by Chris Ould
I wasn’t the only one watching from the crash barrier, and about twenty yards away a knot of people let out a cheer when they saw the kayak capsize. It wasn’t over yet, though, because the Lynx moved down the line of kayaks, tipping them each in turn until all but one of their occupants was out of their boat and clinging to it.
Job done, the helicopter gained height again and swung round, as if to reassess the situation below. And by now the naval pursuit boats were also winning. One Alliance boat had been pinned against a rocky shore and the other was being chased out into open water as a grey frigate appeared from the north.
And even after all this the whales and the fishing boats behind them were still heading for shore, not much more than three hundred yards distant by now. Because of the slope of the land I couldn’t see who or what was waiting for them on the beach, but after Sandoy I had a pretty good idea and I didn’t feel compelled to see it again. Instead I put up my collar and walked back to the car.
32
AS HENTZE PULLED INTO THE YARD AT THE BACK OF THE station two of the blue vans sent over from Denmark were heading out in a hurry. There were three of these vans altogether, provided for the transport of prisoners if – as had been predicted – the Alliance protests resulted in mass arrests. So far the vans hadn’t been needed, but with this second grindadráp less than a week after the first, someone had obviously decided to make a show of strength.
A second whale drive was bad luck, to Hentze’s way of thinking. If nothing else it served as a distraction from other police work, and it was hardly going to make Alliance witnesses feel more willing to come forward to talk about Erla Sivertsen’s death.
Inside the station there was more activity than normal and Hentze climbed the stairs with Hans Lassen, who was hurrying between the ground floor and fourth.
“We’ve got five or six Alliance people under arrest at the moment,” Lassen told him, taking the steps two at a time. “There’ll be more, though. The navy are still fishing them out of the sea.”
“The navy?”
“Yeh. The Alliance used boats this time: a couple of inflatables and others in kayaks. Those are the ones who ended up tipped in the water.”
“Was anyone hurt?”
“None of ours,” Lassen said, as if that was all that mattered. “And we’re seizing the kayaks and boats as evidence. At least that’ll stop them being used again for a bit.”
Lassen went on up the stairs as Hentze headed into CID and the incident room. Only Dánjal Michelsen was there: as a SWAT-trained officer, Sonja had been called out as soon as the grind was announced, and there was no sign of Ári either. He was definitely not SWAT-trained.
“How did it go with Høgni Joensen?” Hentze asked when Dánjal looked up from his computer. “Did you bring him in?”
“Yeh,” Dánjal said. “He had an alibi for Saturday night, though, so we let him go.”
“Right.” Hentze wasn’t particularly surprised. “So where’s Ári now?”
“Gone to a Response Team meeting for the grind. Listen, have you got a minute?”
“Sure. What’s up?”
Dánjal glanced round, then stood up and gestured towards the corridor. “Okay if we go to your office?”
“All right, if you like.”
Once inside Hentze’s office Dánjal closed the door as Hentze sat down at the desk.
“So what’s up?” Hentze said again. It wasn’t like Dánjal to be so covert.
“I think you should know, I pulled a fast one on Ári,” Dánjal said.
“What sort of fast one?”
Dánjal gave Hentze a brief précis of Høgni Joensen’s alibi for Saturday night and the reason why he hadn’t wanted to admit where he was.
“I wouldn’t have guessed,” Hentze said with a thoughtful nod. “Still, at least the alibi takes him out of the equation.”
Dánjal nodded. “I just thought you should know – I mean, that I didn’t tell Ári the full story. I didn’t think he needed to know that Høgni’s gay, but just in case it comes back later for some reason I thought you should be in the picture.”
“I can’t see why it would come back,” Hentze said. “But okay – is that it?”
Dánjal shook his head. “Actually, no.” He paused, then straightened up. “I think Ári went too far when he was questioning Høgni. I mean, he had him crying, for God’s sake. And I think he enjoyed it. It was like a power trip, to see how brutal he could be. Christ knows what he’d have said if he’d known about Høgni’s sexual orientation. The guy would probably have ended up weeping under the table.”
He broke off for a moment, as if he realised he might have gone too far, and then his tone became slightly more conciliatory. “Listen, I know Ári wants— I know we need to move the case forward, and okay, Høgni didn’t help himself by lying. But there are ways and there are ways of doing these things, right? You can’t just tear someone apart simply because you think they might have done something – at least, not unless you’ve got more than your own half-baked suspicion to go on.”
Hentze considered that thoughtfully for a moment, then said, “No, of course not. But I’m sure Ári handled it the way he thought was right.”
“Hjalti, come on,” Dánjal said, reanimated by the political answer. “You know what I’m talking about. You out of everyone. Ári was trying to bully Høgni into confessing. That’s the long and short of it and I don’t think it’s right. In fact I think someone needs to speak up about it – to Remi, at least.”
This was more than Hentze had expected and now he leaned forward, shaking his head. “Listen,” he said evenly. “I understand what you’re saying, okay? And yes, if Ári acted the way you say, he went too far. But if you go to Remi about it – if you make it official – you’re going to set a boulder rolling down the hill and there’ll be no stopping it.”
“Yeh, well, maybe that’s what’s needed.”
“You think Ári would be squashed?” Hentze shook his head. “He’s too quick on his feet. Was there a recording of the interview?”
“Yeh, on Ári’s phone.”
“Were there any other people present – a lawyer?”
“No.”
“Has Høgni made a complaint?”
“No, but—”
“So, where does that leave you? What do you think Ári will say when – if – Remi calls him to explain? He’ll say he conducted the interview with vigour, but nothing more. And because it went nowhere he deleted the recording. He will also say that you were being oversensitive, that you misinterpreted his line of questioning, and – when he finds out – that you deliberately failed to report the full facts of Høgni’s alibi.”
Dánjal shook his head, but Hentze could see that he knew all these things to be true. You only had to know Ári to know that. “It’s bullshit,” Dánjal said, deflated.
“Yeh, I agree,” Hentze said. “But that’s how it is.” Then, relenting a little, he said, “Listen, leave it to older heads, okay? You’re still too far away from your pension. Let’s just get through this case and after that, when we see how it’s gone… Well, like I said, there are older heads who can consider everything as a whole. You understand?”
Dánjal was still clearly reluctant, but in the end he nodded. “Okay, if you say so,” he said.
“I do.”
When Dánjal had gone Hentze turned his chair to the small window. Nothing but sky to be seen, which was fine.
Damn it.
He’d been able to keep his own reservations about Ári in check – more or less – but if the others like Dánjal were starting to see cracks, too… It didn’t bode well. Ári Niclasen wasn’t stupid and he could be subtly vindictive if he got a sniff of dissent or personal criticism from those on his team. Fortunately things rarely got that far, but in the past it hadn’t been unknown for certain CID officers to gradually lose their positive assessments and find themselves taking uniform shirts out of the wardrobe again.
And still… And still�
� There was something else. Not just Ári’s desperation to find a viable suspect – that could be taken as normal – but the fact that Remi had not reined him in, not even a little. It was almost as if Ári’s activities were being allowed to serve as a distraction, a smoke screen, hiding… What?
There was a knock on the door. Oddur Arge was looking pleased with himself and Hentze’s heart sank. Now what?
“I think I’ve identified one of the meeting places,” Oddur said before he was fully inside. “It’s ‘Q’ in the codes. Both times it was used Erla took photographs at Hoyvík near the time of the rendezvous.”
“Do the pictures show anyone we could identify or talk to?”
“No, just the museum buildings in the first group and some of the cove in the second. But it does prove we were right.”
Hentze noted the “we” with some reluctance. “What about the other locations – the other code letters, if that’s what they are.”
Oddur shook his head. “No, there was nothing. If she took pictures at those meetings she didn’t keep them.”
“So we’re not much better off,” Hentze said.
“No, only a little,” Oddur acknowledged. “But while I was thinking about all this I wondered if we’d overlooked something obvious, so I called a friend of mine in Copenhagen – Ulrik. He works in the intelligence branch so I asked if they – the Danes – had a file on Erla – you know, because she worked for the Alliance.”
“And?” Hentze asked.
“No, nothing.” Oddur shook his head, but didn’t seem downhearted.
“Nothing at all?”
“Well, not that Ulrik could find. There are files on some of the other AWCA staff members – above Ulrik’s clearance, unfortunately – but that’s the point, isn’t it? You’d expect there to be something on Erla, too. So, the fact that there’s nothing could very well mean that her file’s been removed or restricted to protect a covert operation.”
It was more than apparent that Oddur had completely bought into the idea that they’d uncovered some kind of conspiracy, but on top of everything else it was a step further than Hentze was willing to take. Yes, he still felt there was something amiss, but he also believed in grounded police work: building a case from the facts, not the other way round.
“So, what do you think we should do next?” Oddur asked, his expression expectant. “Should we take it to Ári or Remi?”
Hentze appeared to give that some serious consideration. “It’s good work so far, and that could be the next step, but without anything more specific maybe we should give it more thought. Overnight. If we shout out too soon, well, it might be too easy to dismiss. You know what the others can be like, eh?”
Oddur did know. “Yeh, yeh, you’re right,” he told Hentze. “We need something else to make up the rule of three.”
“Rule of three?”
“Yeh. You know: once is accident; twice is coincidence, but three times is enemy action. It’s James Bond. Goldfinger.”
“Oh, right, of course,” Hentze said without any irony. “Well, let’s see if we can find a third then, okay?”
“Okay, sure,” Oddur said, showing no sign of dampened enthusiasm. “I’ll get on it.”
James Bond. God help him. Hentze shook his head as Oddur went out.
33
HENTZE DECLINED WHEN I OFFERED HIM A BEER. IT WAS GONE six o’clock – my own, fairly flexible sun-and-the-yardarm point in the day – but I wasn’t surprised when he said no. Still, I thought I sensed a bit of regret when he accepted coffee instead, standing in the kitchen as I made it. He had something on his mind, but wasn’t ready to share it just yet. In its place he said, “So, how has your day been? Did you go to see Múli?”
“Yeah, it was interesting,” I said, spooning Nescafé. “Not as rundown as I’d thought. I also found the guy who owns the houses there: a man called Boas Justesen. He wasn’t much help, though.”
“So a dead end?”
“More or less. What about you? I saw the grindadráp at Norðragøta on my way back. It looked like the Alliance pulled out all the stops.”
Hentze nodded. “They were able to get their boats there this time. It’s unfortunate.”
“Why?”
“Because when we have the navy and helicopters chasing around it makes us look bad: like we use a big hammer on a small nut.”
Which wasn’t Hentze’s style, I knew that.
“Were there many arrests?”
“Yeh, quite a few and some whales escaped, so now there are some people saying the Alliance should pay compensation.”
“Do you think they will?”
“I don’t think so, but their boats have been taken as evidence, so maybe it goes to the courts to decide. I don’t know. Takk.” He accepted his coffee, like punctuation putting an end to the subject.
“I want to ask your opinion about the Erla Sivertsen case,” he said then. “Your thoughts. Do you mind?”
“Not if it’s useful,” I said. “Come through and sit down.”
He followed me to the sitting room and we sat in the chairs by the French windows. Too grey and cold to go outside, but an interesting sky thick with cloud, which I watched while he told me the bones of the case.
It took him about ten minutes – sometimes going back over a detail when I queried it – but by and large he left out any chunks of extraneous detail, giving me the impression that he’d already been paring away at the whole thing for some time. What he wanted – as much as to tell me – was to clear his own line of sight, so he could see the wood for the trees.
By the end of it I knew there was only one real question to ask. “Do you think Finn killed her?” I said.
“No.” He was definite on that. “An affair with her, yes, that’s possible. I don’t like to think so, but…” He shrugged helplessly. “But I don’t think he killed her.”
“Why not?”
“Because if he had I don’t believe he would have left her body like that. That’s what I don’t think is right with all this.”
“Because it was staged – the body was arranged to make it look as if something else had happened?”
“Yes.” Then he shook his head in frustration. “But I don’t see what it achieves, to do that. Anyone who is intelligent enough to think about what they are doing, they must also know that there will be tests made. We will find out how she died, we will know if there was a rape, and that the knife stabbing is done after she’s dead. So what was the point of trying to deceive us?”
“Maybe you’ve got a psychopath on the loose,” I said, deadpan.
“Are you serious?” A deepening frown crossed his forehead.
I’d been trying to lighten the mood, but it was misjudged. “No, I’m not serious,” I said. “I don’t think a psychopath’s very likely. Statistically you’d be very unlucky if it was.”
“Good then,” he said with a touch of relief. “So, why would someone want to confuse us? No, that’s a stupid question. Why not make things harder for us? He doesn’t want to be discovered.”
“So why leave her body there, then?” I said, batting it back. “That’s the most obvious question. If he doesn’t want to be discovered, why take all that time and trouble when he could have put her in the sea? If he’d done that there was a chance that she wouldn’t be found, but not by leaving her the way he did.”
“So it’s done on purpose.”
“Or in blind panic. But then…”
“The killer would not have arranged her body.”
“No, I wouldn’t think so.”
I stood up, just for want of something to do, and also to think. “What about the people at the house where she was living?” I asked. “And other members of AWCA? You didn’t get anything from them?”
“No. They all have alibis for Saturday night.”
“That’s convenient.”
“Yeh.” He nodded, but I could tell his thoughts had moved on. He shifted and took a piece of paper from his pocket, unfolded it
and held it out.
“What do you think this means?” he asked.
It was a tabulated list: five letters each followed by four numbers. I shook my head. “Are they flight numbers? Times?”
“Times, yes. Each one is a text message sent by Erla Sivertsen to the same phone number. We think – Oddur thinks – they are times for meetings at arranged places.”
I looked at the list again. “Any idea where the places are?”
“Only one. Oddur thinks ‘Q’ is Hoyvík.”
“And the messages were on Erla’s phone?”
“No, on a SIM card. It was hidden in her car, so I think it must have been hers.” He seemed to debate for a second, not sure if he liked what he was thinking of saying. “Oddur has a theory that Erla was an undercover person to watch the Alliance.”
“Working for who?”
“If you believe it, then not for us, I’m sure about that. Maybe the Danes. There are some Danish officers here and there is a saying – a what do you call it – a proverb? ‘If one Dane comes into a room more Danes will probably follow.’”
“If I was playing devil’s advocate I’d ask why anyone would want to put an informant in with the Alliance,” I said. “I mean, they’re not exactly secretive about what they’re doing, are they?”
“No, that’s true. I’m not saying I believe Oddur’s theory.”
“But you’ve tried to check it out?”
“Yeh. As far as I can tell there’s no sign that Erla Sivertsen has ever worked with the police and she has no criminal record. Of course, Oddur says that if she was undercover, the people she worked for would make sure there was no way to find out, but anyway I don’t see how it is possible. She joined AWCA more than a year ago, before they had any plans to come here to protest.”
I could see why he didn’t think it was a likely theory but I stayed with the devil’s advocate role. “Even so, if she was undercover or some kind of informant it could give you a motive for her murder – if someone in the Alliance found out what she was doing.”
