seemed to know everything and see everything even though he was nowhere near. Naruana could only hope that Igimaq didn’t know what his son had done, how low he had stooped. Hope that he hadn’t seen him as he stood there, his hands stained with the blood of a prey no hunter would boast about.
His headache returned and his hand hurt even more than before.
Chapter 13
Thora watched as Matthew and Dr Finnbogi walked up to yet another house, knocked on the door and waited patiently for someone to answer. No house had looked more like a public building than the others, so they had had to resort to simply going door to door. There was no one out on the streets to ask for information. At first Thora had accompanied Matthew and Finnbogi, but when it seemed clear that their efforts would provide little or no result she decided instead to wait in the car and make an attempt to warm herself up. The humidity in the air as a result of the fog made it considerably colder. She was chilled to the bone and cursed herself for the stupidity of her packing as she sat there in her borrowed gloves and hat in the car’s back seat. She watched Matthew and Finnbogi fidget on the doorstep and make another attempt to get someone to answer. Then they knocked on the door so loudly that the noise carried all the way into the car. They waited a moment before moving on to the next house. A mist had started to form on the windows and Thora reached out over the seat to wipe it off, so that she could keep better track of the two men’s movements. When she leaned back in her seat again she gripped her chest with both hands and let out a low cry. Someone was standing right next to the car, staring at her.
She was an apparently young woman, although it was difficult to discern her age due to the fog on the window as well as her thick clothing. Her face was expressionless as she stared straight at Thora, who fought to regulate her heart rate. The woman stood that way for several seconds, and when Thora got sufficient hold of herself to roll down the window she continued to stand there like a statue. The only thing differentiating her from a shop-window mannequin was the occasional blink of her dark eyes. More than anything else Thora wanted her to leave, but if she drove the woman away Matthew and Finnbogi would kill her, after they’d trudged through the village from end to end in search of residents to speak to.
‘Good day,’ said Thora in Danish. ‘Can I help you?’ Her voice sounded shrill and she spoke unnecessarily loudly.
At first the woman just stared back at her, causing Thora to think that perhaps she did not speak Danish. Before Thora could give English a try the woman opened her mouth and spoke. What could be seen of her face suggested that she was young, between twenty and thirty. Her face was strong and her high cheekbones were further emphasized by the redness of her cheeks. Her eyes were dark and clear, but the yellowish tinge to their whites ruined her otherwise healthy appearance. ‘You shouldn’t be here,’ said the woman. A dull odour of alcohol was carried into the car on her breath, which formed thin white clouds in the cold air.
‘In the village?’ asked Thora. ‘We just wanted to ask a few questions. There are two men lost, and they might possibly have come here.’
‘You should go home,’ said the woman, still staring at Thora expressionlessly. ‘Back to your home. Wherever that is.’
‘We’re leaving soon.’ Thora wished that she understood what was going on. Now her Danish would really be put to the test. She started speaking and although her vocabulary was childish she hoped that the gist of what she wanted to say came across. ‘Are you opposed to the project or did the employees of the Icelandic company do something to you?’
The woman gave Thora an inquisitive look, not unlike the one Thora had just given her. ‘You’re staying in a bad place. No one should be there. Go home.’
‘How is it bad?’ Thora pressed the button to roll the window all the way down. She did this without thinking, as if it were the windowpane separating them that made her unable to understand what the woman was talking about.
‘Bad.’ The woman appeared impatient, showing a reaction at last. ‘You don’t need to understand why. Just believe me. Take your friends and leave and don’t come back.’
‘Why are you telling me this?’ Thora wondered whether this strange conversation would be any easier if she stepped out of the car and they stood side by side.
‘You’ll have to pay me for more information.’ The woman had become stony faced again. Thora did not know how she should answer. She had no money with her, apart from several hundred nearly worthless Icelandic kronur, which was probably fitting as she didn’t expect the information she was buying to be worth much. ‘I need to know more than that if I’m supposed to pay you.’ Hopefully Matthew or the doctor had some money with them. Matthew must have taken out some Danish currency, just in case. In most things he was the perfect opposite of Thora, who trusted more often than not in God and luck.
‘You won’t get anyone else to talk to you. The people here don’t want anything to do with you.’ The woman’s eyes narrowed and she appeared lost in thought. ‘It’s not a good time for me – otherwise I wouldn’t be talking to you. How much do I get for talking to you?’
‘That depends on what you can tell me.’ Thora hoped that Matthew and the doctor wouldn’t come rushing up and scare the woman away. She had something to say and Thora guessed that now she was trying to put a value on the information. ‘I’m mainly trying to find out about two men who disappeared from here recently.’
The woman exhaled, once again emitting a sour odour of alcohol. ‘I know which men you’re talking about.’
Thora tried to conceal the excitement that gripped her. Was it conceivable that the men were here in the village? ‘Have you met them recently?’ The woman shook her head energetically. ‘Did they come here after the others went home?’
‘One of them,’ replied the woman. ‘The fat one. He came alone.’
‘When was that and what did he want?’ After blurting this out, Thora went silent; she had to keep control of her questions even though others were springing to mind. Matthew and Finnbogi had the photo of the drillers, so she couldn’t ask the woman to point out the one she meant. If Thora remembered correctly, Bjarki was much bigger than Dori, but that was a moot point if only one of them had come to the village.
The woman shrugged, causing her light blue jacket to lift slightly. It was so thick and stiff that it took a moment for the garment to sink back to its place. Until it did, the woman looked neckless. ‘I don’t know exactly when he arrived. It was more than a week ago. Maybe two. He wanted to make a call.’
‘A call?’ Thora could not remember having read or heard of a phone call during the period the woman was talking about. The camp’s telephone connection had supposedly been cut off several days after the two drillers were left behind alone, and no one had mentioned that they’d made contact since then. ‘Do you know who he wanted to call?’
The woman looked with pursed lips at Thora. ‘You’re definitely going to pay me?’ Thora nodded and the woman continued, although the words seemed to come out reluctantly. ‘I don’t know. Probably the police or a doctor. He was looking for someone like that.’
‘And was he able to make a call?’ asked Thora, hoping that the answer would be yes. Maybe the men had been arrested and because of some red tape had been stuck in a Greenlandic prison without the knowledge of the Icelandic authorities. The arrest could even have been connected with the body they found in the ice.
‘No,’ replied the woman. ‘No one would let him in. He was very strange and I know it never crossed my mind to open my door. He would have been better off going home, as I tried to tell him through the door. He didn’t listen.’
‘How do you know that he didn’t go home?’
‘Well, he left when it became clear that he wouldn’t be able to use a phone, and he couldn’t have gone anywhere else other than back to the camp. The only clear way from here to other towns is by helicopter, and no one else came here between the time that the big group left and you arrived. There are no roads leading here, and the man didn’t have access to a boat, not that he would have been able to sail it through the ice anyway.’
‘What about a dogsled or a snowmobile?’ Thora hadn’t seen a snowmobile at the work site, though it was
