In the main photo, armed and helmeted men were entering a building. It was a six-column shot-Takamäki realized that he now owed Turunen a beer. There was a balloon across the photo: “Iltalehti along for the raid.” Takamäki briefly scanned the article, but it didn’t offer any new information. A shorter piece featured a photo of Takamäki and a few of his comments. The set also included Mary J. Juvonen’s commentary, where she criticized the prison authorities for their laxness. The police took a beating as well, for not immediately releasing the news about the fugitive’s escape and holding back Timo Repo’s photo.
“What about the other papers?”
“Blurbs, single column.”
“Well, this’ll give them a jolt to join in our manhunt,” Takamäki said. At that moment, his phone rang; it was a blocked number. Takamäki glanced at Joutsamo before growling hello.
“Römpötti here, hi.”
“Hi,” Takamäki answered. He knew the TV reporter well. “Look, I’m in kind of a rush right now.”
“This won’t take much time,” Römpötti replied, clearly annoyed. “Next time you invite reporters and photographers along on your raids, can you give me a call, too?”
“That’s not exactly how it went,” Takamäki said defensively. “But we can talk about that later.”
“So Repo’s still on the lam?”
“Yep,” Takamäki replied. The call ended with Sanna Römpötti promising to call back.
Takamäki lowered his phone to the desk. “And now the other reporters think we’ve been giving Iltalehti preferential treatment.”
“Oh, shit,” Joutsamo said.
“I’m betting Skoog can handle this Iltalehti case for us. I think he’d actually enjoy it. Knowing our deputy chief, he’d probably initiate a criminal investigation into Juvonen’s actions.”
Joutsamo laughed. “Resisting police authority? That’s pretty nasty, but I don’t have a problem with it. On to item number three.”
“How many of these are there?”
“This is the last one.”
“Well?”
Joutsamo briefly considered how to formulate her words. “There’s something strange about that Repo murder case.”
Takamäki looked his best investigator in the eye. “Tell me.”
“I can also write you a memo, but last night I realized what’s been bothering me about it the most.”
“Is that why you have those bags under your eyes?” Takamäki asked.
“You’ve got some pretty nice ones yourself. And where’d you get that scratch on your cheek?”
“All right, continue,” Takamäki replied, before the conversation got off on the wrong track.
“I read the reports, but nowhere does it say how Repo’s wife’s murder came to the police’s attention. All that was written in the reports was that a patrol went to the scene.”
“It could have been some neighbor, couldn’t it?”
“A neighbor would have called the police if the sounds of arguing or other noise would have been heard coming from the apartment. But no one heard anything or reported anything of the sort.”
“So in your view, a third person was at the scene who left and anonymously called it in to the police. And this third person has never been found.”
“Everyone considered the case so clear cut that no one was interested in the third person, or just to be safe, let’s say the potential third person.”
“That also sounds like an issue we might want to take upstairs to Skoog.”
“You think we should dig a little deeper?”
Takamäki nodded. “I trust your instincts here. When you have time, write up a memo about the investigation reports and the verdict, and we’ll talk about how to proceed from there. Was there anything new in the night-shift reports?”
Joutsamo shook her head and stood. “Some residential B amp;Es, assault and battery at a grill, petty theft at a grocery store, and about twenty pounds of dynamite went missing from a residential construction site. Nothing out of the ordinary.”
Takamäki nodded and Joutsamo exited . Thefts of explosives didn’t happen every day, but they were by no means unheard of. Evidently construction crews stole them from each other. This conclusion was based on the fact that the stolen explosives were rarely recovered.
After Joutsamo left, Takamäki thought for a second. He picked up his phone and took another look at the two photos he had shot the previous night in Tuomarila. He pulled the Sello surveillance camera images out of his desk drawer. Neither shot was particularly high quality, but it was the same car. The license plate alone confirmed that.
Takamäki had talked with Jonas that morning. His son remembered the car having been green, but he’d been confused about other details, too. According to Jonas, he had been in a hurry to get home because he was supposed to go to hockey practice. The only problem was, Jonas’s team didn’t practice on Mondays. He didn’t remember the trip to the hospital at all. The doctor had ordered him to stay home from school at least until the end of the week.
Takamäki lifted the receiver of his desk phone and tapped in Lauri Solberg’s number. The Espoo investigator answered right away. Takamäki asked if he’d have time for Takamäki to bring the photos by today. That suited Solberg. Takamäki also told him that his son didn’t remember the events clearly. Solberg still wanted to talk to the boy, and Jonas would have to bring the medical reports along to the interview, but they could agree on a day later.
“By the way,” Solberg said. “I don’t want to talk about those surveillance camera images over the phone, but just out of curiosity, is the vehicle a Toyota?”
“Yeah.”
Solberg read off a license plate number that stunned Takamäki into silence.
“Yeah, that’s a match,” Takamäki muttered.
“That Toyota burned last night in the parking lot at the Espoo ice arena.”
“Burned?” Takamäki wondered.
“Yup,” Solberg said smugly, pleased to have caught the lieutenant off guard.
“What time?”
“Why?” Solberg asked, but continued nevertheless. “The fire department got the alarm at 5:53 a.m. Someone in the neighborhood called it in. Of course we were in contact with the lease holder. An Espoo resident by the name of Tomi Manner, who said he noticed the car had been stolen when he came home late last night from a business trip. Says he would have reported it missing this morning.”
“Interesting,” Takamäki managed to say, before asking a question to which he already knew the answer. “Who owns the car?”
“An Espoo leasing company.”
The first thought to pop into Takamäki’s head was that Manner had torched the car so he couldn’t be traced to the hit-and-run, but on the other hand, since Jonas hadn’t been badly injured, it wouldn’t have gotten him more than a fine. Then again, Manner didn’t necessarily know about the extent of the boy’s injuries. The next thought was insurance fraud. Something bizarre was definitely going on with the car, especially since he had seen it last night at Manner’s place with his own eyes. But he wasn’t about to tell Solberg that. At least not yet.
“Hello,” Solberg said. “You still there?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, this could be insurance fraud or something related to your son’s hit-and-run, so I sent Forensics out to check his house in Tuomarila. Manner’s story might not be a total crock, because preliminary information indicates that someone other than Manner had been moving around in the vicinity of the garage where the vehicle was parked.”
Takamäki reflexively wiped his cheek with the scratch on it. He wondered whether he had smeared blood somewhere or left fingerprints behind. What about footprints? He had been wearing Nike running shoes, thousands of pairs of which had probably been sold in Finland. He didn’t have anything to hide, but still he decided to not say anything to the Espoo police officer. “Okay, I’ll call you this afternoon to set up a time to bring those photos over.”