The Day is Dark

by Yrsa Sigurdardottir

  ‘Gylfi! Hi, it’s Mum.’ Her words echoed down the phone. ‘Are you at home now?’ Her heart glowed as she pictured her offspring, Gylfi – with little Orri in his arms – and Sóley.

  ‘Yes. Listen, I was thinking . . .’ Not a word about when she was coming home or how the trip had gone. ‘Sigga and I are thinking about going to Spain this summer and a brochure from a travel agency came with Fréttablaðið this morning. Would you maybe want to lend us the money for the trip because we don’t have any and then we would pay you after we started working in the summer?’ He spoke so rapidly that Thóra had to try her hardest to figure out what he was saying.

  ‘Lend you money for a trip to Spain?’ Thóra was slightly bewildered. She connected Spain with sun cream, bikinis and beer, and nothing was further from her right now.

  ‘Yes, it’s not expensive at all or anything. If you pay right away you get a discount too.’ Gylfi paused expectantly.

  ‘But what about work? How do you plan on finding a job if you’re just going to leave straight away? Usually, temps have to be found to cover employees who go off on holiday, to Spain or anywhere else. Have you not thought about that at all?’

  ‘Maybe it was like that when you were young. No one expects people just to stay in Iceland in the summer any more.’ Thóra tried to look on the bright side. He hadn’t said all those years ago when you were young.

  ‘Can we talk about this when I get home?’ Thóra stared at herself in the large mirror embedded in the surface of the bar. In the second that passed between seeing this person and realizing who it was, she discovered how other people saw her. A blonde, attractive but worried-looking woman who should frown less and try to dress more appropriately. Her bright, low-cut silk blouse didn’t belong here.

  ‘Yeah, but this offer is only valid for a few days. And the best trips will probably sell out immediately.’ Gylfi didn’t explain which trips those were and what distinguished a good trip to Spain from a bad one.

  ‘Let me think about it, then we’ll take a look when I come home.’ Thóra heard the front door of the hotel open on the floor below. She could easily have craned her neck over the edge of the landing to see who had come in, but she didn’t feel like it. If they had to stay here much longer, she would definitely start taking a keen interest in people’s comings and goings, but things hadn’t got that bad yet. ‘You need to think about Orri, too. I doubt he’d enjoy that kind of trip, sweetheart. He’s far too little.’ She added silently to herself: And you’re too young to take care of a small child abroad.

  ‘Ah, but we’re not going to take him with us,’ said Gylfi proudly, convinced that he’d trumped her. ‘He’ll be staying with you. Just the two of us will go.’

  Thóra opened her mouth to speak but closed it again immediately. Up the stairs towards her was walking the Greenlandic police officer who’d questioned her at the work site. ‘Gylfi, I’ll have to call you a bit later, when I know when I’ll be home.’ She hung up and stood up from her high bar stool. The man looked anything but pleased as he came towards her and greeted her with a terse nod.

  ‘Will you please gather your group and ask them to pack their things?’ Thóra was filled with an unreal hope that they were about to be sent home. ‘You need to come back with us to Kaanneq.’

  It had been good to have something to think about other than suffocating darkness, isolation and the lack of a shower, but now those thoughts reappeared in a flash. Thóra looked at her loose three-quarter-length sleeves. If this blouse was inappropriate here at the hotel, it would be completely ridiculous at the camp. ‘Can I get changed first?’

  Chapter 29

  23 March 2008

  ‘I can’t be here. I have to get home.’ Just as she had before, Friðrikka was staring out of the meeting room window and mumbling to herself. The atmosphere in the group was tense and anxious. Outside it was dead calm, but worse weather was forecast. The pure white snow glittered in the gentle daylight, but as darkness began to descend the landscape displayed its true face: here the struggle for life was hard; the strongest survived and the weak were shown no mercy. ‘They can’t send me wherever they want. I’m an Icelander and I must be allowed to go home.’

  Eyjólfur was sitting on the floor, leaning against the wall with his eyes closed. He was chewing gum energetically – apart from that one might have thought he was sleeping. Having to return to the work camp seemed to have hit him and Friðrikka the worst. The others hadn’t exactly celebrated, but had accepted the news silently and had uncomplainingly packed up to leave. It’s not like they’d had a choice. The police had informed them that a travel ban could be slapped on them at short notice if they looked likely to try to leave or to get a plane to come and pick them up. They would have the court order in their hands before any flight from Iceland could even touch down. The only sensible thing to do was comply with the police and try as best they could to answer the questions put to them. Thóra had spoken briefly to the group and emphasized that the most important thing to remember was that they had nothing to hide; they hadn’t been at the site when Usinna vanished or when her bones were found, nor had they been there when the drillers had disappeared. It would work in all their favours if Oddný Hildur’s fate were explained as soon as possible, and in that respect the police investigation was their best hope. They would simply have to accept this as a temporary inconvenience. When it was over they could go home proud that they had done all they could to try to determine the fate of these four individuals. Thóra’s speech was received as most speeches are: it convinced those who were in agreement already, but did little to inspire Eyjólfur and Friðrikka. Both of them were unhappy about having to go back out into the wilderness, he because he allegedly had other duties to attend to, and she because her nerves appeared unable to endure any more.

  ‘I’m not entirely sure what we’re doing here.’ Alvar wiped a bead of sweat from his forehead. It was hot and stuffy in the meeting room and their attempts to turn down the radiator had produced no results. Outside it seemed to have warmed up a little, despite the poor forecast, but it seemed to take the building as long to adapt to rises in temperature as it did to drops. ‘I could help with the search if they want. It’d give me something to do.’ They had watched some of the men set out into the snow; they were wearing thick winter coveralls and had two dogs on leads. They were too far away for anyone to see who they were, but it was clear the group had expanded since the first three had arrived.

  ‘I doubt they care about receiving any direct assistance from us. They just want to talk to us,’ said Thóra. ‘Especially now they know who the bones in the drawers are likely to belong to.’ She had told the police about her phone conversation with Sigmundur Pétursson, and had gone with them to the coffeemaker in search of the necklace. The bulletin board was where he had said it would be, but the necklace was gone. That made his story slightly more dubious, but the investigators appeared to be content with the information nonetheless, even though Thóra understood from them that since Usinna had never been reported lost or dead it wasn’t a given that any of this was connected to her. Thóra gave them Pétursson’s name and phone number, in case they needed further confirmation. She didn’t actually understand why the police had chosen to bring them back to the area instead of just sending one or two officers to take statements from them at the hotel. Maybe something else had come to light that they wanted to explain to the group, or have the group show them. For instance, it was easier said than done to investigate the computer system. Thóra herself wouldn’t have found much there without the assistance of Friðrikka and Eyjólfur, who knew the system like the backs of their hands.

  ‘They’ve found something.’ Finnbogi seemed to be speaking to himself rather than to the others as he leaned on the table and stared into his lap. ‘They’re acting differently to yesterday.’

  Thóra agreed with this, and from the look on Matthew’s face he did too. The policemen seemed much more serious, avoiding looking any of them in th
e eye and if they addressed them at all they did so in short sentences, stiffly polite. ‘I should hope they have,’ she said nonchalantly. ‘They’re not here for a holiday. With all these personnel, they must have come up with something. But it’s in our interests that their investigation succeeds. We’re all looking for the same answers, aren’t we?’ Christ, it would be good to get home and no longer have to constantly be the group’s cheerleader.

  There was a knock at the door and a Greenlandic policeman walked in. At first Thóra thought he had a gun, but then she realized it was a black radio attached to his belt. The radio crackled for a moment, but no voice was heard. ‘I would like to speak to you two further.’ The man pointed at Friðrikka and Eyjólfur. ‘Am I right in thinking that you are employees here?’

  Eyjólfur sighed but Friðrikka appeared not to have heard the man. ‘Does this have to do with anything in particular?’ asked Thóra. She did not trust them to help the investigation in their current states. ‘Neither of them was at the place where the bones were found. Friðrikka had stopped working here by then, and Eyjólfur was only here occasionally. Besides that, they’d never been to Greenland until after Usinna died.’ She hoped this was true. ‘I’m just wondering whether this is something Matthew or I could help you with. Those two are rather tired.’

  The policeman opened his mouth and appeared on the verge of bawling her out when his radio started crackling again. An unfamiliar name was called and the officer brought the radio up to his mouth. ‘I’m here. Over.’ The officer turned his back on the group. ‘I’m not alone.’ Through the static they heard someone say in Danish: ‘I think you need to come. It’s impossible to describe this. I’ll send someone for you.’

  ‘There they are,’ Matthew called from the window. He was speaking to Thóra, but naturally everyone heard him and tried to see what was going on. A car drove extremely slowly along the track to the camp and entered the parking area. Thóra thought it resembled a funeral procession, and judging by how quickly the policeman had left them it was entirely likely to be one. He had rushed out but come back in to the meeting room almost immediately to get the keys to Berg Technology’s jeep, since there were too many people for one car. The jeep had then sped off. At least two hours had passed and everyone in the stuffy meeting room had been a bit bleary-eyed by the time he returned and informed them of what was going on.

  The cars were parked outside the cafeteria, but their chrome bumpers and exhaust pipes could be seen from the meeting room, gleaming as they pumped their fumes into the cold, still air. ‘I’m going out.’ Thóra took Matthew by the arm. ‘Come on. The man didn’t say anything before he left about us being banned from getting fresh air.’

  ‘He just forgot to say it,’ said Friðrikka shrilly. ‘We shouldn’t go anywhere. What if they have body bags in the cars? I couldn’t bear it.’

  ‘Fine. Then you stay, but I’m out of here.’ Thóra yanked determinedly on Matthew’s arm. ‘Come on.’ After one final unsuccessful attempt to see into the cars through the window he followed her, but was clearly reluctant.

  ‘They’ll herd us back in as soon as they see us. We’re getting dressed for nothing. It’s also blatantly obvious what we’re doing. Who goes out into this weather without having urgent business?’

  Thóra had already thought of this. ‘Loan us some cigarettes, Bella. We’ll just say we came out for a smoke.’

  ‘Me too.’ The doctor had become just as excited as Thóra. ‘I’m coming with you.’

  Bella held tight to her cigarette packet, just in case they tried to take it off her.

  ‘Okay, okay. Let’s go.’ The more time they wasted standing there bickering, the more they would miss. In the end four of them went outside, while Eyjólfur and Alvar stayed inside with Friðrikka, who was still lecturing them about what a bad idea it was as Thóra shut the door behind them. They beat all speed records putting on their coveralls and snow boots and showed the same swiftness in lighting their cigarettes on the landing outside, before walking in the direction of the cars. Thóra didn’t dare not smoke her cigarette properly, but it took all her willpower not to retch. She noticed that the doctor appeared to be having the same problem. Matthew, however, exhaled a grey cloud and beamed at her.

  They stopped a short distance from the cars. From there they could see everything that was happening without running the risk that the police would herd them back inside. The police noticed the smokers but didn’t appear too worried about them, since they were busy unloading one of the pickup trucks.

  Thóra was relieved when she saw that it was a number of bags each too small to contain the body of an adult individual, though they seemed heavy. The men were silent as they carried the grey bags into the cafeteria building. Their seriousness was compelling; the smokers all forgot to keep up the pretence of activity and even Bella’s cigarette burned up slowly and evenly. Finally the last two bags were carried towards the house. One of the policemen was careless and slipped on a patch of ice. He landed on his tailbone with a great shout, but it was not concern for his possible injuries that made the four ‘smokers’ gasp. When the man dropped the bag, an arm rolled out of it.

  ‘What the hell was that?’ Bella hung her coverall on a hook that was already overloaded and the bulky orange garment ended up in a heap on the floor. She didn’t bend down to pick it up, and no one made any comment. They had other things to think about.

  ‘That was an arm. Without a doubt.’ The doctor leaned up against the wall to kick off his boots. ‘I don’t know whose it was or where it came from, but it was an arm.’

  ‘I don’t think there are many candidates to whom it could have belonged,’ said Thóra. ‘It would be quite something if it did come from someone other than one of the people we’re looking for.’ She stepped from the floor up onto a wooden platform that remained dry while the floor was awash with melted snow. ‘But what was in the rest of the bags? Did anyone count them?’ No one had thought to do so.

  ‘What should we tell the others?’ Finnbogi held hesitantly on to the knob of the door to the corridor. ‘I’m not sure Friðrikka will take this well.’

  ‘We’ll say nothing. Simply that we didn’t see anything,’ said Matthew. ‘We’ll find out soon enough who this is and what happened and until then there’s no need to upset her any further. I think an animal must have attacked someone. Under normal circumstances people’s arms don’t fall off.’

  Thóra was silent, but she thought about the frightening video that was the main reason for their expedition from Iceland. She remembered how the splayed feet had jerked abnormally and how before the jerking there had been a whistle that ended with a dull thud. This had been followed each time by a splash of blood. She remembered clearly thinking that it looked as if either a corpse were being dismembered or someone were being killed, and now she had the feeling that it hadn’t been a polar bear or a rogue walrus that had separated this arm from its body. The landing outside creaked, the main door opened and in walked three policemen. The first was the Greenlander who Thóra was certain was directing the investigation. ‘Well.’ His manner was dry, which was nothing new, but now his voice was tempered with anger. ‘I need to speak to each of you privately and then get one of you to come and identify some human remains. I understand that you’ve seen what’s going on and I must express my disappointment that you didn’t stay inside.’

  ‘We wanted to have a cigarette. The smokers’ room is too wet, from the snow that was in there when we arrived.’ Matthew had sidestepped the policeman’s accusation rather neatly, in Thóra’s opinion. ‘We had no idea what awaited us, or we’d have just smoked out of the window.’

  It was impossible to tell whether the police officer believed him. ‘Well, it can’t be undone,’ he said. ‘I would simply ask that you don’t waste any time trying to read anything into it.’

  His last statement obviously went in one of Bella’s ears and out the other, because she immediately piped up, ‘Did a polar bear attack someone?’
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  The police officer stared coldly at her. ‘No one has died here from a polar bear attack for seventeen years, and the last one happened by mistake. An old woman walked too close to a bear in a whiteout and it swiped at her, knocking off the top part of her head. The bear neither ate her nor tore off her limbs. She died in hospital from her head wounds. Polar bears don’t attack people except under very unusual circumstances.’ He turned to look at Finnbogi. ‘You’re a doctor, aren’t you?’ Finnbogi replied that he was. ‘We were hoping to get your opinion on something we’ve found. No one can get here until tomorrow, weather permitting, and it would help us to get some confirmation on a few things.’ He didn’t elaborate any further.

  ‘Of course. There’s not much I can do here but you’re welcome to take advantage of my expertise. However, we won’t be able to do any autopsies. We don’t have the equipment for a procedure like that.’

  Thóra seized her opportunity while the policeman appeared to be in a talkative mood. ‘Is this either of the men we’re looking for?’ She didn’t know whether she was hoping for a positive or a negative response.

  The police officer did not look at her or answer her question directly. ‘We need one of you to come and identify . . .’ He hesitated, but then added: ‘It’s more than one person. Probably two.’

  That made things clearer. It had to be Bjarki and Dóri.

  Thóra and Matthew had a problem. They had successfully managed to behave as though everything were normal when they returned to the meeting room, as had Bella. Friðrikka, Alvar and Eyjólfur seemed to suspect nothing and had only asked once where the doctor was. They were told that he was going over to show the police where he had taken samples of water from, and that was all. None of them seemed to find that strange at all, so they had no idea yet that the investigation had reached a different level. However, this could change at any given moment, since it would fall to either Friðrikka or Eyjólfur to identify the remains if the doctor determined that they did belong to the drillers. This was where their dilemma lay. Which of the two would be better suited to the task? Eyjólfur seemed less stressed than Friðrikka; on the other hand, he appeared to be getting steadily more upset, while Friðrikka appeared to be recovering a little. Maybe it would be too much for him to see the dead men, whereas it might do her good. Friðrikka seemed less concerned about Bjarki and Dóri than about her friend Oddný Hildur, but the reverse was true for Eyjólfur. If the doctor concluded that these were the remains of a man and a woman, the choice would be simpler: Eyjólfur would have to go; but if it were two men, it would complicate matters somewhat. Thóra had read somewhere that it helped the bereaved to see their dead friend or relative; it was important for them in their coming to terms with death and in accepting what could not be changed. Otherwise, they might have difficulty accepting what had happened, and moving through the grieving process. In this case neither Friðrikka nor Eyjólfur could be considered a close relative, but this advice could still apply. Perhaps identifying the remains would help Friðrikka to shut off her flood of tears and Eyjólfur to calm down. But it might also throw them completely off-balance. The corpse in the freezer had certainly agitated Friðrikka enough.