A DEAD MAN in the snow, a puppet on a stretcher, a woman in the audience, and on the fourth screen Hämäläinen was talking to a winner who said he had been a loser all his life.
‘And now it’s too late,’ he said. ‘What am I supposed to do with all that money now? I don’t feel like travelling, and I can’t drive a car because of my eyes.’
Hämäläinen smoothed over the situation with a joke.
The audience laughed.
The white-haired man remained waspish, and seemed unwilling to be disabused of the idea that winning the jackpot was an unreasonable imposition, the last thing he needed in his old age.
‘Very funny,’ said Sundström. ‘That’s how I’d like to be when I get old.’
‘Seriously?’ asked Tuulikki.
‘It was a joke,’ said Sundström.
The monotonous ring tone of Joentaa’s mobile sounded. He took it out of his trouser pocket. ‘Petri?’ he said.
‘Hi, Kimmo. Well, we already have something,’ said Grönholm.
‘Yes?’
‘When the roof of the skating rink collapsed, twenty-four people lost their lives. We have their names.’
‘Good.’
‘Can I fax them to you? Or if you can lay hands on a computer I’ll send you the list in an email.’
‘Do that. As soon as you can, please.’
‘Right,’ said Grönholm. ‘You’ll see that several of the victims had the same surnames. We haven’t gone through them yet to find two who might be father and son. We’re going to do that now.’
‘Fine,’ said Joentaa.
‘I’ll ring back as soon as I have news.’
‘One more thing: does the list include the names of injured victims who survived?’
‘Er, no.’
‘We need to know about them too.’
‘That could take more time. As far as I remember, there were quite a lot of them, and it’ll be a good deal more difficult to get a full list of those names.’
‘Try, please. And as soon as you find the name of a survivor that matches any of the victims let us know. We may be looking for a man and boy who died, and a woman who was among the survivors.’
‘Okay, we’ll get to work on it. More later,’ said Grönholm, breaking the connection.
Joentaa turned to Tuulikki. ‘Can you reach Olli Latvala?’
‘I can try, but I’m afraid it’s not likely. He’s looking after the guests, and we have an enormous programme today.’
Joentaa nodded. ‘He said there were names of at least some of the audience, and if they wrote ordering tickets those were sent by post. I’d like a list of any names.’
Tuulikki nodded. She tried ringing Olli Latvala, but after a while she shook her head. ‘No good. He has ears for nothing but his headset right now, and the people taking part in this evening’s show.’
Joentaa nodded. ‘Never mind. I have to call up an email. Is that computer connected to the Internet?’
‘Yes, of course,’ said Tuulikki.
Joentaa sat down in front of the monitor and minimised the photograph from Mäkelä’s CorpsesForDummies archive folder.
‘What was Petri able to tell us?’ asked Sundström.
‘They have the names of the dead. He’s sending a list.’
‘Maybe I’m rather slow on the uptake,’ said Westerberg, who had also come over to the computer, ‘but I don’t quite see the connection.’
Joentaa opened the email that Grönholm had sent him; it contained no text, only an attached Word document.
‘The list must contain the names of the man and the boy you can see on that photograph.’
Joentaa opened the attachment. Another list, he thought. First name, surname. No dates of birth yet. Mertaranta and Päivi Holmquist were working on that, because the age of the victims was important. They all leaned towards the screen and read:
Leo Aalto
Seppo Aalto
Markku Aalto
Petra Bäckström
Sulevi Jääskeläinen
Eva Johansson
Ronja Koivistio
Ella Kuusisto
Lara Kuusisto
Pentti Laakso
Kielo Laakso
Viola Lagerbäck
Sipi Lindström
Raija Lindström
Ilmari Mattila
Veikko Mattila
Kaino Nieminen
Tuomas Nieminen
Arsi Peltola
Urho Peltola
Tuomas Peltonen
Akseli Pesonen
Tapio Pesonen
Laura Virtanen
Joentaa felt that at any moment he might come upon a name he knew. Someone he had met at some point and lost sight of, only to find him again on this list years later. But the names remained strange. Strange black characters on virtual white paper, on a monitor in a strange room. In alphabetical order.
‘Was Petri able to give us anything else?’
‘They’re still working on it, trying to make out which are the relevant names. I told him to look for a man and a boy, possibly father and son. He’ll be in touch as soon as they have anything new,’ said Joentaa.
Sundström nodded.
On one of the big screens on the glass wall, Hämäläinen was saying goodbye to the gloomy jackpot winner, and the white-haired man left the stage leaning on a stick.