“Glad to hear it.”
Takamäki wondered if he should have lied after all and said Jonas had sustained a concussion. Would that have lit a fire under the Espoo investigator?
“Any information on the driver?”
“Umm…we’re looking into it,” Solberg said. “Of course.”
“Were there any eyewitnesses?”
“Unfortunately, I’m not allowed to share any information about the case with you at this point. The police are investigating the matter, and it will definitely be resolved. The only thing you can do at this point is trust us.”
Takamäki counted to five before responding. “Has any action been taken in this matter?”
“Of course. The responding unit wrote up its report, and I’ve been assigned to investigate.”
“And what steps have you taken today in this case?”
“Preliminary investigative measures.”
This time Takamäki made it all the way to ten. “So you’ve read the original report and that’s it. In other words, nothing.”
Solberg tried to pacify him: “Please calm down, sir.” He sounded like he had spent time in the field and was seeking authority from the voice he had used to give orders to the public.
“I’m as calm as I possibly can be,” Takamäki said, thanking his luck that the conversation was taking place over the phone.
“Good. Could you please repeat your name for me?”
“I’m Jonas Takamäki’s father. Kari Takamäki.”
Solberg was silent for a moment. “You mean the lieutenant from Helsinki Violent Crimes Unit? I thought there was something familiar about your voice.”
“The one and only. Does it make a difference?”
“Not really. Except that I can tell you I have eighty open investigations on my desk. Today I’ve been conducting interrogations on three old cases, so maybe you can see why this case hasn’t moved forward a whole heck of a lot today. The patrol that was at the scene didn’t get a single statement from a witness who saw the vehicle’s license plate. I was basically thinking I’d place an ad in the neighborhood paper and try to get some eyewitnesses that way.”
“Why are you so forthcoming with Lieutenant Takamäki but not Mr. Takamäki?”
“A fellow policeman understands, a father wouldn’t.”
The response disarmed Takamäki. The investigators in charge of run-of-the-mill crimes had their hands full. When cases were thrown in the laps of overworked investigators without any preliminary work, most would remain shrouded in darkness, even if there initially had been some chance of solving them. No one had time to even perform the preliminary steps properly. With white-collar crime, the Metropolitan Helsinki Inter-Municipal Group had gotten to the point where they reviewed all cases together and categorized them as urgent or non-urgent. This allowed them to dedicate sufficient resources to the cases that demanded rapid responses. The same sort of classification would work with run-of-the-mill crimes as well. Using similar categorization, some precincts had achieved some positive results with misdemeanors, but it had required that the initial investigative steps had been conducted properly.
“Has it occurred to you that there might be surveillance camera images of the incident?” Takamäki asked.
“Surveillance camera images? From where?”
“The shopping mall, for instance.”
“Are there?”
“I don’t have any interest in getting involved in the case, but the images do exist. I have some good news and some bad news about them. The bad news is that the images are from exterior cameras that are erased every twenty-four hours.”
“And the good news?”
“I went and picked them up. I have the photos.”
Solberg thought for a second. “Under what authority?”
“Let’s just say it was unofficial collegial assistance.”
“So, the media’s favorite lieutenant didn’t trust his colleagues. He just had to go and solve the case all by himself,” Solberg jabbed. “Helsinki Homicide Investigates Collision between Cyclist and Car in Espoo. Now that would make a good headline.”
This time Takamäki silently counted all the way to fifteen. “Yeah, well, but isn’t it a good thing that someone’s actually investigating it? Are you interested in those surveillance camera images?”
“Sure, I’m interested, but this case isn’t getting any special treatment just because a lieutenant’s son is involved.”
“I’m not expecting special treatment, but how about a proper investigation? I could drop off a flash drive with the photos around 5:30 this afternoon. I’m tied up with a case of my own here.”
“Sorry, office hours end at 4:15, but give me a call tomorrow. I don’t have any interrogations scheduled, and I might just have time to take a look at those surveillance camera images.”
“Fine. I’ll call you tomorrow,” Takamäki said, and lowered the receiver. This time he decided to count to twenty, and out loud, before he did anything else.
Joutsamo walked in as he hit sixteen. “What’s up? Are you meditating or something?”
“Seventeen, eighteen, nineteen, twenty,” Takamäki recited.
“What’s going on?”
“You know a cop at Espoo by the name of Lauri Solberg?” Takamäki asked.
“Doesn’t ring any bells,” Joutsamo said, confused.
“In that case it doesn’t matter,” Takamäki said, his voice now calm.
Joutsamo eyed her boss as he turned to his computer.
“Umm, Kari, the meeting’s supposed to start now.”
“Huh? Oh yeah, of course.” Takamäki replied.
“Does Solberg have anything to do with Jonas’s hit-and-run?” Joutsamo asked.
Takamäki stood up and walked past her. “Suhonen here yet?”
“Yeah,” Joutsamo said, more perplexed than ever, following her lieutenant into the corridor.
The conference room was just down the hall. Takamäki could see Suhonen and Kulta in the corridor. The men were counting together out loud. “Nine… ten…eleven…”
“What the hell?” Takamäki wondered, before he saw Kohonen doing chin-ups from a bar rigged up in the conference room doorway.
“Twelve,” Kulta counted, but Kohonen seemed to be slowing down. “One more!”
Kohonen strained at the bar, trying to pull her chin up to it. “No…problem,” she huffed, as her face turned the same shade of red as her hair.
“You got it, you got it!” Suhonen encouraged.
Kohonen struggled, and finally managed to complete chin-up number thirteen.
“Only thirteen, huh,” Kohonen panted on the floor. “I ought to be able to do the same fifteen as Suhonen here.”
“How many does the lieutenant have in him?” Kulta asked.
Before Takamäki could answer, Joutsamo intervened.
“He just made it to twenty over in his office. Now let’s start this meeting.”
* * *
Salmela was sitting in his rusted-out Toyota van in the Hakaniemi public market parking lot. He had backed the van up so that the rear was toward the brick building.
Whereas the finer folk did their shopping at the Market Square at the southern harbor, Hakaniemi Square had traditionally been a working-class marketplace. This history still lived on in the labor unions that kept watch over the square from the surrounding office buildings. And red flags flew in honor of the working man every Mayday, when crowds of thousands gathered at the square before their traditional parade through Helsinki’s streets.
Salmela had no political convictions, but he did believe that taking from the rich was just fine. And the same went for the poor, too.
Kallio, a neighborhood of grim apartment buildings, rose behind the square on one of the city’s highest hills. Its apartments were small, mostly studios or one-bedrooms. It had been a distinctly working-class area for decades, but was now headed down the same path as New York’s SoHo. First students and artists displaced the working class, and then the rich bought up housing that was conveniently located close to the city center. The hundred-year-old Market Hall behind the van was solid but attractive, and the area’s working-class spirit had been preserved in the interior. Salmela didn’t care for the place, though. The red brick façade reminded him too much of the exterior of Helsinki Prison.