Read Online TH02 - The Priest of Evil by Matti Joensuu - Free Book Online
Authors: Matti Joensuu
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silver hair and a beret pulled down almost to her eyes, and she was clenching a pile of papers to her chest. She held out one of these flyers to Harjunpää, but his eyes were cast downwards. There must have been about a hundred or so people milling about and the air was filled with a dull, uncertain and disquieted murmur.
‘Take it!’ said an urgent, demanding voice beside Harjunpää: the woman with the flyers was doddering alongside him. ‘Take it!’
‘No, thank you. They’re waiting for me down there.’
‘Take it! You of all people will soon find yourself praying for mercy! And the Lord shall grant it to you, but even more mightily shall the Lady!’
‘Give it a rest!’
‘To deny the existence of the divine Lady is an affront!’ croaked the old woman. Harjunpää was becoming annoyed. The last thing he needed amidst everything that had happened that morning was the save-the-planet brigade. For want of anything better to do, he stretched out his hand, tookthe flyer, pretended to look at it, folded it and stuffed it in his jacket pocket.
Blue and white police tape had been drawn between the ticket machines and the escalators, preventing anyone from going down to the platforms. ‘POLICE LINE: DO NOT CROSS’ it read again and again. Behind the tape stood two uniformed policemen, and Harjunpää recognised one of them as his old friend Rannila from his student days.
‘Morning. Murder Squad’s on their way,’ he said, quiet and sober.
‘Hi. What’s the situation?’
‘I just heard on the radio that they haven’t managed to get him out yet, just some body parts. And it is a he, apparently.’
‘Thanks,’ said Harjunpää as he lifted the tape, crouched underneath and made his way briskly down the escalator. By now he could clearly make out a smell that he couldn’t quite put his finger on – it was simply the smell of the underground, a blend of stone and slowly seeping water.
Upon reaching the intermediary level he noticed that the incident had occurred on the eastbound track, where a glowing orange train now stood stationary. Just then he sensed another smell: the smell of a mutilated body, of blood. The train’s carriages had been separated from one another, leaving a gap of twenty or so metres between them. At first Harjunpää didn’t quite understand what was going on: every time he had dealt with underground cases in the past the body had had to be extricated from the front of the train.
Nonetheless it was at this gap that the firemen were working and one of them had crawled so far under the carriage that only the glow of his lamp could be seen. The paramedics had already begun gathering their equipment and were clearly getting ready to leave. This was the final confirmation that no one was going to be brought out from beneath the train alive. There were a number of constables from the division standing on the platform, amongst them DS Viitasaari, who was wearing the field director’s vest. Kivinen from forensics was crouching down beside a body bag laid out on the platform. From a distance the body bag looked empty, or so Harjunpää thought.
‘Hello, Harjunpää,’ Viitasaari nodded and glanced down at his notebook. ‘This is looking pretty bad. Not a single eyewitness, or if there were any they were long gone by the time we got here – probably in toomuch of a hurry to get to work. And here’s the funny thing: this guy’s managed to get himself stuck between the carriages.’
‘What about the driver?’
‘That woman over there. We breathalysed her, she’s clean. Didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary coming into the station, just crowds of passengers waiting. It was only when she was about to pull away that she noticed people waving to her in the mirror and someone running up to her compartment.’
‘Let’s hope there’s something on the security tapes.’
‘We’ve taken them in. You can collect them before you leave.’
‘So maybe it wasn’t suicide
‘Take it!’ said an urgent, demanding voice beside Harjunpää: the woman with the flyers was doddering alongside him. ‘Take it!’
‘No, thank you. They’re waiting for me down there.’
‘Take it! You of all people will soon find yourself praying for mercy! And the Lord shall grant it to you, but even more mightily shall the Lady!’
‘Give it a rest!’
‘To deny the existence of the divine Lady is an affront!’ croaked the old woman. Harjunpää was becoming annoyed. The last thing he needed amidst everything that had happened that morning was the save-the-planet brigade. For want of anything better to do, he stretched out his hand, tookthe flyer, pretended to look at it, folded it and stuffed it in his jacket pocket.
Blue and white police tape had been drawn between the ticket machines and the escalators, preventing anyone from going down to the platforms. ‘POLICE LINE: DO NOT CROSS’ it read again and again. Behind the tape stood two uniformed policemen, and Harjunpää recognised one of them as his old friend Rannila from his student days.
‘Morning. Murder Squad’s on their way,’ he said, quiet and sober.
‘Hi. What’s the situation?’
‘I just heard on the radio that they haven’t managed to get him out yet, just some body parts. And it is a he, apparently.’
‘Thanks,’ said Harjunpää as he lifted the tape, crouched underneath and made his way briskly down the escalator. By now he could clearly make out a smell that he couldn’t quite put his finger on – it was simply the smell of the underground, a blend of stone and slowly seeping water.
Upon reaching the intermediary level he noticed that the incident had occurred on the eastbound track, where a glowing orange train now stood stationary. Just then he sensed another smell: the smell of a mutilated body, of blood. The train’s carriages had been separated from one another, leaving a gap of twenty or so metres between them. At first Harjunpää didn’t quite understand what was going on: every time he had dealt with underground cases in the past the body had had to be extricated from the front of the train.
Nonetheless it was at this gap that the firemen were working and one of them had crawled so far under the carriage that only the glow of his lamp could be seen. The paramedics had already begun gathering their equipment and were clearly getting ready to leave. This was the final confirmation that no one was going to be brought out from beneath the train alive. There were a number of constables from the division standing on the platform, amongst them DS Viitasaari, who was wearing the field director’s vest. Kivinen from forensics was crouching down beside a body bag laid out on the platform. From a distance the body bag looked empty, or so Harjunpää thought.
‘Hello, Harjunpää,’ Viitasaari nodded and glanced down at his notebook. ‘This is looking pretty bad. Not a single eyewitness, or if there were any they were long gone by the time we got here – probably in toomuch of a hurry to get to work. And here’s the funny thing: this guy’s managed to get himself stuck between the carriages.’
‘What about the driver?’
‘That woman over there. We breathalysed her, she’s clean. Didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary coming into the station, just crowds of passengers waiting. It was only when she was about to pull away that she noticed people waving to her in the mirror and someone running up to her compartment.’
‘Let’s hope there’s something on the security tapes.’
‘We’ve taken them in. You can collect them before you leave.’
‘So maybe it wasn’t suicide
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