Death By Water by Torkil Damhaug Page A

yesterday. There was something she wanted to ask about.
    – What do you mean?
    Liss could hear the anger in her voice. She started to shiver. She didn’t want to hear what was about to be said. Anything else she could stand. Just not this.
    – She hasn’t come home, he said. He was still hesitant. – She’s been gone since yesterday evening.
    So she’s probably broken up with you, Liss might have said, but Mailin wasn’t like that. Liss could do it, suddenly do a runner if she got fed up with someone, and say nothing. But not Mailin.
    – We didn’t quarrel, Viljam said, perhaps guessing the direction of her thoughts. She could hear that he was struggling to keep his voice calm. – We’ve been getting on better than ever.
    Liss clicked to the message from her sister the day before. On my way from the cabin. Always think of you when I’m out there. And then, rather cryptically: Keep Midsummer’s Day free next year. Call you tomorrow.
    – She was out at the cabin, she said. – She may well have gone back out there.
    Liss could see her sister sitting on the cabin steps and looking down towards Morr Water. It was their place, they owned it jointly. Their father had wanted the two of them to have it, and no one else. It was all they had to remind them of him.
    – We went out there and looked for her, Viljam answered. – She wasn’t there. She was supposed to be on a TV programme yesterday but never showed up, and no one’s seen her …
    Zako is a shit; it flashed through Liss. He can’t have done something like this. I’ll kill him.
    – What can I do? she managed to say. – I’m over a thousand miles away.
    She fumbled at the keys to cut off the call; she had to find somewhere she could be on her own.
    At the other end, her sister’s partner was breathing heavily. – We called the police last night. They asked me to come in and make a statement. I wanted to talk to you first. Find out if she called you. She said she was going to.
    The light in the tiny space around Liss changed, began to force its way into things, the mirror, the basin, pulling away from her. – If Mailin disappears, then I disappear too, she murmured.
     
    Wim was using his mobile when she returned. He pointed to a spot below the skylight where he obviously wanted her to pose. She remained standing outside the toilet door, fiddling with her own phone. No calls from Mailin. Just three from her mother she hadn’t answered. She slid down the wall, the rough surface scraping her naked back. Sat there chewing on a cigarette. There were two messages from her mother. She called voicemail. The first: Hi, Liss, it’s Mum. It’s Thursday evening, twenty-three forty-three. Can you ring me as soon as you get this message. It’s important. To the point, as always. But the voice sounded frail. Liss could hardly face listening to the next message, but she had to. It was from this morning. Liss, it’s Mum again. You must call me. It’s about Mailin.
    She had bitten straight through the filter. Wim was standing over her, talking. Something about time passing, something about a meter; he wasn’t cheap, and here she sat helping herself to his time as though he was a nigger eunuch. She got dressed and muttered something about an accident. Obviously he believed her, because suddenly he stopped talking and contented himself with a shake of the head.
    – Tomorrow you be here clean and focused, he called after her as she disappeared out the door.
     
    The December day was filled to the brim with a cold damp that gusted along Lijnbaansgracht and froze around her, layer upon layer of floating ice. The roads were slippery, but she cycled alongside the canal as fast as she could. A woman wearing a coat and a broad-brimmed hat who stood smoking by the railing of one of the houseboats turned and waved as she rode by. She pedalled harder. Two old men were fishing from a canal bridge. One was wearing a flat hat; he spat in the water. Suddenly she stopped.