“I know. For whatever reason, I’ve been distant, but it has nothing to do with you and I’ll make myself get over it. Kate’s brother and sister from the States are here visiting us. Why don’t you bring your wife and kids over on Thursday. I’ll cook us a big family dinner.”
“Sounds good,” he says. “You have to go now. Patients are backing up.” He hands me some papers. “These are the order for your blood test, which I expect you to take now, and prescriptions for some new meds.”
“What kinds of meds?”
“Opiated painkillers, tranquilizers and sleeping pills. I want you to use them freely. You need rest and relief from pain.”
I grab my coat and start to protest. He pushes me out the door. “See you Thursday,” he says.
21
I go to another waiting room, Stand and read until my turn comes up. I have a busy workday ahead and waiting frustrates me. A nurse draws some blood. I exit the hospital and look at the prescriptions in my hand. I dislike taking medication in general, but Jari was right. Passing out at Arvid’s house taught me that I need relief. I go to a pharmacy and get them filled.
It’s minus ten degrees, crisp and pleasant, a little after ten a.m. A darkened sky looms over a snow-white city. I lean against my Saab, smoke cigarettes and make phone calls. First in line is Milo. His voice is hushed, uncharacteristic of him. I ask him if he can run background checks on Iisa Filippov and Linda Pohjola. He says he’s working the case from a different angle at the moment and can’t talk right now. He asks if we can meet later, outside the police station. He has things to tell me. I suggest Hilpea Hauki at two thirty. He says perfect, he lives in the neighborhood. My interest is piqued.
Next I call Jaakko Pahkala. I’ve know him for years, since I was a uniform cop in Helsinki, before I moved back to my hometown of Kittila and took over the police department there. He’s a freelance writer for the Helsinki daily newspaper Ilta-Sanomat, for the gossip magazine Seitseman Paivaa, and the true-crime rag Alibi. Jaakko loves filth, specializes in scandal.
“Hello, Inspector,” he says. “This is a pleasant surprise. I thought you would never speak to me again after the Sufia Elmi case.”
Jaakko committed obstruction of justice by releasing details of the murder that I wanted suppressed, published morgue photos that demeaned the victim and did his best to discredit me and have me fired because I refused to grant him an interview.
“I didn’t, either,” I say, “but you have your uses.”
He laughs. His high-pitched voice grates on me. “Who do you want dirt on?”
“Iisa Filippov.”
“I’m interested in her murder myself. What do I get?”
Jyri wants Rein Saar hung out to dry. I’ll make it hard for him. “A good scoop, provided I stay anonymous.”
“Give.”
I light another cigarette, exhale smoke and frozen breath in a long plume. “Iisa Filippov and Rein Saar were both stunned with a taser. He would have had a hard time giving her a prolonged torture session after that. And the taser is missing, wasn’t at the crime scene.”
“Damn,” he says, “that’s good.”
“Your turn,” I say.
“Iisa Filippov was a party girl, fuck monster and trophy dick collector. Notches on her bedpost include Tomi Herlin, Jarmo Pvolakka, Pekka Kuutio, and Peter Manttari.”
Herlin: a heavyweight boxing champion and hero-of-the-people-turned-politician and then finally drug-addled sad case. He committed gun suicide eleven days ago and lay dead for two days before his body was discovered. Pvolakka: the only ski jumper in the world to have won gold medals in Olympic Games, World Championships and Ski Flying World Championships, and to have finished first in the overall World Cup and Four Hills Tournament. Also hero-of-the-people-turned-nutcase and finally loser with a penchant for stabbing others. Kuutio: former minister of foreign affairs. Forced to resign because of a scandal involving hundreds of harassing text messages he sent to a stripper. Manttari: aka Peter the Great. Washed-up porn star.
“Drugs?” I ask.
“Of the recreational variety.”
“Her husband?”