Free Fatal Headwind by Leena Lehtolainen

arrived. Then I wondered why I assumed the Merivaara children would take care of their mother rather than the other way around. Maybe that was because Anne looked so small and fragile. She was even shorter than I was and at least twenty pounds lighter. Her wrists were slender, like those of a child. Riikka, tall and self-confident like her father, seemed like the responsible one, which was often the role of the eldest daughter.
    Puupponen was already waiting in Interrogation Room 2. After the helicopter ride, I was in serious need of coffee and food, so I asked for something to be brought in. Katrina Sjöberg was probably hungry too.
    Puupponen turned on the recorder, and I dictated the time and place and the names of the interviewers, and then asked Katrina Sjöberg to list her personal information.
    “Katrina Wilhelmina Sjöberg, formerly Merivaara, maiden name Sjöberg. Born January 25, 1934, Föglö, Åland Islands. That is also my current residence. I am an artisan by trade. Now and then I fill in for the church organist, and once a week I volunteer at the local library.”
    The routines of a police interrogation seemed to amuse her, despite obviously being upset by the death of her stepson. Perhaps the amusement came from experiencing the situation as unreal. Comprehending a sudden death could take a long time, and being interviewed by the police was hardly normal for most people.
    “So you have some reason to suspect that Juha’s death wasn’t an accident or a heart attack or something?” Katrina Sjöberg asked before I had a chance to begin.
    “Why do you suggest a heart attack? Did he have heart trouble?”
    “Last winter he had two serious heart attacks. The doctors said they were caused by stress, and it’s probably also partially hereditary. The men in our family have always had heart trouble.”
    Anne and Riikka hadn’t mentioned this. Had they known that this could have been a heart attack? Just then the coffee arrived. I greedily grabbed an egg-anchovy sandwich while Katrina chose a smoked-meat sandwich and started wolfing it down with equal gusto.
    “About your family . . . so you were your former husband’s cousin?”
    “Second cousin. Our grandfathers were brothers. The Sjöbergs are an old sailing family. Our great-great grandfather was a sea captain, as were my grandfather and uncle.”
    “At what point was the family name Finnishized?”
    “Juha’s father married the daughter of an ardent Finnish nationalist. Changing his name was a condition of the marriage and the inheritance that would follow.”
    Katrina Sjöberg smiled dryly. She said that Juha Merivaara’s mother had died of leukemia when he was only eight years of age. Katrina was twenty-five then, having graduated a couple of years earlier from the Wetterhoff School of Arts and Crafts. She was working in one of the best dressmaker’s shops in Helsinki, but she dreamed of founding her own studio.
    “We Sjöbergs have always been opportunists. I took up with my second cousin Martti because I knew he knew a lot of rich people. I thought I could get customers through him. After the death of his wife, Martti was lonely, and of course I was attracted to this older, self-confident man who had money for flowers and restaurants. Maybe in my stupid little head I thought of Martti as a tragic figure because he was a widower. Then what happened happened, the classic mistake. We got married quickly, in the summer of ’61. A week after the wedding I had a miscarriage.”
    Katrina Sjöberg gave another crooked smile. “Martti probably never would have married me if I hadn’t been pregnant. I wasn’t much of a trophy wife. Too much ambition and too many of my own ideas. I tried to be the best mother I could for Juha, but I didn’t do a very good job. The fact that I got pregnant again delayed the divorce, but in the fall of ’64 I moved out with Mikke in my arms. He was only a year old at that point. We lived in Helsinki so Mikke could