The pen wouldn’t work at first and Karl had to be careful not to break the tip in his frantic haste to scribble the numbers down. Then suddenly the ink began to flow. ‘Two, four, one, two, seven, nine, seven, three, one, nine.’ He read over the numbers on the page as they were repeated, trying to detect an accent, but the synthetic voice didn’t sound foreign. Could some Icelandic organisation, either illegal or government-operated, have set up a numbers station? It didn’t seem possible. It must be a foreign station using Icelandic to confuse people. But the broadcast was clear, too clear to come from far away. Karl listened to the sequence, mystified. Surely it couldn’t originate in Iceland? Even if someone in this country did feel the need to pass on secret messages, he would have bet his bottom dollar that the internet would be the chosen method of communication. Shortwave was too passé for his fellow Icelanders.
As if to hammer home its point, the voice began to read the original number group again: ‘One, seven, zero, three, nine, two, zero, five, six, nine.’ Karl copied it down and stared at the result: 1703920569. He read the sequence over again as it was repeated. ‘One, seven, zero, three, nine, two, zero, five, six, nine.’ All the numbers were right. It must be an absurd coincidence. Or some kind of joke aimed at him.
It was his ID number.
Karl examined the other series: 2412797319. That could be an ID number too. He tapped it into a search engine on his phone and 122 results came up, none of which were Icelandic. He tried adding a hyphen in the appropriate place after the first six digits and searched again. Bingo. The owner of the ID number turned out to be a woman whose name – Elísa Bjarnadóttir – he didn’t recognise. He tried searching for images of her but that didn’t help. Her face was no more familiar than her name. Karl put down his phone. The whole thing was bizarre and uncanny. The broadcast of the message had finished and the soulless voice signed off with the words: ‘Goodbye, more later.’ This was followed by a melody played on a musical box. Then silence. He took off his headphones.
There was a feeble buzzing from the fly in the window. Karl turned towards the sound, wondering if he should let the poor creature out and grant it its longed-for freedom. It would of course perish in the freezing conditions outside but at least it would die happy. But he forgot the fly when he heard the faint sound of a voice from the headphones. The broadcast from the mysterious station was starting up again. Karl replaced his headphones and heard: ‘Hello. Hello. Hello.’ After this the same number groups were repeated. It was clear that he would not make it to the club meeting after all. This was a pity seeing as he finally had something to report. But perhaps it would be better to keep this to himself for the time being. Especially if it turned out to be a prank aimed at him.
While Karl sat listening intently, the fly threw itself at the glass one last time, then fell down dead.
Chapter 4
Saturday
Margrét seemed to have no idea that she was being watched. She was sitting on a small sofa that barely had room to accommodate her and the huge cuddly animal propped at her side. She hadn’t touched the toy. Her green eyes roved restlessly around the sparsely furnished room in search of something to fix on, sliding away from the gaze of Silja, the young woman in the chair next to her, who was trying to keep up a flow of conversation with simple questions. Silja smiled at Margrét and took care not to glance unnaturally often at the large mirror on the wall facing the sofa. The girl’s eyes, on the other hand, kept returning to stare at her own reflection, completely unaware of the people watching her on the other side. She hadn’t said a word, restricting her responses to a nod or shake of her head as appropriate. This didn’t matter as Silja’s questions hadn’t yet touched on any important issues. She had to win the child’s trust first, and anyway they were still waiting for the police representative to show up.
‘This is a disgrace. Where’s the bloody cop?’ The girl’s paternal grandfather had brought her to the interview. Although he must have been on the right side of sixty, his curly hair was so white it was almost translucent. He had turned up unshaven, his badly crumpled shirt collar sticking up on one side. In other circumstances Freyja would have been surprised he didn’t feel the collar chafing against his jaw, but it was normal for people to arrive at the centre in a distressed state. No one took any notice; they had seen worse. He had more urgent matters on his mind than shirt collars or shaving: his daughter-in-law had been murdered, his son was still abroad, and he and his wife found themselves looking after their three grandchildren with no idea how to cope with their grief and trauma. Saliva sprayed from his mouth as he spoke, the fine drops spattering the polished surface of the table. They gleamed there briefly before evaporating. The others affected not to see. ‘Are you going to subject her to endless bloody questions about her school and friends? Can’t you see how she’s feeling? What the hell does that stuff matter? Aren’t there more important things to discuss?’
The people sitting round the table all turned as one to Konrád Bjarnason from the State Prosecutor’s office. By common consent they seemed to regard it as his job to answer the man. From Freyja’s limited experience of Konrád this did not bode well. He was the type who put on a Teflon suit each morning in the hope that no responsibility would stick to him during the day. He lowered his gaze and dusted some imaginary fluff from the garish tie that was completely out of keeping with the sombre atmosphere. When it became clear that no answer would be forthcoming, all eyes turned to Freyja instead. She could hardly play the same silent game and wait for their attention to move on to somebody else. If everyone passed the buck they’d be here all day. She wondered how best to handle the grandfather. There was little point pleading the excuse that the case had come up without warning and she hadn’t had a chance to make the necessary preparations. It was true, though; she hadn’t even been given the name of the man in charge of the investigation, let alone had an opportunity to speak to him before the meeting. The Police Commissioner’s office had simply told her to assemble the team and to expect a little girl for interview; someone from the police would provide the necessary questions. But the officer in question hadn’t turned up.
Freyja cleared her throat, squared her shoulders and adopted a carefully neutral expression. She could feel her hastily secured ponytail slipping down her neck. She’d had no more time to get ready than Margrét’s grandfather; when the phone call came from the police she’d been sitting in her dressing gown at the kitchen table, enjoying her first coffee of the weekend, her eyes still full of sleep. The time she could have used to tidy herself up had been spent instead on assembling the team: the psychologist Silja who was to interview the girl, a representative from the Child Protection Agency, a doctor and a nurse. The last two were not regular employees of the Children’s House but were brought in as required. Freyja had summoned them in case, on top of everything else, the little girl had suffered some form of abuse at the hands of the murderer. It was better to be prepared for every eventuality; a man who could brutally murder a young woman in her own bed was capable of anything. The precaution had proved unnecessary, however, as it turned out that the girl had already undergone a medical examination. But since the women had arrived by the time this was established, and the cost of their call-out had already been incurred, Freyja had decided to keep them there, to be on the safe side.
There was a lot riding on their successful handling of the case as it wasn’t every day that the police requested the help of the Children’s House in a criminal investigation. Although they were always brought in when sexual abuse was suspected, they had little experience of eliciting disclosures from children who had been exposed to other types of crime.
It had been hinted to Freyja that this unusual course had been taken because the girl had flatly refused to set foot in the police station and had been equally unwilling to answer the detectives’ questions at her grandparents’ house. The centre was a last resort and it was imperative that they do a good job, since it was unlikely that they would be
given another opportunity to show what they were capable of. If this went wrong, it would be Freyja’s fault and she could expect a reprimand from the Child Protection Agency. The Children’s House was her baby and as director she was responsible for the day-to-day running of the centre as well as for the individual cases referred to them. She had only been doing the job for four months and today’s interview was probably the most important since she’d taken over, if you could single one out in this way. After all, every case involved the possibility that the life of an innocent child had been wrecked. It was a cause for celebration whenever all suspicion of a crime could be dismissed, an outcome that fortunately wasn’t uncommon, though sadly wouldn’t apply in today’s case.
The social worker from the child protection services raised his eyebrows. Freyja got the message; she was taking too long to answer. Little Margrét was fidgeting on the sofa, her eyes trained on the door of the interview room. From her grandfather’s expression it was plain that his patience was running out. Who could blame him? Freyja forced a smile.
‘I realise that the psychologist’s conversation with Margrét might seem pointless, but the questions aren’t as random as they sound. Silja’s an expert in the forensic interviewing technique specially designed for children like your granddaughter. It’s essential for her to establish a rapport with Margrét before she moves on to more important questions.’
The man shook his head, then said in a more subdued voice: ‘Well, I only hope you lot know what you’re doing. She’s been through enough trauma.’
‘You need have no worries on that score.’ Freyja noticed out of the corner of her eye that Silja was tapping her ear as if the earpiece concealed there was on the blink. It was hardly surprising; she was expecting to be fed questions but none were coming through. Freyja switched on the microphone. ‘The policeman hasn’t arrived yet, Silja. Keep talking if you think that’s OK. Otherwise we’ll have to take a break or postpone the interview.’ The woman on the other side of the glass gave a discreet thumbs-up. Over the intercom they heard her ask yet another question, this time about pets.
‘Have you got a dog, Margrét? Or a hamster, maybe?’
The girl shook her head, her red locks swaying. A strand of hair caught in the corner of her mouth and she pushed it away with ivory fingers. Her skin was so pale she looked as if she’d never seen the sun.
Her grandfather was watching her intently. He looked as dazed as he had when Freyja first saw him and Margrét walking hand in hand up the drive. The Children’s House was located in a residential house with only two parking spaces and by the time they arrived, both had been taken. He had been forced to park further down the street and they had trudged here through the freshly fallen snow. Walking was clearly an effort and the little girl had balked every now and then and stood staring at the house in bewilderment. Each time, her grandfather had bent down to encourage her. Now, though, he heaved a sigh and seemed to regret that he hadn’t given in to her wish to turn back. ‘The kids had a cat that died. It was run over. At the time we thought it was the worst heartbreak the poor little things would have to suffer.’
Freyja reached for the microphone again. ‘Silja, avoid talking about pets. Her cat was hit by a car.’ Again the woman gave a discreet sign that she had received the message. Changing the subject, she asked instead if Margrét owned a toboggan and had been sledging recently. Freyja glanced at the wall clock and decided to give it ten more minutes. If the policeman hadn’t arrived by then, they would call it a day. They couldn’t subject the little girl to much more of this. There was too much at stake. The first meeting with a child was usually crucial, but she would have to come back. Again and again. A whole host of people would want to hear her statement – the police, the judge, the lawyer defending the person eventually charged with the crime, and the prosecutor as well. It would be a miracle if they managed to extract all the information they wanted from her in one go, to everyone’s satisfaction.
The screen of Freyja’s phone flashed on the table in front of her. It was the letting agent who was trying to find her a flat. She longed to answer; there was stiff competition for the few properties that came up for rent and the place was bound to have been snapped up by the time she rang back. But there was no way she could take the call now. She would have to make do with her brother’s dump for a while yet. It took some getting used to after the flat she had until recently shared with her partner, but then her ex was a well-paid financial consultant, while her brother was an inmate of Litla-Hraun Prison. Unfortunately, since she had owned no share in her ex’s luxury pad, she had left the relationship as skint as she’d entered it. It was only thanks to her brother’s situation that she wasn’t out on the street. He had just under a year left of his sentence, and the way things were going it would take her that long to find a place to rent. The alternative was to fall for some guy and move in with him. But given her success rate during the months she’d been single, there was quite frankly more chance of the President of Iceland driving over to the prison and granting her repeat-offender brother a pardon.
Freyja had done her best to meet a new man, dutifully going out on the town with her girlfriends and constantly checking out the talent on and off the dance floor. She was blessed with good looks, and knew how to tart herself up when necessary, so it shouldn’t have been a major challenge. She had seen a couple of men she liked the look of, both extremely attractive and apparently after the same thing as her. On each occasion she had struck up a conversation and downed a few drinks with the guy before dragging him home with her. The first had broken down in tears when she sat beside him on her brother’s battered old sofa in the hope that he would finally make a move. He had confided that he was gay but didn’t dare come out as he was a masseur and feared he would lose all his male clients. Sighing, Freyja had encouraged him to do the right thing. She hadn’t a clue if he’d followed her advice as she hadn’t encountered him again.
Things had gone better on the second occasion – to begin with, at least. The man, a carpenter called Jónas, had recently moved to Reykjavík from Egilsstadir in the east of the country. Luckily, he had proved to be straight, and although they had been a little self-conscious with one another while upright, once horizontal they had fitted together like a well-oiled machine. But she woke up the next day to find that the man had done a runner and she hadn’t heard from him since. The really galling part was that she’d gone to sleep contented, feeling fairly confident that she’d met a man who was at least worth giving a chance. Plainly the feeling hadn’t been reciprocated.
The clock on the wall showed that half the extra time was up. Margrét’s voice came over the intercom, clear but sad. For once the girl had taken the initiative in the conversation: ‘Why’s that big mirror there?’ All those sitting round the conference table turned to face the glass. The girl was staring back, as if straight at them. Silja looked in their direction as well. She was sitting closer to the mirror, so the little girl couldn’t see the face she made for Freyja’s benefit. They had been caught out, as sometimes happened, and in such cases their policy was to tell the truth. It wasn’t fair to demand honesty from the children while lying to them in return. The two-way mirror was a recent innovation; previously interviews had been watched on a TV screen. Freyja had proposed the change soon after she took over, after watching several interviews by the old method. The screen tended to increase the viewers’ detachment from the subject, evoking involuntary associations with a TV programme. The verdict was that the new arrangement helped people to connect better with what was happening, simply by virtue of seeing the child and interviewer full size.
Silja turned back to Margrét. Her voice was as composed as before but her smile had faded. ‘It’s a sort of magic mirror. The other side’s like a window, so people can watch without having to squash in here with us. Clever, don’t you think?’
Margrét shook her head. She chewed her lower lip, frowning. ‘Is there somebody there now?’ she asked, fear and an
ger mingling in her voice.
‘Yes.’ Silja twirled her pen as if she were walking ahead of a brass band with the world’s tiniest baton. Freyja had begun to recognise the characteristic signs of tension.
‘Who?’
‘Your grandfather, for example.’
Margrét dropped her eyes. ‘I don’t want to talk to you any more. I want to go home.’ She looked up suddenly. ‘To Granny and Grandpa’s. Not to my house.’
‘But we’ve only just started chatting. Shouldn’t we stay a little bit longer? Then you won’t have to come back. Not for a while, anyway.’
The girl’s eyes narrowed. ‘I don’t want to be here. I want to go home with Grandpa.’
Freyja switched on the microphone again. ‘Wrap it up, Silja. The cop still hasn’t arrived and it sounds as if things are going downhill. We’ll just have to reconvene when she’s in a better frame of mind.’ It wasn’t unusual in difficult cases to have to cut short the first interview. Sometimes the child wasn’t in a receptive mood, or the psychologist failed to establish a rapport. In either case the team generally judged it wiser to take things slowly, call it off and try again another day.
The Legacy Page 5
