetti laptop. Where had I seen one of those? Italian computers weren’t exactly common.

  On Mikke Sjöberg’s boat.

  Of course that could just be a coincidence, but I had
wondered what Mikke was doing with a computer at all on a boat with almost no electricity. I would have to find out what happened to Harri’s computer. Koivu said he hadn’t searched all the files because Harri’s death had been determined an accident. But what if there had been something else on the hard drive that might reveal Harri’s murderer?

  I turned to the personal-data form in the file for Harri’s parents’ phone number. If I introduced myself as Lieutenant Kallio, maybe they wouldn’t connect me with the Maria their son had dated for a few months during that first year I was in law school. That was ten years ago, and we had only met once. Harri’s parents were unlikely to remember.

  My anxiety was pointless, though, because no one answered. Koivu could go visit them when he had time, since they already knew him. But what if we did find the computer? In all likelihood the hard drive had been reformatted, and why would they have kept any of Harri’s backups?

  I was just heading down to the cafeteria for some lunch when my cell phone rang.

  “Hey, it’s Koivu.” From his eager greeting I could tell he had discovered something. “We found the info on Mare Nostrum in the safe-deposit box. The company is registered in St. Peter Port on Guernsey, and in Vilnius, Lithuania. There are three shareholders, but two of them only hold five percent each. The minority shareholders are Lithuanian citizens, Vitalis Ramanauskas and Imants Peders. The principal shareholder’s name might ring a bell though: Juha Merivaara.”

  14

  When I got home from work I was in a better mood than I had been in a long time. I had asked the Lithuanian police to track down Ramanauskas and Peders. At the coffee machine, Puupponen and I had a good laugh about how cosmopolitan our unit was, doing business with Estonia, Lithuania, and Scotland Yard all in the same day.

  I was looking forward to a quiet night at home with Iida while Antti went to the symphony. Koivu had promised to contact Harri’s parents about the computer. Seija Saarela was coming in on Friday to talk to Koivu, and I had asked him to mention Mikke Sjöberg’s Olivetti to her too.

  When I got home, Antti and Iida were having a snack. Iida insisted on eating her blueberry porridge by herself. At least half of it was on her bib or the floor. The bandage on her eyebrow was stained, and her mouth was all blue, like a clown who had accidentally used the wrong color of makeup. I kissed my daughter on the forehead and my husband on the mouth, and Einstein head-butted my shins in hopes I would feed him. Instead I made myself a sandwich.

  “The math department called and asked whether I intended to apply for another assistantship.”

  Antti’s five-year appointment was ending in January.

  “When does the application period end?” I asked, my mouth full of cucumber.

  “Today. The department secretary called thinking my application must have got lost in the mail.”

  “So you aren’t going to ask for an extension?”

  I had always left Antti’s career plans up to him. They weren’t for me to decide. Antti had defended his dissertation three years ago, but his career at the university had stalled with this assistantship, and Antti lacked the sharp elbows and knack for stepping on other people that he needed to get ahead. He was completely disgusted with the university scene, where publishing had become more important than the pure pursuit of knowledge.

  “I still have a couple of grants, as you know. And I’m happy to keep watching Iida through the spring. But after that . . . maybe I’ll find some other math gig.”

  “You’re going to become an insurance actuary? Or put on a suit and work in a bank? I have to say I’m having a hard time picturing it.”

  Antti was just like me, most comfortable in jeans and a sweater. His straight black hair reached just to his shoulders, the perfect length for a ponytail. His narrow face, aquiline nose, and large mouth gave the impression the Sarkela family might have picked up some Indian blood somehow.

  “I was thinking of something a little different. What if the Nature League or Greenpeace had some use for my math skills, or maybe the Marine Research Institute? I met a guy named Samuel Juntunen who was talking about an EU-funded Baltic Sea research project starting next summer than would need some mathematicians.”

  “Category theorists?” Antti’s subfield was the least practical possible.

  “I’d have time over the winter to brush up on my basics again.”

  “So you’re going to become a professional do-gooder,” I said with a smirk, although I had always liked my husband’s serious approach to the world and life in general. Sometimes it could get a little extreme, and occasionally Antti would slip into a melancholy funk. I could usually drag him back out, though.

  “I can’t just stand on the sidelines for my whole life watching the world go to hell. If I can find some way to combine my unique skill set with what you call ‘do-gooding,’ then why not? You aren’t one for just letting things slide either.” Antti walked over and wrapped his arms around me. Immediately Iida demanded to be part of the hug, and we ended up in a hot-dog hug with Antii and me as the two sides of the bun. Instead of mustard, we were all covered in blueberries and porridge.

  “Do you think of policing as do-gooder work?” I asked when we finally let go of each other.

  “I don’t mean that, just that you take your work seriously too.”

  “For some strange reason I think of it as a pretty shitty job, but I wouldn’t trade it for anything,” I said. “So if you go back to work, we’ll have to find a day care for Iida. Or are we bad parents if we don’t want to take care of her ourselves?”

  My conscience stabbed me like a knife every time I read letters to the editor condemning working mothers, even though I knew it wouldn’t help anyone for me to dote over Iida at home until she started school, completely ignoring my own needs. When I brought this up with my sister Eeva, she always asked me why I wanted a baby anyway. Eeva was an English teacher but had decided to be home with her children until her third started school next year.

  Iida’s face turned red and she started grunting. I recognized the signs and headed off to change her diaper. She got away from me, though, and started tottering around the living room giggling. Chasing Little Stinky around the room turned into a game, with her hiding first behind the couch and then the armchair, tittering happily as I pretended not to be able to find her. As a result of the game, she had poop down both legs by the time I finally dragged her upstairs to the bathroom. Her happy kicking just spread it around more. The phone rang, and Antti appeared at the bathroom door looking irritated.

  “Phone’s for you. Something about work. It’s Lähde.”

  “I’m off tonight and my hands are covered in poop!”

  “He says it’s important. He seemed pretty upset.”

  “Oh shit,” I said, from the bottom of my heart. “You take over here so Iida doesn’t fall off the changing table.”

  After washing my hands, I ran to the phone. Lähde, who was the on-call officer that night, sounded apologetic and frightened.

  “Maria, we have an emergency. Ström just called me here. He was drunk and asked me to tape his call. When I said I had the recorder on, he said he was going to shoot himself after he hung up, and that he was only calling so he wouldn’t cause us any extra work.”

  An emptiness washed over me, and part of my brain refused to understand.

  “Was he serious?”

  “I think so. He wouldn’t listen to anything I said and just slammed the phone down. When I tried to call back, he wouldn’t answer.”

  “Was he calling from his apartment?”

  “Yes, that’s what the caller ID said. I already sent two patrol cars that way.”

  “Good. I’m on my way. Stay by the phone. I’ll call as soon as I know the situation.”

  I didn’t bother running back upstairs. I just yelled to Antti that I had to go. Pulling on my shoes and leather jacket, I grabbed my wallet and phone. Not until I tried to turn the car key in the ignition did I realize how badly my hands were shaking
. What the hell was Ström doing? When I pulled out onto the street, I floored it, even though I was being a danger to myself and to others. Why didn’t I have my goddamn police car so I could turn on the lights and siren! At an intersection, I almost ran into a garbage truck. The driver honked and shook his fist at me, but I didn’t have time to hang around to explain my reckless driving. I tried to comfort myself by telling myself that Ström had been forced to turn in his gun while he was on leave, but that didn’t help for long. I remembered that he also had a permit for a .38-caliber Beretta.

  Ström lived on a quiet side street in a studio apartment in a red brick high-rise, where he had moved after his divorce. I had been to the door a couple of times, but he had never asked me in. In the courtyard there were two police cars, and Senior Officer Liisa Rasilainen first rushed to wave me off, but when she realized it was me, her expression changed.

  “Maria! I’m glad you’re here. We just got here a minute ago. According to the neighbors they heard a shot from Ström’s apartment three minutes ago, and one of them had already called it in.”

  I nodded. There wasn’t much to say. Neighbors had started gathering in the yard and peering out from their windows. Liisa stayed to keep order, but the other officers were already on the third floor. I ran up the stairs. Even though my legs felt light, they were crumbling beneath me.

  The door to the next apartment was open, and an officer in field overalls was trying to calm a gray-haired man who was understandably agitated after hearing a gunshot. The other patrol officers greeted me with relief because I had come to take charge.

  “We’ve tried the doorbell and the megaphone. No one answered, but the super is on his way,” Junior Officer Haikala said.

  “Are you sure the shot came from here?”

  “That’s what the neighbors said.”

  “Give me the megaphone.” Almost ripping it out of Haikala’s hands, I lifted it to my mouth with anxious hands.