Don't Wake Me

by Martin Krüger

  ‘Do you see that? It’s an archway.’

  ‘And what used to be a gate.’ Jasmin walked over to it and put her hand on the stone, which was damp and covered in moss. It felt like a furry hide under her fingers. The iron rods that had once barred the way were now barely more than a rusted outline. ‘It’s a graveyard. Out here in the forest, in the middle of nowhere.’

  The three of them passed under the arch together. Jasmin spotted the gravestones, which were also covered in moss and dense vegetation. Many of them were crooked or had fallen over completely. This was a place that hadn’t been visited for a long time – a place that had been deliberately forgotten and abandoned to the wilderness.

  Bonnie growled. She pulled at the lead again, almost knocking Jasmin off balance; the lichen-covered paving slabs were slippery and treacherous.

  The dog barked in the direction of a large grey gravestone that reared up out of the dark soil like a huge shard of bone. It was easily big enough for a person to hide behind.

  Maybe this place wasn’t as abandoned as she’d thought.

  Henriksen’s hand went to his gun. He put his finger on his lips and gestured for her to stay back.

  Then he started to approach the gravestone. Bonnie continued growling and tugging at the lead.

  ‘Show yourself, right now! We know you’re there!’ Henriksen drew his gun from the leather holster he wore on his belt in what Jasmin felt was a surprisingly slow and clumsy movement. He pointed it at the gravestone, inching forwards all the while.

  ‘Show yourself! I’m not going to say it again!’

  Suddenly, something leapt out from behind the gravestone. Jasmin caught a glimpse of a dark shadow on four legs that scurried into the undergrowth at lightning speed.

  A dog?

  Bonnie barked one last time and fell silent.

  ‘Just a stray dog,’ said Henriksen, though he didn’t sound entirely convinced.

  Jasmin cleared the leaves and moss from a nearby gravestone. The rough granite felt like sandpaper under her clammy fingers.

  ‘This place – is this really where the people who died in the fire at the sanatorium were buried? But then why are there names on the gravestones? Why create a special graveyard for them if the idea was to sweep all this under the carpet?’

  Henriksen was too far away to hear her, so these words were only for the wind – and maybe for Bonnie too, though she didn’t seem to take much interest in them. Jasmin watched the inspector pace up and down among the gravestones at the other end of the cemetery, shining his torch on the eroded inscriptions.

  This place brought her out in gooseflesh, and not just because it was a graveyard and the people buried here might have died a terrible death. Something about it wasn’t right – something felt so wrong that it made the hairs on her arms stand on end.

  Had Larsen tricked her? Had he sent her here, far from any other settlement on the island, to get her out of the way? Was he in cahoots with the others?

  Christensen, she thought, running her index finger over the letters chiselled into the stone. Who were you?

  She walked over to Henriksen, who was squatting in front of a fallen gravestone and clearing the moss away with his gloved hand.

  ‘There are forty-five graves here.’ Henriksen wiped the rainwater from his face. His expression was serious. ‘Forty-five, Ms Hansen.’

  A flash before her eyes. Jasmin clung on to a nearby gravestone in an effort to stay upright. She raised her hand to her face and felt a warm liquid dripping over her top lip. Blood was trickling from her nose. She wiped it away vigorously, but she still couldn’t shake off the burning smell or the echo of screeching tyres from that fateful night.

  ‘Forty-five victims we were supposed to forget,’ she said quietly, her words washed away by the rain. ‘And we won’t find any mention of this place in any official documentation. I’m certain of it.’

  ‘I doubt that’s true. We’ll look into it.’

  ‘We?’ Jasmin asked. ‘Since when is there a we? I thought you were investigating all possible leads.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Henriksen rose to his feet, giving a quiet sigh as he braced his hand against his lower back. Jasmin stared at him. She’d seen this man before, she realised.

  She’d seen Henriksen somewhere before. His gesture felt so familiar to her – for a brief moment she felt it jogging her memory.

  But you can’t remember where.

  Henriksen gave her a penetrating look, as if he’d realised what was going through her mind.

  ‘It means,’ she replied, ‘that you think I might be involved. Because that’s how it always goes. You have to consider every eventuality. And you think it’s odd that I came to this island on my own, with just my son and my dog, and that I didn’t want my husband with me. Maybe you even think Paul’s kidnapping was cleverly staged.’

  Henriksen hesitated before he replied, but when he spoke, his voice was cool and professional. ‘You’re quite right. I’m not ruling anybody out. There are still too many variables in this case. Too much is still unclear.’

  ‘The body on the beach. The missing corpse.’

  ‘Precisely. That might indicate the culprit isn’t acting alone.’

  ‘Maybe. In any case, I’m glad you’re going about your work so professionally.’ Jasmin walked over to the next grave. ‘You know what? We should take photos of all these headstones. It should be possible to compare the names with the patient records from the sanatorium, assuming they weren’t all destroyed in the fire.’

  ‘Good idea.’ Henriksen reached for his phone, but it slipped out of his hand and landed in the mud.

  Jasmin picked it up and handed it to him. ‘Here you go, Inspector,’ she said with a smile.

  There was a symbol engraved on the back of the device. Jasmin caught only the briefest of glimpses before Henriksen took it from her.

  It was the inverted triangle with the open top-right corner.

  Why did Henriksen have that symbol on his phone? She’d seen it before, either on the night of her accident or at some point afterwards – she wasn’t sure which. But she’d also seen it prior to the accident, somewhere on Minsøy.

  She knew that because Jørgen had been with her when she’d seen it.

  You already know this man. That gesture, the way he carries himself – and now the symbol too. Where do you know him from?

  ‘Ms Hansen?’

  She shook her head – shook off these thoughts and her sense of déjà vu. ‘Sorry. I imagine it’s tricky to investigate cases like this one – when people are kidnapped while their relatives are nearby.’

  ‘Every kidnapping is a shocking event. But everyone reacts differently.’

  ‘What about me? How am I doing?’

  Henriksen wiped his phone down and put it in his trouser pocket. ‘You’re coping better than most. You can’t bear to do nothing. That means there’s a chance you might get in our way and maybe even harm the investigation, but I have to admit, I wouldn’t have found my way here if you hadn’t got Larsen to tell you about the graveyard.’

  ‘I just want him back.’ Jasmin felt the rain running down her face like teardrops. ‘If only I could hold Paul in my arms again . . .’

  ‘It’s OK, Ms Hansen.’ Henriksen took a step towards her and gently touched her arm. Jasmin clung on to him as she felt her legs start to tremble.

  You’ve tried to suppress it. You wanted to keep reality at arm’s length, but Paul has disappeared. Paul has been kidnapped, and you’re doing all you can to distract yourself, but you’re slowly starting to realise it’s no use.

  ‘I don’t want anything to happen to him,’ she whispered in desperation. ‘I don’t want him to—’

  ‘Ms Hansen, we’re going to do everything in our power to get him back.’

  ‘But what if it’s out of our hands? What if we fail? What if we try everything, but in the end – in the end all we can do is stand back and watch it happen?’ Tears were now flowing down her ch
eeks – tears she’d been trying to hold back all this time, but which she couldn’t hold back any longer.

  Pull yourself together. You won’t find him standing here crying. Whining won’t help Paul.

  She started taking photos of the gravestones. Henriksen did the same at the other end of the cemetery, and eventually they met in the middle.

  ‘Somebody was here before us,’ said Henriksen. ‘Over there I found a series of letters spray-painted onto the headstones. Like a group of vandals were hanging around here.’

  ‘Letters?’

  ‘Four Ns, an H, an E, three As, an S and a J.’ Henriksen showed her the photos. The letters had been sprayed on in red paint. Jasmin swallowed as she looked at the graffiti.

  ‘I’m cold,’ said Jasmin, ‘and I feel like I’m never going to be dry again.’

  ‘Same here.’ Henriksen quickly shoved his mobile phone back in his pocket as if he were expecting her to try and take another look at the triangle symbol on the rear. Jasmin felt sure he’d noticed her reaction. ‘What now? Should we wrap this up? Go back to the car?’

  ‘Yes. For now. But maybe there’s more,’ she said, as the three of them walked back down the path towards the car. ‘Maybe they killed these people to cover up more than what we know about. Larsen said an escapee from the institution murdered a young girl. What if that isn’t true? Or if it isn’t the whole story? What if they did things here that they wanted to keep hidden from the authorities, and that was why they started the fire?’

  This thought had been nagging away at Jasmin for a while now, and she felt relieved at having shared it with Henriksen.

  ‘Is there any evidence for that?’

  ‘You mean, is it more than idle speculation?’ Jasmin replied. She got into the car beside the inspector and held her hands in front of the air vents as he started the engine and adjusted the heating. ‘It’s just an idea. A suspicion, since I think this whole story is a sham.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  Jasmin hesitated. ‘No. I’m not sure.’

  ‘You can trust me.’ The car rejoined the tarmacked main road and Henriksen accelerated. The wind grew even stronger, driving the rain almost horizontally against the windows in wild gusts. The howling sounded like a child crying in the distance. Could it be Paul? When Jasmin looked back, she thought she saw two lights gleaming on the road.

  They were being followed.

  ‘I think someone was watching us. Look, there’s a car behind us.’

  Henriksen’s eyes wandered to the rear-view mirror and his brow furrowed. ‘Yes, I see them. It’s probably just—’

  ‘Watch out!’ Jasmin yelled. A man was crossing the road in the downpour. Henriksen slammed on the brakes and managed to miss him by a hair’s breadth. Jasmin saw a tall figure in a long grey coat disappearing into the fog – caught a brief glimpse as the tyres screeched and she lurched forward into her seatbelt.

  ‘That was him!’ she cried. ‘The drifter! I’m certain of it!’

  Henriksen stopped the car and turned around. The shock absorbers creaked as he pulled up abruptly on the side of the road around where they’d seen the figure.

  ‘Stay here,’ he ordered her before leaping out of the car. She saw him hurry a little way down the road and watched him draw his pistol. Again, it looked clumsy, as if the holster had got snagged on his coat. Once he finally had his gun in his hand, he vanished into the mist.

  Bonnie raised her head to bark at the window, at the rain outside, and Jasmin couldn’t get her to stop. ‘Shh, Bonnie, be quiet!’ Jasmin hissed. Her heart was racing. You weren’t mistaken, she told herself. It was him, the stranger you saw at the house – the stranger everyone’s been talking about.

  Now he was here, which meant he might have followed them to the graveyard. Maybe he’d even listened in on them and heard what she’d discussed with Henriksen.

  Bright lights in the rear-view mirror. The Jeep!

  Fuck.

  Jasmin opened the door and planted her feet on the asphalt. ‘Wait here,’ she said to Bonnie. ‘Hendrik?’ she called into the pouring rain as she pulled her hood down over her face. ‘Where are you? Hello? Can you hear me?’

  No reply. It felt like the world had been swallowed up by all the rain – everything was so quiet, as if a blanket had been thrown over the island, smothering every sound.

  ‘Stop!’ she heard Henriksen yell. ‘Right now!’

  Oh God. The words echoed through her mind. Oh God, oh God, oh God.

  Then silence.

  What now? Why did Henriksen shout like that? And what if something happens to him? Should you go back to the car? Find a hiding place? Call the police?

  Jasmin took a few steps back towards the car and gripped the door handle. The rain ran down her face, obscuring her vision. ‘Hello?’ she called uncertainly. ‘Hello?’

  There was no reply – no sound beyond the ceaseless patter of the rain and the babble of water running down the dark asphalt.

  That harsh light once more, this time accompanied by a piercing pain that throbbed behind her temples.

  Jasmin took out her phone and with a chill sense of dread, she realised she didn’t have any signal out here. Not a single bar.

  ‘Hello? Inspector Henriksen? Are you there?’

  You have to look for him. He should have come back by now. There must be something wrong.

  Once again, Jasmin began to walk cautiously in the direction Henriksen had headed. Her right hand vanished into her coat pocket.

  It is what it is, said a voice in her head that sounded like Marit and Stale at the same time. You can’t change your nature. Nobody can.

  She stretched out her hands like a blind woman fumbling her way through the fog, feeling the rain flowing down her fingers. Apparitions darted around her, faces in the mist. Jasmin had no idea how long she spent blundering around like this. For a split second, she thought she saw the body from the beach emerging from the drifting fog – lurching towards her – and she threw her right arm up to defend herself. She heard a loud bang close by that made her jump.

  Then there was somebody lying on the ground in front of her, curled up into a ball, injured. Somebody wearing not a grey trench coat, but a dark raincoat. It was Henriksen.

  Jasmin knelt down beside him and felt his pulse, her hands shaking. Despite the rain running down her fingers and his neck, Jasmin managed to detect a heartbeat. He was alive. Then she saw the blood on the back of his head, as if he’d fallen over. Jasmin had seen plenty of injuries like this before, and although as an anaesthetist she hadn’t been directly involved in treating them, she still knew what she needed to do. ‘Hendrik? Can you hear me?’

  She watched as his eyes wandered up to her face and met her own. He reached out his hand as if to grab hold of her. ‘You’ll be all right,’ she called to him reassuringly. ‘It’s only a flesh wound. Do you have a first aid kit?’

  Henriksen nodded and mumbled, ‘In the boot.’

  Finding the car keys in his pocket, Jasmin sprang to her feet and hurried back to the car. Bonnie looked up as she approached and her tail thumped against the upholstery, but Jasmin merely unlocked the boot and took out the first aid kit before rushing back over to Henriksen, where she swiftly bandaged his wound, all the while casting nervous glances into the rain, afraid the drifter might return. As soon as she’d finished, she helped Henriksen back onto his feet.

  ‘Slowly, nice and slowly.’

  He threw his arm around her and Jasmin led him back to the car, taking short steps.

  ‘Easy now, Hendrik. Easy. You’ll be right as rain, it’s barely more than a graze.’

  But you don’t know that, she thought. Minor wounds sometimes turn out to be worse than they first seem.

  ‘What happened? There was a bang?’

  ‘It’s nothing, I just tripped,’ the inspector managed to say. ‘All of you stay where you are. Everything is OK, there’s no need to get worked up.’

  All of you? He has no idea who he’s talk
ing to.

  Jasmin started the car. Her thoughts turned to Dr Gundersen, the island doctor. She’d be able to tend to Henriksen’s injury. Luckily Jasmin knew where to find her.

  ‘Drive slowly,’ Henriksen added as Jasmin steered the car through the rain. You need to hurry. Whatever he says, it’s important for him to get checked out and treated as soon as possible.

  So get a move on.

  Jasmin raced down the wet road at top speed.

  Henriksen sighed and moaned softly beside her as the car hurtled over a bump in the road. ‘I’m sorry,’ Jasmin said instantly, ‘but we’re nearly there. It was definitely him – he must have attacked you. He realised you were following him. Now we know for certain he’s dangerous.’

  She followed a long curve that ended in a straight stretch of road running along the clifftops. The waves crashed furiously against the sheer rock, sending spray flying upwards, and the roar of the water sounded like a raging beast.

  ‘A storm,’ Henriksen whispered, so quietly that Jasmin could barely hear him. ‘There’s a storm brewing, it’s coming closer and closer. You need to be careful. We all do . . .’

  ‘Why?’ Jasmin glanced across at him, unsure if he was lucid or if he was seeing things. His eyes were focused on a mark on the ceiling of the car.

  ‘Because it might wash you away, Jasmin. Because it might carry you along with it and there’s a risk you might never come back, never find your way home . . .’

  She swore and put her foot down again. At the same moment, the phone in Henriksen’s pocket started ringing, and the ringtone sent goosebumps crawling up Jasmin’s back and over her neck.

  You know that music.

  You’ve heard it before.

  It was Wagner. ‘Siegfried’s Death’.

  The same piece Larsen had been playing on his record player when she visited him.

  It can’t be a coincidence.

  Shit, what’s going on here?

  The ringtone kept playing, but Jasmin drove on undeterred. Eventually she reached the sign for Skårsteinen, where she braked and turned off the road. Dr Gundersen’s practice was on the edge of the village. With Jasmin’s help, Henriksen managed to get out of the car and hobble over to the door, where Jasmin rang the bell. A dog started barking somewhere in the neighbourhood and Bonnie joined in from inside the car.