‘So you don’t know? What did he buy? Can you describe him to me?’
Mattila studied her with an amused expression. ‘You aren’t from the police, I’d have noticed that. You’re playing at detectives a little, aren’t you?’
‘I need to know who was asking about the sanatorium. It might be important. Please, tell me as a favour, if you remember him. Describe him to me.’
Mattila closed his eyes and frowned as if he was thinking carefully. ‘He looked a bit dishevelled, somehow. Like he was on the run. He had a scar on his face and a tattered old coat that looked like it was only being held together by all the patches on it.’
That sounded like the homeless man’s coat. But did he have a scar on his face? Jasmin tried to call the figure she’d seen last night to mind, but all she could really remember were his strange blue eyes.
Those eyes. Like they were reflecting the North Star itself – cold, piercing and emotionless. Had he been here, in the shop? Were the drifter who seemed to keep turning up around the island and the dead vagrant on the beach one and the same person?
‘And then he bought the book and left. That was the last I saw of him.’
‘The book? This book here? Larsen’s history?’
‘I had two copies in stock. He bought one, and you’re thinking about purchasing the other.’
‘That’s right,’ said Jasmin thoughtfully. ‘I am.’ She made her decision. ‘Yes, I’ll take it. And there’s another thing I’m going to do too. I’m going to talk to Larsen. It’s about time someone shed a little more light on all this.’
Jasmin spent the rest of the day with Paul and Bonnie. Only in the evening, once he’d fallen asleep and Bonnie had settled down at the foot of his bed, did she find time for her book.
It mentioned the sanatorium – there were even pictures of it – and after a quick search online she managed to find out where it was located too: on the western end of the island, near a small bay and next to a long line of jagged rocks where the land fell steeply away to the sea far below and it was impossible to get to the foot of the cliffs without breaking your neck. All that remained there now were the ruins of the sanatorium, a handful of houses and a hydroelectric plant. Johann Larsen lived a little further to the north in another remote spot – almost as remote as Gabriela Yrsen’s house.
How did all this fit together? Was there any connection?
Jasmin had put new batteries into the large torch and fetched a screwdriver from the toolbox, and both items were now lying ready on the coffee table.
Do you really want to do this? It might be dangerous to leave Paul here on his own, but you can’t take him with you either. Bonnie will stay with him. She’ll watch over him, and you’ll be as quick as you possibly can, won’t you?
Are you really sure?
She didn’t know the answer. All she had was a vague sense that she needed to bring light into the darkness, to achieve clarity at long last – and yet the feeling clashed so violently with her instinct not to leave Paul alone that it made her heart ache.
Forgive me, Paul, she thought. Forgive me for leaving you on your own for a while.
She went back into her son’s room once again and kissed him gently on the cheek, at which he sighed in his sleep and rolled onto his other side. Then she tiptoed back to the door. The torch and screwdriver disappeared into her coat pocket. She put on a brown woollen hat and pulled it down low over her face.
The drive back into the village was long, her headlights scarcely able to penetrate the darkness on the road. The rain had set in again and the radio was playing a song by a local band that Jasmin hadn’t heard before. Yet the music managed to calm her nerves. If the headlights of a Jeep suddenly appear in the rear-view mirror now, she thought, then everything will repeat itself.
Then you’ll scream.
Skårsteinen came into view, the buildings on the outskirts of the village dotted at random over the landscape like building blocks scattered by a child. Nobody was about, nobody saw her.
She turned off towards the harbour and followed the road until the grey building belonging to the fishing company came into view, along with the towering chimneys of the smokehouses and the white lorries with Bakke written in blue lettering on the sides. Jasmin parked the car a short distance from the road, got out and looked around. The area was deserted; there was nothing but darkness behind the windows of the old brick warehouse. A quiet rushing noise came from the sea as the waves crashed against the nearby quayside.
This is where they brought the body. And if he hasn’t been collected yet, he must still be here. He has to be. And you’re going to find him, look into his face one more time and figure out if he was really there on the night of your accident. If he has a scar like the bookseller mentioned. If the body in the warehouse is the drifter.
A chain-link fence blocked her way onto the premises, with a set of large crates labelled Parkov International stacked beside it. Jasmin looked around. There was still nobody else about.
Now or never.
Go through with it or turn back. Once you’re over the fence, it’ll be too late to change your mind.
Jasmin climbed onto the crates and reached for the fence, placing first one foot onto the wire, then the other. The mesh rattled and jingled; it was much noisier and more strenuous than she’d expected.
Somewhere in the distance, a dog started barking. The noise was loud, a warning call. It was on the alert.
Jasmin froze. Her heart was pounding; her hands shook as they gripped the fence. She felt her courage draining away, felt the wire cutting into her skin.
Up or down.
This decides everything.
You haven’t come all this way only to turn back now, she thought. Come on!
Jasmin roused herself, gathering all her courage, before climbing upwards and lowering herself down on the other side. Her feet landed on the concrete with a thud.
It was loud, far too loud, but she couldn’t do anything about it now. Under the light of the moon, Jasmin crouched down and crept forwards, keeping one hand on the grey wall of the fishery building so as not to lose her way. Ahead of her she saw the cooling units, humming quietly in the night, and to her right was a door. The coolant lines disappeared into the same building. This was the place she was looking for. With a bit of luck . . .
The door was locked. Jasmin took the screwdriver from her coat pocket and tried to insert it between the door and the frame, but it wasn’t as easy as it looked in the movies. However much she threw her weight behind it, the door didn’t budge an inch.
It’s no good. Turn back, drive home and forget this whole stupid idea. You’re trying to play at detectives, just like Veikko Mattila said, but you’re in way over your head.
Jasmin turned around, her shoulders sagging. Failure.
In the silvery moonlight, she caught the gleam of a window that had been left ajar.
As if the finger of fate were pointing towards it.
She and Jørgen had locked themselves out of their apartment in Oslo once. Jørgen had managed to get hold of a screwdriver and then, with a simple little trick, he’d managed to pop the kitchen window, which they’d left open like this one.
Jasmin had watched him do it and remembered.
Maybe you’ll get lucky. Maybe it’ll work here too. But before that . . . She looked around for another crate and found an empty one that was evidently waiting to be filled. It scraped quietly along the concrete as she braced herself against it and pushed it over to the wall, so she could climb on top and reach the open window.
After that, Jasmin got to work with her screwdriver. Jørgen had pushed down sharply in the spot where the window met the frame, then tugged on it and rattled it back and forth. Jasmin swore quietly when nothing happened after her first attempt.
Again.
It has to work.
The screwdriver slipped, but Jasmin composed herself and tried once more.
Stay calm. It must be doable somehow.
And eventually she managed it. The window gave way with a quiet jolt and swung wide open.
Jasmin tucked the screwdriver back into her coat pocket and reached through the opening. The brickwork surrounding the window offered her a handhold as she pulled herself up and clambered into the building.
You’ve done it.
On the other side, she hopped down quietly, dropping a few feet to the tiled floor. She found herself inside a kind of factory where the fish from the trawlers were processed. Long rows of gleaming stainless-steel tables lay spread out before her, along with a conveyor belt covered with large hooks for transporting heavy fish. There were knives stored in huge blocks, electric saws and drainage channels along the floor.
To her left, she saw a curtain of heavy plastic strips covering the entrance to a corridor. Jasmin pushed it aside and peered through the doorway. The gleam of her torch was the only thing penetrating the thick darkness. A gurgling noise came from one of the drains, and the air smelled of fish, blood and the acrid odour of cleaning agents.
The temperature started to drop.
You’re on the right track. She followed the coolant lines that wound their way along the ceiling far above her head like lifeless snakes, and they eventually led her to the refrigerators. Huge steel doors blocked her way, sealed shut with a locking system operated by a lever on each door. Jasmin passed her torch to her left hand and pulled the first of the levers downwards. The door unbolted itself with a quiet hiss and Jasmin hauled on the handle with all her strength until it stood open. Ice-cold air poured out in thick clouds of fog and she instantly started to shiver.
If you go in there and the door closes behind you then you’ll be a block of ice by the time everyone comes back in the morning.
No, she couldn’t risk it. Jasmin cast her eyes around for an object heavy enough to keep the door open, but she couldn’t see anything in the processing halls that she could easily move.
But inside the refrigerator . . .
One of those big boxes of fish might do.
Jasmin pulled up the hood of her coat and stepped inside, holding the door open with one arm and hauling one of the big red boxes off the shelf with the other. It fell to the floor with a bang and a clatter, and she managed to drag the container full of frozen fish towards her and position it in the doorway, where it blocked the door from closing.
Now for the important part.
Jasmin followed a route marked with yellow arrows that led deeper into the refrigerator. Amid the endless shelving that reached all the way up to the ice-encrusted ceiling, the clouds of icy fog and the frost-covered floor and windows, she found it difficult to keep her bearings. The inside of the vast refrigerator felt like a frozen labyrinth of death.
She peered to the left and right, but she couldn’t see anything anywhere that resembled a human corpse.
They were here, she thought, as the cold gradually robbed her of all rational thought. It ate away at her, making each breath more uncomfortable than the last, sinking deep beneath her clothes and into her body.
Henriksen had been here, Boeckermann too, and they’d had a van with them. This was the only place on the island where they could temporarily store a corpse before transporting it to the mainland.
It has to be here.
Jasmin walked a little further into the freezer and felt herself hunching forward with every step, as if her body were responding instinctively, struggling to protect her from the cold.
Jesus Christ, you need to get out of here. Whatever they’re storing in here, they’ve set the temperature far too low.
Jasmin was on the point of turning back when she saw it: an empty shelf with no red crates on it. No fish, not here. Instead, there was . . .
She could hardly believe her eyes. Was this a hallucination, conjured up by her brain as it slowly froze?
Don’t be absurd, she scolded herself. Take a closer look.
There, in the darkness, on one of the lower shelves, lay a large black body bag like the ones used by the police. You’ve seen those things before at the hospital. You’ve found him.
Now all she needed to do was open the bag and look at his face once more.
Jasmin reached for the zip.
Chapter 14
The headlights of the Jeep in the rear-view mirror were blindingly bright. Jasmin felt herself reach out with sweaty fingers to turn off the radio. She fumbled for her phone.
Someone’s following me.
Someone’s coming for me.
Those two thoughts pushed all others from her mind, but then the Jeep accelerated and overtook, speeding away until its tail lights – like the eyes of a snake – disappeared into the distance.
Jasmin lowered the window a little. Fresh, cold air blew into her face. It felt invigorating, exactly what she needed.
She put her foot down once more. Another few miles. You’re nearly home. As for Jørgen – he’ll understand. That you needed an evening to yourself, for once. That you wanted to clear your head.
And what he doesn’t know can’t hurt him, right?
Jasmin looked down at her phone and opened WhatsApp to send him a message, but there were no bars on the display. She was too deep in the forest to have any reception, too far from the nearest mobile phone mast.
When she looked up again, the dazzling headlights were back. She felt hypnotised, like a terrified deer, the seconds rushing onwards, as if there was no avoiding it, no way of escaping from the two tonnes of iron and steel hurtling towards her – until she yanked the wheel to one side with a scream.
Too far.
Too fast.
The car swerved out of control; there was a smell of burning rubber, a horrible stench and . . .
There he was.
His old moth-eaten coat covered in patches, his shoes worn, ready to fall apart as soon as he took another step. His eyes ice-blue, staring, reproachful.
Accusatory.
Jasmin heard the dull thud as her car hit the man – heard snapping and cracking, the shock absorbers screaming as the stranger disappeared – and then the bonnet was doused in blood and the windscreen shattered as the low-hanging branches of a pine tree smashed through the glass as if it was made of paper.
But this time there was more.
She remembered something. Another fragment emerged from the fog and re-entered the conscious part of her mind.
The Jeep pulled up nearby. She heard its tyres screeching to a halt on the wet asphalt. Jasmin felt blood flowing down her face, dripping onto her lips. It tasted of iron and copper and felt warm – hot, even.
The driver’s door of the Jeep swung open. She heard the sound of footsteps drawing nearer. Jasmin tried to turn her head towards the window, but a wave of agony flooded through her body. She couldn’t do it, her neck felt . . .
Please don’t let me die, don’t let me be paralysed, please no . . .
More and more blood flowed over her nose, her cheeks.
Somebody opened the door of her car.
A pain in the crook of her neck, like the prick of a needle.
As Jasmin lost consciousness, she thought she could see strange things playing out in front of her. A figure in a black raincoat, the hood drawn down low over their face, dragging an object along the ground. It was some kind of animal, with four hooves and thick fur.
Something like a deer.
The beep of the freezer’s temperature alarm roused Jasmin with a start and she gave a low cry. Her hand was still resting on the cold metal of the zip as if it were frozen to her skin, and she was staring into the face of a corpse.
Ice-blue eyes.
Lips eaten away.
But no scar on his cheek that she could see.
The body from the beach is the same man you saw on the night of your accident – but he isn’t the drifter with the scar on his face who you keep hearing about.
They’re two different people.
She zipped up the body bag and whirled around. The cold had seeped through
to her bones; her coat was filled with crystals of ice. She hurried to the door, afraid that somebody might shut the heavy steel colossus from the outside and lock her in.
When she reached the exit, she pushed the box she’d left in the doorway to one side and stepped out into the corridor.
She’d never been this cold before in her life. It was hard to breathe; her cheeks and lips were numb, as if she’d spent hours in there with the corpse, staring at its face.
Now you know what you wanted to find out.
It’s him.
You weren’t mistaken.
Jasmin searched for a way out, hurrying through the darkened corridors and the tiled processing halls, until she found a door a few minutes later that was only bolted from the inside. She pulled the bolt back, threw the door open and sprinted towards her car. And all the while, the same thoughts echoed through her mind on a loop: Someone made the body disappear and then brought it to Minsøy. Someone on this island means nothing but evil.
And you’re the only one who knows what’s really happening.
Jasmin got in her car and took several deep breaths. By the time she started the engine and turned the heating up, she’d managed to compose herself enough to be able to drive – to move her fingers and grip the wheel. She steered the car back onto the main road through Skårsteinen, heading out of the village and towards the south, as distant stars glimmered icy blue in the cold night sky above her.
You know there’s something going on here. You know that better than Henriksen, better than Boeckermann.
Only one person knows it as well as you.
The driver of the Jeep.
If he was acting alone.
Chapter 15
The house stood before her, dark and silent, as she steered the Volvo onto the drive. Rain had started falling again, wetting the grass and making it glitter under the headlights.
A nocturnal bird called softly as Jasmin walked over from her car to the front door. She could control the motion sensor with her phone, and she now opened the app to switch it off temporarily before entering the house.
Everything was quiet and cloaked in deep darkness.
Don't Wake Me Page 10
