He was in the cell where he had found Arnaq and where he had been beaten up. Now there was only him in the darkness and the stench. The water trembled in the bottle in his hand. He put it down and found his cigarettes. Everything was shaking. He was shivering as if he had a fever. The first drag made him so nauseous that he flicked the cigarette away.
He clutched his head with both hands and slowly rotated his head from side to side. He drank some more water and then got up. He discovered that the door wasn’t bolted. They probably hadn’t expected him to get up again.
In his mind he could still see Arnaq’s shining eyes. Her panic as he had left the room. She’d had only had a few minutes of feeling safe and rescued.
He pushed open the door to the cell where Tupaarnaq had been kept, but it was empty.
Matthew went out into the corridor and looked in the direction he had come from. All the naked lightbulbs glowed brightly, except for one which had been smashed, but he remembered that it had been damaged when he first arrived. The corridor in the opposite direction ended in darkness. That was the way he would be going. The other way would only lead him out and up into the burning town. His fingers closed around the wedding ring.
After twenty metres and a couple of locked doors he reached an open door, which led to a room with a white tiled floor, unlike the concrete in the other rooms he had seen. It was dark in the room and there was an acrid smell. He pushed the door open fully and discovered that the tiles continued up onto the walls. There were a couple of steel tables in the middle of the room, and along the back wall there was a long kitchen table and shelves.
A figure was lying on one of the steel tables. Matthew froze. He held his breath and narrowed his eyes. The body lay completely still in the darkness. The hair. The jacket.
‘Malik,’ Matthew exclaimed and rushed inside the room. He touched his friend’s face. Malik’s skin was warm and soft.
A noise in the darkness made him turn towards the door. It sounded like a person kicking something. Matthew reached for a long, broad knife on the kitchen table and then looked at Malik, who hadn’t stirred.
The noise resumed; a knocking sound that reached the kitchen from the corridor.
Matthew closed his eyes and pressed his left hand against his chest. He forced himself to breathe slowly. The fingers of his right hand gripped the knife.
He walked past Malik and up to the door, and just as he entered the corridor there was a new noise. This one sounded like a strangled shout, and it seemed to come from a nearby room whose door was ajar.
Matthew quickly looked about him and then retreated a few steps back into the kitchen.
‘We’ll deal with that later,’ he heard from the corridor.
Matthew rushed back to the long kitchen table and threw himself onto the floor. He could just about squeeze himself in between the bottom shelf and the tiled floor.
He twitched when the light in the room was turned on. He struggled to breathe fully as his chest was pressed hard against the floor. He tensed his muscles in an attempt to gain control and breathed slowly although his body demanded more oxygen. His right hand was still clutching the knife.
There was no doubt that one of the voices belonged to Abelsen. Matthew had only met Abelsen once before, when Ulrik had tied Abelsen to a chair in Jakob’s house. Abelsen’s voice was very close to him, but now the tables had been turned. This time Matthew was the captive, while Abelsen was walking free.
Matthew couldn’t see anything other than their shoes. A pair of black hiking boots and a pair of old, worn clog boots, several sizes bigger than the hiking boots.
‘Seriously,’ Abelsen said. ‘I’ve had just about enough of this slaughterhouse.’
‘I take good care of the dead, Kjeld.’ The other man was wheezing as though he was carrying something heavy.
Matthew recognised Bárdur’s voice, and heard him groan as he let go of something. The object sounded heavy and moments later water started dripping onto the floor not far from Matthew’s hiding place.
‘It’s fine,’ Abelsen continued wearily. ‘Only I don’t want to hear about it or see it, understand?’
Bárdur grunted something which Matthew failed to catch.
‘That’s your business,’ Abelsen said. ‘And you still chuck the dead girls into the pool?’
Bárdur muttered something about unclean creatures, but Matthew couldn’t hear all of it.
‘Bárdur,’ Abelsen said sharply. ‘When I tell you who lives and who dies, then that’s how it is, do you understand? Or I’m clearing out this bunker.’
‘I can’t control Kristina and Solva,’ Bárdur said. ‘They only listen to themselves these days.’
‘Nonsense,’ Abelsen said. ‘They’re your daughters. Shorten their leash. They must be as obedient as Símin.’
Bárdur muttered a grumpy reply.
Matthew caught only the words ‘the pilot’ and ‘the pool’.
‘I don’t give a toss what you do with the bodies,’ Abelsen said. ‘As long as those I need are kept alive. And make sure your two crazy daughters respect that. Keep your hands off my people.’
‘From a woman came the origins of sin, and because of her we all have to die,’ Bárdur chanted loudly.
‘Yeah, yeah,’ Abelsen said. ‘Where are the girls?’
‘Yours or mine?’ Bárdur mumbled.
‘Mine,’ Abelsen snapped. ‘Listen, you moron, if Arnaq dies before we catch Tom, I’ll hold you responsible and you’ll be punished for it—I’ll make sure of it. As long as Tom is at large, we need her and Matthew alive. Is that clear?’
‘I don’t know about Arnaq,’ Bárdur muttered. ‘She…isn’t doing too well.’
‘No, because you idiots practically starved her to death, didn’t you?’
‘We gave her some meat,’ Bárdur said in a wounded tone.
‘Idiot,’ Abelsen said again, and heaved a sigh. ‘The Colonel has learned that Tom is in Ittoqqortoormiit. You want to find him too, don’t you? You remember what he did to Mona? Vengeance is yours and also the Lord’s right, my friend.’
‘He must be judged and chastised in anger and wrath,’ Bárdur said, sounding more cheerful. ‘It is the wish and the word of the Lord.’
‘Exactly,’ Abelsen said. ‘We need to find Tom before anyone starts poking their nose into this mess.’
Matthew held his breath for a moment. His cheek was squashed against the tiled floor and the cold numbed his skin. So Abelsen knew where Tom was. The floor pressed against his chest. Was there anyone not looking for his father? And why the hell was all this happening now? They’d had twenty-four years to find him if it was really that important. Why now?
‘I can smell smoke,’ Abelsen said. ‘I told you so just now, didn’t I? Something is burning.’
‘I haven’t done anything,’ Bárdur said.
‘This is bad for us,’ Abelsen said. ‘We don’t need any more busybodies out here; honestly, it’s like Copenhagen Central Station.’
Their feet moved back towards the door.
‘Do you want me to get rid of your girls now?’ Bárdur mumbled.
‘No, God damn it,’ Abelsen said harshly. ‘I’ve just told you! The Colonel will bloody kill us…We need Arnaq…And I’ll see to my own daughter myself if she doesn’t pack her black rags and get her bald head out of my sight soon.’
‘And the police lady?’
‘The police what?’ Abelsen’s boots stopped. ‘Listen, you moron. Just forget about her for now. We need to find out why we can smell smoke and we’ll deal with everything else later.’ He hesitated. ‘All right, you can have her.’
‘So she’s mine? The police lady?’
‘Yes,’ Abelsen said with a weary sigh. ‘If that’s what you want, then yes, from now on she’s yours…Keep her…After all, you’ve already chained her up, haven’t you?’
Bárdur grunted happily.
‘But right now let’s get out of here,’ Abelsen said. ‘We need to find Tom…Get the bo
at ready and I’ll be there in five minutes.’
51
Matthew stayed under the kitchen table until everything was quiet, then he crawled out on his stomach and spent a moment staring up at the ceiling. The men had turned off the light as they left, but his eyes had quickly adjusted to the darkness.
He took a deep breath and stood up. As Abelsen had pointed out, it was starting to smell like smoke in even the furthest corners of the bunker, so the fire must still be raging above ground.
Viktor lay soaking wet on a table close to him. That was the reason Abelsen and Bárdur had come to the kitchen. Bárdur dumped his victims in the kitchen, but he seemed unable to control his daughters, who had thrown Viktor into the pool where only girls could be thrown.
The knocking from earlier resumed and Matthew looked towards the door, then back at Viktor. There was no doubt that he was dead. Only his aviator jacket gave away his identity. His face had been smashed to a pulp. Matthew dipped his fingertips in the water around Viktor’s body on the steel table. It tasted salty. He touched Viktor’s arm gently and looked at his ruined face.
The knocking came back and Matthew hurried out into the corridor. He had heard Bárdur and Abelsen leave, so it couldn’t be them making the noise.
He slowly pushed the door, which was half open, and found a living room behind it. It looked old-fashioned. The furniture was similar to that in Bárdur’s house on the other side of the fjord, but this room was larger and smelled much more lived in.
The first thing to catch his eye was an altar and a large wooden crucifix with a crucified Jesus. He hadn’t expected this. There were also two large silver candlesticks, each with a tall white candle, both lit. Jesus’s eyes were sunk into his head and his mouth gaped emptily.
Jesus’s golden skin and blood drops gleamed in the flickering candlelight.
In the middle of the room was a shabby armchair with a roll of gaffer tape on the seat cushion. Behind the armchair a narrow door was ajar.
Matthew took a deep breath and braced himself. There was light behind the door and he saw the two women on the bed as soon as he went in. One was staring at the floor, while the other was lying down and looking right at him. It was Rakel. She had gaffer tape over her mouth and her legs and arms were also taped together. An iron ring attached to a long chain was fixed around one of her ankles.
Her black eyes stared beseechingly at him, but at the same time she kept nodding towards the old woman sitting slumped on the edge of the bed.
Matthew’s instinctive reaction was to free Rakel, but the sight of the old woman’s hands stopped him. She was holding a live hand grenade in each, and next to her was a slim green metal box containing more grenades. The pins were lying on the floor by her feet. Her legs were skinny. One ankle was in very bad shape.
‘Please,’ Matthew said, taking a careful step forward. ‘Allow me to help you with those?’ His whole body trembled with fear. ‘You’re holding onto them very tightly, aren’t you?’
She looked up. Her hair hung limply down either side of her face. Once it had probably been blonde, but now it was white. Matthew breathed slowly. She wasn’t as old as he had first assumed, but she was apathetic and her eyes distant. He looked at her ankle again. Then he looked at Rakel in the bed. ‘Please,’ he repeated. ‘Allow me to pick up the pins?’
‘No,’ she said in a flat voice, and dropped both grenades.
Matthew spun around and threw himself into the living room, where he had only just hit the floor when the explosion ripped everything behind him to shreds.
The shock wave rolled through the door and slammed him into the armchair. The door itself was blown off its hinges, and tongues of flames licked his neck and hands, which he held up to shield his face.
The tremors from the explosion made the plaster scatter from the ceiling and Matthew watched as the large Jesus figure crashed to the floor, where it shattered. The flames reached the living room from the bedroom and he could feel heat, but his hearing was almost gone. He touched his ears. One was bleeding; both of them were howling. He pushed himself onto his knees. His left little finger stuck out at awkward angle. He was aware that it was hurting, but found it difficult to distinguish between the different types of pain he was experiencing. The hairs on the back of his hands had been burned off, as had some of the hairs at the back of his head. The tears were rolling down his cheeks. ‘I’m sorry!’ he sobbed.
Jesus’s head had been knocked off and was now lying close to the armchair. Matthew stared into the empty eye sockets and the open mouth.
‘I’m sorry,’ he whispered.
Inside the bedroom the fire was dying out, but there was still smoke everywhere and his throat and lungs were stinging. He looked at his crooked little finger, grabbed it firmly and pushed it in place. The pain sent a spasm through his body.
‘No,’ he screamed, bashing his undamaged hand against the floor. ‘No, no, no!’
He got to his feet and found the knife and the tape on the floor. He coughed. His cough got worse every time he tried to move. He cut off a piece of tape and wrapped it around his broken finger and the finger next to it so the healthy finger could support the broken one. Pain shot up through his arm, but it was preferable to his finger being unsupported when he moved. The back of his neck where his hair had been scorched was sore. His eyes were stinging from smoke and tears.
He turned his face to the narrow doorway into the bedroom. His right eyelid felt droopy. As if it was dead. His mouth tasted of metal, smoke and rot, as if everything inside him had putrefied in a foul stench. He wanted to go back inside the bedroom, but he could barely lift his feet when he looked at doorway and the black patches from the explosion on the door frame, the floor, the walls and the ceiling.
Matthew raised his left hand up to his mouth. He bit his forefinger. Tiny bites. Repeatedly.
The bed had been upended completely. Everything else had been flung against the walls, which were pockmarked and spattered with blood and bits of human flesh. His knees buckled and it was only the sooty door frame that stopped him from collapsing completely. His mouth was open and he gasped for air in trembling breaths.
His fingers were locked around the knife in his right hand.
He turned and ran out through the living room.
He continued moving without looking around him. He ran down the corridor, his legs working without his brain joining in. He followed the puddles of water that had dripped from Viktor’s clothing when Bárdur had dragged him to the kitchen. He followed the water trail past the cells. A little further on, the trail disappeared behind a damaged door.
The light was on in the room, which looked like a changing room with linoleum flooring.
The floor was stained with blood in several places and the stains reached both the door leading to the corridor and the double glass doors at the far side of the room.
Behind the glass he could see water shimmer in a pool. He opened the doors and immediately spotted Arnaq and Tupaarnaq, who were both lying on the floor with their hands tied behind their backs. Tupaarnaq’s legs were also taped together, and there was tape covering her mouth.
‘Are you okay?’ he exclaimed, grabbing Tupaarnaq’s shoulder.
She nodded and shouted something behind the tape.
He knelt down and carefully removed the tape covering her mouth.
‘Get Arnaq out!’ she wheezed.
‘Now?’
Tupaarnaq nodded. ‘We have to get out…now…I just need to catch my breath…The pool is full of dead bodies…We have to get out. Now.’
Matthew coughed. His lungs protested.
‘They could come back any minute.’
‘I think Abelsen and Bárdur have gone above ground.’
‘They’re not our only problem,’ she said. ‘Get Arnaq out now. I’ll be all right in a minute.’
‘Okay,’ Matthew said, and cut Tupaarnaq’s hands and legs free.
‘You’re not allowed near the pool of the dead, demon.�
�
Matthew spun around and looked towards the door. Two redheaded women were staring stiffly at them. One of them cackled. They were both skinny and pale. They were in their late twenties.
‘This place is just for the dead,’ the taller of them declared.
‘The pool of the dead?’ Matthew said, looking at the water.
‘Yes,’ the taller one said, her voice distorted as if she was mimicking someone. ‘Girls go in the pool and boys in the stomach.’
They both chuckled, especially the smaller one.
Matthew frowned and got up.
‘You’re a demon from above,’ the shorter one said. She shook her head as if frightened by her own words.
‘Demons must die,’ the taller one said.
Tupaarnaq got up and positioned herself next to Matthew.
‘I’ve had enough of your bullshit,’ she snarled, looking about her. Then she pushed Matthew into the two redheaded women, while she herself stepped back to pick up a mop. As he fell, Matthew brought down one of the two skinny women with him, while Tupaarnaq floored the other with a blow from the mop. She kicked both the women in their sides and legs as hard as she could.
The two women screamed hysterically.
‘God will vanquish you and throw you into a pit of fire,’ the taller one hissed. Her lips quivered from rage, but it also looked as if she was smiling insanely. As if she really was expecting God to crush Matthew and Tupaarnaq like bugs at this very moment.
‘Get in the water,’ Tupaarnaq shouted, hitting them with the mop and shoving them towards the water. She hit them hard, aiming for their faces. ‘Go join the dead.’
The taller one reached for the mop, but Tupaarnaq was quick and shoved her in the chest so hard that the woman nearly stumbled into the pool.
Matthew managed to drag Arnaq out of the room and Tupaarnaq reversed out behind them. She closed the door and in the same movement slipped the mop through the two big handles, trapping the women.
The red-haired women hammered furiously on the glass. Their teeth were bared and their eyes shone with hatred. The shorter of them grinned and shook her head while she screamed and shouted about God’s wrath.
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