The Killing Bay

by Chris Ould

  She nodded, even though it clearly wasn’t as much as she’d hoped. “Have you eaten?” she asked.

  “Yeah, in Tórshavn.”

  “Would you like a drink?”

  “That would be good. Takk.”

  “Beer?” She moved towards the fridge.

  After talking to Eileen Skoradal in her shop I’d walked through the town centre for a while and then been seized by an idea and found my way to the library – býarbókasavnið – in another ugly building: flat-fronted, office-block design. Inside it was more welcoming: lots of Scandinavian open space and primary colours, bright and warm and with helpful staff. Yes, they had copies of newspapers from the 1970s on microfiche and if I wanted to browse through them I was welcome; the assistant could show me where.

  I knew my Faroese wasn’t up to it – nowhere close – so I declined the offer and said I’d just wanted to check if the resource was available. I might come back later with someone to help me. Sure, that was fine.

  After that I walked down to HN Jacobsens bookshop by Vaglið square and bought a large-scale map and a few items of stationery. I was precise and picky about this or that notebook, this or that pen. I recognised the preoccupied behaviour but I didn’t try to suppress it. I was on an upswing and to a certain extent I welcomed it because it brought focus and gave me a purpose after days of just walking the hillsides.

  It was just getting dark when I got back to Leynar and started down the steps to Fríða’s guest house. The lights were on in her place and she must have been watching for my car because she opened the door in case I didn’t intend to call in.

  “Jan, do you have a few minutes to come in?” Fríða said. She was wearing one of her long knitted cardigans, wrapped round her as if she was feeling the cold, and her voice was oddly formal.

  “Sure, of course,” I said. “What’s up?”

  “The police have arrested Finn,” she said. “It’s about Erla.”

  So now we were in the kitchen, each with a beer, and Fríða was clearly mulling over the fact that we’d found out no more from Hentze, other than the fact that Finn Sólsker wouldn’t be released tonight.

  “Do you think they believe he did it?” Fríða asked in the end. “Would they hold him like this if they didn’t?”

  “Professional opinion?”

  She nodded.

  I said, “I don’t know about here, but in England it’s not unusual for people to be arrested or held for questioning even if they’re not a firm suspect. The police want to make sure they’ve got all the facts before deciding to charge or release. And if someone’s refused to answer questions, being arrested can make them think twice. It tells them you’re serious, and that it’s in their interest to tell the truth.”

  Fríða looked thoughtful, then shook her head. “With Finn it might not be so easy. He doesn’t like to be accused. It makes him stubborn.”

  “He’ll probably do better if he’s not.”

  That didn’t make her feel any better. “How long can they hold him?”

  “Twenty-four hours from the point when he was arrested, or they can ask for an extension.”

  I’d picked up that much from spending time with Hentze. No different to the UK, though some other things were. By British police standards their arrests and interviews were less codified and rigorously recorded; not necessarily a bad thing, depending on which side you were on, of course.

  “So he might not be free in the morning.”

  “Maybe not. I’ll ask Hjalti tomorrow, though.”

  I wondered how much Hentze would be involved with the case now, given his relationship to Finn. I could well imagine Ári Niclasen being keen to lead and perhaps being glad of an excuse to sideline Hentze. True, my opinion of Niclasen had never been very high, but I knew the type. I also knew that Hentze was the better copper.

  “Finn wouldn’t do something like that,” Fríða said then, decided. “The police must have something wrong.”

  “Could be. It happens a lot. More than you’d think.”

  A platitude. Without more information it was all I could offer. There could have been a hundred reasons why Finn had stood out to the police as a potential suspect and there was no point in trying to guess what they might be.

  “Why would he kill her?” she said. “There could be no reason. It doesn’t make sense.”

  I remembered the tension I’d noticed in Martha Sólsker when Erla and I had come to Finn’s boat after the grind. There were a couple of conclusions you could draw from that. “You think he was still fond of her?” I asked.

  “Sure, of course. Why not?”

  “How fond?”

  She knew what I was asking, but rather than answer it directly her voice took on a slightly reminiscent note. “My father used to say that Erla was Finn’s dark princess. You know the idea? That everyone has someone who may not be good for them, but they find it hard to resist going back. But that was a long time ago. Now…” She shook her head.

  Whether she didn’t want to think about the obvious possibility or didn’t believe it, I couldn’t tell. Whichever it was, it was enough to make her move to the sink and rinse out her empty beer bottle.

  Then I heard the front door open and close and Matteus called, “Hey!” from the lobby followed by the thud of a bag being dumped. He came into the kitchen.

  “Hey,” he said again, slightly breathless as if he’d been walking quickly, “Hevur tú hoyrt?” then switched to English for my benefit. “Have you heard? About Uncle Finn?”

  “Ja,” Fríða said.

  “It’s been on the news.”

  “Ja,” Fríða said again.

  “Do you know why they’re saying it? It must be bullshit, right?” His conviction had a sixteen-year-old’s certainty.

  “Don’t say ‘bullshit’,” Fríða chided him, but without any real force.

  “Yeh, but it is, right?”

  He looked towards me, as if he thought I’d give a professional opinion.

  “Chances are it’s only a routine arrest so they can ask questions,” I told him. “There’s a big difference between that and being charged. I wouldn’t worry too much about it.”

  I caught Fríða’s glance and a small, grateful nod. “Takk, Jan.”

  It was my get-out, to leave them in private, so I took it and made for the door. “Just shout if you need me, okay?”

  * * *

  Hentze and Martha stayed in the kitchen while the others searched the house and garage. He’d made a couple of attempts to be close to his daughter, but when Martha had side-stepped and moved away he’d given up and sat down at the table.

  Martha continued to keep herself busy in a determined manner, sorting laundry and cleaning the sink. She was angry in a way Hentze recognised from her childhood: closed down tight, containing the pressure inside her like a moka pot on a low light. All the while they could hear muted noises from the activity in the other rooms.

  “So, have you talked to him?” Martha finally asked after a silence of several minutes.

  “Not today, no. Ári Niclasen took the interviews.”

  “And he doesn’t believe what Finn said because he was sleeping with her.” She wouldn’t use Erla Sivertsen’s name, as if it was a point of principle not to let her into the house.

  Hentze shifted. “You said that to Annika, but do you know it for certain?”

  “I’m not stupid.”

  “Of course not.”

  She cast him a black look. “Don’t patronise me, Dad.”

  “I wasn’t. I didn’t mean to.”

  Martha’s expression made it clear that she didn’t believe this, but she said nothing more.

  It had been a mistake to come with the others, Hentze realised now. It would have been better later. He’d only wanted to reassure her, but she was a grown woman and well capable of dealing with this. Instead, he’d probably made things worse. Bad enough to have your privacy invaded by strangers, but more humiliating when witnessed by people you kn
ow, trying to do good.

  Not for the first time he wondered whether he was overprotective by nature, or – where Martha was concerned – whether it was his way of showing that she was just as valued as her brother had been, despite Sóleyg’s apparent evidence to the contrary.

  Of course, Sóleyg had never meant her grief over Jógvan to be taken that way. It was an illness she couldn’t control, and over time – with Hentze’s protection – Sóleyg had improved. Working part time in the pre-school, as she did now, had acted like an inoculation, strengthening her resistance. But still Hentze couldn’t help keeping up his constant vigilance for things that might trigger a re-infection of grief. So perhaps it really was his nature, to watch, to guard, and to worry when he could not.

  And he couldn’t now. That much was clear. Martha had retreated and didn’t want protection.

  Hentze pushed his chair away from the table. “I’ll see how much longer they’re likely to be,” he said, standing up. “Then I’d better get back.”

  26

  Tuesday/týsdagur

  THERE WAS A GROWING, PINKISH LIGHT IN THE SKY AS I LEFT Leynar the next morning. The particular stillness amd clarity of the air was something I’d come to associate with Faroese dawns. They were like nothing I’d seen anywhere else; the rising light caught the underside of the clouds, while the sea and vast mountainsides remained dark. It was like that for ten minutes or so and then it was gone and the world shifted into a different phase.

  By the time I was through the two tunnels and driving alongside Kaldbaksfjørður the car was warm and the voice on the radio was still incomprehensible. It didn’t much matter. I was only listening to see if I heard any names I recognised – Erla Sivertsen, Finn Sólsker – but I didn’t.

  I parked on a side road off Niels Winthers gøta and walked up the hill past a construction site where a concrete-framed building was already well advanced and men in hard hats were starting things up for the day. At the top of the pedestrianised part of Niels Finsens gøta I found the Smyrjibreyðsbúðin café, newly fitted out and smartly finished in black wooden cladding.

  Inside it was subdued, just open, with only two other customers, but there was already a smell of pastries and bread. There was no sign of Hentze so I took a table by one of the side windows and ordered coffee and two croissants, then ate, drank and waited. It was unlike Hentze to be late, but he was.

  He arrived just after seven twenty. Not a man to appear flustered, he looked as if he had more things on his mind than he could easily deal with, and that prioritising them was a job in itself. He had lost the relaxed groundedness he’d had the last time I’d seen him by the sheep sheds.

  “I’m sorry to be late,” he said. “I had something to do.”

  He didn’t volunteer more, so I didn’t ask. I let him order coffee and decline anything to eat. I got the impression that he didn’t expect to be here for long.

  “You wanted to ask about Finn?” he said, cutting to the chase.

  “For Fríða. Only what you can tell me.”

  He took a few seconds to put his thoughts into order – editing them, maybe – then he said, “A coat and hat we think were Erla Sivertsen’s were found in Finn’s boat shed at Sandur. He was brought to the station to explain how they were there, which he says he doesn’t know. He also says he hasn’t seen Erla since the grind on Friday, but we know that she spoke to him on the phone on Saturday night when he says he was working on his boat – alone,” he added, because he knew I’d ask.

  “Any forensics?”

  “Yeh, but we don’t know the results yet. Today, we hope.”

  “So it’s circumstantial.”

  He nodded, then sipped his coffee. I knew there had to be more because a coat and a phone call on their own proved little. Anyone with a half-decent imagination could explain them away – at least until forensics showed something damning.

  “We also believe he was having an affair with Erla,” Hentze said then. “Martha thinks so and there are other reasons to believe it.”

  His dark princess, I remembered.

  “Has he confirmed that?” I asked.

  “Nei. At first he answered questions, but after that he has been difficult.”

  From the way he said it I could tell that he thought Finn had taken the wrong path. It didn’t necessarily mean that Hentze thought he was guilty; more that Finn wasn’t helping himself. You get people like that: suspects who stand on principle or are just bloody-minded in refusing to talk, even when simply giving an honest account would be in their best interests.

  “How long have you got left on the custody clock?”

  “Until midday, unless we ask to increase… for an extension.”

  “Depending on the forensics.”

  “Yeh.”

  I was going to ask him about the post-mortem, but it wasn’t anything more than professional curiosity, and because he hadn’t volunteered any details I decided to leave it. He looked as if he could do without anyone else picking at him for information.

  “I’ll tell Fríða, if that’s okay,” I said. “She wanted to know how long he might be held.”

  “Sure, that’s okay.”

  “Takk,” I said. Then: “So who’s in charge?”

  “Ári, but Remi Syderbø is watching over it.”

  “Right.”

  I got that. If I’d been Syderbø I’d have been watching over Niclasen, too.

  Hentze glanced at his watch. There was something else I wanted to ask before he had to go, so I shifted.

  “Listen, changing the subject,” I said. “Have you heard of a commune that was set up at Múli on Borðoy in the mid-seventies? They called it the Colony.”

  He was silent for a moment. “Ja, yeh, I knew of it, from when I was a teenager.”

  “Anything specific?”

  He shrugged. “There were always rumours – gossip – about what went on there,” he said. “A few boys would go out to see if they were true but I wasn’t one of them.”

  “Rumours about what?”

  He made a “huh” and shook his head. “That they all went around naked and the women would have sex with anyone; that you would be given marijuana cigarettes and get drunk on homemade beer. If you could imagine something, that was what happened. So of course, it was very attractive if you were thirteen or fourteen. We would dare each other to go there, or make plans for how to go for a weekend when our parents didn’t know.”

  “And did any of that happen?”

  “Not as far as I know. That didn’t stop the ministers making sermons in church, though; and the older people saying how could such a thing be allowed. I think there was a – what do you call it: petition? A petition to the government, but in the end it didn’t matter because they left.”

  “Any idea why?”

  He made a dismissive gesture. “It’s not a good place – an easy place – to live. In the winter there are storms and gales and not so much shelter. I think it was just too hard for them.”

  “Does anyone live there now?”

  “No. The houses have been empty – abandoned – for years.”

  “But you can still get out there?”

  “Yeh, for sure. In good weather there is a beautiful view from the headland. The road isn’t good, though – are you thinking to go?”

  “I thought I might have a look,” I said. “Apparently my mother spent some time there, so…”

  “You’re on your own investigation still?”

  “Like you said, if I don’t do it now…”

  “Yeh, of course.” He made an apologetic expression. “I’m sorry I haven’t had chance to look for your mother’s doctor yet.”

  I waved it away. “Doesn’t matter. You’ve got enough on your plate.”

  “I won’t forget, though,” he said, then checked his watch again. “I’m sorry, I have to go for a meeting.” Outside we parted with a handshake and went in different directions. As I walked back to the car I called Fríða and told her what Hentze
had told me. Most of it, anyway. It was hard to assess what she thought.

  “So we won’t know until midday what’s going to happen,” she said.

  “No. They’ll either charge or release him or ask for an extension of custody. They won’t decide until they get forensic results.”

  “Okay, I see. Thanks for finding out.” A moment of silence. “What are you doing today?”

  “I thought I’d go north to Borðoy and have a look around.”

  There was a brief pause, then, “Okay. I’ll see you later when you get back.”

  * * *

  The meeting was delayed by almost an hour. There was no explanation, but neither Ári nor Remi were anywhere around.

  To occupy the time Hentze dealt with some of the housekeeping tasks for the investigation, but without knowing the forensic results or having the strategy meeting there wasn’t much the team could usefully do. Tidy up loose ends and catch up on reports, that was about all.

  Then Sophie Krogh arrived and parked herself on the edge of the desk Hentze was using.

  “I was summoned,” she told him. “A royal command from Ári.”

  There were others around so Hentze let the slightly derisive tone pass rather than draw attention to it. He knew it as an indication of solidarity, though; Sophie wasn’t known for her love of Ári.

  “So, are you all finished?” he asked.

  “Yeh, unless you’ve dug up anything more I’m back to civilisation on the afternoon plane.”

  In the background a phone rang. Dánjal answered, then called across the office. “Hjalti? Ári says can you go to his office. Sophie, too.”

  “What shall we give him,” Sophie said, shifting off the desk. “A Broadway duet or a comedy routine?”

  Ári wasn’t alone in his office. For whatever reason, Remi Syderbø had come here rather than use his own. He was standing while Ári sat behind his desk and Hentze tried to read what this arrangement might signify, but as Sophie closed the door Remi put an end to any speculation.

  “We have a problem,” he said. “The forensic samples that went off to Copenhagen yesterday didn’t arrive.”