It was as if her life had been brought to a full stop: she couldn’t look forward, couldn’t picture what tomorrow might bring. Her greatest need now was to talk to Pétur, but she couldn’t bring herself to call him. Not yet.
Eventually finding the will to move, she set off slowly round the corner of the building and kept walking in the direction of the sea. Although the sun had broken free of the clouds, she was met by a stiff breeze when she reached the coast road. She crossed it, heedless of the traffic, and took a seat on a bench, gazing out across the bay towards the panorama of mountains. She never tired of this view. All those summits she had conquered in her time: Esja, Skardsheidi, Akrafjall. The breathtaking beauty had a calming effect, soothing her, taking her back to some of her happiest moments. But it also brought back images of Elena washed up in the cove. The sea giveth and the sea taketh away.
Once again, Hulda felt the crushing weight of her loneliness.
She had so much on her conscience.
Her thoughts returned to Elena. Could she be the key? The way by which she could earn a kind of absolution? Restore her honour, to some degree? Could she salvage something from the wreckage of her life by solving this case? If nothing else, to feel more reconciled to herself?
The restless waters of Faxaflói bay supplied no answers, but perhaps they brought a tiny glint of hope. She had assured Magnús she was abandoning her inquiry, but what were the chances of his finding out if she continued working on it for the rest of the day? Made full use of her last few hours on the job? There were two leads she still had to follow up. Who would it hurt if she went ahead? It would mean having to lie, pretend she was still in the police, but it was unlikely anyone would question the fact.
Yes, she had to do it. Just for today. It was her last chance. It would provide the necessary distraction until she could summon up the courage to face Pétur this evening.
XV
‘No one can hear you,’ he said, laughing as he wrestled with her long johns, trying to pull them down.
It was then that she acquired an extra burst of strength from somewhere, in spite of the numbing cold, and managed to shove him away so hard that he fell off the bed on to the floor.
She leapt out of the bunk, blind in the gloom, aware that her only chance was to get out of the hut and run away into the snow, find somewhere to hide in the vast, empty landscape. As unrealistic as the idea was, she had to try. In that instant, she spotted the faint gleam of the ice axe that he had untied from her rucksack and placed by the door.
By some miracle, she managed to reach it first.
XVI
Hulda knocked on Albert’s door. She was hoping to speak to his brother and find out whether he had taken Elena for a drive somewhere in a four-by-four. To her surprise, the lawyer answered the door himself, though it was not yet four in the afternoon.
‘Hulda?’ he said, a little taken aback.
‘Albert, I just knocked on the off-chance …’
‘Right, right, I came home early for once, as there wasn’t much on.’ He seemed embarrassed and a little shifty, as if business might not be going that well. ‘Didn’t you get the papers? Baldur told me you dropped by yesterday evening to pick them up.’
‘Oh, yes, I’ve got them. But they’re all in Russian, so I haven’t been able to glean anything from them yet.’
‘Yes, I thought they were, but, you never know, there might be something useful in there. Let’s hope you can get justice for the poor woman. She was my client, after all.’
‘Actually, I was hoping to have another quick word with your brother.’
‘With my brother?’ Evidently, this was the last thing Albert was expecting to hear.
‘Yes … He, um, there was something he happened to mention yesterday,’ she lied clumsily, cursing herself for not having come up with a better excuse, but then she hadn’t been expecting to run into Albert, ‘that I just wanted him to clarify.’
‘What on earth has he been telling you? Something to do with Elena?’
‘No, well, yes, not directly. It’s a bit hard to explain.’
‘To do with me, then?’ Albert’s voice sharpened.
‘What? Of course not, nothing like that. Is he in?’
‘No, he isn’t. He managed to pick up a house-painting job today, so he won’t be home for a while yet.’
‘Could you ask him to give me a ring when he does get in?’
Albert appeared unsure how to react to this request, but eventually said: ‘Yes, yes, of course. I’ll do that. I’ll call you at the station.’
‘No, call the mobile, you’ve got my number,’ Hulda said hurriedly, and smiled.
Albert briefly returned her smile then quickly closed the door.
XVII
Since access to the services of an official police translator was now denied to her, the obvious answer was to see if Bjartur could help. Hulda got back in her car and headed out to the interpreter’s place in the west of town. It would be her final port of call, unless something significant turned up in the papers. While part of her clung to this hope, the realization was growing that she would be grateful to let it go and have a rest at last.
Her phone rang and she pulled over to answer. It was Magnús again.
‘Hulda,’ he said, sounding grave.
‘Yes.’ She braced herself.
‘I didn’t want to burden you with anything else today but there’s something I forgot to mention: they arrested Áki this morning.’
‘Really?’ Her spirits rose a little. ‘For running a
