Repo handed the woman a five-euro bill from the money Karppi had given him, and she gave him the change and a piece of plastic the size of a credit card.
“I’m sorry. Is this a key, or?” Repo asked. The last time he had been to a public swimming pool, the cashier had given him an old-fashioned metal key for his locker.
“Never been here before? No worries,” the brunette explained. “Use that card to get through the turnstile. Just swipe it across the reader and the turnstile will let you through. You need a fifty-cent coin for the locker. Drop it into the slot inside the door and that’ll release the key. You’ll get your money back when you leave.”
The system sounded complicated to Repo, but everything seemed to have moved in that direction in the last eight years. Just like the card system in the buses, but luckily he had still been able to pay the driver with cash.
“Got it, I guess,” Repo said. He went to the turnstile but couldn’t see the man in the peacoat anymore. He was probably already in the locker room.
Repo swiped the card across the reader and was allowed to pass. The first door led to the women’s locker room, the next two to the men’s. Repo took the middle door. The locker room smelled like a strong cleaning agent and was relatively empty. It contained four or five rows of lockers about thirty or so feet long. There was no one in the first row.
In the second row, there were two older men getting dressed. They were discussing the politics of the ’70s. Repo heard the names Sorsa and Sinisalo, the social democratic and communist bigwigs of the era.
Repo continued down past the rows of lockers. He didn’t find the man in the peacoat until the last row. He had already hung his coat in his locker and was taking off his sweater. Repo walked past him and made a mental note of the locker number: 78. Repo rounded the corner, opened a locker and hung his coat inside. He stood there, as if absent-mindedly waiting for something.
Five minutes later, Peacoat Man sailed past Repo naked. He was carrying his swim trunks and towel in his hand.
Repo waited another minute before putting his coat back on. He walked back to the rearmost row and up to locker 78. He quickly scanned the area. There was no one around. He drew a spike from his pocket and pulled the door back with his fingers as far as the lock would give. Repo slid the screwdriver-like tool in through the crack and forcefully pressed the tongue of the lock inwards. The lock struggled for five seconds, and then gave with a snap.
Repo pulled the locker door open.
The man in the peacoat had tidily hung his clothes on the hooks, and Repo hastily searched the coat pockets for his keys. He removed the car key from the ring and pressed the locker door shut. He also tried to twist the tongue of the lock back far enough that the door wouldn’t open by its own weight, otherwise someone could steal the guy’s clothes, too.
You couldn’t tell from the outside that the lock had been forced open. The entire process had taken about thirty seconds.
Repo put the car key in his pocket and calmly walked out of the locker room. The brunette at the register gave him a vaguely surprised look, but he mumbled something about a meeting that had slipped his mind.
Once outside the building, Repo made a beeline for the car. It took him a second to figure out that he needed to open the doors remotely. He sat in the driver’s seat and thought for a moment before starting up the engine. He hadn’t driven in eight years. He checked the emergency brake. It was off. Gas, clutch, brake, turn signals. Repo pressed the clutch to the floor and tested the gear box by shifting from gear to gear. It all started coming back to him.
He turned on the ignition and nosed out into the traffic. The clock on the dash read 5:20 p.m.
* * *
Pulling the first shift on the tip line, Joutsamo had forwarded the incoming calls to her desk phone. She was browsing through media websites, and, based on what she saw, most had quickly picked up Takamäki’s release. The majority had used the headline “Murderer Escapes.” The articles were pretty sparse in terms of content. So far, none of the newsrooms had found Repo’s photo in their archives. It was unlikely that they would have sent photographers to cover the original court case anyway.
The two first calls had come from known troublemakers, who always called the police with their so-called “info.” The phone rang a third time. Joutsamo’s phone had a display that should’ve revealed the number of the caller, but now it read “Blocked.” She turned on the recorder.
“Helsinki Police Department, Violent Crimes Unit,” Joutsamo answered, marking the time of the call in her notebook: 5:47 p.m.
“Hello,” said the caller, her voice tentative.
“Hello,” Joutsamo responded.
“I just heard about that prison escape on the radio,” the woman continued, her tone now more animated. “They read the description, and a man who looks just like that just went into that building.”
“What building? Where are you?”
“I’m here in Bear Park. The address of the building he entered is 18 Fifth Street. I followed him into the stairwell, and it looked like he climbed up to the top floor, or maybe the second to the top.”
“You didn’t follow him any further, though?”
“I didn’t dare to, because it looked to me like he pulled a gun out of his pocket right there in the stairwell. I’m not positive, but that’s what it looked like.”
“Good. Do you know Repo from before?”
“What?” the woman gasped. “How would I know a convicted felon? He just looked like the description. He was walking through Bear Park with this evil glare in his eyes.”
“Could I get your name, please?”
“Not a chance,” the woman huffed.
“Why not?”
“You’ll try to put me on the witness stand. I thought long and hard about whether I should even call, but I figured it was my civic duty.”
“Well, thank you,” Joutsamo said, ending the call and the recording. She wondered whether the press release could produce results so rapidly. The description was generic enough to fit many men, of course, but the caller seemed sane enough. Joutsamo wondered where Repo would have obtained a gun.
Joutsamo walked down to Takamäki’s office, where the lieutenant was just pulling on his overcoat. “You headed out?” Joutsamo asked.
“Yup, I figured I’d spend some time with the family for a change.”
“Okay, we’re going to go see if there’s anything in a tip that just came in,” Joutsamo smiled.
“What tip?”
“A helpful member of the public called in and said that she saw a man matching Repo’s description entering a building on Fifth Street.”
“Is that so?”
“And she said she saw a gun, too.”
Takamäki looked intently at Joutsamo. “Reliable?”
“I really don’t know. But for the time being, it’s the only thing we got. I was thinking Suhonen and I would go check it out.”
“What did she say about the weapon, word for word?” Takamäki asked.
Joutsamo checked her notes. “The caller thought the man pulled a gun out of his pocket in the stairwell.”
“And who is this member of the public? Did she give her name?”
“No, because she thought she’d end up a witness.”
“Are there any known PTs in the building?” Takamäki asked. Apartments whose residents were known to be dangerous were registered in the Potential Threat database.
“No.”
“I wonder what’s there, then?” Takamäki said, taking his coat off. “Okay, let’s bring in a few SWAT men to help out. No point fooling around if it really is Repo and he has a gun. The guy could be desperate. I’ll take the lead from here and call in the SWAT team. You and Suhonen head right over just in case he moves, assuming it is him. Kohonen’s still here, isn’t she?”
“Yes,” Joutsamo said.
“Kirsi can check who lives in the building. Brief her quickly before you go. Let’s shoot for,” Takamäki glanced at his watch, which read 5:52 p.m., “entry by 7:00 at the latest, but as soon as SWAT can spare us the men.”