The Darkness

by Ragnar Jónasson

  ‘Uhuh,’ Dóra confirmed.

  ‘Short, fat and ugly,’ you said.

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘Well, yesterday evening, I met a man who’s indirectly linked to the case, so it’s possible he met Elena at some point. He has access to a four-by-four, too.’ Hulda was reminded of Dóra’s comment about all off-roaders looking the same to her. Perhaps that was because she had seen the same vehicle more than once; perhaps Baldur had fetched Elena in his brother Albert’s car. She’d soon find out. Hulda started rummaging in her bag for her phone. When she couldn’t immediately find it, she was struck by the horrible thought that she might have forgotten it at home, as it now dawned on her that she hadn’t checked it all morning.

  ‘Sorry,’ she mumbled. ‘Just a sec.’

  Ah, there it was. Hulda let out a sigh of relief. ‘The thing is, I’ve got a photo of him here somewhere. Let me see…’

  Nothing happened. Was the battery out of juice? Damn.

  ‘You don’t happen to have a charger for one of these, do you?’ she asked Dóra. ‘That fits this…’ She indicated the power jack.

  ‘Can I have a look?’ Dóra took the phone, pressed a button and it made a sudden noise. ‘You had it switched off. Here you go.’

  At that moment, Hulda had a vague recollection of turning off her phone the night before. ‘Sorry,’ she said, her face reddening. Everything was going wrong today.

  As she was searching for the picture the phone started making a shrill bleeping to indicate an incoming text message. Then it did it again and again and again.

  ‘What on earth’s going on?’ Hulda said aloud, speaking to herself rather than to Dóra. The messages opened one after another on her screen.

  CALL ME NOW

  CALL ME IMMEDIATELY!

  GET DOWN TO THE STATION NOW!

  HULDA, CALL ME RIGHT NOW!

  The texts were all from her boss, Magnús. And there was one from Alexander, too: ‘Hulda, can you call me? I want to talk to you about the investigation. There’s really no need to reopen it.’ She decided not to reply to Alexander, or to call him.

  But she couldn’t ignore Magnús’s texts. What the hell was going on?

  Not that she gave a damn.

  ‘One minute, Dóra. I need to make a quick call.’ Her heart pounding, Hulda selected Magnús’s number but then dithered a moment. Did she really want to talk to him? Was there any way he could have good news for her? And if not, what on earth could he want? For months, he had barely spoken to her, just left her to get on with her cases without showing the slightest interest in them. But now that he had fired her – or as good as – he was suddenly desperate to get in touch with her. Could she have stepped on someone else’s toes?

  She braced herself and pressed the call button.

  Magnús picked up at the second ring. That in itself was unusual.

  ‘Hulda, where the hell have you been? For fuck’s sake!’ She had often seen him lose his temper but, hearing his voice now, she realized she had never known him seriously enraged before.

  She drew a deep breath. ‘I drove out to Reykjanes to see where Elena’s body was found and follow up a couple of leads. You asked me to carry on with the case today.’

  ‘Asked you? I let you: there’s a difference. And leads, you say? You’re on some wild-bloody-goose chase, Hulda! Nobody murdered that Russian woman.’

  ‘Actually, there were two women,’ Hulda chipped in.

  ‘Two? What do you mean? Anyway, that’s irrelevant. You’re to get yourself over here right now. Do you hear!’

  ‘Is something wrong?’

  ‘You bet your life something’s wrong. Get your arse over here right now. We need to talk.’

  He hung up. He had often treated her unfairly, she felt, but never had he been so downright rude. Something was seriously wrong.

  Hulda sat at the reception desk, feeling shell-shocked. Not knowing what had happened was killing her. All she could think of was that it must have something to do with Áki. Had she unwittingly wrecked her colleagues’ investigation? If so, why couldn’t he have told her over the phone?

  Finding her voice at last, her face burning, Hulda said: ‘Afraid I’ve got to dash.’

  Dóra nodded. ‘Yes, I got the feeling you might. He didn’t sound too happy, whoever he was!’

  Hulda forced out a smile. ‘No.’

  ‘But what was it you wanted to ask me?’

  ‘What? Oh, of course.’ Hulda lowered her gaze to her phone and eventually located the photograph of Baldur Albertsson. ‘It’s a bit out of focus, but could this have been the man in the four-by-four?’

  Dóra peered briefly at the phone then gave an emphatic nod.

  Hulda stared at her, completely thrown.

  ‘That’s him,’ said Dóra. ‘Without a shadow of a doubt.’

  XI

  She awoke with a gasp.

  It was impossible to breathe, she was suffocating. It took her several moments to work out where she was: cocooned in a sleeping bag in a freezing hut in the middle of the night.

  The cold was so intense that it had blocked her nose, which is why she was having difficulty breathing. For a moment, she felt trapped in the sleeping bag and scrabbled frantically to widen the opening, feeling close to hysteria. She had to get her head free so she could snatch some air.

  Finally, she succeeded.

  Sitting up a little, she tried to calm down, to slow the frantic beating of her heart.

  Her coat, which she was using as a pillow, had become uncomfortably creased. She refolded it to make it as soft as possible then lay down again, pulling her sleeping bag up to her chin, leaving her head uncovered this time, and concentrated on trying to get back to sleep.

  XII

  Hulda shelled out for a taxi back to Reykjavík: CID could pay. She supposed she could have rung Ólíver and accepted his offer but that would have taken more time and she was in a hurry.

  To her intense relief, the driver who picked her up showed no propensity to chat, leaving her free to think. Halfway back to Reykjavík, she realized she had failed to keep her word to Amena: she had promised to tell Ólíver that she had helped the police, but then forgotten to do so, too preoccupied with her own problems. She had felt so sorry for herself all day, but now she felt a sense of guilt. Poor Amena didn’t have many allies in this country, and Hulda could have done something to help her, a small favour. She had been entirely focused on saving Elena, though it was too late for her. But Amena was still alive and Hulda had a chance to right this wrong; she resolved to call Ólíver later, just not right now.

  The sky was brightening: with any luck, they’d leave the drizzle behind on Reykjanes.

  With her nerves still jangling from her phone conversation with Magnús, there was no chance of grabbing a nap during the drive. The adrenaline was pumping through her veins and her mind was racing. She had no idea what was coming but, prepared for the worst, decided she’d better ring Pétur.

  ‘Hulda, what an unexpected pleasure,’ he said, sounding as upbeat as ever. ‘How are things?’

  ‘Busy, actually,’ she said. It was a relief to hear a friendly voice and know that, in him, she had found someone she could trust, someone she could really talk to. It was a heart-warming feeling.

  ‘I’m looking forward to this evening. I’ve booked a table.’

  ‘Yes, about that … is there any way we could postpone it till tomorrow? I’m not quite sure how my day’s going to pan out.’

  ‘Oh, I see.’ The disappointment was clear in his voice. ‘No problem.’

  ‘Could I maybe ring you once I’m free? We could grab a bite to eat then.’

  ‘Yes, that sounds good. But we can’t postpone till tomorrow: it’ll have to be the day after.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Dinner at Hótel Holt. We can’t postpone it till tomorrow because we’re climbing Esja tomorrow evening. Had you forgotten?’

  ‘Oh, yes, of course, so we are.’ At the thought,
she was filled with a surge of happy anticipation, looking forward both to the hike and to spending time with Pétur.

  ‘I’ll hear from you later, then,’ Pétur said.

  ‘Yes, I’m hoping I won’t be too late,’ Hulda replied, grateful that he had reacted so well to the last-minute change of plans.

  They rang off and Hulda was left alone with her thoughts again. Part of her wanted to give the taxi driver a different destination, chicken out of the coming meeting with Magnús. Her complete ignorance of what he wanted to see her about only made matters worse. If only she could go home, relax, recover her composure and never darken the doors of CID again. Never be forced to deal with her useless boss, never have to listen to his reprimands. But that would mean abandoning Elena to her fate and perhaps allowing her killer to walk free.

  She knew only too well that this wasn’t an option: she was someone who stuck to her guns, always had done. So she sat there in silence as the taxi ate up the kilometres, the lava-fields of Reykjanes giving way to the suburbs of Reykjavík, a mixture of apartment blocks and large detached houses with back gardens where families might be enjoying a barbecue, now that the weather was cheering up; the kind of life that Hulda had lost.

  As soon as she walked into the station, preparing herself mentally for the coming storm, it struck her: something had changed. You could have cut the atmosphere with a knife. She made a beeline for Magnús’s office, looking neither left nor right, avoiding her colleagues’ eyes. For once, though, he wasn’t there. At a loss, Hulda looked around awkwardly, before deciding to try his second-in-command, who occupied the smaller office next door. Yet another young man whose rise through the ranks had been more meteoric than Hulda would have ever dreamed possible.

  She was spared the effort of explaining her business. He started talking the moment he saw her, and it was plain from his expression that he didn’t envy her the impending encounter. ‘Maggi’s waiting for you in the meeting room.’ He told her which one, shaking his head as if to imply that the battle Hulda was about to engage in was already lost.

  She made her way to meet her doom with dreamlike slowness, like a condemned prisoner on her way to the gallows, still completely in the dark about what was going on.

  Magnús was alone in the room. From the look on his face it was painfully obvious that he was in a foul mood. Before she could even greet him, he asked curtly: ‘Have you spoken to anyone?’

  ‘Spoken to anyone?’ she echoed, confused.

  ‘About what happened last night.’

  ‘I haven’t a clue what happened, I’m afraid,’ she said.

  ‘Good. Sit down.’

  She took a seat across the table from Magnús. There were some papers in front of him, but Hulda’s eyesight wasn’t what it used to be and she couldn’t make them out.

  ‘Emma Margeirsdóttir,’ he said slowly, after a long pause, his eyes resting on the papers.

  Hulda’s blood ran cold when she heard the name.

  ‘You know who she is, don’t you?’

  ‘Oh my God, has something happened to her?’ Hulda asked, in a voice close to breaking.

  ‘You’ve met her, haven’t you?’

  ‘Yes, of course. But you knew that. I’d already told you.’

  ‘Quite.’ He nodded and allowed a silence to develop. And drag on. He was clearly hoping to entrap Hulda with her own tactics, but she wasn’t going to fall for that; she was determined to force him to make the next move.

  In the end, he caved in first. ‘You questioned her, didn’t you?’

  ‘Yes, that’s right.’

  ‘And you told me, if memory serves, that nothing of interest had emerged from the interview.’

  Hulda nodded, feeling herself break out in a sweat. She wasn’t used to being on the receiving end of an interrogation, and you could hardly call this anything else.

  ‘“Nowhere near solving it” – those were your exact words, weren’t they?’

  Again, she nodded. Magnús waited for her to answer and, this time, she couldn’t stand the pressure: ‘That’s right.’

  After a further pause, Magnús said, on a slightly gentler note than before: ‘You know, I’m a little surprised at you, Hulda.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I thought you were one of the best in the business. In fact, I know you are. You’ve proved that repeatedly over the years.’

  Hulda waited, unsure how to react to this, one of the first and only compliments he’d ever given her.

  ‘The thing is, she’s confessed.’

  ‘Confessed?’ Hulda couldn’t believe her ears. Was it possible? After all that had happened; after Hulda had risked her neck to spare the woman.

  ‘Yes. We arrested her last night and she admitted to having knocked down that man, that bastard paedophile. Naturally, she has my sympathy, but the inescapable fact is that she ran the man down – deliberately. What do you say to that?’

  ‘It’s unbelievable,’ said Hulda, striving, but no doubt failing, to strike a convincing note.

  ‘Yes, unbelievable. But she had a powerful motive, as we both know.’

  ‘Yes, she did.’ Hulda made an effort to breathe calmly.

  ‘She can expect to do time. And her son, well, who knows what’ll happen to him? It’s tough, Hulda; don’t you agree?’

  ‘Yes, of course. I really don’t know what to say…’

  ‘One can’t help but sympathize with her.’

  ‘Well, I suppose…’

  ‘You’ve got a reputation for that, Hulda: for giving people the benefit of the doubt. Avoiding passing judgement. I’m aware of that much, though, sadly, we’ve never got to know each other as well as we might have done.’

  Sadly. The hypocrisy of it.

  ‘Did you give her an easy ride?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘During the interview.’

  ‘No, far from it. I came down pretty hard on her, considering the circumstances.’

  ‘With no result?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘The thing is, Hulda, there’s one part I don’t quite understand,’ he said, drawing his brows together and employing that familiar patronizing tone he’d used so often before. ‘You see, Emma claims that she confessed to you during your conversation…’

  It was as if Magnús had lobbed a hand grenade into the room. Hulda felt herself go weak at the knees. Was there any way she could dig herself out of this? How much had Emma said? Why had she betrayed Hulda like that? It was incomprehensible.

  Or was Magnús bluffing?

  Fishing for the truth?

  Trying to trick Hulda into admitting misconduct?

  The problem was, she couldn’t read him, didn’t know how to play the next move. Should she make a clean breast of things or carry on lying to him and deny it?

  Hulda took her time before answering. ‘Well,’ she said eventually, ‘to tell the truth, she was very unclear. Of course, she was still in a distressed state about those pictures we found of her son. It’s possible she may have thought she’d confessed to something, but that wasn’t how I experienced our conversation.’ She dabbed at the perspiration on her brow.

  ‘I see.’ Magnús’s face remained impassive.

  He was quite good at this, Hulda realized: she’d underestimated him.

  ‘So it was all a misunderstanding between the two of you. Could that explain it?’

  Hulda had the feeling that she was digging herself deeper and deeper into a hole with every question she answered. She felt uncomfortable in Magnús’s office, as if she were trapped there.

  ‘Must have been. Are you absolutely sure she did it – knocked him down, I mean? Regardless of her confession?’

  ‘What are you implying?’ he asked slowly, sounding more curious than surprised.

  ‘Perhaps it was just a cry for attention, especially if she told you she’d already confessed before.’ Hulda went on trying to brazen it out, though all she really wanted at this stage was to give in and admit everythin
g.

  ‘She was definitely responsible for the hit-and-run, I don’t think there’s any real doubt about that. But that’s not the main issue here.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘She had more to tell me…’

  At this, Hulda’s heart began racing so fast she thought she might faint, and Magnús spun out the moment, as if he were enjoying watching her squirm.

  ‘Emma told me you’d got in touch with her later that same evening, after the interview. Is that correct?’

  ‘I don’t remember. Yes, maybe, to check some details for my report.’

  ‘Hulda, she claims you rang to tell her not to worry about her confession. That you weren’t going to take it any further.’ And now he raised his voice, his face like thunder. ‘Is that possible, Hulda? Is there the slightest possibility that she’s telling the truth?’

  How was she supposed to respond to this? Ruin her record on the eve of her retirement, all for an act of kindness that had rebounded on her? Or continue to deny it? After all, it was Emma’s word against hers.

  To win time, she opted not to say anything.

  ‘Do you know what I think, Hulda? I think you felt sorry for her. No one wastes any pity on a paedophile – not me, not you – but that doesn’t mean we can take the law into our own hands. If you ask me, I think that sympathy for this woman led you to cross a line. Which I can understand, in a way.’ He paused briefly, but Hulda remained obstinately mute. ‘She would be facing prison, mother and son would be separated … I do understand. You lost your daughter, after all.’

  ‘Keep my daughter out of this!’ Hulda shouted. ‘What the hell do you know about her? You don’t know a thing about me and my family and you never have!’ This explosion took even Hulda by surprise, but at least it succeeded in momentarily wrong-footing Magnús. He’d better not dare to drag Dimma into this again. If he did, Hulda couldn’t be held responsible for her actions.

  ‘I’m sorry, Hulda. I was just trying to put myself in your shoes.’

  It was becoming all too clear that Emma had shopped her, in spite of Hulda’s good intentions. The woman’s betrayal was so incomprehensible that Hulda felt wounded even thinking about it. Yes, Emma had been in a highly agitated state, but that wasn’t enough to excuse her behaviour. She must have had a complete meltdown when questioned by Magnús.