Page 14 of The Darkness
‘More than a year ago.’
Pétur frowned. ‘I don’t remember that.’
‘It didn’t attract much media coverage at the time. She was an asylum-seeker.’
‘An asylum-seeker … No, I definitely didn’t hear about that.’
Not many people did, Hulda thought.
‘How did she die?’ he asked.
‘She drowned, but there were injuries on her body. The detective who handled the case – not one of our best men, I might add – dismissed it as suicide. I’m not so sure.’
Feeling pleased with the progress she’d made that day, she gave him a brief account of her discoveries but, to her disappointment, Pétur looked sceptical.
‘Are you sure,’ he asked hesitantly, ‘are you sure you’re not building this up to be bigger than it really is?’
Hulda was a little taken aback by his frankness, but another part of her appreciated it.
‘No, I’m not at all sure,’ she admitted. ‘But I’m determined to follow it up.’
‘Fair enough,’ he said.
It was getting late. They had swapped their coffee for red wine a couple of hours ago. Pétur had stayed longer than anticipated but, far from complaining, Hulda welcomed the company. The rain clouds had finally departed, making way for the sun, and the sky was deceptively light outside, belying the lateness of the hour.
The wine hadn’t been Hulda’s idea. After finishing his coffee, Pétur had asked if she happened to have a drop of brandy, and she apologized but said she did have a couple of bottles of wine knocking about somewhere.
‘I like the sound of that. Good for the old ticker,’ he’d said, and who was she to question the word of a medical man?
‘It strikes me as a bit unusual,’ Pétur remarked warily, feeling his way, ‘that you don’t have any family photos on display.’
The observation took Hulda by surprise, but she tried to sound casual: ‘I’ve never been one for that kind of thing. I don’t know why.’
‘I suppose I understand. I probably have too many photos of my wife around the place. Maybe that’s why it’s taken me so long to get over her. I’m stuck in the past, quite literally.’ He heaved a sigh. They were on to their second bottle now. ‘What about your parents? Your brothers and sisters? No pictures of them either?’
‘I don’t have any brothers or sisters,’ Hulda said. She didn’t immediately go on, but Pétur waited patiently, sipping his wine. ‘My mother and I were never particularly close,’ she said eventually, as if justifying the absence of photographs, though there was no reason why she should have to make excuses.
‘How long ago did she die?’
‘Fifteen years ago. She wasn’t that old, only seventy,’ Hulda said, conscious of how scarily soon she would be that age herself: in just over five years. And the last five years had gone by in a flash.
‘She can’t have been very old when she had you,’ Pétur remarked, after doing some quick mental arithmetic.
‘Twenty … though I don’t think that would have counted as particularly young in those days.’
‘And your father?’
‘Never met him.’
‘Really? Did he die before you were born?’
‘No. I just never knew him – he was a foreigner.’ Her thoughts wandered back. ‘Actually, once, years ago, I did go abroad to try and trace him, but that’s another story …’
She smiled politely at Pétur. Though she tolerated these personal questions, she wasn’t keen on them. No doubt he expected her to respond in kind, by asking about his family and past life, to bring them closer. But that wasn’t going to happen. Not yet. She felt she knew enough about him to be going on with: he’d lost his wife and lived alone (in a house that was far too big for him), and, more importantly, he came across as a decent, kind man; honest and reliable. That would do for Hulda.
‘Yes,’ he said, breaking the silence, sounding a little tipsy now. ‘We’re two lonely souls, all right. Some people take the decision early in life … to be alone, I mean. But in our case, I think it was fate.’ He paused. ‘My wife and I made a conscious decision to put off having children – until it was too late for us to change our minds. Towards the end, we often discussed whether it had been a mistake.’ After a moment, he added: ‘I don’t believe in having regrets: life is what it is, it plays out one way or another. But having said that, I really wish I weren’t so alone at this point in mine.’
Hulda hadn’t been expecting this level of candour. She didn’t know what to say, and after a brief silence Pétur went on: ‘I don’t know how you two ended up childless, and I don’t mean to pry, but that sort of thing, decisions like that, they have a profound impact on our lives. They matter, really matter. Don’t you agree?’
