Once he had completed the preparations as best he could, he began his search for the stepfather that Marion had mentioned in connection with Andres, who might be the man that Andres had spotted by chance in the area. Erlendur traced the name of Andres’s mother and found his date of birth, then searched the register of Reykjavik residents for the period when he was growing up. According to the records Erlendur examined, the boy had been four years old when he lost his father. After that his mother was registered as living alone with her son. From what Erlendur could discover, Andres was her only child. If she had lived with anyone for any length of time, he or they were not registered at her home, apart from one man who turned out to have died thirteen years ago. Erlendur found the street names and numbers where the woman had lived. She had moved constantly, even within the same area, living in the city centre, in Skuggahverfi, in the suburb of Breidholt when it was under construction, and moved from there to Vogar and finally to Grafarvogur. She died early in the 1990s. At first glance, Erlendur could find no trace of the stepfather Marion had mentioned before dying.
Since he was digging through the police archives anyway, he decided to examine any reports of incidents linked to racial prejudice or hate crimes. Erlendur knew that other members of the CID had been detailed to look into that aspect of the case but he did not let this deter him. He generally did as he pleased, ignoring his place in the precise hierarchy of the investigation. In all, more than twenty detectives were working on Elias’s case, each assigned a specific task relating to the collection of information, surveillance of comings and goings from the country, or examination of transactions at car-rental companies and hotels in the city and surrounding area. They had also contacted the Bangkok police and enquired about any possible movements to or from the country by Sunee’s relatives. The Reykjavik CID were inundated with tip-offs every day, most of which were recorded and followed up, although this was a time-consuming process. Members of the public called in after watching the news or reading the papers, claiming to have important information about the case. Some of it was absurd and irrelevant: drunks claiming to have solved the case using nothing but their own ingenuity and even giving the names of relatives or acquaintances who were “a bunch of arseholes’. Every lead was investigated.
As far as Erlendur knew, there were not many individuals in the police files who were considered actively dangerous or likely to commit serious crimes from racist motives. A few violent thugs had been arrested, at their own homes in a couple of instances, and a variety of offensive weapons — clubs, knives and knuckledusters — had been removed, along with propaganda that could be described as neo-Nazi: material from the Internet, pamphlets, books, photocopies, flags and other racist paraphernalia. Much of it had been confiscated. This was no organised circulation of hate propaganda, and few people had been picked up by the police specifically for showing hostility towards immigrants. Most complaints about racial prejudice were the result of random, one-off incidents.
Erlendur rooted around in the boxes. In one he found a carefully folded Confederate flag and another bearing a swastika. There were also a variety of publications in English, which, judging from the titles, seemed to write off the holocaust as a Zionist conspiracy, and racist pamphlets featuring pictures of primitive African tribes. He unearthed articles from American and British magazines inciting hatred, and finally an old book of minutes from an association calling itself “Fathers of Iceland’.
The book recorded several meetings that took place in 1990, where the issues discussed included Hitler’s contribution to the reconstruction of post-Weimar Germany. At one point there was a passage referring to the problem of immigration in Iceland and discussing how to stem the tide. It predicted that the Nordic race would face extinction in Iceland within a hundred years if miscegenation continued. Among the measures to oppose this it advocated passing tougher laws on eligibility for citizenship, and even closing the borders to foreigners, regardless of whether they came to the country to work, for family reasons or as asylum seekers. The entries stopped abruptly. Apparently the association had disbanded without warning. Erlendur registered that the handwriting was elegant, the style terse and to the point, with no unnecessary digressions.
Although no list of members was appended, the minutes contained a name that seemed familiar to Erlendur. He was sitting racking his brains about where he had heard it before when his mobile rang. He recognised the voice immediately.
“I know I mustn’t call but I don’t know what…”
The woman began to sob.
“…I don’t know what to do.”
“Come and talk to me,” Erlendur said.
“I can’t. I can’t do it. It’s so terrible how…”
“What?” Erlendur said.
“I want to,” the voice said. “I do want to, but it’s impossible.”
“Where are you?”
“I . . . “
The woman abandoned what she had been going to say and there was silence.
“I can help you,” Erlendur said. “Tell me where you are and I’ll help you.”
“I can’t,” the voice said, and he could hear the woman crying down the phone. “I can’t . . . live like this . . .” She trailed off again.
“But you keep calling,” Erlendur said. “You can’t be in a good way if you’re phoning me like this. I’ll help you. Are you hiding because of him? Is it because of him that you’re in hiding?”
“I’d do anything for him, that’s why-‘ The woman broke off.
“We need to talk to you,” Erlendur said.
Silence.
“We can help you. I know it must be difficult but…”
“It should never have happened. Never.”
“Tell me where you are and we’ll talk,” Erlendur said. “It’ll be all right. I promise.”
He waited with bated breath. All he could hear over the phone was the woman’s sobbing. A long moment passed. Erlendur did not dare to speak. The woman was weighing up her options. His mind racing, he tried to find something to say to her to clinch the matter. Something about her husband. Her family. Her two children.
“Your children will certainly want to know—”
Erlendur got no further.
“Oh God!” the woman cried, and hung up.
Erlendur stared at the phone in his hand. The caller ID was blank like last time. He assumed the woman had called from a public payphone; the background noise had suggested as much. When he had her first call traced, it turned out to have been made from the Smaralind shopping mall. Information of this kind had little bearing as a rule. People who called the police from public payphones did so for a reason and avoided using phones near their home or workplace. The location would tell the police nothing.
Pensively, he shoved the phone back in his pocket. Why was the woman calling him? She disclosed no information. She did not tell him why she was in hiding. She did not mention her husband or reveal anything about what she was thinking. Maybe she felt it was enough to let him know that she was alive. She might even be trying to prevent him from looking for her. What was she concealing? Why had she left him?
He had got little response when he put the same questions to her husband. The man shook his head as if he had no idea what was going on. It was almost his sole reaction to the disappearance. It was not until after New Year that Erlendur met his ex-wives and asked them what they thought could have happened. One received him at her home in Hafnarfjordur; her husband was abroad on business. The woman was eager to help Erlendur with his inquiries, eager to tell him what a shit her ex-husband was. He listened to the diatribe, then asked her if she thought her ex was capable of harming his new wife. The answer came instantly.
“No question,” she said. “I’m certain of it.”
“Why?”
“Men like him,” she said contemptuously, “they’re capable of anything.”
“Have you any proof of what you say?”
“No,” the woman said, “I ju
st know. He’s the type. I bet he’s started sleeping around again. Men like that never give up. It’s like a disease. It’s like a disease with those bastards.”
The other woman was more informative when she came, at her own request, to see Erlendur down at the station. She did not want him to come to her house. He described the case to her and she listened attentively, especially when he began to hint at the possibility that her ex-husband might be involved in his new wife’s disappearance.
“Have you no idea what happened to her?” she asked, her eyes wandering around the office.
“Do you think he could have done something to her?” Erlendur asked.
“Is that what you think?”
“We don’t think anything,” Erlendur said.
“Yes you do or you wouldn’t be asking.”
“It’s simply a routine inquiry,” Erlendur said. “We try to consider every angle. It has no bearing on what we do or don’t think.”
“You think he killed her,” the woman said, seeming to perk up.
“I don’t think anything,” Erlendur said, more firmly this time.
“He’s capable of anything,” the woman said.
“Why do you say that?”
“He once threatened me,” she said. “Threatened to kill me. I refused to divorce him so he could get married for a third time to that bitch you’re looking for. I said I’d never give him a divorce and he’d never be able to marry again. I was very angry, maybe even hysterical. A friend of mine told me about the affair, she’d heard people gossiping about it at work and told me. Everyone knew but me. Do you know how humiliating it is when everyone knows except the person who’s being cheated on? I went berserk. He hit me. Then he said he’d kill me if I put up any fucking obstacles.”
“He threatened to kill you?”
“He said he’d throttle me nice and slow till I was dead.”
Erlendur started out of his musings. He looked down at the book he had been perusing and his thoughts returned to the name recorded under the minutes. He remembered who it might be. Sigurdur Oli had mentioned the name and how bad-tempered and unpleasant he had been. If it was the same man, Erlendur would have to bring forward the interview he had scheduled with Kjartan, the school’s Icelandic teacher.
His mobile rang. It was Elinborg. She had a printout listing Sunee’s incoming calls over the last month. Some were from her ex-mother-in-law, others from the chocolate factory or friends, and twice she had been called from the school.
“Then the same number crops up eight times.”
“Whose is it?”
“It’s a business number. An insurance company. It’s the only unexpected number on this list, as far as I can see. There aren’t many numbers.”
“Have you asked Sunee about it?”
“She claims not to recognise it. Says she vaguely remembers someone trying to sell insurance.”
“Do you think it’s the boyfriend?”
“We’ll soon find out.”
17
Ever since news of Elias’s murder had passed like wildfire round the country, a steady trickle of people had been coming to the block of flats to lay flowers and cards on the spot where his body was found. Toys, teddy bears and model cars could be glimpsed among the bouquets. A memorial service was to be held for Elias in the garden that evening.
Elinborg and Sigurdur Oli were busy in the area. Twice they drove past and saw people laying flowers on the spot. Most of their day was spent interviewing Niran’s friends individually. Their accounts tallied in all the main details; none of them admitted to knowing Niran’s movements on the afternoon Elias was attacked, nor could they say where Sunee might have taken him. They flatly denied selling drugs at the school, dismissing it as a lie, and although they admitted that they had once come to blows in the school playground, they insisted that it had not been their fault. None of them had seen Elias that day. Two of them had hung around with Niran for a while after school but parted from him at about the time Elias was found. They had been by the chemist’s. The two of them had spent the rest of the day together and seen no more of Niran. None was aware that Elias had any particular problems at school. They claimed they’d had no contact with Niran since Elias was found. As far as they knew, the brothers had a very good relationship.
The most talkative and helpful of the boys was called Kari. He seemed genuinely willing to help the police, whereas the other three were very reluctant, gave curt answers and volunteered nothing unless specifically asked. Kari’s manner was different. Sigurdur Oli saw him last and was prepared for a fairly brief interview but it turned out to be quite the opposite. The boy was accompanied by his parents; his mother was from Thailand and his father from Iceland. They knew Sunee and her brother and talked of the tragic, incomprehensible event.
“Mostly people just go on about having nothing against immigrants,” the man said. He was an engineer and had taken time off work to provide moral support for his son. He sat at the kitchen table, a tallish, rather overweight figure, with his wife who was small and petite with a friendly, smiling face. The police had contacted them and both were clearly very concerned. The woman had also cut short her day at work as departmental manager at a pharmaceuticals company. The man was talking about his experience of Icelanders, as the husband of a foreigner.
Sigurdur Oli nodded. He was alone. Elinborg had been called away to deal with another matter.
“We say we have nothing against Asian immigrants, nothing against people coming over from Asia and settling here. It’s exciting to eat out at Thai restaurants and experience an exotic culture, listen to different music. But when it comes to the crunch people always say that we shouldn’t let in “too many” of those people,” the man said, making a sign for quotation marks with his fingers.
“We’ve discussed it so often,” the woman said, looking at her husband. “I suppose it’s understandable in a way. There are so few Icelanders; they’re proud of their heritage and want to preserve it. Their tiny population makes them vulnerable to change. Then along come the immigrants and spoil everything. Many of the people who move here become isolated, whether they’re from Asia or wherever, they never learn the language properly and remain outsiders. Others do a better job of fitting in; they realise how important it is and really work at it. Learning the language is absolutely key.”
Her husband nodded. Kari sat looking down at the floor, awaiting his turn.
“Wasn’t there something about that on the news the other day?” the man said. “Some problem with the Icelanders living in Denmark. Their children refused to learn Danish. That’s no different, is it?”
“Of course immigration can cause problems,” the woman continued, her eyes on her husband. “That’s nothing new. It happens all over the world. The crucial thing is to help people adapt, though of course they have to show a willingness to adapt themselves if they really want a future in Iceland.”
“What’s the worst sort of thing you hear?” Sigurdur Oli asked.
“Fuck off home, Thai bitch.”
She came right out with it, without the slightest hesitation or sign of the impact such words might have on her. As if she had been asked this before and had developed a thick skin to such abuse. As if it was just another fact of life. Kari darted a glance at his mother.
“Do you get the impression that prejudice is on the rise?”
“I don’t know,” the man said.
“Do you experience prejudice at school?” Sigurdur Oli asked the boy.
Kari hesitated.
“No-o,” he said uncertainly.
“I don’t think you can really expect him to admit to that sort of thing,” the man said. “No one likes telling tales. Especially not after such a terrible thing has happened.”
“Some other kids have claimed that Kari and his friends are peddling dope at the school. They said it without hesitation.”
“Who said that?” the woman asked.
“It’s just something we’ve heard,”
Sigurdur Oli said. “There’s probably no need to take it too seriously at this stage. And I can tell you that the witness was not very reliable.”
“I’ve never sold any drugs,” Kari said.
“What about your friends?” Sigurdur Oli asked.
“No, they haven’t either.”
“And Niran?”
“None of us have,” Kari said. “It’s a lie. We’ve never sold any drugs. They’re lying.”
“Kari doesn’t do drugs,” his father said. “It’s out of the question. He doesn’t sell drugs either.”
“You would know, would you?” Sigurdur Oli asked.
“Yes, we would,” the man replied.
“Tell us about the trouble at school that we’ve been hearing about,” Sigurdur Oli said. “What’s really going on?”
Kari stared down at the floor.
“Tell them what you know,” his mother said. “He hasn’t been very happy at school this winter. Some days he hasn’t wanted to go in. He thinks people are lying in wait for him, that some of the boys have got it in for him and want to attack him.”
“Mum!” Kari protested, looking at his mother as if she was giving away embarrassing secrets.
“One of Kari’s friends was beaten up,” her husband said. “The school authorities can’t seem to do a thing. When there’s trouble it seems they’re powerless to act. A boy was suspended for a few days, that was it.”
“The school claims there’s no overt racism or tension,” Sigurdur Oli said. “No trouble or fighting beyond what you’d usually expect in a large school. I take it you wouldn’t agree with that, judging from what Kari has told you?”
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