Thin Ice: An Inspector Gunna Mystery (Gunnhildur Mystery Book 5)

by Quentin Bates

  ‘He was supposed to be the driver. I told you before, didn’t I?’

  ‘Yeah, maybe, but I don’t see how he fits in.’

  Magni lifted one of the two fish fillets, laid it flat and worked the knife carefully between the meat and the skin, pinching its tail with the fingers of his free hand.

  ‘It’s Össur’s job. He had the idea and the inside information, so I guess he knew when the old guy was going to have all that money ready. Árni and me, we were just the hired help, independent sub-contractors, if you like.’

  ‘I get that, but he wasn’t with you on Thursday? So why’s he dead?’

  Magni pushed the knife forward with a single smooth motion and held up the skin, leaving the fillet on the table.

  ‘Y’see,’ he said, working the knife into the tail of the second fillet and repeating the operation. ‘You see, it was Össur’s job, but with me to help out, like a minder. I was flat broke and he offered me a payday to just go with him and watch his back. Árni was supposed to be the driver. He was supposed to turn up outside the old guy’s place just as we came out the door.’

  ‘Right, so what went wrong?’

  ‘No idea,’ Magni said, slicing the fish fillet into steaks. ‘We came out the door. We’d left Árni round the corner and told him five minutes. I’m not sure Árni knew what it was all about, if he’d figured out what Össur was going to do. Maybe he was held up, or just didn’t think he had to be there right on the dot of three. Anyway, out we came, expecting to jump straight into his truck and off to the airport, but he wasn’t there, so we had to run for it.’

  ‘And you ran into us?’

  ‘Yep. Össur was frantic.’

  ‘It could have been an accident. Nothing to do with the old guy you robbed.’

  ‘That’s just it. We don’t know what went wrong, and it’s not as if Árni can tell us now. But if it’s something to do with Alli, then we’re properly screwed if he gets hold of us.’

  Tinna Lind watched in fascination as Magni dipped the fish pieces in egg and then breadcrumbs, laying them carefully in the pan one by one.

  ‘Did you know how dangerous this job was going to be?’

  ‘Hadn’t a clue,’ Magni said with a scowl. ‘I thought it might be a bit hairy, but not like this. If I’d known he was going to bump the old bastard for all that cash, I’d have backed out right away. But I thought he was just collecting some small amount he was owed; never thought it was going to be this hardcore.’

  ‘Why did you take the job?’

  ‘Because I needed the money, and because I was drunk,’ he said, flipping the fish in the pan. ‘Drain those potatoes, will you? And call the others. This’ll be ready in a few minutes.’

  Gunna plugged the memory card from the petrol station into her computer and watched the same footage half a dozen times without getting a decent view of the man’s face. She was staring at it yet again when Eiríkur came in and sat down.

  ‘Any luck?’

  ‘The fire investigator has confirmed that the fire was started deliberately, and it seems the dead man had been working for Alli the Cornershop.’

  Gunna groaned. ‘Not that arsehole again? Why can’t we put him away and lose the key?’

  ‘Who knows? We might be able to this time if we can pin Árni Sigurvinsson’s death on him.’

  ‘Post-mortem report?’

  ‘Miss Cruz is doing the post-mortem tomorrow. She said that judging by her initial examination, the victim had been beaten badly and had lost a toe.’

  Gunna told herself not to be impatient, knowing that the force’s only forensic pathologist was already stretched too far for comfort.

  ‘So he had been mistreated?’

  ‘Looks like it,’ Eiríkur said. ‘We’ll find out when she’s finished the post-mortem.’

  ‘You’re going?’

  Eiríkur grinned. ‘No. We drew straws for it and Helgi’s going.’

  ‘But the doctor at the scene reckoned smoke inhalation, didn’t he?’

  ‘He did, and I reckon that’s what the post-mortem will come up with tomorrow. How did you get on this morning?’

  Gunna gestured to the screen.

  ‘Good and bad. There’s footage of the missing women’s car with someone else buying a tank of petrol, but he’s taken care not to let his face show.’

  ‘So, not much use then?’

  ‘It places the car outside Selfoss and the owner not in it, so it looks like he drove into the petrol station from the north and drove away southwards, as if he was going to Selfoss. I had two hours going around the town with Lárus Erlendsson looking for anywhere with CCTV that might have picked it up, but no luck.’

  She turned back to the screen and the footage that she had left playing and saw a white car flash past on the screen.

  ‘What?’

  Eiríkur crouched behind her as she rewound the footage and found that it had run on for more than an hour, triggered every time something went past the filling station.

  ‘Is that the same car?’ Eiríkur asked.

  ‘Looks the same, doesn’t it?’ Gunna said, slowing the replay down and noting the time, just over an hour later than when the Explorer’s driver had bought fuel. They watched the car speed past on the fringes of the camera’s vision, but then stop and come back, the reversing lights bright and the registration number unmistakeable.

  ‘It’s him. He drove into Selfoss, stopping to get fuel, and then drove back out the same way.’

  ‘He missed the turn-off,’ Eiríkur said as the Explorer turned off into the dark along the unmade road at the junction, its tail lights disappearing into the blackness.

  It felt like a lazy Sunday. Össur had again retreated to the bridal suite. Erna had washed up, not particularly well, but she’d done it. Tinna Lind lounged in an armchair with a book while Magni dozed on the sofa.

  As the bongs sounded the hour and the news on the radio, his eyes opened and he listened to the series of advertisements first. A dry-voiced announcer read out news of a visit by a Norwegian minister to Iceland and cut to a brief comment by the visiting politician’s Icelandic counterpart on how satisfying it was to welcome his opposite number, although there were issues they still had to agree on.

  His eyes started to close again as the news moved on to a judgement by the supreme court on the case of a trade union threatening to take a case against the government to a European court, and the news from Ukraine had him yawning. But then his eyes snapped open and Tinna Lind laid the book down.

  ‘Police in Reykjavík are still seeking to establish the whereabouts of Erna Björg Brandsen and her daughter Tinna Lind Brandsen Bogadóttir who were last seen on Thursday afternoon. They were last seen travelling in the city area in a white Ford Explorer registration number . . .’

  ‘That’s us,’ Tinna Lind said and Erna appeared from the kitchen with a dishcloth in her hands.

  ‘What’s us?’

  ‘On the radio.’

  ‘Shhh,’ Magni scolded.

  ‘Anyone aware of Erna Björg or Tinna Lind is asked to call the confidential police information line on . . .’

  ‘Shit.’

  ‘You didn’t think they wouldn’t be looking for us, did you?’

  Magni sat up and smacked a fist into the palm of the other hand.

  ‘Össi!’ he yelled. ‘For fuck’s sake, what’s he doing up there on his own?’

  He hammered on Össur’s door and eventually it opened, the pistol again pointing at him.

  ‘Put that fucking thing away,’ he said in frustration.

  ‘What?’

  The room was thick with smoke and Össur had a dazed look on his face.

  ‘You’re blasted, right?’

  ‘I’ve had a puff. What business is it of yours?’

  ‘Listen. There was something on the news just now.’

  ‘About us? What on the TV?’

  ‘On the radio. Listen, they’re looking for the girls and the car. It’s the car that’s the
problem. They know the number and that’s what they’re looking for.’

  ‘So? It’s hidden away, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yeah, but did that old guy who was here the other day see it? Do you remember?’

  Össur’s face was blank. ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘It has to go,’ Magni decided.

  ‘Why? Just keep it hidden away. Nobody’s going to notice it in there, are they?’

  ‘And then what? We just walk out of here? We need a car, and we need that car to get another car.’

  ‘I see,’ Össur said, but Magni found it difficult to be sure that he understood.

  ‘Look, I’m taking the car as soon as it’s properly dark and I’ll be back with another one tonight. Got that?’

  ‘Yeah. Reckon so.’

  ‘That means you’re going to have to straighten up and be downstairs while I’m away so the old lady doesn’t do anything stupid and run for it. Understood?’

  ‘Yeah, I know. Don’t give me orders.’

  ‘And tomorrow we move out of here, right?’

  Alli preferred neutral ground. The last place he wanted to go near was the Undertakers’ black-painted headquarters, and he didn’t want to have Rafn sitting in his place with that sardonic look on his face. Instead he chose a coffee shop and they met outside.

  Rafn was wearing a suit that made him look very different to the denim-jacketed character he normally dealt with, and Alli felt disturbed by the change as they took a seat in the corner, Rafn taking the seat by the wall, which gave him a view of the door and the rest of the room, while Alli sat at a disadvantage with his back to the rest of the world.

  Alli ordered coffee for himself and raised an eyebrow at Rafn.

  ‘A latte with a hazelnut shot,’ he said crisply.

  ‘You’re looking smart,’ Alli said, and Rafn nodded seriously.

  ‘We have to these days. Business is changing.’

  Neither of them wanted to get to business until the waitress had delivered their coffees, which she did fussily, arranging cups and saucers on the little table, looking stonily at Alli and giving Rafn a smile.

  ‘She wouldn’t have smiled at you quite so sweetly if she knew what you’re really like,’ Alli said, sounding sour.

  ‘Appearances can be everything.’

  Alli looked around quickly.

  ‘Any results?’

  Rafn sipped his coffee delicately.

  ‘Nothing,’ he said. ‘Absolutely nothing at all.’

  ‘He’s disappeared?’

  ‘That’s what it looks like. Vanished. No sign of him anywhere.’

  Alli’s brows knitted in frustration. ‘If Össur was about, you’d find him. He can’t not flash cash around if he has it.’

  ‘And he has.’

  Alli’s coffee suddenly tasted sour. ‘Somebody would know someone else who would know. Reykjavík’s not that big.’

  ‘You know a guy called Magni? I don’t know his patronymic. A big guy by all accounts.’

  Alli’s mind went back to the brawny man with the red stubble who had knocked Baldvin flat with no apparent effort.

  ‘No. But I might have seen him.’

  ‘The last we heard was that Össur was hanging about with a guy called Magni, and the sadly deceased Árni Sigurvinsson,’ Rafn said, placing his tall glass delicately on the table and dropping his voice. ‘I don’t suppose Árni told you anything before his tragic accident?’

  Magni couldn’t help being nervous. He had driven plenty of cars before that had been borrowed from their owners without the formality of asking permission, but this was different. The police would undoubtedly be actively searching for this one. The number would trigger an alert as soon it was noticed and Magni had no desire to spend days answering awkward questions, especially not with a hundred thousand euros waiting for him.

  He turned off the main road as soon as he was able and kept to suburban roads through the city outskirts, looking around to scope out any possible replacements for the Explorer. It would either have to be something old that he could hot wire, as a modern car would be beyond his skills, or the other option would be to break in somewhere and steal the keys to a car.

  On the other hand, his own car was sitting unused on the forecourt of his sister’s house in Gardabær, though he immediately dismissed the idea of using that. That was his cherished car, the one he had worked hard for, rebuilt and frequently polished until it shone. He needed something anonymous that could be sacrificed if necessary, not the apple of his own eye.

  He cruised through the city at a strictly legal speed until the germ of an idea emerged. He wanted to be able to take a car that wouldn’t be noticed too easily, and he also wanted to park the Explorer somewhere out of the way, preferably where it wouldn’t be noticed for a few days.

  The sight of a police vehicle in the distance made him start and he held his breath as he hauled the Explorer off the road and down a side street, where he waited for a few minutes before venturing back under the street lights. The sighting convinced him that it was far too hazardous to stay in the car, so he took it quickly past a busy junction and into a district where shops outnumbered houses. He drove into the car park of the local church, tucking the Explorer away at the far end between two other cars.

  He left the key in the ignition, reasoning that with any luck someone else would steal it, which would throw the police off the trail in what he hoped would be completely the wrong direction. But before walking away, shoulders hunched and his collar turned up high, he stooped, lifted a handful of half-melted snow and mud, and smeared it over the number plate.

  Magni walked fast. The place he had decided on was somewhere he had been before and he had no objection to doing the place’s owner a bad turn. The parking lot was lined with cars, some for sale and some for hire, and many of them, Magni knew, with chequered histories.

  The office was a temporary building and the back door was no match for the long crowbar he had brought with him from the shed behind Hotel Hraun. The lock manfully withstood his efforts, but the door frame itself splinted and parted. Inside he rifled the office space, discovering a shallow cupboard of keys on hooks that also yielded to the crowbar. Eventually he selected a clean-looking grey Skoda, which he knew would have four-wheel drive without looking out of the ordinary. Minutes later he swept from the car park, but cursed as the fuel light immediately came on. There was no choice but to buy fuel and he cast about for a filling station, preferably an unmanned one.

  He didn’t like having to do it. Filling the stolen Skoda up only a few kilometres from where it had been taken was a dangerous move, but he took the precaution of stopping to smear the car’s registration plates with more mud before rolling up his collar and once more relying on Erna’s credit card to do its work as he did his best to hide his face from the cameras he knew had to be there somewhere.

  Gunna had hoped to catch Gísli alone, and the sight of a yellow Mazda that had seen better days parked outside made her wonder whether or not to drive past and go home. It had been a long day, she was tired and she didn’t relish the prospect of an intense investigation, which intuition told her was probably more complex than it appeared.

  The door swung open as Gunna strode up the path and Drífa stepped outside with a backward look. Gunna frowned, wondering why the girl looked so furtive, shivering outside the front door.

  Her raven-black hair had made a comeback, Gunna noted, but she was relieved the black lipstick and what she thought of as personal ironmongery had gone. Not much more than a year ago, Drífa had been a radical student with a penchant for goth accoutrements, but the arrival of a child and the effort of salvaging a relationship that neither she nor Gísli had expected to embark on had called for compromises all round. Drífa had ditched her style and put university on hold, while Gísli had stopped spending most of his respectable seaman’s earnings on gas-guzzling cars and had made the effort to go back to college.

  ‘What’s the matter, sweetheart?’ Gunna aske
d, seeing how awkward Drífa looked, standing in the half-light by the front door, the skin of her bare arms turning rapidly to gooseflesh. ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘We have a visitor,’ Drífa said. ‘I thought I’d warn you,’ she added awkwardly.

  ‘Why’s that?’

  ‘Well. I wasn’t sure.’ Gunna saw Drífa struggling to find the right words. ‘It’s Gísli’s father. He’s here.’

  ‘Ah.’ It took Gunna a moment to take in what she had said, and she stifled her rising, bitter anger with a couple of long breaths. ‘I’m probably not the best person to turn up right now,’ she said finally, swinging her car keys on one finger.

  ‘I thought so, and I reckoned I’d warn you before you came in.’

  ‘How is he?’ Gunna asked, her voice strained.

  ‘He’s so frail I don’t know how he managed to get here on his own. I don’t know how old he is, but he looks like a very old man.’

  ‘He’s not sixty,’ Gunna said, calculating rapidly. ‘Fifty-eight, maybe? Fifty-nine?’

  ‘Whatever,’ Drífa said. ‘He looks ninety, but I guessed you’d prefer not to meet him.’

  ‘Any more than he’s likely to want to meet me.’

  ‘He’s asked about you a few times. Twice today.’

  ‘All right, thanks, Drífa. That was thoughtful of you. A confrontation wouldn’t do any of us any good,’ Gunna said, spinning her keys. ‘Say hi to Gísli and tell him I’ll drop by tomorrow if I can get away early enough.’

  ‘I will,’ Drífa said, still sounding awkward but also relieved.

  Gunna drove away, wondering why she was angry with a man she hadn’t seen for more than twenty years, while she could see Drífa standing by the door, watching her until her view of the house in the mirror had disappeared into the darkness.

  * * *

  It was late when Magni arrived back at Hotel Hraun. Reykjavík had been clear, but north of the city snow had started to fall and he was forced to take it slowly. It was tempting to leave the Skoda, which he found to be a far more comfortable drive than the big but underpowered Explorer, outside overnight. But he bumped it through the hotel garden and drove it into the restaurant, where it added to the pools of water already there.