Better equipped this time, she tackled the slope again, her heart in her mouth.
It was still an arduous climb but now, thanks to the crampons on her boots, she was able to get a better purchase on the snow. Inch by inch, she worked her way upwards, praying that she wouldn’t lose her footing again; keeping her gaze fixed on the ground in front of her, terrified of toppling over backwards at the steepest point. One laborious step at a time, until, noticing that her progress was becoming less of an effort, she realized she was past the worst and the way ahead seemed to be getting easier. Her knees buckling with relief, she sank down on to the snow to wait, feeling mentally and physically drained. The slope was so steep that she couldn’t see if he’d even started up it, let alone how far he had climbed, but she was afraid to call out to him, mindful of what he had said – half jokingly, it had seemed – about the danger of an avalanche. Why on earth had she let him talk her into this madness?
III
It was long past breakfast time and, anyway, Hulda couldn’t stomach the thought of eating. Deciding to take a quick breather instead, she walked round the corner to the local supermarket. The weather was gloomier than it had been yesterday, the sky obscured by a thick layer of grey cloud, and the wind was unseasonably blustery. Could spring really have come and gone in a single day?
The weather had a dampening effect on Hulda’s mood. As a rule she didn’t let the unpredictable Icelandic climate get to her, but she found herself wishing that today of all days, the last day of her old life, could have got off to a more promising start.
All night long, she had been haunted by dreams of Dimma, yet in spite of this she had slept well for once. Though the dreams had been shot through with sadness, at least she had been spared the recurrent nightmare that had plagued her for years. Maybe it was a coincidence, but she suspected that talking about Dimma had been beneficial, especially to a good listener like Pétur. Perhaps one day she would feel able to open up to him about her daughter, tell him stories about her, tell him what a dear, sweet girl she had been.
Hulda roamed aimlessly up and down the aisles of the supermarket, seeing nothing to tempt her, before eventually emerging with the only items that had caught her eye: a bottle of Coke and a packet of Prins Póló chocolate wafers. Prins Póló – that took her back, reminding her of the days when Iceland used to barter with Eastern Europe, Polish chocolate in exchange for Icelandic fish. How the world had changed.
Once she had pulled herself together, the first task of the day would be to drive out to the Reykjanes peninsula and try to kill two birds – more, if possible – with one stone. She needed to talk to the Syrian girl, if it wasn’t too late. Since the girl had been arrested yesterday, Hulda assumed she was being detained in the police cells at the airport, though it was equally possible that she had already been deported, sent home on one of the morning flights, which would mean Hulda had missed her chance to question her. For Christ’s sake, why hadn’t she made arrangements to interview her, or at the very least set an alarm this morning? She was really getting careless in the face of her imminent retirement.
She would have to stop off at the hostel in Njardvík as well, to show Dóra the photo she had sneaked of Baldur Albertsson. If Dóra wasn’t there, she could always email her the picture, but she would rather witness her reaction first hand. It might be a shot in the dark but, at this stage, Hulda felt she had to keep all avenues open.
It occurred to her that it would also be worth taking this opportunity to examine the cove where Elena had died or, rather, where her body had been found. There was always a possibility that she had breathed her last somewhere else.
Hulda was behind the wheel and heading out of town before it dawned on her that she probably wasn’t in a fit state to drive, with all the alcohol that must still be sloshing around in her veins. It was years since she had last found herself in this position. At the next junction, she did a U-turn and went home to call a taxi.
It was a relief to be able to slump in the back seat and relax for once, while somebody else took care of the driving, especially since the taxi was a new, luxury vehicle that purred along the Reykjanes dual carriageway with a smoothness and speed a world away from her old rust bucket.
The black lava-fields unfolded before her eyes, seeming almost to flow past the car windows, majestic in their stark simplicity, yet monotonous as an endlessly repeated refrain. She remembered reading about how they had formed, recalling that some of the lava dated from before Iceland was settled in the 800s, some of it had been produced by later eruptions. Above the flat terrain, the clouds grew heavier and blacker the further they travelled from Reykjavík, until the odd drop of rain began to spatter the windscreen.
The combination of lava and rain had a calming effect on Hulda and she let her eyelids droop, not to doze but to gather herself to face the day’s demands. A series of images played through her mind, but Elena no longer occupied the foreground, having retreated behind the sharpening figures of Dimma and, now, Pétur.
She found herself dwelling more on Pétur than she’d expected, as if suddenly accepting the inevitable. Yes, age had crept up on her, taking her cruelly by surprise, but the changes it brought could be positive, too. Perhaps, after all, she deserved to be contented; to stay up late on a weekday evening, knocking back wine with a handsome doctor, without a bad conscience. Deserved a chance to forget the nightmare, once in a while. Deserved not to have to take orders from a useless boss who should never have been promoted above her.
Lost in these thoughts, she nodded off in spite of herself and slept until the driver woke her by announcing that they were nearing their destination. It took her a moment or two to work out where she was: Keflavík police station.
Falling asleep in the middle of the day was quite out of character, to say nothing of falling asleep in a taxi. There must be something in the air; everything seemed out of joint today. Hulda had a foreboding that something was about to happen, she just didn’t know what.
IV
Darkness had fallen in earnest now. After he had joined her at the top of the slope, they had walked over level ground for a while before pausing briefly to fix torches to their heads. Now, she could see clearly where she was placing her feet, but all else beyond the narrow cone of light was shrouded in darkness. When she asked if they were anywhere near the place where they were to spend the night, he shook his head. ‘Still a way to go,’ he said.
The snow was so perfect, glittering in the light of her head torch, that it seemed like sacrilege to tread on it and break the pristine crust. Never before had she experienced such an intense connection to nature. The icy fetters seemed to cast a mysterious enchantment over their surroundings. Focusing on the elemental beauty, she did her best to forget her reservations about the trip.
Before long, the hard, icy surface gave way to deeper, softer going. Stopping for a moment, she switched off her head torch and waited for her eyes to adjust to the dark. The faint outlines of snowy knolls and mounds could be glimpsed all around them, and it came home to her more starkly than ever that without her guide she would be utterly lost; she hadn’t a clue how to find the hut they were making for or retrace their steps to the car. Without him, she would almost certainly die of exposure out here.