The Girl without Skin

by Mads Peder Nordbo

  64

  Matthew woke to a fierce pain shooting through his body from the right side of his ribs.

  Ulrik was bent over him, staring into his eyes. ‘I’m going to beat you to a pulp,’ he snarled as he drew back his clenched fist.

  ‘Ulrik,’ a voice interrupted him. ‘I know why you’re here.’

  ‘Shut up, you old fool,’ Ulrik hissed.

  ‘But you’re wrong,’ Jakob continued from his armchair. ‘I investigated your family’s murder from a distance, based on all the evidence I could find, and I’m absolutely sure that your sister didn’t kill your mother or your sisters.’

  ‘That’s it—I’m going to bloody well kill you first,’ Ulrik bellowed, getting up from the floor. ‘Don’t you dare say another word about my mother, you bastard! Do you understand?’

  He reached Jakob in seconds and pulled the hood from the old man’s head, revealing his white hair and pale, wrinkled face. The old man’s ice-blue eyes bored into the young Inuit’s boiling brown void, even as Ulrik gripped Jakob’s throat.

  ‘What the hell?’ Ulrik was suddenly taken aback. ‘You…You… How would you…’

  ‘Tupaarnaq never killed your family,’ Jakob continued in a wobbly voice as Ulrik’s hand was still clamped around his soft neck. ‘Your father shot your mother and your two sisters. Then Tupaarnaq came home and presumed that her father had been caught raping her sisters, just like he had raped her. And perhaps that was what had happened—I don’t know. So she cut open your father like he had cut her open. Do you understand what I’m saying?’

  He continued to fix the horrified young man with his eyes. ‘Everyone assumed that Tupaarnaq had shot her mother and her sisters first. No one ever suspected your father of having raped them, because Tupaarnaq dressed your sisters before the police arrived. She didn’t want them to be found naked. That explained why their blood was on her hands and arms. She dressed them after your father had killed them. Do you follow?’

  Ulrik’s grip tightened around Jakob’s neck so that his fingernails dug into Jakob’s skin. Something inside crunched.

  ‘The case was a no-brainer,’ Ulrik sneered. His mouth distorted and his nostrils flared. ‘They were dead, and that…that fucking cunt was covered in everyone’s blood…She was sitting on the floor, clutching an ulo, right next to my dad, who had been gutted…Fuck. Gutted. Like a seal.’

  ‘That killing represented years of hatred and pain,’ Jakob said hoarsely, still not taking his eyes off Ulrik for a second. ‘Many hours of being pressed against the bed. But the killing wasn’t prompted by her own violation. It was because your father had done to your two little sisters what he had done to her, and afterwards he had killed both them and your mother.’

  The hand around Jakob’s neck loosened and slipped away.

  ‘Are you so blind, Ulrik, that you can’t see the truth? Even when its blood is dripping from your own hands?’

  Ulrik slumped back.

  ‘Your father killed your mother and your sisters when he discovered that he wasn’t your real father. I think he went berserk and killed them in a rage when your mother revealed that his only son wasn’t his.’

  ‘Now you’re just guessing, you son of a bitch,’ Ulrik said, straightening up. ‘This is bullshit. Are you out of your mind?’ He pressed his lips into two thin lines, while he stared at his clenched fists and a growl rose from deep within his throat.

  ‘Look in the mirror,’ Jakob continued calmly. ‘Neither of your parents had so narrow a face or was as tall as you.’

  ‘Shut up!’ Saliva frothed around Ulrik’s mouth as he raised his arm, preparing to deliver a blow. ‘Fucking shut up!’

  ‘Do you remember,’ Jakob continued, still calm, ‘that they were dressed? Your sisters. When they were found. Do you remember that there were no bullet holes in the clothing, even though they had been shot with a rifle right through their chests? Why would Tupaarnaq have taken off their clothes, shot them and then dressed them again? Can you tell me that?’

  Matthew’s mobile rang in his trouser pocket. He turned his attention to Paneeraq on the sofa. Her expression was distant and her cheeks streaked with tears. She was rocking back and forth, and staring at the white candles with Jesus and the Virgin Mary.

  His mobile rang again.

  ‘No one ever questioned that,’ Jakob’s voice continued. ‘But for me that has always been the key to Tupaarnaq’s innocence. Your sisters were killed naked, but found dressed. That is a fact. Your father raped your sisters. Your mother found out and told him, out of rage and impotence, that he wasn’t your real father. Your father lost his temper and killed them all. She took his son, he took her daughters.’

  Ulrik stepped back and stared frantically out into the yard below, while he wiped his palms hard on his shirt. ‘It’s too late!’

  Matthew watched Ulrik before turning to look at the others in the room. ‘Paneeraq,’ he whispered towards the sofa. ‘Paneeraq?’

  There was no reaction from the curled-up figure, who continued rocking back and forth.

  ‘Paneeraq?’ he said again. ‘Where’s Tupaarnaq?’

  ‘It was you who killed Aqqalu out on the ice cap, ilaa?’ Jakob went on. ‘They thought I was the mummy, didn’t they? Abelsen and Lyberth? You were supposed to get rid of my body, but something went wrong, ilaa?’

  The mobile buzzed again in Matthew’s pocket. Refusing to be ignored.

  Ulrik turned and glanced at Matthew. ‘Shit…Lyberth told me that the guy on the ice cap wasn’t an old mummy, and that I had to make sure that the body was never sent off for any tests.’ Ulrik pounded his forehead with his fists. ‘It can ruin everything and cause even greater division in Greenland, he said. Our careers are at stake…I was meant to get rid of it. The body and the pictures and everything.’ He looked up. ‘I didn’t know they were covering up a murder…I didn’t know.’

  Jakob took a deep breath and exhaled. ‘I know. What about Aqqalu?’

  ‘Aqqalu,’ Ulrik groaned. His face was smeared with snot, and he kept wiping it with his hands. ‘Fuck…He…he wouldn’t let me take the body, even though I explained to him that it was essential for Greenland’s future. He didn’t want to…Bloody idiot…He banged his head on one of those crates with an iron edge…From the university. He…’

  ‘And then he died?’

  Ulrik nodded again and wiped more snot from his face, while he sniffled loudly and small sobs erupted from his throat. ‘Abelsen…’ He gasped for air. ‘Abelsen promised to fix it. All I had to do was get out of there.’

  ‘And so Aqqalu was gutted to make it look like your father’s murder.’

  Ulrik howled and rubbed his fists against his face. ‘I didn’t know…I didn’t know…that…he was going to do that…I…It’s so we can pin the blame on your sister, he said…My fucking sister. I didn’t even know that she had been let out.’

  ‘Did Abelsen do it?’ Jakob looked towards the window and craned his neck.

  Ulrik nodded. ‘And the fisherman.’

  Matthew had rolled onto his back and could feel his mobile buzz again.

  ‘A police car with some of your colleagues has just pulled up,’ Jakob announced in a voice louder than anything else he had said so far. He nodded in the direction of the window. ‘They’re here to interview Matthew and Tupaarnaq.’

  ‘Shit,’ Ulrik said. He pushed the curtain aside so that he could look down into the yard. ‘I…I…’ He quickly scanned the room, and then disappeared through the door.

  Jakob got up from the armchair and made his way to Matthew. He bent down and cut the strips with a knife that had been lying in a fruit bowl on the coffee table.

  ‘Where’s Tupaarnaq?’ Matthew said quietly as he felt the tight plastic strips come away. At last his arms were free to move again.

  ‘Ulrik took her away while you were unconscious. I don’t know where she is, or why he came back without her.’

  ‘I think I know where she might be.’ Matthew stood up, rubbing his
wrists. ‘They’re in your old house.’ He glanced towards the door. ‘We haven’t got time to explain all that to Ottesen now. Ulrik is in meltdown…He might very well kill her immediately.’

  ‘If you go back to the stairs you came up, you can continue up another floor, then run to the end of the gallery and take another staircase down to the yard.’

  As Matthew raced down the stairs at the far end of the apartment block, his mobile rang again. This time he managed to answer it.

  ‘Hi, Matthew. What’s happening?’

  ‘I can’t explain it now, Leiff. I’m on my way to Abelsen’s house. Ulrik has gone mental, and I think he’s going to kill his sister and Abelsen.’ Matthew gasped for air as he sprinted down HJ Rinkip Aqqutaa. ‘Jakob…the police officer from ’73…he’s alive…and he claims that Ulrik’s father isn’t his real father, and that it was Tupaarnaq’s own father who killed the family back in Tasiilaq… And now…Ulrik has lost his mind.’

  ‘Where are you?’

  ‘I’m approaching Gertrud Rasks Vej…I’m heading for Abelsen’s house.’

  ‘Okay—are you able to listen while you run?’

  ‘Yes…’

  ‘The police went to Lyberth’s home to go through his things in connection with his murder.’ Leiff paused. ‘By the way, I believe that Ulrik is currently suspended. He has been under a lot of stress. Anyway, that wasn’t what I wanted to tell you. No, they found some old papers at Lyberth’s place. Nothing relating to your case, but still relevant. Abelsen didn’t move to Greenland from Denmark, as everyone thought. His father was a Danish doctor who worked here in the 1950s, but his mother was an underage Inuit girl from Tasiilaq, whom the doctor raped. Well, that particular fact wasn’t mentioned in the papers at Lyberth’s, but I took the liberty of ringing the world and his wife until I hit the jackpot. I managed to get a couple of names to follow up, you see. The girl died a long time ago, but she still has family in Tasiilaq who can remember that far back. Are you still there?’

  ‘Yes,’ Matthew wheezed. ‘I’m just passing the lake.’

  ‘Good. Abelsen lived with his young mother until he was ten years old, when he was sent to boarding school in Denmark—Daddy paid for it. As far as I could work out, that was the price for Abelsen Jr remaining a secret. You see, Daddy already had a wife and family in Denmark. At the age of twenty-four, Abelsen returned to Greenland, but this time to Nuuk, where he soon befriended another blatantly ambitious young man, Lyberth. Abelsen was a cold and calculating lawyer, Lyberth a politically active vicar who would sell his own mother to get to the top. The rest is history, as far as their partnership is concerned. But listen to this. Ulrik. You won’t believe this, but it adds up with what you’ve just told me. Abelsen pulled the same stunt as his father and got a woman pregnant in Tasiilaq. Only this time it was a woman who already had a daughter.’

  ‘And that daughter…was Tupaarnaq?’ Matthew panted.

  ‘Precisely, and the child that Abelsen had with Tupaarnaq’s mother is Ulrik. That’s why Lyberth took the boy in. One favour deserves another, as they say. Abelsen had no hint of family loyalty, but he cared enough to get Lyberth to take Ulrik in when his family was wiped out by Tupaarnaq’s father, and Tupaarnaq was jailed for the murders.’

  ‘Christ almighty…’ Matthew wheezed. ‘He’s going to kill them… both of them.’

  65

  The windows in Jakob’s old home were dark, but the house itself stood out more clearly now than in the dense, moist fog that had surrounded it the last time Matthew was there. There was only one row of houses further along, and then the rocks sloped steeply down to the North Atlantic, which lay calmer than it had done for several days.

  The rough planks met Matthew’s hand as he reached the end of the path between the rocks. He wiped his face on his sleeve and stepped sideways to look through the living room window. Abelsen was slumped in an old armchair in the middle of the room. His body was limp, but his eyes were open.

  Matthew ducked immediately and pressed his back against the wall. With his eyes closed, he bumped the back of his head soundlessly against the wood. He turned around and pushed himself slowly up, in order to peer over the window ledge. He scanned the living room, but the only person he could see was Abelsen. The man’s thin forearms were tied to the broad armrests with black strips.

  Matthew heard a crash behind him. He spun around and looked across at the nearest houses, but there was nothing to see. Maybe a boat or a trailer had been knocked over. He turned his attention back to the window. An icy shiver crawled down his spine immediately.

  Abelsen was staring right at him.

  Matthew looked away, then took three steps to the front door, which he pushed open in a slow, gliding movement. The hall was small, and he quickly reached the living room, where the pale old man in the chair nodded for him to come over.

  ‘Get a knife from the kitchen and free me,’ he whispered between thin lips.

  Matthew looked around the room. ‘Where is your Faroese?’

  ‘Forget about him,’ Abelsen mumbled.

  ‘Is Ulrik here?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Abelsen snarled irritably and grimaced. ‘Why is that any of your business?’

  ‘I think he’s going to kill his sister, and that is my business.’

  ‘Cut me free, then we can talk about it…Not a second before.’ Abelsen moved his back from side to side and flexed his neck in a series of small cracks. ‘Did you bring the notebook?’

  ‘The notebook?’ Matthew shook his head. ‘No, I didn’t bring the bloody notebook, but if you call off your Faroese and Ulrik, maybe we can talk about it.’

  ‘Idiot,’ Abelsen said, and wrinkled his nose. ‘Reporters—you’re vermin, the lot of you.’ He heaved a deep sigh. ‘I want that notebook…and that’s final.’

  ‘And I want Tupaarnaq.’

  ‘Christ, don’t tell me you’ve fallen for some Greenlandic slag? That bitch will bite off your dick, given half a chance.’

  ‘Yes, you’d know all about Greenlanders, wouldn’t you? With a mother and a son from Tasiilaq…The one you shagged wasn’t Danish either, and she ended up getting killed because you couldn’t keep your dick in your pants.’

  ‘You think you’re so clever, boy.’ Abelsen jerked both arms, leaving red welts in the skin from the sharp strips. ‘Now free me, goddammit.’

  ‘Not without Tupaarnaq.’

  ‘It’s a pack of lies, all of it. I never lived in Tasiilaq, and as far as Ulrik is concerned, he’s not my son. I don’t know where you got that story from, but it’s all lies. I never fathered a son, and certainly not a crybaby like Ulrik. My guess is he’s the product of one of Lyberth’s countless drunken one-night stands. They’re like two peas in a pod, the pair of them.’

  ‘I never said anything about Ulrik being your son.’

  Abelsen’s arms on the armrests relaxed for a moment, before tensing again when he clenched his fists. ‘Now free me,’ he commanded from deep down his throat.

  ‘So you can kill me, like you killed Lyberth?’

  Abelsen threw his head forward and grabbed the strips with his teeth. He shook his head and bit into the plastic. Blood started trickling from his mouth, down his wrist and onto the wood.

  ‘Where are they?’ Matthew shouted, kicking the armchair.

  Abelsen looked up for a moment. His eyes were crazed. His chin and his thin lips were smeared with the blood that flowed from his teeth and gums. ‘She’s dead,’ he sneered. ‘Dead, like you, you bastard.’ Then he resumed his attack on the plastic strip.

  Somewhere above them they heard a thud.

  Matthew kicked the armchair again. ‘We found Najak in the shipping container in Færingehavn, you know,’ he said, almost absent-mindedly, and then he looked back at Abelsen. ‘You’re finished, arsehole.’

  ‘How big an idiot are you? That shipping container is empty now.’

  Matthew shook his head. ‘And I have the film reels. I told you that in my email, didn’t I? And
I’m sure the police will find plenty of DNA evidence out there.’

  A new and much clearer sound from above drew Matthew’s attention back towards the ceiling. ‘Is that Ulrik?’ he shouted. ‘Are you up there, Ulrik, you piece of shit?’

  66

  Matthew pulled the harpoon off the wall; as far as he remembered from the notebook, it had been displayed there as an ornament since before Jakob lived there. He weighed it in his hand, sizing up the thin wooden spear that ended in a heart-shaped arrowhead. Once, many years ago, the wood had been polished as smooth as glass. The arrowhead felt cool against his skin. Then he snatched the ulo from the bookcase and ran towards the stairs.

  Abelsen sensed nothing. His teeth chewed away at the hard plastic, while he panted and growled furiously.

  The stairs leading up to the first floor were covered by a grey floral carpet, which was so faded that the flowers looked like brown patches. The steps disappeared under his feet two at a time, and in a few seconds he had reached the top and pushed open the first door.

  The room lay in twilight, and he couldn’t see very well, but he could hear that someone was in there. He took a firm hold of the harpoon and brandished it, ready to strike.

  At the far end of the room was a solid wooden bed, and in the middle of a chaos of quilts and blankets Tupaarnaq lay on her back, her arms tied tightly to the bedposts. She was naked and tried to scream when she saw Matthew, but a piece of fabric had been stuffed into her mouth.

  Ulrik was squatting on his haunches between her legs. His torso was lowered over her. He muttered incomprehensible words and saliva dripped from his chin. In his clenched right hand, which rested on the quilts on the mattress, he was clutching a knife, which flashed in the light from the passage. His trousers were pulled halfway down his thighs, and his dick stuck stiffly out into the air, right above the dark leaves between Tupaarnaq’s hips.

  ‘This slag needs to be punished,’ he hissed, turning slowly to look at Matthew.