Snow Woman by Leena Lehtolainen Page B

after Christmas once I healed up. Of course that pissed me off since it was the middle of the Christmas party season, and there’s always lots of demand for private dances, but I couldn’t do anything about it.”
    “So you went on sick leave?” I asked.
    Milla grimaced. “Well, I guess you could say that. I have a fixed-term contract, and that means no sick leave. At least he promised to take me bac k. You don’t need to say he’s a shithead. I know he is.”
    She paused and then continued. “I guess I just stayed at Rosberga becaus e . . . becaus e . . . because I was afraid of my neighbor, damn it! I still want to throw up when I think I might run into him. I think Elina knew that, even though she kept bugging me to report him to the police. Before Christmas she helped me install that chain on my door.”
    “What made you come home again then?” I asked.
    “After Elina disappeared, I couldn’t stand being there anymore! All during Christmas that Kivimäki bitch stared at me like I was cheap meat, Johanna was wandering around sighing about her brats, and that other one, Niina, was always banging that classical shit on the piano or blabbering about horoscopes. Apparently I’m a triple Scorpio, which is why I’m such a fuckup. I guess it makes things easier for her to explain away everything with some freaking star chart. No one seemed too concerned when I left.”
    “So the last time you saw Elina was on the night of Boxing Day?” I asked.
    “Yeah, that’s what I said. Do we have to go over that again?” Milla raised her eyes from the microphone, and I saw from her expression how difficult it had been for her to talk about the rape. I wondered about her experiences with incest. What kind of life had she had? Milla seemed like a little girl to me despite her tough exterior. I’m not sure why. Maybe it was the childish way she talked.
    “We have some slightly contradictory information about who Elina was walking with that night. You said before that you saw her with Joona Kirstilä,” I continued.
    Milla nodded. “I saw and heard them. I noticed them coming toward me on the road, and I didn’t want Elina to start lecturing me about where I was going, so I hid behind some trees. They were so into their conversation they didn’t notice me.”
    “And you’re completely sure it was Kirstilä with Elina?” I said.
    “Absolutely! I saw him! Short guy with dark, curly hair, dressed in black with a red scarf. I’d know him anywhere. Sort of a magazine cover type.”
    “What were Elina and Kirstilä talking about?” I asked.
    “They weren’t talking, they were arguing. I think it was about moving in together. Elina was saying something about how she couldn’t even think about it in the situation she was in. Then Joona asked what situation, but I didn’t hear the answer.”
    I thought it was interesting that Milla referred to Kirstilä as “Joona.” How well did she know him? She’d said he was an occasional customer at Fanny Hill. My runaway imagination instantly dreamed up a scenario in which Milla and Joona murdered Elina together. But what would their motive be?
    “Let’s forget Kirstilä for now,” I said. “Where did you go after you left the estate?”
    “I told you, I hitched a ride from Nuuksio to Espoo and then took the train to Helsinki. I spent some time barhopping, and then at Kaarle’s I me t . . . what was his name? I don’t remember. Does it matter?”
    It did. Determining Elina’s precise time of death was impossible, but she had probably succumbed to the cold sometime in the early morning hours of the twenty-seventh. Milla could be lying. Maybe she didn’t go to Helsinki at all. I quizzed her about who gave her a ride—apparently a man who lived near the estate—the bars she had been to, and the man she spent the night with. Milla couldn’t remember anything other than the man’s nickname, Jorkka, and an apartment building near the Kulosaari metro station.
    Just