The Killing Bay

by Chris Ould

  “Ja?” a voice said.

  “Er ta Rói?”

  “Ja. Hvør er tann?”

  “Tað er Jan Reyná,” I said, and dropped back into English because I couldn’t go further on my Faroese. “We spoke a couple of weeks ago, at your boat.”

  “Ja, I remember. What can I do for you, Inspector Reyná?”

  Using my rank made a point, but I wasn’t sure what it was. “I wondered if you had time to talk to me again. There are a couple of things I’d like to ask you about.”

  There was a short pause, then he said, “Sure, okay, go ahead.”

  “I’d rather meet up with you, if that’s okay.”

  The pause was longer this time. “Okay,” he said in the end. “You can come to my house. Do you want to know the address?”

  “Is it the one in the phonebook?”

  “Ja, it’s the same.”

  “Okay. What time would be best?”

  “Any time. I will be here.”

  * * *

  From Sandur, Hentze drove to Húsavík and then – after speaking to Sophie Krogh and handing over the evidence bags containing the red waterproof jacket and woollen hat – he made his way back to Skopun. He arrived at the ferry with about two minutes to spare but it was enough time to see two uniformed officers standing beside a silver Volvo in one of the parking bays by the ferry dock. Even at a distance, he saw from the licence plate that it was Erla Sivertsen’s missing car. Not missing any longer, then.

  Hentze debated for a second whether or not to forsake the ferry and take a look at the car instead, but he knew it would be best left for a forensic team, so he followed the loading foreman’s wave and drove across the ferry ramp and into the hold.

  Forty-five minutes later he arrived at the main incident room and took Dánjal Michelsen aside.

  “Is Remi around? He’s not in his office.”

  “In a meeting.” Dánjal raised his eyes skywards to indicate the fifth floor.

  “Did he say for how long?”

  “No, but he only went up about five minutes ago.”

  “Right. Thanks.”

  “Did you hear?” Dánjal asked. “They’ve found Erla Sivertsen’s car in the ferry car park at Skopun.”

  “Yeh, I saw it. Has anyone told the technical team?”

  Dánjal nodded. “They’ve said they’ll look at it as soon as they can.”

  “Okay. Anything else new?”

  “Well, there was one thing I wanted your opinion about. Have you time?”

  Hentze debated briefly. “Give me five minutes, then I’ll be back.”

  At his desk, Ári Niclasen was typing with alacrity, but he looked up when Hentze knocked and came in, closing the door behind him. “How are the technical team getting on?” Ári asked.

  “Better now it’s light,” Hentze said. “They’re searching the area inside the larger cordon. After that I think they’ll be finished – at Húsavík anyway.”

  “Okay, good.”

  “There’s something else,” Hentze said after a beat. “I think I may have found Erla Sivertsen’s coat and her hat. There’s nothing to identify them, but they match the description we have.”

  “Where were they?”

  “In a tackle shed at Sandur. Like I said, they’re not definitely hers, but I’ve bagged them up and given them to Sophie Krogh for analysis.”

  “Who uses the shed, do you know?”

  “Yeh, it’s Finn Sólsker’s. His baitman, Høgni Joensen, found the coat this morning. He wasn’t sure who it belonged to so he put it aside.”

  “Wait.” Ári held up a hand. “Finn Sólsker? Martha’s Finn? Is that who we’re talking about?”

  “Yeh,” Hentze said.

  Ári paused. “Right,” he said then. “I just wanted to be sure. Have you asked him about the coat and the hat?”

  Hentze shook his head. “No, he wasn’t there and I thought it was important to get them to Sophie so they could make the morning flight to Copenhagen with the rest of the samples.”

  He paused, momentarily debating whether to go on. But he’d started this now, so he said, “Also, I’ve already spoken to Finn about Erla. They’d been friends since school and went out together for a while, so I asked him when he last saw her, which he says was on Friday at the grind on Sandoy.”

  Ári took a moment to digest that. “So what are you saying?”

  “I’m saying that if the coat and hat do belong to Erla Sivertsen, then clearly we need to find out how they came to be in Finn’s shed. But I may not be the best person to do that.”

  “Because of your relationship with Finn?”

  Hentze nodded. “I think it’s possible that Finn may have seen Erla more than he wanted to admit – at least to me.”

  The trouble with vagueness, as Hentze well knew, was that while it avoided saying something specific, it did not rule out any other interpretation. And he could see that the interpretation Ári Niclasen had immediately made was the most obvious one. But at least he had the decency not to simply blurt it out, even if he did seem to savour the idea for slightly longer than was necessary.

  “Okay, I see,” Ari said eventually. “Well, in that case you could be right – I mean, that it might be better if someone else talks to Finn. Do you know where he is now?”

  “Either at home or at his boat, I should think,” Hentze said. “Høgni Joensen’s probably told him what happened by now.”

  “Do you think Joensen could be implicated as well?”

  “I’m not saying anyone’s implicated,” Hentze said, slightly more sharply than he intended. “Just that we don’t know how the coat got there.”

  “Yes, of course,” Ári said understandingly. Then he stood up. He seemed energised by the development. “Well, we’d better find Finn and ask him then. And don’t worry, I’ll deal with it, given that it’s… sensitive.”

  “I’m not sensitive about it,” Hentze said. “It just needs to be looked at.”

  “Yes, yeh, sure,” Ári nodded, as if agreeing to a shared euphemism. “But, as there’s a personal connection… you did the right thing.”

  “I’m glad you think so,” Hentze said. He should have waited for Remi Syderbø after all, he realised, but it was too late now.

  Back in the main incident room he got a coffee from one of the vacuum flasks by the window, then crossed to Dánjal’s desk. He was working on the timeline of Erla Sivertsen’s known movements: a tedious task of sifting and cross-matching information from statements.

  “So what did you want my opinion about?” Hentze asked when Dánjal stopped typing.

  Dánjal reached for a sheet of paper on the desk. “I was going through some of the background info in the statements,” he said. “Did you know Erla Sivertsen owned a flat in one of the blocks off Kirkjubøarvegur? In his statement her father says she let it out to a friend – a woman called Ruth Guttesen.”

  Hentze shook his head. “No, I didn’t know. Do you think it’s relevant?”

  “Well, I just wondered if you thought it was worth talking to the tenant – I mean, if she was a friend of Erla’s. Also, don’t you think it’s a bit odd that Erla stayed in a shared house if she had her own flat here?”

  Hentze shrugged. “Like you said, if it’s been let—”

  Ári appeared in the doorway with Sonja Holm. “We’ll be out for a while,” he announced. “If there are any developments, call me. Or go to Remi, of course.”

  With that Ári moved on again briskly and Hentze knew that he thought he’d got a hot lead now – and that he wanted to follow up on it before Remi got out of his meeting. He really should have waited, Hentze reflected gloomily.

  “Have you got the address of Erla’s flat?” he asked, turning back to Dánjal.

  “Yeh: Heimasta Horn 26, apartment 45.”

  Hentze put his coffee aside, hardly touched. “Okay, give this Ruth Guttesen a call and see if she’s in. If she is I’ll go and talk to her.”

  It would be better to go out and
do something than sit around waiting for Ári to return.

  16

  THE FIVE-STOREY APARTMENT BLOCKS ON HEIMASTA HORN had been built less than ten years ago, below the slope of Lítlafjall and overlooking Argir and across the sound to Nólsoy. They were of a modern, angular design but still had something of the traditional about them, with the appearance of wood cladding – although it was really dark metal – and high pitched roofs. They were upmarket and – as Hentze recalled – expensive.

  He left the car in one of the parking slots beneath the block at number 26 and went up in the lift to the fourth floor – one down from the penthouse level. There were five flats on the walkway corridor, all their doors painted yellow and evenly spaced. At the door marked with the number 45 he rang the bell.

  Ruth Guttesen was in her mid-thirties, Hentze guessed; a woman who presented confidently and with an open manner. She was a geologist, she told Hentze after inviting him in and asking if he would like coffee. She was currently working for a Norwegian oil company, she said, which meant she often spent up to a fortnight away in the North Sea, analysing data from the rigs. In fact, she was in the middle of packing and due to catch a flight to Bergen that afternoon, to start another ten-day shift, but that troubled her because she was afraid she would miss Erla’s funeral, although no one could tell her yet when it would be.

  The woman appeared genuinely dismayed by Erla’s death, but it was a quiet, reserved grief, for which Hentze was grateful. He didn’t feel much like navigating emotional outpourings.

  “Do you know how long Erla owned this apartment?” he asked when they were sitting at a glass-topped table. The view – even if this wasn’t the penthouse – would certainly be a good portion of the apartment’s value.

  “Yes, she bought it off-plan before it was even finished,” Ruth Guttesen said. “She used to say it was her pension. Then, when she started to work abroad more she decided to let it out. I was looking for somewhere to live at the time and so it worked out well all round.”

  “Can I ask how well you knew her?” Hentze said. “I mean, apart from being her tenant.”

  “Well, we used to be closer – I mean, before she left to do her photography. She was away most of the time for the last five years or so. But when she came back between jobs we’d usually get together if I wasn’t working myself. She usually stayed over, unless she went to Suðuroy to see her parents.”

  “You mean she stayed here?”

  “Yeh. There are two bedrooms, so it was no hassle – and she didn’t ask as much in rent as she could have, so…”

  Hentze considered that. “So had she stayed with you recently – I mean, while she’d been here working for AWCA?”

  “Yeh, a few times.”

  For a moment she looked as if she was going to say something more, but instead she sipped her coffee.

  “Would it be all right if I looked at the room she used?” Hentze asked.

  “Of course. It’s along there. The second door. I don’t think she left anything, though. Maybe just a toothbrush. The clothes in the wardrobe are mine.”

  The bedroom was a decent size with the same view of the town and sea as the living room. The furniture was modern, uncluttered, and the only personal touch was an original oil painting of a gannet on a cliff top. More out of form than because he expected to find anything, Hentze checked the drawers but came up empty. The room told him nothing.

  In the living room Ruth Guttesen had gone back to her laptop, but she closed it out of politeness when Hentze reappeared.

  “Thank you,” he said.

  She nodded. “Do you have any idea about what happened?”

  “It’s still an early stage of the investigation. At the moment we’re just trying to get a better picture of what Erla was like – what sort of person would you say she was? How would you sum her up in a sentence?”

  Ruth frowned in thought. “I don’t know if I could. She had guts, I would say. If she decided she was going to do something she didn’t let anything put her off. She’d stick at it until she’d achieved it. So maybe it would be better to say she was determined. She wasn’t afraid to set herself goals.”

  “Right,” Hentze said. “And you say she’d stayed here a few times since she came back in July?”

  “Yeh. I think when she wanted a bit of peace and quiet, you know? A bit of space away from the others.”

  “I understand. But in that case, couldn’t she simply have come to live here – or wouldn’t that have been convenient for you?”

  “No, it would have been fine with me,” Ruth said. “Half the time I’m not here anyway: there’s work, and my boyfriend lives in Norway. I told Erla that, but she said she needed to stay with the AWCA people. I suppose because she wanted to be on hand to take pictures if anything happened.”

  To Hentze the idea of choosing to share a house with half a dozen people, all younger and idealistic, instead of using a flat like this seemed strange. And nor, from what he could tell, had Erla Sivertsen been one of those people who continue to live like a student well after they have passed the age to reasonably do so. She appeared to have been a woman who was far more grown up than that. Which might also account for the occasional need for some peace and quiet.

  “Can you tell me if Erla was seeing anyone before she died?” he asked then. “Was she in a relationship of any kind, do you know?”

  For the first time Ruth hesitated before she answered, as if framing an acceptable response. “I think there might have been someone,” she said. “But I don’t know who he was.”

  “She didn’t talk to you about him?”

  Ruth shook her head. “No, she— I only suspected it from a couple of things she said, and because once I came back and thought there might have been a man in the apartment while I was away.”

  “And while Erla was here?”

  Ruth nodded.

  “What made you think that?”

  “Well, there was a smell of aftershave. I know that sounds silly, but I’ve always had a good nose for that sort of thing.” She shrugged. “And also there was the toilet seat.”

  “Left up?”

  “Yeh.”

  “But you didn’t ask Erla about any of this?”

  “No. I mean, it wasn’t my business. And besides…” She trailed off, as if unwilling to voice the final assumption.

  “Yes? Go on.”

  “Well, I thought, if she doesn’t want to tell me, maybe there’s a reason, you know? Like maybe she prefers to keep it quiet.”

  “Because he might be married?”

  “I thought it was possible,” Ruth acceded. “Something like that.”

  Hentze nodded. Asking leading questions wasn’t good practice and he’d only done it because he was pursuing his own personal agenda. Which was also a poor approach. What was it Jan Reyná said: If you don’t know enough for a theory, don’t make up a story instead?

  Hentze knew he was making up a story out of too few facts and too many suspicions, and he knew he should stop – at least, until he had more than just suspicion and worries.

  “Would you like another coffee?” Ruth asked, breaking his train of thought.

  Hentze shook his head. “No, thank you. There’s just one more thing I need to ask – was Erla anxious at all, the last time you saw her?”

  “No, I don’t think so. She was as normal.”

  “And you hadn’t noticed anything odd or suspicious in the last week or so – maybe someone looking for Erla at the door or on the phone?”

  “No, I don’t think so. Except… there was a man I didn’t know outside the flat about a week ago. A week last Saturday. I know it was then because I’d just come in on the last flight from Denmark. I’d sent a text to Erla to say I was coming – just so I wouldn’t surprise her if I arrived and she was here. She hadn’t replied, so I thought maybe she was busy.” A shrug. “Anyway, when I came from the lift with my bags there was a man coming along the balcony from the flat.”

  “This flat?
”

  “Yeh. It couldn’t have been any other because we’re at the end. So I said, ‘Can I help?’ but he just shook his head and said, ‘I’m on the wrong floor.’ Then he got to the lift and went down.”

  “He was Faroese?”

  “No, he spoke in Danish.”

  “Can you describe him?”

  “Not really. Suit and tie. A raincoat. He was about forty-five, I’d say, but I didn’t get a good look at him. I wasn’t really paying attention, except that I remember thinking as I got to the door, ‘Maybe that was Erla’s guy and she’ll be inside.’ That was why I remember it now. And because I’d thought he wasn’t her type.”

  “Oh?”

  “I mean he was just a bit drab-looking: a bit urban, you know? Erla preferred the outdoors kind of guy.”

  “Right,” Hentze said. “So would you recognise this urban man if you saw him again?”

  Ruth shook her head. “I don’t know. I don’t think so, not for sure. Sorry.”

  “No, it’s better to be honest about these things,” Hentze said. “And just to be clear: was Erla here when you let yourself in?”

  “No.”

  “Okay, well, thanks for your help, and for the coffee.” Hentze pushed back his chair. “I’ll let you get back to your packing. But just in case we do need to talk to you again, is there a number I can reach you on?”

  “Yes, sure.” She handed him a business card from a bag beside the table and Hentze took his leave.

  Outside the flat he looked along the walkway as far as the lift and saw that Ruth Guttesen had been right: if someone had come this far along the walkway the only reason would have been to call at her flat. Of course, that didn’t mean that the man she’d seen and who’d spoken Danish to her hadn’t simply been on the wrong floor, as he’d said.

  Something and nothing then? Maybe.

  The one thing Hentze took some comfort from was the fact that Ruth Guttesen’s description of the man appeared to rule out the possibility that he had been Finn Sólsker.