The Last Refuge (23 page)

The memory-gaps from events that had taken place inside the Natur had been filled in by what Tunheim and Nymann had told me, and further fragments by Gotteri. The fight with Dam and the argument with Karis were now in my head. So was the sight of the man’s lifeless body lying in that pool of blood. I could see that every time I closed my eyes. His ripped throat. His staring eyes. The image placed there either by the police photographs or by reality.

The rest I couldn’t figure out, no matter how much I wanted to. Every scrap of recall had to be tested. Was it real or wishful thinking? Was it real or what I was scared of? And I
was
scared. Scared that I’d done it. That I’d murdered Aron Dam.

I was terrified that history had repeated itself.

Four walls. Four white walls. They screamed out at me like a projector screen. Movies played out on them, projected from either my imagination or my memory. When all you have to do is sit and think then time becomes your enemy just as much as thought.

The one thing in my favour was that if I waited long enough the time came for lights out, and for the first time since I’d arrived on these islands, I was in the comfort of darkness. I wrapped myself in it, wearing the shadows like a favourite coat. At least in the dark, I couldn’t see the walls.

There were two problems with the darkness however: first, sleep still wouldn’t come. Second, eventually it did.

Chapter 32

It’s dark. That’s my first clue. The second is that the person I am following through the alleys of the old town is myself. Yet no matter how many times I tell myself that it is a dream, I can’t wake up and I can’t walk away from whatever is about to happen. And I’m aware that I’m walking in the shadows, keeping away from the streetlight, so that the me I’m following can’t see the me that is stalking my every move.

There is no noise whatsoever. Neither set of my footsteps makes a sound. Someone has pressed a mute button and turned the whole play into a silent movie. We turn into a straighter part of the street, my shadow and me, and for the first time I am able to see another figure further ahead. I am following me, following him. The first man is bigger, broader. He’s familiar. I can’t see him properly in the dark but I know it is Aron Dam.

We are getting closer but not too close yet. We want to be deep in Úti á Reyni before we do it. He knows what he’s going to do and I know it too. I’m not him though. I’m me. And so is he. I try to shout out and tell him to walk away before it’s too late, before we do something that can’t be undone, but no sound comes from my mouth.

Dam walks on until we are on the cobbles and the houses are smaller, closer, tighter, no room for cars or the twenty-first century. Nowhere to run now, just the little black houses and the ocean beyond. Up ahead, I see myself close in on the prey. I quicken my own step too.

Then . . . I don’t understand. What is he doing? Aron Dam turns and beckons the first me on, a whirl of his arm urging me closer. I stop and watch myself hurrying towards him. Dam is outside the Prime Minister’s office, the red walls glowing in the darkness. He walks to the left, towards the slipway that leads down into the water, down to where it is even darker. He stands in the shadow of the open archway, halfway down the slope, his arms open wide, inviting.

I don’t want to watch this but can’t tear my eyes away. I watch myself walk towards him, quickly, purposefully. Without breaking stride, the first me draws my arm back and punches towards Aron’s throat. He staggers back but still stands there. I watch myself thrust towards his throat again. And again. Then again. He is bleeding like a cartoon character who is shot full of bullets then drinks water and sees it gush through the holes. The blood is pouring from him like from a sieve, leaking from every button, every thread, every fibre.

I watch. Horrified. I’m disgusted at myself. Try to scream and shout stop but can’t. I have no sound.

As I stand there, I realise that a
grindaknivur
is in my own hand. I’ve no idea where it came from. But I know what I must do with it. I rush forward, heart pounding, until I am just behind the me that is carving Aron Dam’s throat. I draw my arm back and ram the
grindaknivur
as hard as I can into my own back. I am stabbing and stabbing and I feel every thrust. It punctures a lung, pierces my heart and slices away a large part of my soul.

Job done, I turn away from the sea and the scene and head back towards town. Behind me, both Aron Dam and myself are dead or dying. I’m limping, barely able to breathe or pump blood through my body. I’m dying too.

I walk back through the dark, narrow alleyways of Tinganes, on my own except for the people who line the route. Martin and Silja Hojgaard are there, eyes dark and skin sallow. They are both pointing at me. Karis, too, standing beside her father. Both pointing. Told you so. Tummas Barthel is propped against a wall, swaying and shrugging his shoulder helplessly. Serge Gotteri is there and Oli the barman from Natur. Pointing. Nicoline Munk is there, her long hair tumbling behind her, her eyes like shadows, her finger outstretched accusingly.

Liam Dornan is there too. In his school uniform, laughing silently, his finger pointing straight at my heart. Next to him are my parents, sickly white and eyes blindfolded. Then the four horsemen of my own apocalypse: Chilli Ferguson, Shug Faulds, Tam Taylor and Chick Welsh. They point as one, in orchestrated unison, their eyes unseen but I know they are looking straight at me.

I shuffle lamely past them and try to climb the hill, but every step takes me further down, until I can smell the fires of hell being stoked in readiness for me.

Chapter 33

Elin Samuelsen, my accidental lawyer, sat opposite me in a cell below Torshavn’s court, looking as if she’d rather be anywhere else. She’d swapped her light jacket for a sober navy suit and had gained an extra couple of inches in confidence thanks to higher heels.

I too was wearing a jacket, along with a shirt and tie, courtesy of Silja Hojgaard. At least I was fairly sure it was down to her. Mørkøre told me that a woman fitting Silja’s description showed up at the jail and left the items for me before hurrying off. Martin Hojgaard was much the same height and build as me and the clothes fitted fine. I was to face the judge looking respectable.

‘This is just a hearing,’ Samuelsen told me, fussing at her collar with one hand and squeezing a sheaf of papers with the other. ‘Just a preliminary statutory hearing. If the judge decides to take you into custody leading to trial then we can appeal. If we don’t win the appeal . . . and we probably would not . . . then we will get you a lawyer from Copenhagen experienced in murder trials. I have spoken with my colleagues and this is best. You understand?’

I looked at Samuelsen and would have felt sorry for her if I hadn’t had enough to worry about. The woman was no doubt proficient in her own field but in this one she was as far out of her depth as I had been when I stood on the fish cages at Risen og Kellingin and the waves crashed at me, threatening to send me into the drink. Samuelsen would have been more at ease with those waves than with a murder trial. At least I’d been through the experience before.

‘I have tried to find out what evidence the police have, but no one is talking. I have friends on the prosecution side and we share things, but not this. We will soon find out though. You will not have to say much, I think. The police, the Danes, they will do most of the talking.’

‘Are you okay, Miss Samuelsen?’

She looked annoyed at the question, but also slightly embarrassed. Still, she managed a smile. ‘I am well, thank you for asking. But I feel bad. This is supposed to be stressful for you, not for me. Perhaps you were right, you should have had better.’

It struck me that the truth wasn’t going to do either of us any good.

‘Not at all. We will both be fine. Do you know the judge?’

She laughed nervously. ‘Of course I do. This is the Faroes, Mr Callum. We all know each other. The judge is Mr Sandur Hammershaimb. He is fair. It is all we can ask.’

‘Okay. Let’s hope so.’

Samuelsen pushed her hand back through her hair and blew hard. ‘How shall you plead? It need not be just guilty or not guilty. You can plead what you think the outcome of the case should be. For example, you can plead that the case should be dismissed. That is perhaps a risk I would not recommend. We should leave a route out if the judge has doubt.’

‘I’m happy with not guilty.’

She looked back at me for a bit, taking in what I said, before nodding. It was hard to escape the thought that my lawyer didn’t entirely believe in my innocence.

‘Yes. Not guilty is straightforward. And the evidence against you, at least that which we know of, is entirely circumstantial. Unless . . .’

‘Unless the CSI has found something?’

Samuelsen looked apologetic. ‘Yes.’

‘But she can only have found something if I did it.’

An awkward silence fell between us. It was Samuelsen’s chance to show belief, but she wasn’t for biting, and I wasn’t for letting her off. The lull stretched until she finally gave in.

‘I am not asking you if you did it, Mr Callum. That is not my job.’

‘Fair enough.’ It wasn’t fair and my tone said so.

We made our way into court, a blue-shirted policeman guiding me. The room was more modern than I expected, with laminated flooring and heavy contemporary wooden desks. The back bench accommodated four dark-cushioned chairs, and in front of it two solid desks faced each other in adversarial fashion, with a single table and chair placed in between, for either witnesses or someone to play referee.

Samuelsen and I took our place on one side of the opposing desks, she immediately shuffling, rearranging and generally clinging to her papers, as if they would protect her. I took a deep breath and pulled my chair in close.
Not guilty.
I practised the words in my head so that they sounded confident. So that I believed them myself.
Not guilty.

In they trooped; the extras in the play of my life. Inspector Nymann’s black leather jacket and jumper had been replaced by a sober navy-blue suit with white shirt and navy tie. I felt like standing up and pointing at him as if he was some kind of fake. The sergeant, Kielstrup, was wearing the same light-brown suit he’d worn before. The pale-blue shirt and darker blue tie also seemed identical to the ones he’d worn when they interviewed me, and I wondered if he’d come to the Faroes without a change of clothes. Perhaps they were so arrogant they thought they’d wrap the case up in a day.

The Danes were deep in conversation with a chunky mid-forties man with close-cropped steel-coloured hair, confidence, and a very expensive-looking suit. My guess was he was a lawyer who had handled a murder case before.

The press were identifiable by their notebooks, pens and digital recorders. Local rubberneckers, the guillotine squad, were trying but failing to hide their morbid fascination. Martin and Silja Hojgaard were there too. Both looked deeply concerned, although I couldn’t be sure if it was for me or for their reputation. Serge Gotteri was there, the smile still fixed in place, and giving a carelessly cheery wave towards me.

Three rows back, slumped almost out of sight, was Inspector Tunheim. When I caught his eye, he gave a polite nod. I responded in kind before scanning the courtroom for a second time, checking that I hadn’t made a mistake, looking for the one person who wasn’t there. A third time I looked, row after row, but there was still no sign of her.

My questions to Samuelsen about Karis hadn’t provided any answers beyond what she and Gotteri had already told me. Karis had been interviewed by the police, she was very upset, her father said she wasn’t seeing anyone. Wherever she was, she wasn’t here. Maybe that was all I needed to know.

With each visual tour I made of the room, there was one face that I kept coming back to. I had no choice. In front of Tunheim and to his left sat Aron Dam’s brother, Nils. His eyes were dark-ringed and his mouth locked shut. He stared hard at me; a wild, bitter stare borne of certainty of my guilt. There didn’t seem to be any doubt in his mind who had killed his brother. I looked away, to the Hojgaards or the lawyers, to Gotteri or the cops, but every time I glanced back in his direction, Nils Dam was gazing unblinkingly at me. I had to look elsewhere and shifted in my seat until I faced the front bench, but I could still feel his stare burning into my neck.

The judge, Hammershaimb, arrived once everyone else was in place. He was dark-haired and wiry, looking more like a lightweight boxer than a judge, despite being in his late fifties. He fell neatly into his seat, looking around the court to see what sort of circus he was going to have to be ringmaster of.

Two women and a man, all stern-faced in business suits, had come in with him and took their places at his side. One of the women called out in Faroese and the court fell silent. Game on.

Hammershaimb spoke quietly, the kind of big-stick talking that demanded both respect and that people listen. Samuelsen translated for me. It was legal preamble, laying out the do’s and don’ts and making it clear who was in charge.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw Nicoline Munk, the petite forensic investigator, bustle in and take her place between the two Danish cops. She seemed to be the only one not dressed up for the occasion. She still wore her waterproof jacket and trainers, only the T-shirt and jeans had been swapped for other models.

She was also swapping words with Nymann and Kielstrup. The three Danes had heads bowed and were on the verge of being animated. The stocky steel-haired lawyer walked over and stuck his head into the mix as well. At one point Munk sat back and spread her arms wide, before crossing them in front of her. Samuelsen was watching the play, too, and I could see the intensity in her eyes as she tried to learn something from it.

The judge raised his voice just a notch and the court fell under his spell once more. Elin Samuelsen got to her feet and he addressed me through her. Hammershaimb spoke a sentence or two then paused, leaving a gap for the lawyer to translate.