But I don’t have time to think about Juhani anymore. Not tonight. I make two quick phone calls, start the car and drive off.
I arrive in Konala at one minute to two in the morning.
The offices and warehouse belonging to Toy of Finland are dark. Liitokangas and Sauvonen left the premises at eight o’clock this evening, and there hasn’t been any sign of them since. I know this because Hannes Tolkki has been monitoring his former business all afternoon. I find Tolkki in his old van and climb inside. Tolkki complains about his back but says, other than that, he’s ready. I believe it. The streetlamps cast only a faint glow, but I can see Tolkki’s face clearly. There’s that same stoic determination as when he tried to cut me in half with a chainsaw.
We wait another fifteen minutes.
Then a lorry approaches from the opposite direction. The trailer behind it is long. The lorry slowly pulls up in front of us. At first it passes the gates to the Toy of Finland warehouse, then it slows down, steers the cab to the other side of the road and comes to a stop.
Tolkki and I pull the balaclavas over our heads, step out of the van and start walking towards the gates. We advance as quickly as Tolkki’s back will permit. Our speed isn’t great, but there’s a sense of purpose in his steps. We arrive at the gate, Tolkki types in the security code. The code is correct, but on top of that we need a key. He has one of those too. He has kept all the keys to the business that was stolen from him. I never knew why I kept them, he told me in Tapanila, but now I know. Once the lock is released, I push the gate open and hear the lorry’s engine roar into life.
The lorry starts reversing, and Tolkki waves his hands to guide it through the gates. This is unnecessary because the plan includes detailed drawings of the warehouse and the forecourt and the secluded spot where the lorry will stand parked for the next hour and a half. I close the gates behind us. The lorry comes to a stop, the engine falls silent, the lights are switched off. The lorry doors open, and Esa and Kristian – both in balaclavas – jump out of the cab. We congregate at the warehouse door, which Tolkki opens with another one of his keys. Then he keys in the security code to disable the alarm system, and returns to his van to keep watch. Kristian, Esa and I go inside, but we don’t switch on the main lights. We plan to complete our task using only flashlights and in record time.
We have come to catch a moose.
Luckily, our intelligence was correct. The current owners of Toy of Finland have only partially constructed the Moose Chute. We only have to dismantle a small part of this massive machine, which will considerably help our operation.
Esa and Kristian work silently and efficiently. I leave the warehouse door open and notice that both Kristian and I are trying our best to work, as it were, upwind from Esa. But though from time to time I have to move to keep myself on the right side of the breeze, I don’t consider Esa’s navy-seal diet a bad thing; it seems to raise everybody’s productivity levels.
Esa was my last recruit for tonight’s mission. He agreed immediately because, as he sees it, this is a diplomatic way of maintaining the park’s inalienable right to self-determination. And, as he freely admits, this is a timely reminder that the monitor room is his and his alone, and that he has not forgotten Otto Härkä’s unauthorised incursion into his territory. I don’t know how Esa knows about the visit, and I haven’t asked.
I haven’t forgotten Otto Härkä either, and that’s part of tonight’s plan too. Once the situation with the Moose Chute starts to look promising, I take a walk around the warehouse – and find everything except the Crocodile Canyon. Whenever I shine my torch, I see bright colours, yellows, reds, blues, but I can’t see any bright-green crocodiles or canoes, and by extension I cannot see Otto Härkä either. Eventually I have to conclude that the crocodiles have disappeared, taking Otto Härkä with them. I return from my walk and stop at the dismembered Moose Chute.
An hour and a half was a good estimate.
We open the warehouse’s large folding door and start loading parts into the back of the lorry.
Kristian is sitting in the forklift truck, as though it were a race car, and Esa is using the lift platform at the back as though it were an extension of his own body, and in every other respect is moving as though he really has been trained by special forces. The back of the lorry quickly starts to fill up.
We close the doors at the back, then glance at one another.
Now for our final tasks.
Kristian and Esa open the sports bag they brought with them and take out the necessary tools, while I return to the warehouse. I run the flashlight around the tall, empty space. Everything is exactly as it was when we arrived; the only things missing are the Moose Chute and, along with it, Toy of Finland’s future. I take out Kuisma Lohi’s leather gloves, which I slipped into my pocket while sitting on the back seat of his expensive car. I don’t know why I did it, but somehow I knew that one day they would come in handy. I place the gloves on a counter by the wall, making sure to leave their embroidered initials facing upwards.
I return to the door, switch the alarm system back on and close the door behind me. Esa is walking back from the gates, where he has smashed the lock to make it look like a break-in. He climbs up into the cab while Kristian batters the folding door until the alarm goes off, then prises the alarm system from the wall with a crowbar. After this, he jumps into the lorry, and I run to my car. I give Hannes Tolkki the okay, the van does a U-turn and disappears around the corner. The lorry glides out of the gate, turns back in the direction it came from and pulls into the distance.
I start the car and leave Konala behind me.