Yrsa Sigurdardóttir - The Day Is Dark

‘Isn’t it possible to see whether something was there beneath the building, and what it was?’

‘No, as far as I understand from Alvar, it looked as if there was nothing there. A thin layer of snow had blown under the building and it appeared untouched, so this is all really strange. All I know for sure is that it wasn’t me out there.’

The tyres on the jeeps were so big and over-inflated that they reminded Thóra of Donald Duck’s car. She hadn’t noticed this when they arrived, since she hadn’t been in any condition to do so. It had taken everything she’d had just to squirm into the back seat. Now her attention was more focused and she took careful notice of everything she saw along the way. The scenery was indescribably beautiful, but at the same time it awakened dread in her heart. Alvar was at the wheel, and he, Thóra and Matthew had been joined by Friðrikka. She had recognized the description of the place immediately, south slope, L-3 , and said that she could certainly take them there to look for signs of anything unusual. ‘It’s not much further,’ she said, pointing Alvar to a crag that could be seen vaguely, rising from the snow. ‘Turn left here. The trail runs in the direction of that mountain ahead.’

‘I located the spot too, on the GPS, so I know exactly where I’m going,’ muttered Alvar. ‘Someone took the trouble to input a lot of information into it, which is wise.’ He looked from the road to the device. ‘We’re just about there.’ Suddenly they saw something flash orange in the sheer white surroundings. The closer they drew the better their view of the drilling rig, which was unlike any piece of machinery Thóra had seen before. It was a large oblong house on tracks. Lying across the rig was an arm and on this a vertical steel mast that Friðrikka said was the drill. Next to it stood a little ramshackle hut. It must have been stronger than it looked since it had withstood yesterday’s storm, and doubtless others much worse. Friðrikka told them it was a moveable work shed for the drillers. Thóra saw no evidence of construction, but when she asked her the geologist replied that that wasn’t surprising; the snow covered all disturbances of the earth immediately, so signs of construction could very well lie directly beneath them. They would have to dig down if they were interested in seeing that. At that Alvar cheered up; he had just loaded the platform with all sorts of hand tools and ropes.

The cold bit right through them when they stepped out of the jeep. They were standing near a low peak in the shadow of taller mountains surrounding the area. Thóra was wearing a fur hat that was much too large, which she had borrowed from the coat rack in the cafeteria; it was constantly dropping down over her eyes. She had got her thick mittens from the same place and they fit her about as well as the hat did. They all stood silently for a moment as they adjusted to the cold, which attacked their lungs with each breath. Staring at the shed, they must have all been thinking the same thing: Were the men in there? If that was the case, the oppressive silence gave no indication that they were alive. ‘Who wants to go in first?’ asked Thóra, staring at the dented door.

‘I’ll go,’ said Matthew, and off he went. His hat and gloves fitted him perfectly, and were both as new-looking as his rucksack. ‘Is it locked?’ he asked Friðrikka, who was standing in stiff silence, her eyes glued to the little house.

‘Oh! Yes,’ she said, starting from her thoughts. ‘I know where the key is.’ She went with him to the drilling rig and opened a little hatch on its side, which emitted a low screech that echoed for a long time in the desolation around them. She stuck in her hand and pulled out a clunky-looking key. ‘There you are.’ She walked back to Alvar and Thóra and contented herself with watching from a distance as Matthew tried to put the key in the lock. First he had to move a covering that prevented fine snow from filling the lock when the wind blew outside. ‘I don’t know whether I should hope they’re in there or not.’

It wasn’t clear to Thóra whether Friðrikka was talking to herself, or to her and Alvar. ‘You knew them, I assume?’

Friðrikka simply nodded. A silence followed, which was interrupted when Matthew dramatically opened the door to the shed. He stuck his head in and then looked out again immediately. ‘No one here,’ he called out unnecessarily loudly.

The others relaxed visibly and walked over to the shed. It was larger inside than it appeared from the exterior and they all fitted in there easily. There was a little kitchen with two chairs and shelves fixed up along all the walls. On these were wooden boxes that Friðrikka said were designed specially to store core samples, to prevent them from being broken, damaged or mixed up.

Although Thóra thought she’d gone over the data in the case quite well, it wasn’t entirely clear to her why these samples were so important.

‘They show what the ground beneath us contains,’ explained Friðrikka patiently, when Thóra voiced her puzzlement. ‘The purpose of this project is to determine whether there is molybdenum here in any usable quantity. The more we exploit accessible areas of the earth, the more expensive the metals and other precious material in the ground become. So it starts to pay off to get it from remote places like this.’ She pointed at the boxes. ‘There is much less known about the bedrock here on the east coast than on the west coast, so we basically have to start from scratch. We drill boreholes in the ground and extract core samples that show a full breakdown of what’s to be found here. It’s all documented and if a sufficient quantity of precious material is found in the samples, then it’s possible that it would pay to establish a mine somewhere in the vicinity. We prepare maps that show the strata and estimate how they are situated between the boreholes, and after that’s done we can pinpoint the most suitable place for the mine. Mining sites aren’t just chosen by sticking a pin in a map or throwing dice.’

‘But isn’t it hopeless trying to drill through all this snow?’ asked Thóra. She would have thought such work would have been much easier during the summer, when the ground was bare.

‘No, absolutely not. The drill goes through the snow like a knife through butter, and the snow protects the ground and covers over disturbances caused by the machinery or the transport of people, worksheds, and other things like that. We need to cover a lot of ground in the search and it wouldn’t be a pretty sight if the snow weren’t so thick. We try to keep our impact here to a minimum. It’s an expensive process, and in some instances we also need to restore the area after a project, which can also be costly.’ She shrugged. ‘Since the snow cover melts so quickly every year, we actually have to work fast in our studies. In a few years things will be much more difficult, and we’ll make tracks all over the place.’

Thóra frowned. ‘Is the snow thinning and the ice melting?’ The hand in the photograph had appeared to be enclosed in ice, and if the ice were retreating rather than advancing it seemed doubtful that it was Oddný Hildur’s hand. ‘Do you mean, then, that more ice melts in the summer than is formed in the winter?’

Friðrikka gave her a puzzled look. ‘Yes, I suppose so. I’m not always so good at the small details of these things, but I would think so. And of course the geological conditions from place to place, as well as the wind, probably play a part. Even though it appears white everywhere you look, the layers are thinning and more melts away each summer.’ She looked out of the shed’s tiny window and raised her hand to shield her eyes from the glare of the snow cover outside. But shouldn’t we get going to Borehole L-3 and investigate whether the photo was taken there?’