The Absolution

by Yrsa Sigurdardottir

  ‘Either shut up or spit it out.’ With an effort, Huldar kept his voice level. ‘Or are you having trouble reading what it says? Why don’t you just hand it over?’

  ‘Ha ha,’ said Jóel dryly. Unfolding the note, he read out the morning’s task in ringing tones. ‘A cleaner called to say she couldn’t get into the house where she’s supposed to be working this morning. The family dog has been locked out and she’s afraid something’s wrong.’ Jóel’s face split in a broad grin, exposing the crooked teeth he usually tried to hide. Huldar itched to rearrange them with his fists but controlled himself and allowed Jóel to relish the moment. ‘Oh, yes, and she doesn’t speak much Icelandic. Erla wanted to know if you have enough data allowance left to talk to her via Google Translate?’ He placed the note on Huldar’s desk. ‘The rest of the information’s there.’ Unable to resist the temptation to linger a moment, Jóel drew a long breath, as if savouring the demeaning nature of the task. Then he smirked again. ‘Obviously, this is urgent, so don’t let us delay you.’ As he sauntered away, Huldar gripped the arms of his chair until it hurt.

  ‘Jóel’s a total prick. Don’t let him get to you. I’m pissed off enough for both of us.’ Huldar drove into the residential street where – he hoped – the cleaner would be waiting for them. He thought that’s what they’d arranged when he spoke to her on the phone, but communication had been tricky. ‘Don’t let it ruin your day. Erla’ll stop messing about sooner or later and give us a proper job.’

  Gudlaugur was staring out of the window. The thin-skinned type, he’d taken the whole thing personally. Perhaps he was considering asking for a transfer, either to another department or a different desk. Preferably as far away from Huldar as possible. It was understandable; the boy was paying the price for being associated with him. ‘If you ask to be moved, you’ll be left in peace by that arsehole, and the rest of them too. You’ll get better assignments as well. I wouldn’t blame you.’ Huldar kept his gaze fixed on the road ahead, resisting the urge to check Gudlaugur’s reaction. The last thing he wanted was for the young man to move; he’d miss him. Despite his relative inexperience and his shyness, he could be perceptive when it mattered. And it was uncertain who, if anyone, would take his place. Huldar was glad he hadn’t started grilling him about Ásta again this morning – that could have been the final straw.

  Gudlaugur didn’t reply, either because he wanted to think about it or because their destination had appeared ahead. ‘There.’ He pointed to a large, concrete, single-storey house on what was evidently the more exclusive side of the road. It backed onto the lava-field. The place had clearly been done up: freestanding concrete walls had been added here and there, with an overall eye to creating an angular aesthetic; the roof trim had been removed, and the typically Icelandic corrugated-iron cladding had been replaced with standing-seam copper panels. The front garden had been paved over too. The same applied to most of the neighbouring houses, though on the other side of the road the occasional building had been allowed to retain its original features and was even painted in something other than white or shades of grey.

  ‘Reckon that’s her?’ Gudlaugur gestured towards a skinny woman hanging around by the front door. She wore a brightly coloured anorak made of some thin material and looked as though she was cold, though not as cold as the small dog huddled at her feet. She wasn’t wearing a hat and her thin, shoulder-length hair kept blowing over her face. No sooner had she pushed it back, briefly revealing her hollow-cheeked features, than the wind whipped it over her eyes again. Huldar parked in the drive beside a small, rather beaten-up car. He diplomatically averted his eyes when he saw that the MOT was badly out of date.

  The path to the front door was lined with low posts containing outdoor lights that were currently switched off. The posts were covered in a layer of rust so uniform that they must have been designed that way. Huldar wondered casually how much the occupants had had to fork out for the rust effect. The property certainly gave the impression of being home to people with seriously deep pockets.

  They introduced themselves to the woman and shook her bony hand. She told them her name in a Slavonic accent, then pointed at the door and gesticulated to indicate that it was locked. ‘Not home.’

  Huldar just stopped himself raising his eyes heavenwards. How long had Erla spent sifting through the notifications before she hit on this one?

  The woman now pointed to the dog at her feet, then waved towards the corner of the house. ‘Dog. Outside. Cold.’

  ‘Yes, right.’ Huldar searched for simple words that she could understand; for some way of getting it across to the woman that these things happened but they weren’t a police matter. Stray dogs were the responsibility of the local council. But before he could say another word, the woman bent down, scooped up the dog and showed them its front paws.

  ‘Blood. Much blood.’ They bent to examine the reddish-brown stains on the dog’s hairy legs. ‘Blood. Much a lot blood.’ She waved at the corner of the house again.

  Huldar and Gudlaugur exchanged glances. What would this woman consider a lot of blood? More than could be found in the veins of a small dog? There was no visible wound on the mutt but its shaggy coat could be hiding it. ‘Can you show us?’ Now it was Huldar’s turn to point to the corner of the house. The woman nodded and put the dog down. They had only taken a few steps when Huldar flung out an arm to stop them, turned to the woman and asked: ‘Can we get round the other side?’ He waved at the opposite corner of the house. She nodded. Before they went back, Huldar drew Gudlaugur’s attention to a track in the snow, half a metre wide, which ran from the house across the garden in the direction of the road. It was too irregular to have been made by a sledge and there were no marks left by runners. Here and there they could see pink stains on the snow. It wasn’t unlike the pictures they’d been shown of the scene behind the cinema where Stella had been dragged into the car park by her killer. Chances were that it was a coincidence. Nevertheless, Huldar didn’t want to trample all over what could turn out to be the scene of a far more serious incident than a locked-out dog.

  Gudlaugur had taken out his phone and was tapping it frantically as they walked round the back of the house. ‘According to já.is, a family of four lives here.’ He went on tapping. ‘The father’s a CEO, the kids are still in full-time education and the mother has no job title. Want me to call them?’

  ‘No. Hang on.’ Huldar could have kicked himself for failing to ask Gudlaugur to look up this information on the way. It would have been normal procedure. But his anger at Erla and Jóel had clouded his thoughts. No doubt they had covered this sort of thing on his anger-management course but, ironically, he had been too angry at being forced to attend to take much in.

  Behind the house was a much bigger garden with a large terrace, partly fenced in by low concrete walls. The garden furniture had been packed away for the winter, its lines softened by the covers, rendering it out of synch with the general rigidly geometric effect. Also out of place was the dark trail that led from the big glass sliding door, across the terrace and down onto the snowy lawn, before vanishing round the corner of the house on the opposite side. ‘Shit.’ Huldar held up a hand to stop Gudlaugur and the woman.

  ‘Much blood.’ The woman shook her head sadly. ‘Much blood.’

  Although the terrace had underfloor heating that kept it free of snow, the red streak was no less conspicuous on the pale stone tiles. Here and there they could see dark paw prints, suggesting that the dog had been investigating the scene. From where Huldar was standing, it looked as if the red trail had been licked in a couple of places. As if to confirm this, the little dog suddenly darted through their legs up onto the terrace and began lapping at the broad streak.

  ‘No!’ Huldar bellowed, but the dog didn’t even look round, so he had no choice but to fetch it. Taking the longest strides he could, he snatched up the animal, which was as light as thistledown, and carefully retraced his steps. There was no longer any question of what this meant. A
blood-stained trail. But humans weren’t the only creatures that bled. It was just possible that the owner of the house was a hunter.

  ‘What’s the husband’s number?’

  Gudlaugur read it out as Huldar, the dog clamped under one arm, tried it. From the tone of the ringing, it sounded as if the mobile phone was abroad. No one answered. He had no more luck when Gudlaugur supplied him with the numbers of the wife, daughter and son. The son’s phone immediately switched to a recorded message saying that it was either turned off or not reachable at the moment.

  Gudlaugur tapped Huldar’s shoulder. ‘What’s that in the window?’

  Huldar glanced up from his phone and peered at the large sheet of glass beside the sliding door. The low sun was shining directly on the window, making it hard to see what Gudlaugur was referring to. Then he spotted it. There was a piece of white paper stuck to the inside. He turned to the woman while trying to keep hold of the wriggling dog.

  ‘Are you sure you don’t have a key?’ he asked roughly and the woman shook her head, frightened. As if she expected to be arrested for having either forgotten or lost it, or simply not being trusted with one in the first place.

  ‘Take the dog.’ Huldar handed the shivering animal to Gudlaugur, in whose arms it immediately seemed happier. Then he went over to the window in as few strides as possible, stepping over the bloody trail on the way.

  Behind him Gudlaugur called: ‘Does it say anything?’

  ‘Yes. Well, the writing’s on the other side, but I can see it.’ Huldar shifted to prevent his shadow falling on the paper. As he did so, a shaft of sunlight illuminated it enough for him to see right through.

  Printed in a giant font on the paper was a number:

  3

  He took out his phone again and dialled Erla. This wasn’t the call he had envisaged making when they set off. Grim though the news was, he couldn’t help gloating a little at the trick fate had played on his boss.

  Chapter 17

  He’d forgotten to bring a torch so he had to use the one on his phone. Although it didn’t shed much light, he could see, with a sickening sense of shock, that the boy wasn’t quite dead. His skin was grey, like an old fish, and he stank to match. He was lying where he had landed, but then he was in no condition to move. At least one of his arms looked broken, his head was badly battered, one of his ankles was bust and so was his knee.

  Yet, in spite of all this, the boy wasn’t dead. It had been different with the girl. She’d given up the ghost more or less immediately, without causing him any trouble, her manner of dying so very different from the way she had lived.

  He knew he should put the boy out of his misery. One powerful blow to the head ought to do it, with something heavy like that fire extinguisher. But there was nothing suitable to hand. Maybe it was just as well, because at least it meant he wouldn’t have to get any closer to the boy and that nauseating smell which seemed to be some sort of harbinger of death. He could barely cope with it from a couple of metres away; God knows what it would be like if he was standing right over the body.

  The boy was lying on his back, staring upwards. Whether he could actually see or not was unclear, but there was no way he would be capable of finishing him off with a blow to the face. Not after seeing what it had done to the girl. A blow to the back of the head, now he reckoned he could manage that, but it would mean having to roll the kid over, which was unthinkable.

  It had to end soon. The kid couldn’t survive much longer in that state, on nothing but air. If he couldn’t bring himself to smother the boy or pull his clothes off and drag him outside into the freezing cold, it could take him three days to die. Or maybe a bit less, seeing how much blood he’d lost. His clothes were covered in stains, long since dried and no longer red.

  His senses screamed at him to get out of there. It wasn’t just his nose and eyes; the sporadic rattling from the boy’s throat tortured his ears as well. He couldn’t face touching anything in there and there was a horrible, iron taste on his tongue, which made him long to spit. But that was a complete no-no; he mustn’t risk leaving any biological traces behind.

  Another low rattle came from the boy on the floor. It was such a pitiful sound, like the murmurs of a newborn baby. Totally incongruous in this grim setting. For an instant he regretted the whole thing, asked himself why the hell he was in this position. Then he reminded himself fiercely that the boy had deserved it. But somewhere at the back of his mind, doubt sprang up: was it really true? He pushed the thought away: it would be utterly futile now to start thinking it had all been a mistake. A terrible, fatal mistake. It could never be undone. So there was nothing for it but to make the best of the situation. For now, that meant waiting. Which wasn’t that complicated, and demanded nothing of him.

  The boy emitted another rattle and his head rolled slowly sideways. His eyes closed briefly, then opened again, staring straight ahead. The stare was horribly uncomfortable. Thank God he’d brought the mask along as a precaution, in the unlikely event that the boy might be rescued. Though even if he could see, there was no guarantee that the image before his yellow eyes would be transmitted to his brain. Especially given the trauma he’d received to the head.

  He couldn’t have long left. He just couldn’t.

  The boy’s dry, cracked lips moved. What the hell? He’d come here to fetch his body, not to look him in the eye or hear him talk. The fact he could force out a word couldn’t be a good sign.

  What emerged was a weak puff of air, though you could make out sounds, different sounds, like words. Was it possible?

  There was only one thing for it: he would have to edge closer. What was the boy trying to say? Was he begging for mercy? For help? If so, he obviously had no memory of what had happened before he lost consciousness or he would have known that he could expect no mercy.

  The stink wasn’t that much worse close up. The boy seemed to sense the presence of another person. Staring blankly at the black mask, he went on whispering. But he was struggling to hold his yellow eyes open; the lids kept drooping, one of them swollen and purple.

  Thinking he could distinguish words, he bent closer, turning his ear towards the boy’s face. These might be the kid’s last words. Perhaps they would matter to his family.

  Or maybe the boy just wanted to beg for forgiveness. Hopefully he’d mean it this time. But it was too late.

  The boy raised his eyelids again, slowly, and kept struggling to speak. In an effort to hear, he bent closer until his mask almost touched the grey skin of the boy’s face. There were no breathing holes in the mask but even so he sensed it when the boy opened his mouth and began his breathy whispering again. The stench was like nothing on earth; the stench of mortality. But the voice faded before it could say anything and now the boy seemed to have come to the end of his strength.

  Then his eyes slid sideways, closed and didn’t move again. Straightening up, he looked down at him dispassionately. The boy’s chest was moving up and down in spasmodic jerks.

  Better leave him to it. Things were going the right way. He couldn’t have long left.

  Once he’d made up his mind, there was nothing to do but get out of there and lock the door. He’d come back later. Clearly, he wouldn’t have to worry about the boy calling for help or managing to attract any attention. He would be left to die in peace.

  The moment he was outside he tore off the mask and took great shuddering breaths, drinking in the clean, crisp night air. It was like ice-cold water when you were parched with thirst.

  Then, after warily scanning his surroundings, he headed back to the car.

  Chapter 18

  The quiet residential street had been transformed. Police officers, forensic technicians and the pathology team had congregated at the house, while dogs from the K9 unit had been brought in to search for the occupants’ son, who’d turned out to be missing. They drew a blank.

  The police made countless phone calls. Some were a waste of time, others led to further calls, and a couple
resulted in information that could be used to piece together what had happened. They had a time frame now. Or so Huldar gathered from the comments he overheard. The moment Erla had turned up with her retinue, she had sent Gudlaugur and Huldar packing, regardless of the fact they’d been first on the scene. Now she was back at the station too but in no mood to praise them. She had gone straight into her office and shut the door, without so much as a glance in their direction.

  Erla was on the phone in her glass cage when Huldar knocked. She pretended not to hear but he let himself in anyway. She seemed to be talking to either the father or the mother of the missing boy. When he tried to catch her eye, she avoided his gaze. Finally she ended the call by asking them to let her know when their flight was due in. She hung up and stared at the phone for a moment, perhaps trying to imagine what it was like to be stuck in another country while your child was missing, feared dead. Then her expression hardened and she looked up at Huldar. ‘What do you want?’

  ‘I thought I’d look in and see what jobs you have for me and Gudlaugur. We’re fed up with having bugger-all to do.’ This was no lie. They’d been kicking their heels ever since they’d got back to the station. ‘As far as I can see, there’s more than enough to go around. More than we can handle. So why aren’t any tasks coming our way? We know the background. We’ve done the least overtime of anyone, so it makes sense to use us. Or do I have to remind you that we’re good detectives?’

  Erla’s mouth twisted in a scowl. She had thrown him a fleeting glance when he started talking, then returned her gaze to the computer screen. Huldar didn’t doubt for a minute that there were any number of e-mails, reports and forms awaiting her attention as head of department, as well as all sorts of tasks linked to the current investigation. But it didn’t take a genius to see that she wasn’t actually reading them. Her eyes weren’t moving, her jaw was clenched and her cheekbones were unusually sharp. ‘I haven’t got round to it yet. You’ll just have to wait, like everyone else.’