Frozen Assets

‘Don’t talk such rubbish. This is a fishmeal factory, not a terrorist cell, now get out of the way, will you?’

Bára’s eyes widened as she saw the man swing one shoulder back and push a small machine pistol forward within reach.

‘Gunna, he’s got a gun. Who are these guys?’

‘I don’t know and I don’t like this. This may well be the fast response team we’re supposed to be able to call on, and if this fuckwit doesn’t get out of the way, I’m going to run the bugger over.’

She put her head out of the window. ‘Hey! Get out of the way, will you?’

The man made no move to step aside and Gunna put the second-best Volvo into gear to let it roll gently forward. The man put a hand on his weapon and reappeared at the car’s window.

‘This is a security area and you have no authority,’ he repeated in the same grim voice.

‘Look, mate, some of us have work to do. Bára, ring Vilhjálmur, will you, and tell him to call these cowboys off.’

‘You don’t have clearance,’ the man repeated, head lowered so close to the car’s open window that Gunna caught a whiff of his bad breath. Suddenly he shot a hand inside and made a grab for the keys in the ignition. As he did so, Gunna took her foot off the clutch and the car shot forward.

***

Hårde stiffened. He was sweating under the plastic helmet in spite of the rain and the chill wind. He saw the squad car come hurtling along the quay. The bow rope had already been taken off and he was furiously hand-over-handing it through the fairlead into a coil on the deck. He glanced over his shoulder to see Terje at the bridge window look down at him impassively. The engine roared again and the spring rope tightened as the angle between the ship and the quay increased. The ship strained against the rope and the squad car rolled to a halt on the quayside. Hårde saw the fat policewoman and a smaller one emerge from the car and stride across the concrete apron of the dock just as the engine noise again died away. The spring rope suddenly fell slack as a second man in black appeared from the shadow of the building that ran the length of the quay.

‘Don’t let that rope go, you hear me?’ Gunna yelled. The man casually raised the machine pistol slung over his shoulder and trained it on the Juno Provider’s bridge windows as two more men appeared. Gunna wondered where they were springing from.

The first man waved to the bridge, pointing to indicate that the ship should be brought back alongside, while the other two trained their weapons on the group standing around the mooring lines on its foredeck.

The ship’s engines rumbled as the spring tightened again and the ship gently came back to its berth. A gangplank was swung ashore and scraped across the concrete before it came to rest.

On the foredeck, Hårde was trying to understand what had happened. The fat policewoman had obviously been closer on his tail than he had thought, although he had carefully not underestimated the woman’s tenacity.

He looked across the narrowing gap at the trio on the quay and looked directly into the fat policewoman’s furious eyes as she lifted one hand and pointed a finger at him like a gun. He saw her turn her attention to the black-clad man.

‘What’s going on here?’ Gunna demanded.

‘I don’t have to say anything. You don’t have authority to be on this site. Leave, now, or I’ll have you escorted off.’

Boiling with fury, Gunna drew herself up to her full height, and wagged a finger at the man. ‘I’ve a bloody good mind to have you charged with hindering a police officer in the course of duty. So don’t you try lecturing me, sonny. D’you hear me? That man is a wanted criminal and it’s my duty to arrest him.’

She pointed at Hade, standing motionless on the Juno Provider’s foredeck with the rest of the crew.

‘Leave the site immediately,’ the man repeated.

‘Special Unit, my arse. Bunch of tin soldiers wasting taxpayers’ money and getting in the bloody way.’

The man ignored her and shouted up to the ship. ‘All of you, come down the gangway one at a time, slowly.’

The group from the foredeck trooped down nervously, with Hårde in the middle of the group and Terje bringing up the rear.

‘Who are you?’ the man demanded of each one. ‘Which of you is Hårde? And who is the captain?’

Terje stepped forward, and Gunna had to restrain herself from lunging at Hårde as he stepped out of the group. Even with a gun trained on him, the man radiated a quiet menace that made the hair stand up on the back of her neck. The Special Unit officer motioned for two of his men to escort Hårde while he spoke abruptly to Terje in rapid Norwegian.

As they spoke, a black van appeared from the far end of the fishmeal plant. Hårde took off his plastic helmet and smiled coldly at Gunna and Bára where they stood helplessly glaring at the men with machine pistols cradled nonchalantly in their hands.