‘Harjunpää!’ somebody shouted down the corridor. Harjunpää heard it even though he had shut his office door, but he didn’t react to it. Perhaps it didn’t register that somebody was looking for him.
His sat by his desk, his face buried in his hands, and thought of Onerva who was still in theatre, lying under the dazzling lights, covered with green sheets, people silently working all around her. Harjunpää was hoping for a miracle. He prayed for one, prayed that the surgeons would be able to fix her hand, to attach her torn finger, to do everything they could so that nothing needed to be amputated. He knew it was possible; he remembered reading that with the help of microsurgery surgeons could even reattach severed limbs.
‘Harjunpää! Has anyone seen Harjunpää?’
Every time he let his thoughts drift from Onerva, he found himself reliving the moment in the car lot again. He dashed through the door and ran after Onerva; he sensed the smell and the sounds, saw both cars; he recalled the screech of brakes and the clatter of metal against concrete, and after that… damn it, damn it, damn it.
He moved in anguish, shuffled his feet. What could he have done differently? He might not have rushed her. Perhaps. But after all the problems with the investigation, the unexpected lead had felt so exhilarating… Thinking about it afterwards, it wasn’t just about catching the intruder. Deep down it was about winning, beating all the Tanttus and Järvis and Lampinens of the world. Was that wrong? Was that why he was being punished like this?
‘Harjunpää! Any sign of Harjunpää?’
He rested his face on his arms, took a few deep breaths and inhaled Onerva’s smell. He was wearing the Heart cardigan. He’d picked it up off the floor along with Onerva’s gun once the ambulance crew had left. The cardigan’s sleeves were a little too short for him but that didn’t matter. The important thing was that he was wearing the cardigan. That way he would be with her every step of the way, holding her hand.
‘Harjunpää!’
Kauranen flung the door open and stood in the doorway, out of breath, an investigation bag in his hand and his legs full of impetus.
‘Henrikson and I are responding to a call-out. A man’s been shot on Runeberginkatu. I think you should come with us… There’s a Public Order Squad down there already, and initial information suggests the shooting victim might be your intruder.’
‘Is he dead?’
‘Not yet, at any rate. An ambulance has taken him to Töölö hospital. A single bullet wound to the head.’
‘How did it happen?’ Harjunpää asked and made to stand up.
‘Apparently he’d picked the lock and entered the flat – in the middle of the day… The woman seems to have suspected that someone was breaking in for a while now and she’d got a gun to protect herself.’
Harjunpää brushed the hair from his forehead; he didn’t want to leave. In a way, he was broken. He knew he couldn’t be as vigilant as he needed to be, that he’d just wander about and get in everybody’s way, and to his surprise he realised that he couldn’t care less about what had happened. On top of that, he was waiting for a call from Onerva’s son, Mikko, who had promised to let him know how the operation had gone.
‘Well… Why don’t you take a separate car and go straight to the hospital?’ Kauranen suggested. Somehow he understood the situation. ‘The gun was only a .22 calibre. He could be all right if the bullet didn’t hit him too badly. He might already be conscious… You remember the bloke that escaped from a shooting a while back and sat in the hospital waiting-room with a bullet through his head…’
‘Let’s do that,’ said Harjunpää. ‘But take Thurman from Forensics with you. He knows our man’s handiwork from before.’
Harjunpää steered the Lada into Töölönkatu and continued towards the hospital. He’d driven the entire journey amongst the other traffic and hadn’t hurried – he’d had enough of rushing about – and it occurred to him that less than a week ago he had driven down this same street in pursuit of the same man. And just when he’d come to accept that he would probably never set eyes on the chaffinch man, now they were finally about to meet.
He rolled the car up on to the pavement and placed his parking certificate in the window, got out of the car and walked up to the door, and he was suddenly overcome by a faint sense of melancholy. He’d walked through this door dozens if not hundreds of times, and this might be the last time he did so on official business. Inside the air was pleasantly cool and smelled of treatment and pain; out of sight he could hear what sounded like a heated conversation. He produced his badge and stopped at the registrar’s desk.
‘A man was brought in from Runberginkatu with a gunshot wound to the head…’
‘That’s right. The little blighter… You’d better come with me.’
The man walked round the counter and made his way down the corridor. Harjunpää followed him and didn’t even try to guess what the man had meant. In his own mind, he was prepared for anything.
The registrar stopped beside the open door of a treatment room. This was the room the sound of conversation had been coming from. There were four nurses and a doctor in the room. A curly-haired, frightened-looking nurse was having her arm swabbed with a bitter-smelling liquid.
‘This man’s from the Crime Squad. He’s here about the man we…’
‘You’re a bit too late,’ said the doctor, a serious-looking woman with a tight, thin mouth. ‘He upped and left a minute ago.’
‘Meaning?’
‘According to the ambulance crew that brought him in, he must have come to in the ambulance but lain still, kept his eyes shut and didn’t respond to any questions… When we’d got him in here he sat up and tried to leave. Of course, we can’t force patients to have treatment. It’s highly possible that he was in shock from what happened, the nurses tried to restrain him but…’
‘He started thrashing about and scratching like some wild animal,’ said the curly-haired nurse and showed Harjunpää her arm. It was streaked with red scratches, like the claw marks of a large cat. ‘That’s the thanks we get…’
Harjunpää sighed and leaned his shoulder against the doorpost.
‘How serious were his injuries?’
‘According to the paramedics the bullet caught him here,’ said the doctor running a finger along the side of her temple. ‘It’s left a wound about five centimetres long in his scalp. We wanted to make sure he hadn’t sustained any greater damage to the skull.’
‘So… it’s not life-threatening?’
‘Not as far as we know. But, as I said, assuming that there are no other wounds to the skull. Still, it must have been quite a knock to the head, which would explain why he was unconscious when the paramedics carried him into the ambulance. Additionally he might have sustained some concussion when he fell. That’s another reason it would have been a good idea to take some X-rays.’
Harjunpää stood up straight. ‘I’m sure I can guess, but I’ll ask anyway: you don’t happen to have his details, do you?’
‘I’m afraid not. He wasn’t carrying any ID, just some loose change and a small bag that jangled…’
‘Of course…’
‘And to be perfectly frank, he wasn’t in a very stable frame of mind. Even his eyes were… somehow like a panicked animal. And then he started thrashing about and scratching. It’s in everyone’s best interests to locate this man quickly.’
‘Indeed. Thank you.’
‘What a lovely cardigan…’
‘Thank you.’
Harjunpää returned to the car. He sat still for a few moments, his hands folded limply in his lap, and couldn’t concentrate on anything. Finally he blew his nose and reached for the car radio.
‘Violent Crimes, Kauranen and Henrikson. Do you copy?’
‘This is Kauranen. Copy.’
‘The shooter can’t hear you, can she?’
‘No, she’s inside. I’m out in the stairwell. We’re taking the lock apart.’
‘The victim only sustained a five-centimetre wound to the temple. He did a runner from the hospital before they could examine him.’
‘Damn it… That information certainly won’t comfort our lady here. She’s in shock, I think, but not too badly. She’s worried she might have killed him. Her story makes sense though: for about a year she’s suspected that someone was coming into her flat at night.’
‘Tell her that may very well be the case.’
‘Will do. Are you on your way over here?’
‘No, I’m going back to the station.’
Harjunpää turned the ignition and steered the car out into the flow of traffic, but he had barely driven a hundred metres before he heard Control calling him over the radio. He sighed wearily, and imagining all sorts of terrible things he pulled over at the first available gateway.
‘Harjunpää. Over.’
‘You put in a request a couple of hours ago for a patrol car to apprehend a suspect at Sokos.’
‘Yes, and I happen to know they didn’t get him.’
‘Unfortunately not. But the officers spoke to this Backman guy and the old man that worked in the locksmith’s. It turns out the bloke you’re looking for works there too. His name’s Leinonen, Asko Leinonen. We’ve got his details and an address if you want to stop by and pick them up.’
‘Thank you,’ said Harjunpää, then replaced the radio for the second time. ‘Thank you.’