The Mist

there were markers in the snow and you followed them.’ She was astonished at how firm she sounded, at the courage she was able to summon up now that the chips were down. But there was a cold, sinking fear in the pit of her stomach. She was afraid for her daughter, afraid that this intruder might have hurt Anna in some way.
Leó was silent.
‘That’s what you told us yesterday, isn’t it?’
‘Yes, er, sure, but I didn’t mean it like … I saw some markers, that’s right, but…’
‘And they lead here, but first they go past Anna’s house. The road comes up from the village. And that’s where you came from. You weren’t out shooting on the moors with your friends – whether there were two or three of them, or however many it is today!’ The thought that she might be fighting for her daughter’s life lent her an unaccustomed strength. For God’s sake, Anna should have been here by now!
‘I was shooting,’ Leó contradicted her, more forcefully this time. ‘We were, er, shooting ptarmigan.’
Einar finally intervened. ‘Where’s your gun, then, mate?’ he asked quietly, a hint of steel in his voice.
At last, at last, Erla thought, he was beginning to see the light. He’d realized there was something wrong.
‘My gun? Oh, my gun. I, er, I dumped it when I got separated from the others. I was getting tired and didn’t want to weigh myself down with unnecessary clobber.’
Erla held back, leaving it to Einar to treat this explanation with the contempt it deserved.
But Einar didn’t immediately respond and a fraught silence descended on the little room. The atmosphere was peculiar enough anyway, thanks to the power cut; a sort of twilit gloom prevailed, evoking the time of day that Erla always found most sinister: the hour when ghosts could emerge from the shadows and take on human form, without your being any the wiser.
She shuddered; it was chilly in the room, as usual, but it wasn’t this that triggered her reaction so much as a fervent wish that this stranger had never turned up on their doorstep, never disturbed the precarious balance of their home life. Yes, she was unhappy here – in a way; she couldn’t lie to herself, but she longed to be left in peace with her unhappiness.
She strained her ears, listening out for the sound of the door opening that would herald Anna’s arrival. Waiting for her to breeze into the room, her hair still crusted with snow from her walk, full of apologies for being so late. Once she was here, there would be no need to interrogate Leó. Because maybe, just maybe, he was telling the truth. Her confidence wavered, but then she reminded herself that he could be lying to cover up the fact that he had done something to Anna.
‘So you left your gun behind, did you, mate?’ Einar asked at last, in a deceptively level voice.
Leó nodded, his eyes darting from side to side as if it was dawning on him that the game was up and he had lost. That he wasn’t welcome here any more.
‘Yes,’ he said after a brief hesitation.
‘That strikes me as a bit of an odd thing to do. Guns are expensive toys – they cost an arm and a leg, as I’m sure you’re aware. I’ve never heard of anyone dumping their gun like that. Do you have any idea where you left it? Did you mark the spot?’
‘No, not really. Anyway, I didn’t have anything to mark it with.’
‘You’re obviously not short of money, then.’
‘What? No, of course I’m upset about the cost. I suppose the truth is I panicked – I was scared I was going to die of exposure out there.’
‘And you came up the road, you say. Didn’t you notice the other house on the way here?’
There was a long pause.
‘The other house?’ Leó asked hesitantly.
‘Yes, my wife was asking you about that last night, and again this morning.’
‘Oh, right, yes…’
‘You said you hadn’t seen any buildings apart from our place, but there’s another house that belongs to us too, not that far off. The road from the village runs right past it.’ Einar sounded unusually stern.
Leó didn’t reply.
‘So you didn’t follow the road? The markers?’
‘Yes … er, yes, I did.’
‘And yet you didn’t see the house. Or was it our place you were looking for?’
The silence stretched out, heavy with tension. Einar had drawn back slightly, as if to put more distance between himself and Leó, and Erla leaned as far away from their visitor as she could, as if to underline the fact that it was two against one and he was on his own.
‘Look,’ Leó said, on the defensive now, ‘it’s possible I saw it. I … I did see a building in the distance, but all the lights were off, so I just kept going. It could have been the house you’re talking about, but I was knackered and feeling the cold so badly by then … I was looking out for signs of life, for a light –’
‘It’s our daughter’s house,’ Erla cut in, ‘and there’s no way she’d have refused you shelter if you’d knocked at her door. Do you know what I think?’ – she raised her voice – ‘I think you did go there and she took you in, and … and then you did something to her. That’s what I think! She’s not here yet, she still hasn’t turned up … Tell us the truth, Leó. For God’s sake, you have to tell us the truth!’
‘Erla…’ Einar intervened. ‘Erla, love…’
‘I swear I didn’t meet her, I didn’t even knock at the door – the house looked … there were no lights on that I could see. I really don’t know what I was thinking. It’s hard to think straight in a situation like that.’
Einar abruptly took a step closer to Leó and raised his voice: ‘What do you want from us?’
‘What … what do I want from you? Nothing, I just needed shelter. This is all some