Black Ice

by Ian Giles

  “How much money is there then?” Jeanette asked with a jumble of emotions.

  “There must be a few million—three million is my best guess.”

  “Three million kronor?”

  “Or more.”

  “I don’t know . . . I just want to cry . . . It’s all so awful.”

  But Peter took her in his arms and held her tight, swaying back and forth a little as if she were a child being put down to sleep.

  “Let’s not do anything we’ll come to regret,” he whispered into her hair. “This chance won’t come round again.”

  And he was of course right. She realised that now. It felt good to be in it together now—and in it together in future. She didn’t want to hold him back, didn’t want to put a stop to their opportunity for a beautiful future.

  So she gave in. She dried her tears and brushed off all the twigs and bark and mud that she had only now noticed on her coat. For safety’s sake, she did a lap of the car to check that all hope for the man was gone—that the decision not to call the emergency services was correct. And it had to be. The man hadn’t moved an inch and his eyes were still shut, his mouth half-open. For reasons she couldn’t explain to herself, she got out her mobile and took a photo of what was visible of the wounded body through the side window. Then she returned to the boot, slung one of the bags over her shoulder and started climbing. She stopped further along the road and took a photo of the wreck diagonally from above. She noticed that Peter still hadn’t started climbing.

  “Peter, what are you doing?” she called out. “Hurry up before it gets too dark.”

  “I was wrong,” he shouted back. “There must be twice as much. Can you hear me? Six fucking million!”

  She waited for him. It didn’t take long—he caught up quickly and passed her. Once they were almost at the top, she took another photo of the wrecked car at the bottom—she didn’t know why. Perhaps it was out of respect for the deceased. Someone had to document the end of his life—everyone deserved an epitaph.

  AS THEY LEFT it had begun to snow heavily. Darkness fell quickly, and the snowflakes whirling in the headlights created a dramatic contrast to the safety and warmth of the car. After a long period of contemplative silence they approached the burning issue—the future.

  “What should we do with all the money?” Jeanette dared to ask.

  “House, car, yacht,” Peter said with a smile.

  “I mean right now,” said Jeanette. “Where should we put it?”

  “I’ll deal with that. It’ll be fine in the boot for now. Only I drive this car, and no one steals a car with a company logo on it. But I think I have an idea about where we can keep it for a while.”

  “Okay,” was all she said.

  Peter mostly kept his eyes on the road, but every now and then he looked at her with concern. Eventually, he took her hand.

  “Sweetheart,” he said softly. “Don’t let’s regret this. What’s done is done, and we did it for us. When we’re lying on our sun loungers in the Bahamas holding a drink with an umbrella in it, we’ll thank ourselves. Don’t ruin this.”

  “I’m not going to tell anyone about this, if that’s what you’re worried about,” said Jeanette. “I don’t want to go to prison.”

  “We’ve not committed any crime,” said Peter, emphasizing each word.

  At the same time, he held out his hand in a way that seemed to suggest that this wasn’t the first time he was explaining it.

  “We’ve stolen someone’s money,” Jeanette pointed out.

  “Yes, but whose? Some bank has lost a hell of a lot of money, but what does that matter? They’ll print more, for god’s sake. And it wasn’t us who robbed the bank.”

  Jeanette had a very strong feeling that they had committed another—far worse—sin too, but she let it lie. Primarily because she couldn’t bear to think about it, but also because she didn’t want to mar what tied them together properly. The thing that guaranteed that the future was actually theirs—together. So she capitulated.

  “You’re right,” she said, stroking the top of his hand with her other hand. “I shouldn’t be such a gloomy Gus.”

  “It was a traumatic event,” said Peter. “Let’s put this behind us and look forward instead. Okay?”

  “Let’s do that,” said Jeanette, squeezing his hand before letting it go.

  They drove for a while in silence, Jeanette looking straight ahead. She thought about the next time they would see each other—how would it feel? More intimate? More relaxed? More joyful?

  Or less?

  No, it couldn’t be like that—then everything they had gone through would have been for nothing. Everything hinged on Jeanette—this insight hit her. If she retreated into herself, like she had done at home when it had all gone wrong, this relationship would end before it had even begun—with or without the millions. She promised herself not to be so anxious, to keep up her spirits and think positive—just like Peter always did. The future was bright—how could she have thought otherwise?

  “I love you,” slipped out of her.

  “There it is!” said Peter, beaming like sunshine. “I’ve been waiting for so long!”

  Jeanette hoped he would respond. It took a while, but then it came.

  “Worried?” he said without looking away from the road.

  Jeanette didn’t answer, but she saw the playful look in his eyes and around his mouth and knew to expect more.

  “Just wanted to keep you on tenterhooks,” he eventually said with a smile. “I love you too—isn’t it obvious?”

  Then he caressed her cheek, running his fingers through her hair like a comb and gently pinching her neck before putting his hand back on the wheel.

  “This wasn’t much of a rendezvous,” he said. “But I think we’ll have to lie low for a while. You realise that?”

  Jeanette did. Not because it would really make much difference, but it felt like a sensible approach.

  “We’ll have to exchange coded messages at work,” she said with a smile.

  “Back slang?”

  “Morse code.”

  “Only until the dust has settled,” said Peter. “Two weeks or so.”

  “I think we can manage that.”

  “Really?”

  Jeanette sighed.

  “With great difficulty,” she admitted.

  “The same here. But a man’s gotta do what he’s gotta do.”

  This time he dropped her off a fair distance from work, in an area with apartments where neither of them had any connections. She would have to walk a couple of kilometres, but they couldn’t risk being seen together in case their respective absences were connected—something that was more important today than ever.

  They hugged for a long time, kissed briefly, and parted ways. Jeanette stood still watching the car drive off. Now she was alone with the memories of all the bad things that had happened, and it made it all the more frightening. She didn’t know how she would survive two long weeks without him.

  Little did she know that those weeks would become years.

  31

  Kerstin

  ONCE THEY HAD ended the call, she applied the finishing touches to the canapés. Champagne and fancy finger food weren’t normally part of her diet, but today she was making a splash. After years of waiting, here was her reward. The recompense for the heavy consequences of what had been both illegal and foolish acts for which Karl-Erik had been held accountable, all by himself.

  There had been four of them in on it: a series of robberies against small- and medium-sized branches of banks and post offices outside of the big cities. Karl-Erik had taken the fall, while the others had been acquitted. He had served eight years in a string of prisons, and Kerstin had been alone for the same period. She had moved to Gotland when he had gone inside. She wanted to leave the old life behind her, including the destructive company that came with it. Start afresh somewhere no one knew who she was—and Gotland was the optimal refuge.

  Two years a
go, Karl-Erik had been released, and since then they had lived in the countryside—far from the hubbub of Visby and the annual invasion of tourists. During those years, they had almost certainly been under police surveillance, but they had been patient and waited for the right opportunity. Out of the total spoils of around twelve million kronor, half was going to Karl-Erik as a consolation prize and to demonstrate his accomplices’ gratitude. The money had been laundered over the last ten years, so Karl-Erik had nothing to worry about, so long as he stayed on the straight and narrow and didn’t throw money around.

  Today was the day the money was coming home. When the dream of the horse farm was going to come true. Hence the grand celebrations.

  When an hour had elapsed since his call, she poured a glass of wine for herself. Everything was ready and laid out, the candles were lit and the whole house smelled of festivity. Surely it was only a matter of minutes by now, but it was good that he was driving carefully—the temperature was just below zero, it was pitch black out there, and the snow was coming down heavily. Kerstin paced back and forth beside the window, constantly throwing glances out to the driveway.

  Once she had finished her wine twenty minutes later, she really began to worry. She sent him a text message and called several times, but only got his voicemail. Had his mobile run out of charge without him noticing? Had he got a puncture, meaning that he was crouching in the cold and dark while changing a tire on the car? She put the tray of canapés in the fridge, sat down on the very edge of the sofa, and couldn’t decide what to do. Around an hour later she was still there in the same position, her hands entwined in a viselike grip and her thoughts flitting between various scenarios as she imagined the worst.

  No road was in that big a coverage black spot. No punctured tire took that long to change. He should have been in touch if nothing serious had happened.

  Had he had the police on his tail after all? Was it possible that after all this time they had eyes on Karl-Erik at every moment, that they’d known exactly where he was—and the loot for that matter—and they had pounced on him with his boot full of cash? On Gotland as well . . . Why not do it in Stockholm? Was that possible?

  Was it possible that his accomplices had taken him out? Perhaps they weren’t quite as loyal as they had pretended to be—had they overpowered him in a dark and desolate spot and taken his life? Or tied his hands behind his back and chucked him in the boot of the car? Which was tantamount to murder, given it was far from certain that anyone would actually find the abandoned car before daybreak—he would freeze to death during the night. Or had other criminals caught wind of the whole thing and done something like that themselves?

  The risk was there, of course. But murder . . .? The probability of this having happened—and so close to the end of the journey—was, in Kerstin’s view, almost nonexistent.

  They only had one car, so Kerstin had no prospect of heading out to search for him, which would have been a foolhardy act with no likelihood of success in any case. The most probable thing was that he had been in an accident in the awful weather and had been taken to hospital.

  Her heart pounding, she called the emergency room at Visby Hospital. The very fact that she had to do so felt dreadful, but the news that they hadn’t admitted any patients matching Karl-Erik’s description or with his name didn’t exactly offer her any degree of reassurance.

  Any sane person would naturally have called the police. Kerstin talked it over with herself, weighing the pros and cons against each other before eventually deciding that there was more to lose than there was to gain. Karl-Erik might have good cause to keep out of the way for a while—for Kerstin’s sake, if nothing else. What did she know about who or what he had come into contact with since their call? If she sent the police after him, it wouldn’t make anyone happier—on the contrary, it would ruin everything they had struggled so long to get.

  It wasn’t yet late enough for all traffic to be off the roads. Even if most people tried to remain indoors given the conditions, someone would have reported it by now if an accident had taken place. The police would already have been on the scene, and if Karl-Erik had been arrested on the basis of the contents of his boot, she would be informed soon enough.

  In summary, there was nothing Kerstin could do. She would just have to bide her time. Sooner or later, she would get an answer to all her questions. And no news was good news—wasn’t that the saying? At least, that’s what she told herself when she finally blew out all the candles and crept under the duvet to try and sleep.

  In the days that followed, her hopes of a happy ending fell to pieces. Kerstin felt absolutely dreadful, and couldn’t bring herself to do anything other than occasionally get on the bus to go somewhere along the route that Karl-Erik should have driven. Then she would take long, draining walks in the piercing wind without making any progress. She would spend her nights in a state of spiritual darkness that she had never come close to during her eight long years of waiting. Time came to a standstill; four days of uncertainty felt like more than had eight years with a defined end point.

  But eventually the sun came back, and with it a return to temperatures above zero that made the snow melt away. This was the explanation offered by the two police officers who knocked on her door one afternoon, faces grave and caps in hand, asking to come inside. They said that was why the badly smashed-up car hadn’t been spotted from the road until now.

  “The car was recovered from the ravine at Madvar,” the more talkative one of the duo said. “And it must have been completely covered in snow. Do you know where that is?”

  Kerstin did. Karl-Erik had almost been at Madvar when he had called, but she was in no state to say anything about that. She felt the blood draining from her face, and she allowed herself to be conducted—almost carried—to the living room sofa. When she had regained her senses somewhat, a small number of technicalities were presented that were intended to help her form a better understanding of the accident. Slippery, dark, snowfall, no other cars involved—all words and phrases that would in no way ease the processing of the trauma. Then the obvious questions that she couldn’t answer.

  “When were you expecting him back home?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Didn’t you talk to each other?”

  “Perhaps he wanted to surprise me.”

  “So you’re saying you have no idea whether he was supposed to come home last Thursday or today or sometime next week?”

  Kerstin shrugged her shoulders and shook her head—playing dumber than she was.

  “Why didn’t you report him missing?”

  “I didn’t know he was missing.”

  Kerstin continued to feed them unclear and strange answers that could easily be punctured with phone records in the event of any suspected irregularities. Which there didn’t seem to be, given that the wrecked car had been emptied of all personal possessions, which were now handed over to Kerstin in an emotionally wary manner.

  A wheeled cabin bag was put in front of her on the coffee table. Judging by their looks, she was expected to open it in front of them, but it contained nothing more exciting than clothes and toiletries. They were Karl-Erik’s things, which meant they were of significance to Kerstin. But not to the two police officers, who awaited her reactions while she rooted through the bag. She looked from one to the other, her eyes filled with tears, while they averted their gazes as they handed over some tools, a first aid kit, and a couple of CDs that had miraculously survived the accident.

  “That’s everything,” said one of them.

  They were completely absent of the vigilance that would have been present if there had been anything else found in the car—anything more interesting that Kerstin might have been aware of. She didn’t ask either—it was obvious that someone had got their hands on the cash before the police had arrived on the scene.

  IN FACT, BEFORE, the car had been blanketed in snow. That much became clear the next day. Accompanied by one of the officers who had come to
the house, she was shown the body.

  “I’d like to see the pictures you took at the scene of the accident,” Kerstin requested afterward.

  Despite the shocking news and the grief and the loss that had already firmly taken hold of her, she wanted to bring clarity to exactly what had happened. How Karl-Erik had spent his final moments on earth.

  “I don’t think that’s a very good idea,” the policeman said. “They’re very distressing photos.”

  “I understand that,” Kerstin said. “But I really need to see them—no matter how painful they may be. It’s a way for me to feel closure.”

  Reluctantly, he allowed himself to be persuaded into taking her to his office to show her the terrible photos from the scene of the accident, guiding her through the event that had turned her life upside down.

  It was then she found out that it hadn’t been a case of seconds but hours. The smashed face and the wound on the forehead were upsetting enough, but the shard of glass in his throat and its excruciating consequences were probably what hit her hardest. According to the doctor who had examined the body, it had probably been the direct cause of death. No autopsy had been carried out—and wouldn’t be—given there was really nothing to prove. Karl-Erik was dead. Sentenced to death from the very beginning since the accident was self-inflicted, since it had been dark and the snow had fallen so heavily that before long the car had been blanketed. The examination of the scene had uncovered that the accident had taken place just before or during the onset of the heavy snowfall, which had coincided with the fall of darkness. It had lasted all night—but no longer than that.

  In a few of the photos, the little suitcase was visible in the boot, covered in a thick layer of snow like the ground around it and the roof of the car. There was no sign of the holdalls, which must have been spirited away before the snowfall on Thursday night, rather than upon the discovery of the wreck on Monday.

  This was Kerstin’s own analysis, and it was not one that she sought to share with the accommodating policeman. The gist of it was, however, that someone had been close to Karl-Erik just before the snow began to fall—which meant immediately after the accident. Someone who had clearly grabbed the cash and left the scene without doing anything to save his life or shorten his protracted suffering.