Matthew closed his eyes. He could feel icy shivers running up and down his arms and his back.
‘She’s at school in Denmark, but if you want me to I can tell you more about her.’
Matthew slumped. His throat felt constricted and closed.
‘Give me your number, if you like,’ Else continued. ‘And we’ll see.’
Matthew nodded.
SHATTERED LIFE
44
‘Are you awake?’ Jakob asked as he knocked softly on the bedroom door. He gave the door a light push and peered inside.
Paneeraq pulled the quilt over her head.
‘I’ve fried you an egg,’ he went on. ‘If you come into the living room, you can eat your breakfast there. There’s also yoghurt and apple juice.’
He watched her peek out of the small crack between the quilt and the mattress.
‘Ah well,’ he said in a loud voice, retreating. ‘It doesn’t look like she’s here. I think I’ll go to the kitchen to get some cutlery, and we’ll just have to see if a girl drops out of the sky meanwhile.’
Back in the kitchen he could hear Paneeraq dash through the living room and over to the sofa. The sound of quick footsteps and a big quilt being dragged across the floor.
‘Good heavens,’ he exclaimed in mock surprise when he came back from the kitchen. ‘Did that quilt crawl in here all by itself?’
The quilt giggled.
‘I wonder,’ he went on in a pensive tone of voice, ‘if quilts like fried eggs and rye bread, or whether they just drink juice? I’ve never seen a quilt with a mouth, and I don’t think I really would want to, because it would be difficult to sleep if you’re worried about your quilt nibbling at your toes.’
A head appeared. Two black eyes surrounded by bed hair.
‘Oh no, it’s a troll!’ Jakob shrieked.
Her eyes widened.
He narrowed his eyes and inspected her closely. ‘Aha! It’s you, Paneeraq. Phew, you had me worried for a moment.’
She held out her hand and opened it so that he could see the fossil.
‘And the sea urchin. Are the two of you hungry?’
She nodded.
‘Then make your way to the table and eat your breakfast. I’ve read somewhere that fossilised sea urchins absolutely love fried eggs.’
She scrunched up her nose and looked sceptically at her fossil, but then she put it on her plate next to the rye bread and the fried egg.
They couldn’t see out of the windows, which were completely covered by the snow that had drifted up against the house overnight. Jakob could hear the wind still raging and tearing at everything.
‘I think we’re snowed in,’ he said, nodding towards the front door. ‘Have you ever tried that before?’
She nodded and looked towards the windows on either side of the front door.
Jakob got up and walked over to the front door. ‘I’ll be looking through that window in a moment—if I can clear the snow away, that is.’
Paneeraq nodded again. She reached for her juice.
The front door opened with a hollow sound, and Jakob muttered to himself as he stepped outside and a long, cold gust of wind found its way into the living room.
Paneeraq looked alternately at the door and the window. ‘Jakob?’ she called out tentatively after just under ten minutes. She frowned. ‘Jakob?’ she called out again, louder this time.
A windswept face covered in snow appeared in the doorway. ‘Yes?’
He saw her dive back under the quilt while he brushed the snow off his face. ‘I’m almost done,’ he continued. ‘You’ll be fine here. I’ll leave some food out for you, and I’ll lock the door behind me.’
Paneeraq’s eyes scanned the living room, and Jakob tried to follow her gaze. It was completely different from the living room she was used to at home. The dark furniture and the many fossils and books must have seemed strange to her. He remembered what Lisbeth said: that many little girls in Greenland didn’t know love and affection in a way that was natural to him. He looked at the quilt and the girl. She might well prefer to be with him because it was safe and fun, but he didn’t have to think too hard before realising it could never happen. There was no physical evidence against her father, and her mother was doing her best—despite the father’s long shadow. Jakob sighed to himself. Mortensen would have a heart attack when he found out about it. You kidnapped a child, Pedersen. A potential witness in your own crackpot investigation!
‘Would you like some more juice before I go?’
‘Yes,’ she said from under her quilt. ‘Can stones not feel anything at all?’
‘No, I don’t think so,’ Jakob replied with a smile, while he put two cups on the table. ‘After all, it wouldn’t be very good if we always had to apologise to the rocks for walking on them.’
Paneeraq looked down at her clenched fist and smiled almost imperceptibly.
‘What do you think its name was?’ She opened up the palm of her hand so that he could see the small, dotted piece of flint.
He exhaled and raised both eyebrows. ‘I really don’t know what those creepy crawlies were called all those millions of years ago, but… well, why don’t we call it Paneeraq, just like you?’
She turned her gaze towards him. ‘Do you think that was its name? Is it a girl?’
‘Well, I know it’s not called Jakob, because that would be a silly name for a sea urchin.’
She turned her hand slightly so that she could study the sea urchin from another angle. Her eyes had grown sad again. Her fingers closed around the fossil. ‘They’ll come back.’
‘Who?’ Jakob pressed his lips together.
‘The men. They always come back.’
‘We don’t know that,’ he responded as swiftly and as calmly as he could, but he struggled to hide his agitation. He had been hoping that she had slept through it all. ‘They were just angry. That happens to grown-ups like them sometimes.’
‘They always come back.’ Her voice had slipped deeper into the embrace of the quilt.
Jakob looked at her. ‘Do you mean those specific men?’
She nodded. Slowly. Without looking up.
‘Do you know them?’
‘They visit my dad sometimes,’ she said in a voice so small it was barely audible. ‘And the last time they brought an old man from Denmark.’
‘Old?’
‘Like you… The minister, that bastard, my dad called him when he had gone.’
There was total silence in the room.
Jakob wanted to sit next to Paneeraq and give her a big hug, but he was scared to even touch her hair.
‘They’ll never come back,’ he said. ‘And that’s a promise.’
45
It proved quite a challenge for Jakob to get to work that morning. The storm continued to rage around the houses, snapping up anything left lying on the ground, and it felt as if snow was being hurled at the town from all sides.
Paneeraq was alone in his house with plenty of biscuits, crackers and juice, as well as comics, pencils and paper, should she want to draw. He had told her that she was free to move about his house and that she could touch anything she wanted to. There was nothing dangerous or forbidden in his home. She was even allowed to play with the fossils. She had been upset when he left, but he had promised her that he would be back and that he was going to find out where she would live from now on. She had said that she would like to live with him. He had had no answer to that.
Jakob looked about uneasily as he walked through the entrance to the police station. His recent row with Mortensen was unlikely to be a secret, and he was afraid that everyone would know that he was hiding the girl.