As they approached the lakeside a dot in the sky took form. Then took wings. By the time they’d parked the Mog, the Beaver was throttling back to touch down on the water. Bruce was at the end of the jetty—in less than a minute Momo had turned the plane around and thrown a mooring line out to him.
The back door opened.
Momo greeted all three of them with “Bloody good timing.”
“For what?” said Wilderness.
“Take a seat.”
“On what?”
Momo passed out a box, then another and another. Then he sat in the doorway of the plane, clutching a clear bottle and three small shot glasses and a plastic cup.
“I’m not the fuckin’ queen, mate. You can all sit down.”
Then he splashed something as transparent as Wilderness’s cover into the glasses and handed them out. Pastorius got the plastic cup.
“Bottoms up.”
Bruce spoke first. “This is good stuff. Not sure we’ve ever landed better.”
“Vodka?” said Wilderness.
“That’d be one name for it, but it’s got dozens. Kilju … pontikku … ponantza … tuliliemi …”
“Moonshine?”
“Yep.”
Wilderness realised he was sitting on a case of the stuff. He peered past Momo into the cabin, half-expecting to see a piano and Fred Astaire poised to fly down to Rio, but it was packed with boxes. More than he could count.
“You seem to have cornered the market.”
“Neatly put, mate. Niilo?”
Bruce had knocked his drink back and was on a second glass. Niilo was sipping slowly at his, as though finding it or the plastic distasteful. He stared into it, swirled it pointlessly.
“Yes. Of course. How quickly we get to the point. Yes, I think we may have cornered the market.”
“Well, you did say they had other fish to fry. Not sure where the ‘we’ comes in, though. Are you part of this … racket, Niilo?”
“Racket?” Momo said. “You cheeky fucker!”
Pastorius held up his hand—a cop stopping traffic.
“Of course it’s a racket. You wonder at my role? I’m the protection. The guarantee. Nobody bothers Momo or Bruce while I’m around. As far as Supo are concerned, they’re still patrolling the border for us. Their flights across the restricted zone are sanctioned. They can reach places you’d have difficulty getting to by road. Hence, we have been able to attain a virtual monopoly. But I can only do so much. My cover might be as obvious as yours, but so far most believe it. I pull too many strings, lean on too many policemen, and it won’t be. Do you follow?”
“I think so. I’m waiting for one of you to tell me why you’re telling me.”
“I’ve local cops looking the other way. Out on what passes for the highway … not possible … other airfields … airfields down south … they’re looking out for us … or people like us. But, of course, the market is down south. Nobody buys moonshine in Lapland, because they’re all making their own. With stuff this good, and it isn’t always quite this good, there’s a ready market in Helsinki. It’s just that we can’t reach it.”
“A … black market?”
Such a familiar phrase, he found he was all but savouring it.
“A black market … yes. One we cannot reach. But you can.”
A voice in Wilderness’s head said, “slowly.”
He tacked away.
“What is it, grain?”
“Barley mostly,” said Momo. “Touch of spud. There’s some real rubbish about … just sugar and yeast … you might drink it if you were desperate. Drink too much and you might end up blind. But the blokes who make this are a class act.”
Wilderness allowed Momo to top him up. Sipped slowly. It burnt, but not too much, and it had some flavour, hints of herb, to play around with on the tongue. Perhaps the distillers were a class act. All the same, it was nothing he’d ever drink out of choice, it was a notch or two above rotgut—but this wasn’t choice. It was diplomacy.
“OK. What is it you three think I can do for you?”
The Aussies looked at Niilo.
Niilo said, “Our police will not stop a car with diplomatic plates. To search it would be … an … incident.”
That word again.
“You have plenty of room in the Mog. We fill it up with vodka. You drive back to Helsinki. Don’t go directly to the embassy. Leave the Mog in a public car park. Keys on top of the front wheel, driver side. Find a bar. Have a drink. Come back an hour later. The van will be empty, the keys back on the wheel … and an envelope full of markka. You need never meet the men at the other end.”
“That simple?”
“Probably not … you know … plans … mice … men. But by and large it should work.”
“And the split?”
“Equal shares. A four-way split.”
Wilderness held out his glass once more, bought himself a moment of time.
“What’s the markup on this? A hundred percent? Two hundred?”
Pastorius smiled, Bruce and Momo guffawed.
“Fuckin’ hell mate. We weren’t born yesterday. Nah. Make that a thousand.”
Wilderness broached the matter that was bothering him the most.
“What makes you lot think I’m bent?”
And then they all fell about laughing.