The Puffin of Death

by Betty Webb

  “Just make the personalization read, ‘To Teddy Bentley, a fellow birder,’” I said, handing over my copy.

  She gave me a startled look, then added my requested personalization above a flowery signature. When finished, she eyed me quizzically. “A fellow birder, you say? And your name, it sounds familiar.” Before I could explain, she continued, “Oh. The article in The Reykjavik News. It said that you and another woman were the ones who found…who found…” Her voice, already hoarse from her talk, grated to a stop.

  I nodded and told her I was sorry for her loss. “After what you’ve been through, it took grit to show up today.”

  “I wouldn’t dream of disappointing my fans.” Then she stood up, took hold of my arm and pointed me toward the exit. “I want to talk to you, but not here. Not with everyone watching.” She shuddered.

  After a quick goodbye to Kristin, she led me two streets over to the Hótel Keldur, a brand new glass-and-steel hotel facing the harbor. When we arrived, she guided me through the dramatic black, gray, and white marble lobby into the elevator, and finally to a sleekly appointed suite on the fourth floor. Lit mainly by two tall windows facing the bay, the suite’s motif was also black, gray, and white, but like the rest of the elegant hotel, it somehow avoided looking cold.

  Elizabeth—she refused to let me call her Mrs. Parr or even Miss St. John—sat me down on a white leather sofa and pulled up a black suede chair across from me. “Coffee or tea?” Her voice, now recovered, was stronger than it had been back at the store.

  “I don’t…”

  “Please let me do this. I have so much to ask you.”

  “Coffee, then.”

  “The Keldur makes a lovely cappuccino.”

  “That’ll be fine.”

  She picked up the phone and ordered two cappuccinos along with two helpings of lagkaka, which she explained was a traditional Icelandic cake layered with fruit and cream. She hadn’t lost all her weight on that.

  I cleared my throat. “Look, I meant to tell you I’m so sorry about your husband and…”

  “Yes, yes, you’ve said that and I’m sure you are, but I have to ask you—how did he look? Had he…?”

  She couldn’t finish, but I knew what she wanted to know. The same thing Adele had wanted to know: Did Simon suffer before he died?

  “He looked peaceful, Elizabeth,” I lied. “He never knew what hit him, just died doing what he loved. Looking at birds.”

  She stared at me for a long time through those red-rimmed eyes, then said, “You’d have told me the same thing if he died in agony, wouldn’t you?”

  “I’m telling you the truth.”

  A weak smile. “Writers are good judges of character, Teddy. As such, I have to say that you come across as a woman who would go out of her way to avoid hurting anyone, even if it meant telling a lie.”

  “I wouldn’t. I swear.”

  The smile grew warmer, giving me a hint of the woman she was when not grieving. “That was your biggest lie yet.”

  “I…”

  We heard a discreet tap on the door. “Room service,” a male voice called.

  For the next few minutes we concentrated on our cappuccino and lagkaka, which was as delicious as described, but when we finished, she launched into a recap of her marriage to Simon Parr. Listening to her was unsettling, but she’d been left alone in her hotel suite for days with no one to talk to except the police, and for the first time in days she had the chance to unburden herself. Grieving people tend to do that in one of two ways: they either sob on your shoulder, or they become loquacious, wanting you to know what a saint their dearly departed had been. Elizabeth was the latter, with one exception. Her husband was no saint, she admitted, and neither was she.

  “Ever since that awful Barbara Walters interview, I’ve been deluged with letters decrying some of the choices we made, but our marriage worked,” she said, after giving me a half-hour of the standard biographical material (they’d met at a birding convention, married a year later, tried to have children but failed, traveled the world in search of rare birds, etc.). “It worked because we were able to make accommodations.”

  “Oh?” I pretended nothing more than slight interest.

  “Over the years there were other women, and in my case, a man or two.” She looked away, seemingly to study the large black-and-white abstract painting on a charcoal suede-covered wall. “None of our dalliances were serious, and they certainly didn’t interfere with our love and respect for each other. If anything, they added to it.”

  “Ah.”

  “Compared to the Europeans, Americans are quite backwards on the issue of marriage.”

  “I’ve heard that.” But I promised myself Joe and I would never wind up “European.”

  When Elizabeth turned away from the painting, her face had brightened, but her eyes were still red. “Besides, no one could do for me what Simon did. He made my career.”

  “Really?”

  “He was a CPA, you know, but after we married, he closed his office, took a few courses in marketing and public relations, and became my business and PR manager. At that time, I was what you would call a mid-list writer, someone who, although enjoying a certain level of success, had never really broken through to the big-time. Simon’s attention to detail and talent for research made all the difference. After sitting down and studying the entire New York Times best-seller list, he advised me to take Jade, my archaeologist protagonist, away from obscure digs in Wyoming and have her oversee digs in exotic locations like Egypt, Mykonos, and Fiji. And to put more sex in the books. Lots more sex. Even kinky sex, the kinkier the better. When my sales increased exponentially, he talked me into changing publishers. Next thing you know, I moved from mid-list to the New York Times best-seller list!” She beamed. “All due to Simon.”

  “Amazing.”

  The sorrow returned to her eyes. “Simon was generous in other ways, too. You see this suite?” She waved a hand at the black, gray, and white elegance surrounding her. “First thing he did when he won the Powerball, was plan this tour. He booked everyone into a suite similar to this, and footed the bills for the entire trip.” She managed a wobbly smile.

  I decided to dare a question. “That’s generous, all right. But are you sure you didn’t mind about the other women? Most wives would.”

  She shrugged her bony shoulders. “Oh, Teddy, you’re a sweet girl, but you sound so old-fashioned. I’m not ‘most wives.’ I have my own successful career and my own interests. And my own diversions.”

  “Ah.”

  “Besides, Simon was no cad. He made certain the women he got involved with knew it was only a temporary thing. When their relationship had run its course, he ended it like a gentleman.”

  Like many recently widowed women, Elizabeth was over-romanticizing her husband. Yes, maybe the man had his good points, but each time I saw him in action, he was behaving like a lout. Ergo the scene on the plane, the one in the Viking Tavern with Adele, and the more private dismissal—thank God for small favors—of poor Dawn.

  Which reminded me. Hoping Elizabeth would buy into it, I gave her a version of the same story I had told the others, that I’d run into old school friend Dawn at Vik, and joined her yesterday for a bout of bird-watching at Stykkishólmur.

  “But now she’s missing,” I finished.

  Elizabeth blinked. “Missing? What do you mean, ‘missing’? Wasn’t she with the rest of the group?”

  “She disappeared sometime during the night, and last time I checked, she still hadn’t turned up.”

  The blood drained from Elizabeth’s already pale face.

  “My God. That means…” She raised her hand to her mouth, as if trying to keep her next words from spilling out. “That means she was telling the truth. For once.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “She…she…”


  For a second I thought she might faint dead away—she’d been through so much in such a short time—but showing the same resolve she’d shown at her book signing, she pulled herself together. “It’s just that…” She took several deep breaths. “It’s…it may be my fault.”

  “What do you mean?”

  A tear streaked down her gaunt cheek. “Last night, Dawn called me just after ten, I think, because the sun had finally set. You’ve known her a long time, Teddy, so you must know what she’s like. She loves drama, so when she called and started in with one of her tall tales, I’m afraid I didn’t pay much attention. I humored her and told her to drink something strong or take one of her pills, and get some rest, because everything would look better in the morning. Sometimes that’s all it takes to calm her down. That’s why I…”

  I knew the woman was grieving and that my visit had added to her distress, but I couldn’t help being impatient. “Elizabeth, please. What, exactly, did Dawn tell you?”

  “She told me someone was trying to kill her.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  I had almost recovered from my shock when we heard another knock at the door.

  Elizabeth rushed to answer it, and the next thing I knew, Inspector Thorvaald, all six-foot-five of him, loomed over me, flinty eyes narrowed into slits. “Well, well, Miss Bentley. So we meet again. I could say it is a surprise to see you here, but then I would be lying, would I not?”

  “I…I…” My mouth was too dry for me to do anything other than stutter.

  Fortunately, Elizabeth’s own anxieties took over. Her voice trembled as she plucked at his sleeve. “Inspector, have you figured out who killed Simon?”

  Haraldsson’s voice gentled. “The investigation is ongoing, Mrs. Parr,” he said, using her married name, not her more famous one. When he turned back to me, his voice resumed its former ferocity. “I told you not to get involved in this case.”

  Thinking fast, I waved my autographed copy of Tahiti Passion at him. “I went to Elizabeth’s signing, and when she discovered I was into birds, she invited me up here for some…” I looked over at the table. “Some cappuccino. And lagkaka. I’ve never had lagkaka, before, so I…”

  He waved me silent. “Do not insult me with your fibs. I have only now returned from Stykkishólmur, where I heard all about your so-called interest in birds. As well as your interest in other things, such as who was where and when were they there.” His eyes narrowed even further. “Keep it up and I will find a good reason to put you in the Reykjavik city jail.”

  “No, you won’t,” I snapped back. “Since I’ve been here I’ve learned a little about your legal system and you can’t.”

  “Oh, be quiet.” He sounded more exasperated than angry.

  Still plucking at his sleeve, Elizabeth entreated, “Tell me what you’ve found out, Inspector. I need to know who hurt my Simon!”

  He gently pried her fingers away. “I am sorry, Mrs. Parr, but as I have said, the investigation is ongoing. Now, please, you ladies take your seats. There is something I must tell you.”

  “But…”

  “Wait, Elizabeth.” There had been something about the Inspector’s tone and phrasing that raised the hair on my neck. “Why don’t we find out why the inspector is here, since it obviously isn’t to join us in cappuccino and lagkaka.”

  Elizabeth sat.

  Haraldsson remained standing, looming over us like some forbidding Viking stele. He got right to the point. “Mrs. Parr, it pains me to tell you this, but earlier this evening the body of Dawn Talley was discovered floating in the bay.”

  Elizabeth’s face lost all its remaining color. So, I imagine, did mine.

  Giving us no time to recover from our shock, he continued, “So, Miss Bentley, I need to ask where you were between ten last night and seven this morning. And you, too, Mrs. Parr.”

  Elizabeth looked like she was about to faint so to give her time to pull herself together, I answered first. “Inspector, since you were in Stykkishólmur, you must know exactly what I was doing during those times; looking for Dawn, along with everyone else. Now tell me. Was it an accident? Or did she commit…?” I couldn’t quite bring myself to say the word: suicide.

  “She was found underneath a fishing boat, her hair entangled in the propeller. There were abrasions to her head.”

  “You didn’t answer my question, Inspector. Was it an accident?”

  He raised his eyebrows. “Our medical people are currently looking into the exact cause of the abrasions, but I am the one who is asking the questions here, not you, Miss Bentley.”

  “But…”

  When Elizabeth finally spoke up, her voice was clogged with grief. “Dawn was my friend!”

  The inspector’s voice gentled again. “So I understand, Mrs. Parr. But I also understand that the relationship between you two was rather complicated, that she and your husband were, ah, involved in an affair. Which is why I must also ask you to tell me where you were between ten last night and seven this morning.”

  Her grief gave way to anger. “That relationship was over. And I was right here! If you don’t believe me, you can check the mileage on my rental car. And its navigation system. It’ll prove I’ve never been anywhere near Sticks…Sticks…what’s-its-name.”

  “Stykkishólmur. I am sure you understand the gravity of the situation, two deaths in four days among the same small group of tourists.”

  “Of course I understand. But as for what you term a personal involvement between Simon and Dawn, I’d like to remind you this is the twenty-first century. Their affair was brief and meant absolutely nothing. I’m the one Simon always comes home to, and Dawn understands…” Her voice broke as she corrected herself. “…she understood that.”

  Late afternoon light streamed in from the tall windows facing the bay, bathing the stark black and white furnishings in a warm, golden glow, but the warmth didn’t extend to Inspector Haraldsson’s face. “That is a broad-minded way of thinking.”

  “Oh, please!” Disgust trumped the sorrow on her face.

  “All the same, Mrs. Parr, I would appreciate your stopping by the police station sometime in the next few days to give us a formal statement. Your group is not due to return to the U.S. until Friday, am I correct?”

  Elizabeth nodded.

  “Excellent. And since you were so good as to bring up the odometer and navigation system on your rental car, yes, I would like my techs to look at it.”

  “Right now?”

  A bland smile. “I will send someone out first thing tomorrow, so please refrain from using it before then. May I have the keys now? I will make certain you get them back.”

  Looking perplexed, Elizabeth disappeared into the bedroom, and when she returned, two sets of car keys were in her hand. After giving them up, she said, “I’d appreciate it if they’re returned as early as possible. Except for my signing at the bookstore today, I’ve been cooped up in the hotel since Simon was…since Simon died, and I’m not sure I can take the isolation anymore. I need to be with my friends. I was thinking about driving to Gullfoss tomorrow, where the tour is scheduled to be next. Unless they’ve changed their plans, that is.” As if suddenly exhausted, she resumed her seat on the leather sofa and picked up the iPhone resting on the chrome and class end table. “I’d better call and find out.”

  “What time did you plan to leave?”

  “Before noon.”

  “The techs will have been here and gone by then, and you will have your keys back. I can also save you that phone call. When I was at Stykkishólmur, I spoke to Mr. Perry Walsh, who I understand is the president of the group. He told me that everyone had voted to continue the tour, that they were certain Mr. Parr would have wanted it that way. So! You will enjoy Gullfoss, Mrs. Parr. The waterfall is spectacular. And I hope you will see many pretty birds.”

  When Haraldsson turned to me, his
voice could have dropped the suite’s temperature by at least twenty degrees. “As for you, Miss Bentley, I repeat my warning. Pay more attention to your own business, which, I understand, is a polar bear cub named Magnus, not an Icelandic homicide investigation.”

  With that he left, closing the door softly behind him.

  “What an interesting man,” Elizabeth said, rising from the sofa. “Maybe I’ll write him into my next book. Jade would go crazy for him. In the meantime, how about another slice of lagkaka?”

  Although her voice was steady, her hands trembled. In four days she had not only lost her husband, but also a friend, and I could only imagine how she felt. Anxious to return to the comparative peace of Bryndis’ apartment, I turned down the cake and announced my own departure.

  Before I reached the door, something occurred to me. “Elizabeth? Why didn’t you tell Inspector Haraldsson about the phone call.”

  “Mmph?” Her mouth was full of lagkaka. She swallowed, then said, “What phone call? You mean the one I started to make to Perry Walsh? The inspector said…”

  “No, the phone call you got from Dawn last night, saying she was afraid someone was trying to kill her.”

  With that, Elizabeth looked at her plate of lagkaka as if it had been poisoned.

  ***

  Bryndis had told me she would be spending the night at Ragnar’s, so I was left alone in the apartment on Baldursbrá. In order to distract myself from the distressing events of the past few days, I watched a few television programs, including an Icelandic soap opera with English subtitles. A handsome young man from Akureyri had moved to Reykjavik, angering his sheep-farming family who’d wanted him to take over the family business, but delighting his Reykjavik girlfriend, a sculptor, whose parents weren’t thrilled about their talented daughter dating a mere sheep farmer. I watched long enough to realize that—except for the lack of heavy makeup and neuroses—Icelandic soap operas were no different than their American brethren. Bored, I picked up Elizabeth’s book and began to read.