The Blue Ice (20 page)

She got up then and went below, and I sat on feeling suddenly alone. The mountains were not so bright and the sky seemed less blue. I knew then – and admitted it to myself for the first time – that I'd missed something in life. I had held its hand for a moment. That was all. It didn't belong to me. I had borrowed from a dead man.

One of the motionless bodies laid out on the deck stirred. It was the diver. ‘Sunde,' I called.

He sat up and rubbed his eyes. Then he got to his feet and came aft. ‘Where are we meeting your partner?' I asked.

‘Fjaerland,' he answered.

‘He'll be coming up to Fjaerland in Einar Sandven's boat?'

‘
Ja
.'

‘When?'

‘Dunno. Yer see, Oi only left a message fer 'im.'

‘So he might be coming down the fjord right now?'

‘That's roight.' He shaded his eyes and gazed up the wide stretch of shimmering water. Then he picked up the glasses. But he shook his head. ‘Don't see 'im,' he said.

I took the glasses from him and examined the wide sweep of the fjord. There were several boats in sight, but none small enough. I swung the glasses towards the mountains and the narrowing gap of Fjaerlandsfjord. Fir-clad slopes dropped steeply to water that was curiously different in colour – a cold green. On a tongue of land that was green and fertile the white facade of a big hotel gleamed in the sunlight. It was all very peaceful and serene. The tongue of land was Balestrand and a steamer was moving in to the quay. A white plume of steam showed for an instant above its red funnel. A moment later the mountains reverberated to the distant sound of the vessel's siren.

‘It is beautiful, eh?' I looked up. Dahler was standing beside me.

‘Balestrand, isn't it?' I asked.

He nodded. ‘The sunniest place in all Sognefjord,' he said. ‘The hotel you see is the Kviknes Hotel. It is very big, and all built of wood. The best hotel in Norway. I have many happy memories of that place. The Kaiser used to anchor his yacht here.' He turned and nodded to a low headland over our starb'd quarter. ‘That is the Vangsnes. If you look there you will see a big bronze statue. Once I have climbed to the top of him.' Through the glasses I could see it quite plainly, a colossal statue of a man on a pedestal of rock. ‘It is the statue of the legendary Frithjof placed there by the Kaiser. He wished so much to be remembered, that man. He put another statue at Balholm. It is of King Bele, one of the Vikings. There is something Wagnerian about the Vikings. If Hitler had travelled more I think perhaps he also would have erected statues in this place.'

‘It all looks so peaceful,' I said, gazing again at Balestrand and the white gables and balconies of the hotel.

‘You expected it to be wild and terrible, eh?' He shook his head. ‘The Sogne is not wild and terrible. But the smaller fjords, yes.'

‘Wait till we get into Fjaerlandsfjord,' Sunde said.

Dahler smiled. ‘Yes. Mr Sunde is right. Wait till we are in Fjaerlandsfjord. The water is like ice and the mountains are dark and terrible and at the end the Boya and Suphelle glaciers fall into the fjord. I do not think you will be disappointed when you see Fjaerland.'

He was right. Once past Balestrand the gloom of the mountains closed in around us, throwing back the sound of our engine. The sun still shone and the sky was blue. But the day ceased to be warm. In Fjaerlandsfjord the water was a translucent, ice-cold green. It took no colour from the sky. The fjord was nothing but a twenty mile crevice in the mountains. Sheer cliffs of rock hemmed us in. And where there was a slope, it was so steep that the pines that covered it seemed tumbling headlong towards the cold waters. Up frightening, boulder-strewn gullies deep snow pierced by grey, ice-worn rock glittered in the sunlight. In places there was snow right down to the water's edge. The streams that cascaded like white lace down the gullies burrowed under these patches of snow from fragile bridges. Small black and white birds with long orange beaks flew from crevice to crevice along the rocks. The gloom of the place was something that only Milton could have described. It closed in on us like the chill of fear and silenced all conversation.

For an hour we ran up that narrow fjord. There was no breath of wind. The ice-green water was flat like glass and in it was mirrored the gloom of sunless pines and sheer, dark rock. Then we rounded the last bend and saw the Jostedal. It stood high up at the end of the fjord, very white in contrast to the green of the water and still brighter green of the valley grass bathed in sunshine. It was a beautiful, terrifying sight. A giant steeple of rock rose like a bastion, black against the blue sky. That alone seemed to hold back the vast deeps of snow behind it. And on either side the glaciers tumbled down to the fjord. To the right was the Suphelle – a piled-up mass of blue-green ice like a frozen wave breaking over the lip of the snow-field into the valley below. And on the left the narrow Boya Glacier ribboned down a gully as though to swamp the little settlement below.

The colour of the fjord changed. The green of the water became more livid until it looked like some chemically-coloured liquid. It was the coldest colour I have ever seen. The gloom of the mountains on either side of us contrasted oddly with that colour. And even more odd was the sudden basking warmth of Fjaerland and the cold ice-green and white of the frozen snows behind it.

As we ran into the quay, Dahler gripped my arm. ‘Look,' he said. ‘They are building a boat. And they build him just the same as they build boats two thousand years ago.'

Just beyond the quay lay the yellow skeleton of a boat. Five men were working on it. ‘They are using nothing but axes?' Jill said.

‘That is so,' Dahler answered. ‘They use nothing but the axe. That is the way the Vikings build their boats. And up at Fjaerland they have always built their fishing boats that way. They can make carpets from local wool and stockings and jerseys – all by the method and in the pattern that they have always used. Nothing is new here – except the hotel and the steamers.'

We ran past a little wooden church, past the hotel, half-hidden in trees, and in to the wooden piles of the jetty. ‘Is that your partner's boat?' I asked Sunde, pointing to a small tock-a-tock lying just beyond the quay. But he shook his head. His partner hadn't arrived and as though that were an omen, I suddenly had the feeling that things weren't going to go well.

I left the others and went up to the hotel alone. A waitress in national costume of black with embroidered bodice and frilled lace blouse stood in the entrance hall. ‘Is Mr Ulvik in the hotel?' I asked.

She shook her head and laughed. ‘
Et öyeblikk sa skal jeg finne eieren.
'

I waited. There were tiers of postcards, all of ice and snow and violent, blasted crags. Behind the porter's desk hung handmade rugs in brilliant colours, belts stamped out of leather and strangely shaped walking sticks. On the desk were several pairs of slippers made by hand from what I later discovered to be reindeer. They had originally been made by the inhabitants for walking on frozen snow, but were now produced for the tourist trade on which the village lived. In a corner of the hall were piled rucksacks, rope, climbing boots, ice axes and a pair of skis. The atmosphere of the place was so different from the islands.

Footsteps sounded on the stairs. I looked up. A short, fat little man hurried towards me. He wore a black suit and white collar and looked as out of place as a clerk in a gymnasium. He held out a white, podgy hand. ‘You are Mr Gansert, perhaps,' he said. There was a gleam of gold fillings in his wide smile.

‘Are you Mr Ulvik?' I asked.

‘Yes. That is me.' He spoke English with a slight American accent. ‘Come. We will go into the lounge. You have had tea?'

‘Not yet,' I said.

‘Then we have some tea.' He took hold of my arm and led me into a room where walls and ceiling were delicately hand-painted. The place was empty. ‘It is early in the season,' he said. ‘Fjaerland is too cold yet. The hotel is only just open.' He ordered tea and then said, ‘Now Mr Gansert, I must tell you that I have not got what you want. Our application for the exhumation of this man, Bernt Olsen, is – how do you say it? – quashed.'

‘Quashed!' I exclaimed. ‘Why?'

He shrugged his shoulders. ‘I do not know.' The waitress came in with a tray laden with cakes and buttered toast. When she had gone, he said, ‘First, everything goes well, you understand. I see the doctor at Leikanger. We go to the police. They say there will be no difficulty. They take a telephone to Bergen. I am in Leikanger all yesterday. The application is granted and I make the necessary arrangements. And then, just as I am leaving to catch the steamer, the police tell me the arrangements must be cancelled. They have the telephone from Bergen to say that it has been decided after all that there are no reasons for the exhume.'

‘Look,' I said angrily. ‘I told you I didn't care how much it cost. Did you get on to the lawyers at Bergen?'

His white hand with its fat little fingers caressed my arm as though he were a doctor soothing a fractious patient. ‘Please believe me, Mr Gansert. I do everything that is possible to do. I telephone our lawyers. I telephone to a man very high in the police at Bergen. I even telephone Oslo, to one of the members of the
Storting.
But it is impossible. Something is blocking it. It is against policy, I fear.'

Against policy! That could mean only one thing. Jorgensen had used his influence to prevent the exhumation. Why? That was what puzzled me. Why was he scared to have Farnell's body exhumed? Had the man been murdered? And had Jorgensen had something to do with it? I drank my tea in silence, trying to figure it out. Jorgensen wouldn't directly involve himself in a thing like that. But where big money was involved I knew these things could happen – they could happen in England and they could happen in Norway. ‘Who is blocking the application?' I asked Ulvik.

‘I do not know,' he answered. ‘I try to find out. But everyone is very careful. I think somebody very important.'

I looked at him. He fidgeted nervously under my gaze. Had he been bought? But I dismissed the thought. I didn't like him. But he was the company's agent. And the company was shrewd enough not to employ foreign representatives who could be bought. But still, the money might be bigger than usually available for bribes.

‘I do everything I can,' he declared as though reading my thoughts. ‘Please believe that, Mr Gansert. I have represented your company for fifteen years here in Norway. I work with the resistance. I build up contacts even while the Germans are here and Britain is losing the war. I do not often fail in anything. But this – this is something very strange. There is important business involved, I think.'

I nodded. ‘It's not your fault,' I said. I looked out of the window to the ice-green waters of the fjord. A man was fishing from a rowing boat. The sunlight, striking on the green of the opposite shore, had the brittle quality of evening. Why didn't they want Farnell's body examined? I was now more convinced than ever that the answer to the mystery lay in the graveyard by the church we had passed. I pushed back my chair. ‘You've brought some money for me?' I asked.

‘Yes – yes, of course,' he answered, smiling with the relief of having been able to do something. ‘I have it here in my pocket all ready for you. One hundred thousand kroner. Will that be sufficient?'

‘How much is that?'

‘A kroner is a shilling.' He brought out a thick pocket book. ‘There,' he said, handing a pile of notes over to me. ‘That is five thousand pounds. Will you please sign this – for the accounts of my agency, you know.'

I counted the notes and signed. Then I got to my feet. ‘It is enough, eh?' he asked. He was like a puppy wriggling for a pat on the head.

‘It'll do for the moment,' I answered.

‘Now please, what will you wish me to do? Sir Clinton Mann wrote me that I was to place myself unreservedly at your disposal. Anything I can be of service to you with, Mr Gansert—'

‘Go back to Bergen,' I said, ‘and sit on the end of a telephone. What's your number?'

‘Bergen 155 102.'

‘Good. And find out for me who blocked that exhumation order.'

‘Yes. I will do that. And I will wait for you to telephone me.' He bustled after me as I went to the door. ‘I will leave tonight if you do not mind. There is a boat going to Balestrand tonight. It is much warmer at Balestrand. You have your boat here, eh? Do you go to Balestrand?'

‘I don't know,' I answered. An idea was forming in my mind. Thank God he was leaving tonight.

‘Then I wait for you to telephone me, please. Anything I can do—'

‘Yes, I'll telephone you,' I said and went down the steps to the driveway.

At the road I hesitated. But instead of turning left towards the quay, I turned right and walked slowly towards the church.

It stood alone on a slight mound some distance beyond the hotel. Its white paint caught the slanting sunlight. It was a fairy church, so bright and gay against the gloomy background of the fjord winding down to the Sogne. Above it, up a long boulder-strewn valley, towered the mountains, cold and forbidding, their snows crystal white. Beyond the graveyard a torrent went rushing down to the fjord. I opened the gate and went up the path towards the church, searching the graves as I passed. Some had stone monuments, but many were marked with small wooden crosses on which the names of the buried were painted in black. The shadow of the church lay right across the graveyard and out to the edge of the fjord. In the sunlight beyond, I found what I was looking for – a freshly painted cross with the name
Bernt Olsen
on it. It was just as it had been in that newspaper cutting – the small white cross and the church behind. What the cutting had not shown was the towering mountains beyond and the atmosphere of the place – so remote and chill. I remembered Farnell out in Rhodesia. I remembered him talking of places like this, talking endlessly of the snows and the glaciers up in the mountains and the narrow fjords as the lamp-smoke thickened in our hut and the whisky got lower in the bottle. It had all seemed so remote out there, for at the time of the year the land had been dry as dust under a blazing sun. But now I understood what he had been talking about. And I was glad to know he'd been buried here in the land he loved and for whose riches he had sacrificed everything.