The gun kicked up and back and lacerated the side of Kate’s head. Blood runs down her cheek. She wipes at it and smears it. It drips onto her shoulder. She drops the gun and slumps to the ground. I speak to her but she’s withdrawn inside herself, in shock. She doesn’t move or speak. Her mouth hangs open and spittle dribbles down her chin.
Now Moreau’s shirt and pants are burning. Sweetness pours kossu on him. The flames leap. Moreau can’t move but winks at Sweetness, as if this is a joke only the two of them can share. Sweetness pulls out his horse dick and pisses on him, says “Adieu.”
I look over. Mari, the pregnant girl, is dead. She bled out. Only Sweetness is functional. I ask him to take Milo’s ear to the boat and put it on ice.
The heroin kept me able to think. The pain is returning in spades. I sniff a little more and push myself up with my cane. I hobble over to Milo and shake a little more onto my thumbnail. It’s hard to talk and I slur. “Sniff thith.”
He inhales it and still doesn’t speak, but I see his body relax.
I hobble to Kate and slump beside her. She stares straight ahead, won’t speak to me. I look at her head. There’s a lot of blood, but that doesn’t mean anything. Head wounds always bleed a lot. I think it’s just a simple cut, nothing more. I pick up her hand and let go. It drops back in her lap, limp. The lights are on but nobody’s home. Traumatic shock.
Sweetness comes back. “I know where the money is,” he says.
I want to beat him to death. “Then why didn’t you tell him?”
“I just figured it out. Look at the graveyard behind the house.”
Set back in the clearing are four cairns marked with wooden crosses. They mean that sometime way back when, fishermen got stranded here, probably waited too long into the winter season to leave and got frozen in and died. The ground was too hard to dig, so they covered their friends in rocks and marked their resting places.
“The weathering is the same, consistent, on all the piles except one,” Sweetness says, “and the cross is a little different, too. The money is under the rocks.”
I have to call for a helicopter to medevac us all out of here, but I will not leave that money to be returned to that racist motherfucker Saukko, or to be stolen, probably by Jyri, when they tear this island apart looking for it. After all the suffering that’s been caused by it, I’ll burn it first. I try to speak as little as possible. It hurts like hell. “Try to get it.”
He brings Anu to me, then goes to work. He throws the rocks onto the other cairns as he digs. Breaks up the cross, leaves no evidence that the cairn was ever there. And people call him stupid. The two sports bags of cash are at the bottom. It took ten minutes.
Milo walks over. He’s a bloody mess, but the heroin pulled him together. He says to Sweetness, “Can you drive a boat to Turku?” Milo points. “It’s that way. The boat’s GPS map will guide you.”
Sweetness nods. “I think so.”
Milo talks slow and pauses in the middle of sentences, but stays focused. “Antti’s is the fastest boat, and it’s long forgotten except by us and Saukko, and he won’t think to start tracking it. The keys are on a nail over the kitchen sink. Make sure it’s fueled and leave now. When you get to Turku, take a bus to Helsinki. While you’re on your way, go for a swim and wash the blood off you the best you can. The wind will dry you before you get there. As soon as you get to Helsinki, before you go home, hide the money where no one would ever think to look.”
Kate rolls over on her side, balls up in a fetal position. I ask Milo, “Can you call?”
He requests the helicopter, tells him there are dead civilians and officers down. Fucking Milo. He can’t part with his toys. He collects the Colts and his sawed-off, puts them in our holsters and pockets, and lies down beside me.
I hold Anu on my chest with one hand. I put the other hand on his shoulder. I say, “Just tell them the truth, except say that Moreau shot Antti.”
“OK,” he says, and passes out.
I think about Moreau. He flew too close to the sun, his wings of Icarus melted, and he fell burning to the earth, plummeted to his death.
39
I awake in a hospital bed, doped up. My first thoughts are whether I still have a leg and a jawbone. I lift the sheet. My leg is still there. I feel my face. It’s swathed in so much bandage that I can’t tell.
I ring the bell, the nurse comes in, chipper and smiling, tells me it’s wonderful to see me awake. I thank her and ask her if she could get a doctor to speak to me. I’d like to know not just about my own condition but the status of my wife, daughter and colleague as well.
An hour goes by, a doctor breezes in, also smiling, and asks, “How are we doing today?”
I wish I could hit him.
“Do I still have a jaw?” I ask.
He looks at my chart. “Your jaw is fine. All the bone is intact. In fact, you suffered little damage in that regard. The teeth that were shot away were prosthetics, weren’t your own anyway. The bullet inflicted injury on a previously damaged area. You may have some additional nerve damage and some trouble with mobility on that side of your face. Only time will tell.”
“And my knee?”
He sighs. “The original gunshot to your knee destroyed a great deal of cartilage, and more was worn away through normal use over the years because the damage made it fragile. During your recent partial knee replacement, some of that damaged cartilage was removed. The new gunshot destroyed the prosthesis. I doubt a new one is viable. Again, time will tell. But best guess, you’ll have the same problems you had before the replacement, only worse. I doubt you’ll be able to walk without aid, at least a cane. But you keep the leg. Be thankful for that.”
“My wife and colleague were also injured. Can you check on them for me?”
“Of course.”
“And I want some cigarettes. Can you help me out?”
“I’ll go to the office and see what personal effects you have locked up there.” He gives my shoulder a pat. “I’ll buy you some and take you outside myself, if need be.”
He comes back a little while later. He has my wallet, cell phone, cane, cigarettes and lighter. My other things are in police custody. He wheels me outside to smoke and I find Milo there. “Your friend can relate his own condition. Your daughter is in our nursery, and your wife responds only to her. Your wife is suffering from acute stress disorder, as evidenced by her inability to comprehend stimuli, disorientation, and dissociative stupor. She’s heavily sedated. Her condition will likely improve, it’s just a question of when. Days, or weeks, at most.”
“When can we all go home?”
“You need professional in-home care, since neither of you can take care of the other, and your conditions need close monitoring. The changing of your bandages, for instance, must be done precisely. I can bring you the contact information for in-home care firms. If you can’t afford it, you can remain here until the situation improves.”
The doctor takes me back to my room and Milo comes with us. I thank the doc and he leaves us alone. “The room is probably bugged,” I say, “don’t say anything private. How are you?”
His head is also wrapped in bandages. “They saved my ear. It may hang funny. My hand will never work right again, if at all. Physical therapy may or may not help.”
“I guess you have to learn to shoot left-handed.”
He sighs. “I guess so. I can go home tomorrow, though. That’s something, at least. I hate this fucking place.”