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Johnny said, her voice ringing out over the drone of conversation and turning more than a few heads.
    “Nice to see the sheriff here keeping us legal,” Matti said with a grin when I approached. “Do you know everyone else?” He turned to face the rest of the group.
    “Johnny is an old friend, and how could anyone not know these lovely women,” I said, trying to sound playful.
    “We’ve met before, haven’t we? You played in my brother’s punk band.” Meritta extended her hand. “Meritta Flöjt. I’ve been meaning to come pay a visit to our new lady sheriff. It’s a shame your post is only temporary.”
    “Meritta wants more feminists around here to keep us men in line,” Matti said mockingly.
    “Oh, the men around here aren’t all bad. Your uncle is a perfectly reasonable person.” It took me a few moments before I realized Meritta was talking about Pena. They were both on the city council. Meritta had been the first person from the Green Party ever to win a seat.
    The fourth person in the entourage still hadn’t said a word, trying to hide between her cousin Johnny and the wall. The attempt at concealment was a little pathetic since Kaisa Miettinen was only an inch shorter than her six-foot-two cousin and stunningly handsome in her own right. For a javelin thrower, she was quite slim, which I guess was why the sports journalists had christened her the Javelin Fairy. Blonde curls extending to her shoulders and a shy smile emphasized her elfin, somehow sexless look. At least one person at
Sports Update
and another in the
Helsingin Sanomat
newsroom must have been infatuated with her, because news coverage about her was much more detailed than usual for female athletes. After winning silver at the previous summer’s World Championships, she had been named one of Finland’s best medal hopefuls for the European Athletics Championships in Helsinki and the AtlantaOlympics. I thought Kaisa would have been at her training camp by now.
    Kaisa’s eyes were the same as Johnny’s: bluebell colored with flecks of gold surrounding the irises. At the same height and with similar slim, muscular builds, they could have been twins. But Kaisa was a good ten years younger than Johnny. Her eyes lacked the tired circles, and the laugh lines at the corners of her mouth disappeared with the smile that created them. Johnny, on the other hand, was looking more worn-out than usual.
    “Couldn’t we finish the painting next week?” Johnny asked Meritta, apparently continuing the conversation my arrival had interrupted. “I promised to help my dad reroof his house this weekend. And Kaisa shouldn’t be letting her muscles stiffen up posing since she’s got the Grand Prix coming up.”
    “Kaisa doesn’t have to pose, just you. I want to capture Kaisa in motion. For your portrait I want to show almost every follicle of hair on that beautiful body…” Meritta turned to me again. “I’m doing a series of panels I’m calling Apollo and Artemis, and Kaisa and Johnny are my models. Pretty perfect specimens, don’t you think?”
    Both Johnny and Kaisa seemed self-conscious, so Matti and I turned the conversation to the renovation work on the Old Mine.
    “I think the best thing is that we’ll get to go in the tunnels again,” Matti said. “The feeling down there is like nothing else I’ve ever experienced. You’ve painted down there, haven’t you, Meritta? Are those ones done yet? And what lighting did you use?”
    “I used old mining lights called jack lamps. All of the paintings are in Helsinki on sale in my gallery. Strange I forgot to invite you to come see them before I shipped them off. I paintedthem almost right on the edge of the cave-in area, which gave everything an extra eerie ambiance. And I liked going down there just for the adventure,” Meritta said with a grin.
    “Well you won’t catch me going down there,” Johnny said almost angrily. “You know the city had to close half a street and empty all the