Chapter 12

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Petra slipped her phone into her pocket and walked into the meeting room. She closed the door and offered Aarni Aviki a hot drink. When he declined, she poured a cup of coffee from the thermos and sat down at the table. She glanced at his hands as she arranged her notebook and a small digital Dictaphone that she placed between them. The communications chief for Seqinnersoq began to pick at his thumbnail. Petra watched, sipped her coffee, and waited. It was Aarni who spoke first, in Greenlandic.

“I want an interpreter,” he said.

Petra turned on the Dictaphone, and said, “Can you repeat that, in Danish?”

“I asked for an interpreter.”

“But your Danish is perfect, Mr Aviki.”

“I have the right to an interpreter.”

Petra pushed her coffee to one side and made a note on her pad. “I’m surprised you haven’t asked for a lawyer,” she said, and looked up. “Perhaps that would be more appropriate?”

Aarni stopped picking at his nail and sneered. “You’re one of them,” he said, switching to Danish, “the Danish-speaking Greenlanders.”

Petra gripped the pen between her fingers and took a breath. “Lots of Greenlanders speak Danish, Mr Aviki.”

“Yes, but they are from mixed parents. What’s your excuse?”

“I didn’t think I needed one,” Petra said. She paused for a moment to take a breath. If she wasn’t careful, she realised, this man could easily take her off-topic.

“I heard you grew up in the children’s home, here in Nuuk,” he said.

“Mr Aviki,” Petra said, tapping her pencil on the table, “I would like to ask you some questions about your relationship to Tinka Winther.”

“Your parents spoke Greenlandic,” Aarni said, and leaned back in his chair. “Why don’t you?”

Petra leaned over the Dictaphone and said, “Let the record show that Mr Aviki is evading the question.” Petra paused to catch Aarni’s eye. “And obstructing the investigation.”

“Wait,” Aarni said, “I’m not obstructing anything.”

“Then answer the question, if you will. What is your relationship to Tinka Winther?”

“I don’t have one. We have never met.”

“But you know who she is?”

“After last night’s news on television, doesn’t everyone?”

“I’d like to hear you say it.”

“Yes, I know who she is.”

Petra made a note, scrawling a quick question beneath it. She reached for her coffee, took a sip, and then placed it on the table. “And Malik Uutaaq, do you know him?”

“Of course I do. He is the leader of my party, my boss.” Aarni laughed. “That’s a ridiculous question, Sergeant.”

Petra ignored him, and made another note. She drew a line between the two. “What is Mr Uutaaq’s relationship to Tinka Winther?”

Aarni glanced at the Dictaphone, and then at Petra’s notes, squinting for a moment, as if he was trying to read them. He drummed his fingers on the table and looked around the room. He nodded at the thermos flask of coffee and Petra waited as he pushed back his chair and left the table. She noticed sweat on his brow when he returned. The surface of the coffee vibrated ever so slightly as he held the plastic cup in his hand. Petra repeated the question, as Aarni took a sip of coffee.

“Is this on record?” he asked, and glanced at the Dictaphone.

“I’m not a journalist,” Petra said. “Everything is on record. Of course,” she said, and pushed the notepad in front of Aarni, “if you wanted to write a statement instead…”

“No,” he said, and put the cup down on the table.

Petra studied the man’s eyes, and if she could see what Aarni was seeing, as he weighed his career against his political allegiance, she might have had some pity for the man’s turmoil, as he considered his next move. As it was, she found only contempt for the man who had forced her to consider her own identity, and her place in the country of her birth. She enjoyed seeing him squirm, but still, his answer surprised her.

“No,” he said. “Malik has no relationship with Tinka Winther, at least not that I am aware of.”

“They have never met?”

“No.”

“Perhaps in passing, at a party, for example?”

“Sergeant,” Aarni said, and Petra could feel a renewed confidence in the man’s demeanour, as if he had gained strength and a sense of peace with his decision to remain loyal to his boss, “I think we both know that Malik Uutaaq has a reputation for enjoying a good party. And why shouldn’t he? What he does in his own time, is his own business.”

“But when a girl goes missing, and his name is linked to her disappearance…”

“By whom, Sergeant? Who has linked Malik Uutaaq with the girl’s disappearance?”

“That’s not important. I am just following a lead.”

“A lead?” Aarni stared at Petra. “And how many leads do you have?” Petra reached for the notepad and began to pull it across the table towards her. Aarni stopped her when he pressed his hand on the top page. “How many, Sergeant?”

“The way this works, Mr Aviki, is that I ask the questions, not you.”

“And yet, you are suggesting my boss is involved in the disappearance of the daughter of his political opponent.” Aarni let go of the notepad. “I am the communications chief for Seqinnersoq, and questions such as these, ones that have a direct influence on the party, are my domain. So, I ask you again, Sergeant, what leads do you have? How many are you pursuing?”

The sweat on Aarni’s brow had evaporated. It seemed that the media onslaught since the beginning of the campaign had toughened Aarni Aviki’s skin. Any sign of his earlier discomfort had disappeared, and Petra decided she needed to take a new tack, if she was going to get any useful information out of him. A shadow at the window, and a knock at the door caught them both by surprise, as did the identity of the person to enter the room.

“Ms Winther,” Petra said, and stood up as Greenland’s First Minister entered the room. “I’m sorry, but this is a private interview, and I am going to have to ask you to leave.” She looked at Nivi’s assistant as he appeared in the doorway.

Daniel Tukku nodded. “I’ll handle this. Nivi?” he said. “We have to go. Your flight leaves in forty minutes.”

Nivi ignored him and took a step closer to Aarni. She shook as she spoke, her lips trembling. “I have to fly to Uummannaq, to identify the body of a girl that could be my daughter. I heard that you know something,” she said and glanced at Petra, “that you have information that might help the police find who did this to my daughter…”

“Nivi,” Daniel said, as he placed a hand on her shoulder. He pulled her slowly away from the table, and towards the door.

“If you know anything,” Nivi said, “you have to tell them. Because if you hide something, anything…” Nivi’s voice grew stronger, as she straightened her back and took a breath. “I will make sure you are finished in Greenland, and I will expose you to the world.”

“We have to go,” Daniel said. He glanced at Aarni, and Petra caught the briefest of nods as Daniel guided Nivi out of the meeting room and along the office floor to the stairs. Petra closed the door. When she returned to the table, she picked up the Dictaphone, and turned it off. Aarni pointed at it.

“You have it on tape. She threatened me.”

“She is upset.”

“She was out of line. I could end her career with that tape.”

“Police property,” Petra said, and slipped the Dictaphone into her pocket. She looked at Aarni. “If you have nothing more to add, then you are free to go.” She gestured at the door. “I think you know the way out.”

Aarni pushed back his chair, and stood up. He finished his coffee, straightened his jacket and tie, and walked to the door.

“Just one thing,” Petra said, as he closed his fingers around the door handle, “off the record.”

Aarni looked at her, and said, “I thought everything was on the record, Sergeant.”

“You’re right, but this is personal.”

“Go on.”

“You think you’re better than me, because you speak Greenlandic and I don’t, but you’re forgetting something, Arne.” Petra waited for a second, as he registered her use of his Danish name. “Your mother is Danish. Your skin is lighter than mine. You had an excuse for not speaking Greenlandic in school. I didn’t. And every time I tried, they told me that if I couldn’t speak proper Greenlandic, then I shouldn’t bother. And then they would hit me.”

“Are you looking for sympathy, Sergeant?”

“No, not for me, but for the children, the coming generation. You’re older than me. You were born after the first school reform, when Danish was prioritised.”

The muscles in Aarni’s face tightened. He glared at Petra. “That reform cursed me, and has cursed me my whole life. Me and my generation.”

“That’s right, it did,” Petra said. “Just like you and your language extremism is cursing a whole new generation of Greenlanders. It cursed Tinka Winther, and now she is missing, and likely dead.”

“You don’t know that.”

“That she is dead, or cursed? Does it matter?” Petra shrugged. “I know she couldn’t speak Greenlandic. Her mother made no secret of that in the press.”

“I don’t know what you want to achieve with this little off-the-record chat, Sergeant, but I think we are done for the day.” Aarni took his smartphone from his pocket and stepped out of the meeting room. Petra followed him.

“I have no more questions for you today, but you would be mistaken to think we are done. If the First Minister makes a positive identification of her daughter in Uummannaq, then this investigation changes gear again. If we discover that you withheld information, and this becomes an investigation of a suspicious death, perhaps even a murder, well…” Petra shrugged as Aarni stared at her. “Your reluctance to help and your lack of cooperation might just put you at the top of the list of people we would want to question, again, under less comfortable circumstances.”

Aarni glanced at the screen of his phone, and slipped it back inside his pocket, wiping his hand on his trousers afterwards. Petra tapped the end of the pen against her chin.

“Have you just remembered something, Mr Aviki?”

“No,” he whispered, and again, louder, “nothing.”

“If you’re sure?”

“Yes, I’m sure.” Aarni looked around the office, and then glanced out of the window at the parking area. “I don’t have a car,” he said.

“I’m sure you’ll manage.”

Petra watched Aarni Aviki all the way to the door. As soon as he was gone, she walked across to the window, leaned against the wall beside her colleague’s desk, and tilted her head for a better view of the main entrance below.

“That, Sergeant, might be considered stalking,” the policeman said, and continued typing his report on the computer.

“It might.”

“You wouldn’t want that to come back and haunt you,” he said, and laughed.

“Hush,” she said. “I am looking out of the window. That’s hardly stalking.”

“He is Malik Uutaaq’s spin doctor. If he sees you, he can choose to call it what he wants.” Petra slapped her colleague on his shoulder with the notepad. He laughed again. “You just upgraded to abuse.”

Petra ignored him as she watched Aarni. The glow from the screen of his smartphone lit his face as he began to punch in what she presumed was the number of a taxi service. He never made the call. A flash of headlights from a car parked opposite the main entrance caught Aarni’s attention, and he put the phone back in his pocket. Petra watched him walk to the car and peer in through the driver’s window. She couldn’t see the driver, and the shadow cast by the police minibus parked nearby made it difficult to see if it was a man or a woman sitting in the driver’s seat. Aarni stepped back and waited for the car to pull out before getting into the passenger seat. Petra switched her attention to the number plate, but it was obscured with dirt. She reached out and grabbed her colleague by the shoulder.

“Quick,” she said, “see if you can read the number of that car.”

The police officer pushed back his chair and stood up, pressing his face to the window as the car below them pulled out of the car park and into the street.

“Sorry,” he said. “I didn’t see it.”

“A black Suzuki,” Petra said, and made a note on her pad.

“Do you think it’s important?”

“Who knows, but right now, it’s all in the details.”

She walked back to her desk and sat down on the office chair, dropping her pad beside the computer keyboard as she moved backwards and forwards in the chair, tapping her chin with the end of the pen. Whoever was in the car was waiting for Aarni, but Petra couldn’t recall him calling anyone, or sending a text message during her brief interview. Gaba had him too spooked to call anyone on the ride to the station. Petra smiled at the thought – Gaba had that effect on people. No, she decided, whoever was waiting for Aarni had discovered he was at the police station without him contacting anyone. Petra just didn’t know if it was important.

“Another small detail,” she whispered to herself.

Petra wheeled the chair to the desk and moved the computer mouse to refresh the screen. She typed in her password and checked her intranet messages. There was nothing new. She typed up her notes and thought about what the First Minister had said about flying to Uummannaq. A positive identification would take the case in a new direction, and create a potential frenzy in the media, both in Greenland, and likely in Denmark too.

Petra finished with her notes and leaned back in the chair. She checked her watch, and then looked at the clock on the wall. She had ten minutes before her shift ended. The convenient arrival of someone to give Aarni Aviki a lift from the station intrigued her, but it was something that could wait until tomorrow.