He had waited for a long time for his dog to come back. When the summer ended he’d had to go home without Timi. For months afterwards every time the telephone rang he was sure that it was his grandma calling to say: Guess who just showed up in the yard? It’s that famous dog of yours. You and your dad had better come quick and get him.
But Grandma didn’t call. Autumn had turned to winter and Olli’s father had come and sat down on the side of his bed and told him that it was time to give up hope and accept the truth.
Just as Olli is about to call Timi, the dog is gone and there are three children in his place: a pretty blonde girl and two boys. The Blomrooses. Olli was supposed to meet them in the yard. Only Karri is missing. The Famous Five of Tourula must be on their way to a picnic.
Olli faintly remembers that things haven’t been particularly good between him and the Blomrooses lately. They seem to have been avoiding each other.
Not long ago he was on his way to meet Greta secretly, coming out of the shop with a pear soda and two Lola bars in a bag, and he ran into the Blomrooses.
They said hello and stopped for a moment, but couldn’t think of anything to talk about.
After a tense silence, Anne scowled and said it was obvious that Greta had managed to ruin the Famous Five of Tourula. She said she thought it was Greta’s fault that Karri was gone, and told Olli he ought to stay far away from “that crazy little bitch”.
Olli mumbled something they could interpret as a promise if they wanted to.
Anne nodded, kissed him on the cheek and looked at him with a strange smile on her face.
Leo and Riku were trying to be relaxed, but they only managed to look nervous, gloomy and uncomfortable. Leo explained with his eyes downcast that they had been trying to find some secret passages on their own. “But we can’t find them without Karri, of course,” he said, digging his shoe into the dirt. “Karri’s the one who led us to the openings and managed to get into one before we even realized it was an entrance…”
When the Blomrooses finally went into the store and Olli could be on his way, he sighed with relief.
Being with them had felt unbelievably oppressive, and it was sad. They had been best friends for so many summers. But like the pastor said at Grandpa Notary’s funeral, there is a time for everything. The time for the Famous Five was over, and something else was beginning.
But their summer adventures had been good times.
Now, in his dream, Olli is upstairs at the rifle factory, and he remembers everything much better than he does when he’s awake. The memories become clearer, and they upset him. He feels like he did as a child looking through swimming goggles in cloudy water.
The burglars were the Tourula Five’s first case. Their adventures had begun three years earlier. Olli met the Blomroos siblings and their cousin Karri at the playground at Lounais Park. It was the 1970s. Olli had just turned eight. Grandma had bought him a birthday ice cream at the ice cream stand. Then they had walked to the park, and the Blomrooses and Karri were there with their Aunt Anna.
Olli and the Blomrooses happened to get on the carousel at the same time. They gave him a long look and asked him who he was and what he planned to do that summer. Olli told them that he lived in Koirakkala in the winter and was spending the summer with his grandparents in one of the buildings at the old rifle factory.
Karri leant back. He seemed to be deep in thought.
“He’s always like that,” Leo said. “Thinks his own thoughts and doesn’t know what’s going on around him. But he knows all the best places. Hey, you wanna go with us sometime and see? We actually need five members for the group…”
Riku kicked the carousel into motion. Anne laughed with her mouth open wide and Olli’s hat flew off his head. When he grabbed hold of the carousel’s metal handrail, his arm touched the girl’s pale skin and their eyes met.
The girl winked at him, and it was at that moment that Olli’s years-long, mostly one-sided crush on Anne Blomroos began.
The Blomrooses told him that their aunt Anna and cousin Karri lived in one of the wooden houses in Tourula and that they were guests there for the whole summer. They whispered among themselves for a moment, then invited Olli to come with them on a picnic the next day, and hopped off the carousel.
Olli, the Blomrooses and Karri started playing together, going on expeditions in Tourula and more distant parts of Jyväskylä, and eating Aunt Anna’s lavish picnics. It was a small miracle that they all stayed thin.
The second Famous Five summer Karri led them into their first secret passageway.
They found the entrance on the side of a hill. Olli had brought his dog Timi with him to Jyväskylä, and without the dog they probably would have left it alone. The black opening didn’t tempt any of them except Karri, who stared into it, mesmerized. They were about to continue on their way when Timi scented something, growled and crawled under the ground.
Of course they were scared. The thought of wriggling in after him was crazy. It might collapse, or they might get stuck and suffocate.
But they had to help Timi. And so the Tourula Five began their first exploration of Jyväskylä’s secret passages in order to rescue Olli’s dog.
That time they did find him and bring him back into the daylight.
There are a lot more secret passages than you would think. That’s what Karri said once. But they’re hard to find. According to Karri, nature tries to hide them, and the human brain isn’t meant to notice them.
But now Olli is standing in the hallway of the apartment house at the rifle factory, a child and an adult at the same time, watching the Blomrooses come up the stairs, searching his memories with a sense of foreboding.
Their steps echo menacingly down the hallway. Just a moment ago they were children; now they’re teenagers. He can see on their faces that they’re not on their way to a picnic. The time for picnics is over.
Olli goes inside the apartment, closes the door and gathers up the newspapers. If he leaves right now and runs down the stairs, maybe they won’t even recognize him; he’s an adult now, after all. Bigger, more muscular. If they do give him a problem, he can certainly handle the Blomrooses, even Leo.
He gathers his courage, ready to make a dash, but then someone whispers his name.
He turns and sees a door that wasn’t there a moment ago. It’s open. He hurries to the door and steps into a dark room. A dim figure is sitting on the edge of a bed. A candle illuminates the girl, who is wearing a dress with pears printed all over it. On the wall above the bed is a painting Olli has seen before. Thesleff’s Sleeping Girl.
The Sleeping Girl used to be in a place of honour in Aunt Anna’s living room. Even the children understood that it was a valuable painting, although Aunt Anna didn’t make a fuss about it. Karri mentioned that he liked the painting and kept dropping hints until it was moved to his room. This amused Riku and Leo.
Karri showing any interest in the arts pleased Aunt Anna. She had made him take piano lessons for three years and was upset when the teacher eventually refused to continue, saying that the boy unfortunately didn’t have an ounce of musicality.
So his interest in the painting gave her new hope. As she hung the picture in its new home, she couldn’t resist teasing him a little: “You like the Sleeping Girl, do you, Karri? She is quite pretty, I must admit. Bosoms and everything…”
Leo, Riku and Aunt Anna laughed, and Olli laughed with them. Karri’s eyes darkened. Anne didn’t laugh; she touched Karri’s arm.
Olli, who always watched Anne closely, saw the touch. He stopped laughing as jealousy tore at his gut. The beautiful Anne was in love with her skinny cousin.