Nights of Awe (16 page)
Authors: Harri Nykanen
“Where was the body found?”
“Only ten yards from the spot where those boys snatched the car, or as it says in the law books, seized it without authorization. A little less than a mile from the sandpit where you were this morning.”
“Did the body have any identifying papers on him?”
“An Israeli passport. According to it, the deceased is Ben Weiss, from Jerusalem.”
“I’ll be right there. I’ll call for directions from the car.”
Huovinen was looking at me expectantly. When I told him what I had just found out, he snapped:
“Someone owes us a damn good explanation.”
11
Driving to Kerava three times in one day was starting to exceed the limits of my patience. This time, Simolin came along. He was enthusiastic, filling in the gaps in the “chronological chain of events” in his notebook during the drive.
Huovinen had sent me off with some parting words: “We’re up a huge goddamn creek here. The Helsinki police department doesn’t have the resources to deal with an imported Middle-East crisis. If the Israeli embassy is in touch, tell them immediately to call me. Don’t even give them your shoe size.”
I had met the Israeli ambassador and knew that he could be effective at pressuring you and throwing you off balance. I also knew the embassy’s head of security and was sure that he wouldn’t have the tiniest qualm about squeezing what he could out of our slight acquaintance. In matters like these, delicacy was unheard of.
It was equally clear that Ben Weiss, who had been found shot in the head, had not been out in the woods picking mushrooms, no matter what the embassy claimed.
Toivola had given me precise directions. The place where Weiss and his life had parted ways was easy to find.
The forest had been thinned, and there were stacks of cordwood at the side of the road. Toivola’s Toyota was parked next to one. A police car and an ambulance were also at the scene. A forest tractor had cleared a small opening around the stack; behind it stood a stand of thinned spruce and a sheer rock face. A reporter from the local paper was lurking behind the police tape with a camera and took a photo of me.
Toivola’s face was showing clear signs of exhaustion. He was probably in the middle of the biggest brouhaha he’d ever see.
“The good thing about this is that the day can’t get any worse,” Toivola said.
“Let’s hope not.”
We followed Toivola into the forest. Several uniformed police officers were scouring the terrain. The body was at the foot of a small spruce. There was a contusion from a blow on his forehead, a deep cut, which looked like it had been made with a knife, in his cheek, and a bullet hole at his temple. The face also showed other signs of violence.
The deceased was at most thirty-five years old. His hair was blond and his cheeks were heavily stubbled. He was wearing a dark-blue tracksuit.
“The medical examiner estimated that he was killed yesterday, sometime during the day,” Toivola remarked. “And roughed up before, probably tried to get to talk. Wasn’t there some of the same business in those cases of yours?”
I told him that the killed body-shop owner Ali Hamid had been tortured.
“Something about this Weiss interested the killer,” Toivola reflected.
I remembered something and glanced at the soles of the deceased’s shoes. There was gravel in the treads, the same kind as on one of the Linnunlaulu bodies. Toivola looked at me, baffled.
“According to the CSI, the deceased was dragged here, in other words the killer was alone. The terrain is so hard that no other tracks were left behind.”
Simolin bent over next to the body and touched his hair. “Dyed. It’s dark at the roots.”
“What did you find on him?”
“Aside from the passport, a wallet with a little money in it, a multi-tool, a Seiko watch, no other effects… and this…”
Toivola showed me a small plastic bag containing a pistol shell.
“We found the shell on the forest road. He was shot on the side of the road, but we haven’t found the bullet yet, even though we’ve searched with a metal detector.”
“Has anyone been asking about him?”
“Besides me and the people who are here now, only my superior and you know about this.”
“And at this point, no one else needs to.”
“What about SUPO?” Simolin asked.
“Them least of all. Where’s the passport?”
Toivola handed over the plastic bag containing the passport.
I took the passport and examined it. Ben Weiss, born in Jerusalem on 26 April 1969. In the photo, Weiss was jutting his jaw defiantly towards the photographer. He also had dark hair. What sense did it make to dye his hair blond? I said to Toivola: “I’ll take the passport in for examination. It might be forged.”
I heard the low rumble of a powerful diesel engine. A dark-green Land Rover pulled up next to my car, and two men stepped out. I immediately recognized both of them. One was Inspector Sillanpää from SUPO; the other was Simon Klein, the head of security from the Israeli embassy.
Toivola glanced at me.
“Judging by the way they carry themselves, servants of the state. You know them?”
“SUPO and the Israeli embassy.”
“Speak of the devil.”
When I saw Sillanpää striding towards us with Klein in tow, my first reaction was extreme annoyance. I had decided to twist SUPO by the nose, and some traitor had immediately leaked. My annoyance was increased by the fact that Sillanpää was schlepping along the representative of foreign country.
I ordered Simolin to take a face shot of the deceased with a digital camera and walked up to the newcomers.
“This crime scene is closed to outsiders.”
“Do you mean him?” Sillanpää asked, nodding in Klein’s direction.
“As far as I’m aware he’s not a police officer.”
Klein understood the delicacy of the moment and maintained his composure. “I was just offering my help. If the deceased is an Israeli citizen, I may know him.”
Klein, who was married to a Finn, had come to Finland over two years ago and spoke the language almost perfectly. At the Israeli embassy, the head of security rotated every three years. Maybe the embassy was afraid that a longer post would lead to Finlandization.
“There are over five million Israelis. Isn’t the probability pretty small? And if we need help with identification, we’ll be sure to get a photo to you.”
Klein shrugged. Sillanpää’s eyes bored into mine.
“These kinds of cases work best if there’s some give and take and everyone shows a little goodwill. Nitpicking isn’t in anyone’s interest.”
“I’m the lead investigator and I’ll decide how good-willed or nitpicky I feel and how much I want to give. Could you please wait in the car, Mr Klein?”
I had met Klein on several occasions. I had even been to the sauna with him before at the police-guild cabin in Laut-tasaari, but now I addressed him with deliberate formality. It helped maintain distance.
Klein smiled, but then he gave me an “I’ll remember this” look, turned, and walked away.
“Pretty full of yourself,” Sillanpää muttered. “Klein only had good things to say about you on the drive up. He won’t any more.”
“What if the deceased had been working for the state of Israel? Wouldn’t it be pretty stupid to show your hand too early?”
“That’s a pretty ballsy conclusion. And even if he was, don’t you trust us to take that into consideration?”
“I’m playing it safe.”
Sillanpää shook Toivola’s hand and circled the body, looking at it from all angles.
“Doesn’t look Jewish.”
“Hair’s been dyed,” Simolin pointed out. He was standing stiffly behind the corpse and didn’t like the situation any more than I did.
Sillanpää held out his hand and asked for the passport.
“What passport?” I tested.
“There was a passport on him when he was found.”
Sillanpää’s source was good.
I showed the passport and said, “Don’t mess it up.”
Sillanpää pulled on his gloves. “Looks authentic. It wouldn’t take Klein more than a few seconds to confirm authenticity. He has a laptop in the car and a direct connection to the Israeli population registry and passport office. But if his help is no good…”
Sillanpää knew how to be a pain in the ass, but I didn’t take the bait. I snatched the passport back from him.
“Did he have anything besides the passport?”
“Normal stuff, a watch and a wallet, but there was only money in it, euros. The clothes are international brands.”
“Do you think this guy was at Linnunlaulu?”
“I do. Probably one of the two from the bridge.”
Sillanpää glanced at Klein, who was talking into a mobile phone next to the Land Rover, and then asked: “Am I right in interpreting that this guy and the two bodies from Linnunlaulu were in different camps?”
“That’s what I believe, at least.”
“How could he have ended up here?”
“First tell me something.”
“What?”
“Did Klein contact you or did you contact him?”
Sillanpää considered for a moment.
“I contacted him. I thought he would be of assistance in the investigation. Your turn.”
I had been thinking about the situation the whole drive up and could only come up with one good explanation.
“We have an eyewitness who says two men in tracksuits ran in the direction of the City Theatre soon after the altercation. Apparently there was a man sitting in a green Citroën in the vicinity. He had driven the man who later got hit by the train to the scene. The driver somehow or another forced one of the two runners, in other words Weiss, into the car. Maybe the runners split up on Eläintarhantie, one of them noticed the car and tried to apprehend the driver, but things ended up going the opposite way. I’m ninety-nine per cent sure that the deceased was brought here in the Citroën that was burnt nearby early this morning.”
“I heard about that. What does it have to do with the case?”
I told him.
“Bad luck for the kid.”
Sillanpää nodded in Klein’s direction.
“Wouldn’t it be wisest to use Klein’s help to check Weiss’s passport?”
Sillanpää was right, but I decided to string him along a little longer.
“Soon.”
Toivola slapped a hand down on my shoulder.
“Think I’m gonna take my lunch break. That OK?”
“Of course.”
Toivola’s departure gave me a natural reason to walk towards the cars.
“Keep me up to date, won’t you?” Toivola asked, poking his head out of his rolled-down window.
I promised I would. I went over to him and said: “Remind them to do a gunpowder-gas test on the body, and that shell needs to be compared to the bullets that were found at the body shop right away. At least the calibre is the same.”
Toivola nodded and sped off. I watched his car recede. I had to admit, Toivola and his Toyota both had a certain everyday charisma.
I authorized the ambulance drivers to take the corpse away. They were tired of waiting and got right down to business.
Klein was leaning against the side of his SUV. I handed him some disposable plastic gloves and the passport.
First he examined the passport with his naked eyes, then he pulled out a loupe and stepped into the car and tapped the passport number into the computer. It only took a few seconds to establish the connection.
Klein compared the information in the passport with the information he got from the computer and handed the passport back to me.
“Genuine. Ben Weiss, trades in furs. Lives and works in Jerusalem.”
“Doesn’t really fit the picture.”
“I think it does. He reported he would be taking three hundred thousand dollars out of the country to buy furs. Maybe he got mixed up in the wrong company and was kidnapped or murdered.”
Klein’s theory came too quickly and too ready-digested. He had had time to think about what story would be the best one to offer.
“Horribly wrong, if those two dead men are terrorists, as you suspect.”
He lifted the computer up in front of my face.
“See for yourself. Weiss can’t have had anything to do with those men.”
The information Klein had given was on the screen, but I didn’t buy it. If Ben Weiss was the kind of guy I thought he was, he could have arranged himself an ID with Adolf Hitler’s name if necessary.
Klein eyed me appraisingly.
“I really shouldn’t tell you this,” he said. “According to the currency export claim, his business partner is a company called Arctic Furs. Out of Helsinki. I’m sure you can get more information about Weiss and his affairs there.”
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