To begin with, he had been so numbed by the smoke that he experienced a mild rush. Even the smoke filling his lungs had a calming effect he had never expected. He couldn’t explain it. Sometimes he would take a break from smoking for several days in order to experience again the feeling of getting high on the smoke.
His mobile buzzed in his pocket, and he leant over to drop the cigarette butt into the beer bottle and read the message.
Are you home? Tupaarnaq. That was all it said.
Yes, he replied, and pressed send. He heard nothing for several minutes. Why? he added eventually.
I’ll be there in five minutes.
He got up immediately and pushed the balcony door fully open. He tossed the beer bottle into the kitchen bin and stacked his dirty cups and plates in the dishwasher.
You need to be alone. Am almost there.
He pulled out a drawer, found some pink tea lights, put them on a plate and lit them. Like pretty much everything else in the apartment, they had been here when he moved in. Now their time had come. The smell of warm candle wax began to spread immediately, and he set the plate down on the small dining table between the kitchen and the sofa.
His mobile buzzed. Let me in.
He put down his mobile and went out to the entry phone.
The pale-yellow walls and large, light-grey tiles shone more brightly than the ceiling lamps out on the landing. The lift hummed behind the steel doors, and he reached for the ghost wedding band on the ring finger of his right hand.
‘Inside,’ she commanded the moment the lift door opened.
He allowed her to push him backwards. ‘Okay…’
She had already marched past him and into his hallway. ‘I need to borrow your bathroom and a T-shirt.’
Her thick jumper was draped over her arm, but this time it wasn’t the dark tattoos on her arms and shoulders that attracted his attention. It was the blood on her fingers and hands. They had washed off the seal blood out at sea, and after Brættet her hands had been as clean as his. Now they were smeared with dried blood.
‘I’ll find you a top. What happened?’
‘You won’t be talking to Lyberth,’ she said hoarsely. ‘He’s lying on the floor at my place, gutted.’
Matthew had to grab the doorframe for support. The words echoed in his mind. ‘What?’ he managed to whisper.
‘I don’t know why he’s there, but he’s very dead.’ She heaved a sigh. ‘You’re not expecting any visitors, are you?’
‘No,’ Matthew said. Then he wondered whether it might not be wise to text Malik and tell him not to come over, in case he was planning on it, but concluded that doing so would probably arouse more suspicion, given everything else that had happened. ‘Can I get you anything?’
‘Yes, a T-shirt—but first let me tell you about Lyberth.’
‘And you’re quite sure that he’s dead?’
‘More sure than I was about the seal we sold down at Brættet.’ She turned on the kitchen tap, squirted washing-up liquid onto her hands and started rubbing them together under the water. ‘It’s the first time I’ve seen a dead body since…’ Her back arched and her head slumped a little. ‘It has been a while.’
‘But why would you kill Lyberth? I mean, the two of you didn’t even know one another, did you?’
‘It just so happens that I didn’t kill Lyberth. But no, I don’t know him, and that, if nothing else, would be a requirement for my having a motive.’
‘So someone killed him in your apartment, thinking that you would be the obvious suspect and that they would get away with it?’ ‘Perhaps. I don’t know. It seems far-fetched, but then again it’s what very nearly happened when they brought me in for the murder of those two men.’
‘Aqqalu and the fisherman?’
‘Yes, of course. Them.’ She paused and carefully dried her hands on a tea towel. ‘The three murders are connected.’
‘Are you sure?’
She nodded and sat down in the black recliner at the end of the coffee table. ‘Lyberth had also been gutted.’
Matthew buried his face in his hands. ‘And he’s in your apartment right now? And no one else knows?’
‘The killer knows he’s there. As do you. But apart from that, yes.’
‘Shouldn’t we call the police?’
She shook her head slowly. ‘They’ll bring me in immediately. He was killed in my apartment in the same way as…’ She ground to a halt. ‘I touched the body. I don’t know why. I’m such an idiot. I mean, I could see that he was already dead. This time I’ll get life.’
‘But you were with me all day, and—’
‘I could have killed him afterwards,’ she cut in. ‘There’ll be forensic evidence implicating me. The location. Fingerprints.’ She looked up at the ceiling. ‘It was exactly what happened when they found my… father.’
‘But what about motive? It was you who told me always to look for the cause.’
‘Yes, for the defence. Not for the prosecutor. There, it’s the burden of evidence that weighs most heavily.’
They were silent for a few minutes. Her upper body rocked back and forth a little.
‘If you don’t go back to your place when there’s a dead body inside it, that could also look bad during a trial.’
‘The police just need to find the killer quickly.’
‘But they’re not going to do that if they believe you did it. They’ll just keep looking for you until they find you.’
‘Then I’m going to have to find the killer myself.’ She shook her head. ‘It’s like I told you. Our cases are connected. Oh, shit.’
‘You mean they’re connected to the murders in the seventies?’
‘Maybe. I don’t know. He… arghhh!’
Matthew looked at her. Sitting in the recliner she suddenly seemed smaller than ever. ‘What will the police find at your place, if they discover the body themselves?’ he asked.
‘Well,’ she said, staring vacantly into the air. ‘What will they find?’ She got up and went over to the balcony door. ‘This is so messed up. His hands and feet are nailed to the floor, like some crucified Jesus. A sock was stuffed into his mouth, and he was blindfolded. He’s completely butchered.’
The sofa felt cold and dead under Matthew.
‘His stomach was cut open,’ she continued. ‘Right from his groin and up to his breastbone. His skin had been pulled out to the sides, and everything in his abdomen had been ripped out and thrown onto the floor around him.’
‘Was there an ulo?’
‘No, there wasn’t. And he wasn’t killed with an ulo. The cuts are far too straight and clean.’
‘And he’s lying there now?’
‘Yes, I think so. I don’t remember locking the door behind me. I just grabbed my stuff and got out of there.’
‘And where are your things now?’
‘It doesn’t matter.’ She narrowed her eyes and rubbed her scalp. ‘Mind if I have a shower? I… it’s gross. All of it. I… I’ve been kicked twelve years back in time.’
‘Yes, of course,’ he said, and got up immediately. ‘Let me get you a towel and a T-shirt.’ He hesitated. ‘I accidentally smashed the door to the bathroom, so it doesn’t close properly.’
‘Idiot. Well, I’m still going to have a shower, but don’t you dare come near me, do you hear?’
‘I’ll go for a walk,’ Matthew said, handing her an old black T-shirt. ‘It’s all I’ve got.’
‘You can’t leave while I’m here,’ she said. ‘Or I won’t be able to stay. The police might turn up. Anything could happen.’