The Day is Dark

by Yrsa Sigurdardottir

  Bella was the only one who was not impressed by Thóra’s expedition with the others. She curled her lip so that no one could doubt how boring she found their story. But Thóra could sense something else behind Bella’s contempt: she envied their little field trip. She had been left behind with Eyjólfur to make a list of all the computers and other technical equipment at the camp, which was the first step in trying to determine the monetary value of it all. The two of them had gone from room to room; he had announced what was there and she had written it down, no doubt with a face like thunder. The doctor had continued to make his sample collection, which he alone controlled and understood fully.

  ‘So you think that the corpse of the geologist who disappeared had been where they were planning to drill?’ asked the doctor in a rather sceptical tone. ‘That would mean this photo could be of a work glove.’ He put down the poor-quality printout of the photo: the colours were odd and the image itself grainy.

  Eyjólfur snorted. ‘Yes, precisely. I think that you should look at the image on the screen; this printout is shitty. Onscreen you can see the nails in better resolution – albeit vaguely, but still.’

  ‘Yes, no doubt,’ said the doctor, although his tone didn’t suggest that he believed it. ‘This is all just too incredible. What are the chances of boring one little hole in that place and hitting exactly upon the spot where the woman died of exposure?’

  ‘Little to none.’ Friðrikka still looked worn out from the trip. ‘Actually, they drilled more than one hole, and in more than one place. But it would certainly be a huge coincidence.’

  ‘Could your friend, Oddný Hildur, have got lost in the storm but then realized she was in the vicinity of the shed? Could she have been searching for it to use as shelter?’ Thóra knew as soon as she said this that such a scenario was beyond absurd. The distance was far too great for one person to make it safe and sound through a storm.

  Friðrikka shook her head. Her red hair was dirty – as was all their hair, in fact. ‘No. When Oddný Hildur disappeared the shed was located elsewhere. It gets moved after every drilling. I’m not sure when it was put where it is now but it was after I quit. When I left the drilling rig the shed had been a bit further north for several months, in a place where drilling was coming to an end.’

  ‘Then couldn’t she have been heading there?’ asked Matthew. ‘And simply given up at the point where the shed is now?’

  ‘If so, then she strayed a long way from the camp,’ exclaimed Eyjólfur. ‘That’s too far to go on foot. I can’t imagine how she could have made it that far; the weather was absolutely abominable.’

  ‘And by car?’ asked Matthew. ‘Could she have driven or got a lift?’

  Both Eyjólfur and Friðrikka were silent. The former was the first to speak up. ‘She didn’t go by car because they were all in their places the next day, and as far as getting a lift goes, that doesn’t add up. Who would she have gone with? No one saw her after dinner that night, and no one would lie about that.’ He looked at Matthew, bewildered. ‘I don’t know why any one of us would have kept it quiet. We were searching high and low for a whole week.’

  ‘Five days,’ interjected Friðrikka. ‘You only searched for five days.’ She said nothing for a moment and looked down, staring as if entranced at the pattern on the linoleum. ‘Maybe whoever gave her a lift wanted to hurt her. And left her there intentionally.’

  Eyjólfur glared at Friðrikka, then exhaled deeply. It looked to Thóra as if he were counting to ten. He appeared to regain his composure. ‘If anyone drove her, then it was one of those weirdo villagers. None of us did, since the weather made it impossible to be driving around out there. If she didn’t walk, she must have gone by dogsled.’

  Another argument was brewing, and Bella perked up. ‘Maybe it doesn’t matter at this moment how the woman got there,’ said Matthew drily. ‘I think it’s more important to try to find out what happened to the body – if it was in fact a body in the ice.’ He looked at the objects they had found in the hole. They lay on the table, menacing in their strangeness and irritating in the light of how poorly they fitted into the theory that Oddný Hildur had been found frozen in the ice. As if it weren’t enough to think about where the drillers had taken her body and what had then become of them.

  ‘Were they into drugs?’ asked Bella, pointing at a large and rather battered-looking glass syringe. It had no needle. ‘These drillers or the missing woman?’

  ‘Fat chance,’ said Eyjólfur flatly; characteristically, hardly leaping to his colleagues’ defence. ‘No junkie could work here. Where would you buy dope if you were running out?’ His argument was fairly sound; drug addicts kept mainly to the cities and avoided the wilderness. And they wouldn’t be likely to carry around any of what was lying beside the syringe. All of it was in rather poor condition: snowshoes and a leather jacket that was scratched and tattered, and so black with grease and filth that it was impossible to determine what animal the leather had come from; a newish-looking ice axe and a little bone statue that Matthew had wrapped in a scarf for protection. The other objects hadn’t been handled as carefully, since they weren’t as delicate. Next to these things lay the bone with the holes in it, on top of the tea towel that Matthew had taken from the shed.

  ‘I have a feeling this is probably some kind of Tupilak,’ said Friðrikka, pointing at the figurine. At first Thóra had found the figurine resembled a banana upon which something had been scratched, but when she looked more closely she saw that it was an intricately carved bone to which had been tied some strange-looking odds and ends: hair, some kind of leather and a bird’s claw. The craftsman appeared to have tried to make the bone itself resemble an ogre, and indeed the figurine looked quite monstrous. It had a large face with open jaws and numerous sharp teeth. Little hands with claws were carved onto its belly but otherwise the monster was covered with a pattern that they couldn’t understand, but that possibly symbolized something. On the figurine’s back a tail could be distinguished.

  ‘What is a Tupilak, if I might ask?’ Thóra was dying to hold the object, but considering how carefully Matthew had held it before he wrapped it in the scarf, it was unlikely that she would be granted the opportunity to do so. ‘I read in a book here in the cafeteria that the natives blame it, whatever it is, for what happened to the original inhabitants of the area. Maybe it’s related to those people somehow.’

  ‘I must confess that I don’t know exactly what its role is,’ said Friðrikka. ‘It’s connected somehow to Greenlandic folk beliefs, and these kinds of bones are sold in all the tourist spots.’ She stared at the one in Matthew’s hand. ‘I don’t think that any two are alike, and they don’t follow any specific form. However, they do all have scary faces like that. Still, I don’t recall seeing a version like this one. For example, there isn’t usually anything tied to the figure.’

  ‘So this could be some sort of tourist knick-knack?’ Matthew peered doubtfully at its snarling face. ‘Who would want to own a souvenir like that?’

  ‘I have no idea where it came from. At least, I’ve never seen it before.’ Friðrikka looked across the table. ‘Nor the other things.’

  ‘I don’t know where that syringe comes from, but it’s very different to the ones I’m used to.’ Finnbogi bent down to examine it more closely. ‘It might be used for veterinary medicine. It’s big enough.’ He straightened up. ‘It’s not a drug addict’s, that’s for certain.’

  ‘The jacket is definitely Greenlandic,’ said Alvar, who had kept to himself until now. ‘The other junk I know nothing about.’

  Eyjólfur looked triumphant. ‘So my theory that Oddný Hildur got a ride on a dogsled is maybe not so far-fetched after all. Maybe this jacket and these snowshoes are from whoever drove the sled.’

  ‘And why should he have left them behind? Was there a sudden heatwave?’ Friðrikka spoke like a primary school kid, with the same sing-song contempt that can be heard in every school playground at break-time.

  Matthew let
go of the back of the chair that he’d been holding on to and it hit the edge of the table hard, shifting the objects slightly. ‘This is all just conjecture. We don’t know what was out there in the ice and we don’t know anything about these things, which – according to Friðrikka – shouldn’t have been in the drilling rig.’ He nudged the ice axe. ‘The only logical explanation is that this was used to free whatever was in the ice. Anything else is so far from being feasible that it’s pointless to wonder about it.’

  ‘One other thing is certain. If this was Oddný Hildur, then she didn’t die of exposure,’ said Friðrikka, now speaking in her normal, slightly husky voice. ‘It’s been about six months since she disappeared and it’s impossible that she was buried beneath two metres of ice and snow during that time. Maybe snow, but not ice. It was a deep hole and it would have been necessary to use a shovel for her to have been buried that deep.’

  ‘Would she have been able to dig herself down to take shelter from the weather?’ asked Thóra, directing her question at Alvar. As a rescuer, he must know this.

  ‘Dig herself into the ice?’ He shook his head slowly. ‘I can’t imagine it. People generally find themselves a snowdrift or thick sheets of snow. I’ve never heard of someone digging himself or herself several metres down into ice.’ He looked at his toes, embarrassed at his own stream of words. Thóra had never met a man so shy. ‘Of course I don’t know how conditions have changed these past six months.’

  They all stared at the table, each struggling to come up with a sensible explanation. Surprisingly, it was Bella who broke the silence with a theory that seemed fairly reasonable. ‘Couldn’t someone have murdered this geologist lady and buried her, and then when the drillers found the body by accident, the same person murdered them too?’

  They nodded thoughtfully, all except the doctor who stood with his arms crossed and an unhappy look on his sunburned face. ‘I don’t see why this mysterious murderer should have wanted to kill this woman in the first place, let alone any men who might have found the body. What would be the point?’ Bella had managed to offend the doctor that morning, when he had tried again to point out to her the hazards of smoking. She had told him to mind his own business, and added that she wasn’t constantly pointing out to him that he was losing his hair, which was just as obvious as the fact that smoking was dangerous. ‘That I don’t know,’ she now replied airily. ‘Maybe they found something on the body that pointed to the killer? Maybe one of these things is a clue to the identity of the murderer.’

  ‘Bloody nonsense.’ The doctor turned to Matthew. ‘This is ludicrous, completely fantastical. We don’t even know for certain that a body was there, still less the body of this particular woman.’

  ‘Oh yes,’ said Bella sarcastically. ‘That would make the case much simpler, if it involved yet another dead body.’

  Thóra cleared her throat. As if it weren’t bad enough having to continually try to make peace between Friðrikka and Eyjólfur. ‘This case certainly isn’t simple. Don’t forget the bones in the desk drawers. They’re yet another unexplained phenomenon in this peculiar place.’ She forced out a smile that was supposed to be encouraging. ‘But hopefully we’ll find an explanation for all of it. As things stand, I can’t say that we’re on the right track but you never know, things might become clear later.’

  ‘That’s right.’ Matthew tried to smile along with Thóra, but his smile came out even less convincing than hers. ‘Let’s not waste time arguing about this; it’s of little use.’ He unwrapped the scarf from the little drilled bone. It was still moist from the ice that had melted off it. Then he lifted the idol gently. Tupilak. It stared back at them with its teeth bared; the figurine may not have been very big, but it was impressively hideous. ‘I think we should go down to the village and find someone who can help us sort this out. Maybe this little statue has a rational meaning? Maybe the villagers knew about the drillers and can explain the jacket and snowshoes, as well as the bone?’ He abruptly changed gears. ‘But it may well be that these things have no connection with the body in the ice. In any case, our only hope at the moment is that the villagers can explain some of it. We should visit them straight away.’

  ‘They’ll never help you,’ muttered Friðrikka. ‘The villagers turned their backs on us when we went to them for assistance after Oddný Hildur’s disappearance. They won’t tell us anything.’

  ‘We’ll just have to see about that,’ said Thóra. ‘We have to try.’ She recalled the empty streets and the baleful stares of the girls they had seen from a distance. She felt goosebumps on her forearms but did not know whether they were caused by the cooling temperature or the thought of a hostile reception in a village at the end of earth. She thought of the girls’ piercing black eyes again and realized that she was afraid to go to the village. The trip, however, could not be avoided.

  Chapter 12

  21 March 2008

  The village turned out to be just as Thóra had been expecting – gloomy and hostile. It was as if the inhabitants were not of this world and feared coming out into the open air. The streets were still nearly deserted and a thin fog contributed to the unreal atmosphere. They had watched the fog cover the colourful village as they drove down the hill that separated it from the work site. It seemed as though the residents had ordered it to block the sight of these outsiders – with the assistance of nature, they were concealing what strangers were only intended to see hazily. The light was also peculiar: even though the sun hung in the sky it only gave off a dim glow, and was already preparing itself to sink back down into slumber. Three of them had come on this trip: Thóra, Matthew and Dr Finnbogi. Eyjólfur had decided to try to repair the satellite dishes in the hope of re-establishing a connection with the outside world, and Alvar had offered to help him. Bella had been asked to put her handwritten inventory of the camp’s technical equipment onto the computer and Friðrikka continued to assess the status of the project. They all appeared to be happy not to have to go down to the village, and Thóra felt that Friðrikka and Eyjólfur in particular were breathing more easily as a result. This did nothing to diminish Thóra’s conviction that things were not quite right in the village; the only ones in the group who were familiar with it did not want to go back there.

  The doctor turned and looked at Thóra. ‘Where should we start?’ He had stopped the car on the slope while they silently watched the fog cover the area. ‘No one place seems better than another.’

  Matthew pointed out of the front window. ‘There were two or three people down at the pier. Should we take the chance that they’re still there?’ A thick fog bank now covered both the pier and the foreshore.

  They drove through the village to the little harbour, seeing not a single soul along the way. ‘I don’t know whether they’re avoiding us or whether the villagers generally remain indoors, but I find this very odd.’ The doctor drove slowly, thereby allowing himself the leisure to lean over the steering wheel and have a good look around. ‘I’ve been to lots of villages like this in Greenland and generally people are very friendly and sociable. If everything were as it should be, they would all be coming out to meet us instead of avoiding us.’ Neither Thóra nor Matthew said anything, contenting themselves with looking at the lonely street as it passed slowly by. Colourful curtains were drawn across all the windows. All the doors were shut.

  ‘Maybe they start the day very early and then take a kind of siesta,’ said Thóra, more to herself than to her colleagues in the car.

  ‘I’ve never heard of that.’ The doctor sped up a bit after they’d driven past the last house. ‘They’re not about to waste what little daylight they have at this time of year by napping.’ He suddenly slowed down as the fog became denser. ‘I don’t want to drive into the sea,’ he muttered. ‘You can’t see more than two metres in front of the car.’ When they caught sight of the pier’s woodwork at the end of the gravel path he parked off to the side. The slamming of the car doors broke the silence, then the only sound was the low l
apping of the waves and a thump now and then when a loose ice floe bumped against a pier pillar. They looked at each other as if they were all waiting for one of them to take the initiative and lead them out onto the pier. ‘Just so it’s clear, I’ve never heard of Greenlanders attacking tourists,’ said Finnbogi, looking down the pier, which vanished before them in the fog. ‘We’ll just talk as we go so that we don’t catch anyone off-guard.’

  ‘If they’re still there.’ Matthew listened carefully and announced that he thought he heard some activity in the fog. ‘We got lucky,’ he said, but Thóra couldn’t tell if he was being ironic or serious. He walked out onto the pier and Thóra and Finnbogi followed him closely.

  There was barely enough room for them to walk side by side down the jetty. It was built straight out into the sea, making it possible to dock on both sides. The villagers’ fleet appeared neither large nor elegant; it included three small, unsightly motorized fishing boats and several open motorboats tied to dock rings. There was not a kayak in sight. It was unclear how far the structure extended, because they did not need to walk far before they saw the indistinct shapes of two men. Both of them had stopped what they were doing and stood motionless, watching the party approach. Their expressions revealed neither anger nor enmity; they only appeared surprised at the visit and neither of them answered Finnbogi’s greeting. The man in the boat put down a battered knife that was covered in blood and his companion on the pier raised a gloved hand to his forehead and stroked back the hair from his eyes.

  ‘Good day,’ said Finnbogi in Danish with a strong Icelandic accent, bowing his head curtly. ‘Are you from here?’ Thóra had to make an effort not to burst out laughing at this absurd question. The men were dressed in sealskin clothing, had dark skin, black hair, and slanted eyes – they were as Greenlandic as could be. There was even a dead seal, its belly cut open, lying on the pier, just to complete the picture. The men said nothing and just stared, as silent as before. The smile inside Thóra withered as quickly as it had bloomed. Perhaps the men were offended by such a ridiculous question. She stared at the large knife held by the man in front of them. He was covered in blood from working on the seal. The doctor tried again. ‘We are visiting the work site to the north and we’re in a bit of trouble.’ The doctor’s Danish was decent, in Thóra’s opinion, but that wasn’t saying much as she had never been very good at it herself. She still had enough high-school Danish to be able to follow the conversation – if the Greenlanders wanted to converse with them. On the other hand, Matthew understood nothing; he had enough trouble comprehending Icelandic without having to compound his difficulties by tackling another language. However, no language skills were necessary to understand that the hunters weren’t happy to see them. Yet Finnbogi was unperturbed and kept on as if the men had happily acquiesced to his request for help. ‘We’re missing two men who were at the work camp just over a week ago, and we wanted to check whether you knew anything about them.’ He paused for a moment, but then continued when their only response was to stare at him. ‘Have you seen these men at all? They could possibly have come here in the hope of finding transportation by land or sea.’