Into Oblivion

by Arnaldur Indridason

  Svava looked Erlendur in the eye and spoke firmly.

  ‘I’m aware I might be prejudiced,’ she said, ‘and it can’t be helped, but I don’t believe Dagbjört had met a boy from the camp. I think it’s quite out of the question. I just can’t picture it. Can’t picture it at all.’

  ‘Because …?’

  ‘Because she had her head screwed on,’ said Svava. ‘That’s why. I know I shouldn’t talk like this but it’s a fact. It’s what I feel and I should be allowed to speak my mind. I don’t believe she was seeing a boy from the camp, and anyway it was never proved. No one in the huts was aware of any relationship or recognised Dagbjört.’

  ‘Couldn’t she have been seeing this boy anyway, in spite of the fact no one saw them together?’

  ‘We went over it endlessly day in, day out,’ said Svava. ‘Did he exist? If so, who was he? Did he know what happened? Did she meet him that morning?’

  ‘But you don’t think he existed?’

  ‘No, I don’t. Though my brother disagreed. All I can say is that if there was a boy, he never gave himself up. He knew we were looking for Dagbjört. He’d have heard about our search and would have told us if he knew anything.’

  ‘Unless he was involved?’ said Erlendur. ‘Since he didn’t come forward, doesn’t that point to a guilty conscience?’

  ‘Of course, if you look at it that way,’ said Svava. ‘My brother talked a lot along those lines; Helga too. They were sure this mystery boy must have played some part in her disappearance. Convinced of it.’

  ‘The police put out an appeal in the camp for him or any witnesses who might know something about Dagbjört’s movements or their relationship to come forward.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘But nothing came of it.’

  ‘No. Nothing. Apart from two or three false leads the police followed up that turned out to have nothing to do with her disappearance. That was all.’

  11

  Kristvin’s flat was a typical bachelor pad, located on the top floor of a four-storey block in the Upper Breidholt district, with a fine view north to Mount Esja. The small kitchen had a table with two chairs, a large fridge, a few plates and glasses in the cupboards. There was little to eat apart from bread that was going mouldy and a few bumper packs of chocolate that looked to Marion as if they came from the base, and some Rio Coffee in its signature blue-striped packets. There was a fixture for a bin bag on the door of the cupboard under the sink but no bag, and Marion guessed Kristvin must have taken the rubbish with him the last time he left home and chucked it in the chute on the landing. An automatic coffee machine on the worktop next to the cooker, a box of American breakfast cereal beside it. A plate and spoon in the sink. Kristvin’s last breakfast, Marion thought.

  The bedroom was furnished with a single bed and a small bedside table on which lay two thick American paperbacks. Science fiction, judging by the covers. The bed was unmade and the sheets had not been changed in a while. The half-empty wardrobe contained a couple of pairs of jeans and checked shirts, a leather jacket, a dark suit, and a wide assortment of T-shirts. At the bottom of the wardrobe were two pairs of cowboy boots, one as good as new, the other scuffed from heavy wear.

  There were more sci-fi novels on the bookshelves in the sitting room, a few pieces of shabby furniture – sofa, table and an old chest of drawers on which stood a newish stereo, and two large speakers in the corners. Beside the stereo was a stack of records, mostly American rock. Marion pictured Kristvin listening to music the evening before he went to work for the last time. There were a couple of posters on the sitting-room walls – the Rolling Stones and Neil Young. The drawers in the chest turned out to contain bills, tax returns and some letters his sister had sent him in America.

  Marion was struck by how austere it was; how little it gave away about the occupant, apart from his taste for science fiction and American rock. Nothing unusual in that. His years spent studying in the States had left their mark. There was no sign that he had received any guests during the last days of his life, nor any evidence to suggest he had been involved with a woman.

  The only surprise was the contents of the fridge. The forensics team had subjected the flat to a meticulous examination, taking photographs and samples, searching for any clues as to how Kristvin had died. They found some dog ends in an ashtray in the sitting room, then told Marion to look in the fridge. It was at this point that Erlendur turned up.

  ‘Where have you been?’ said Marion, holding the fridge door open and peering inside.

  ‘I got held up,’ said Erlendur, hoping he would get away without elaborating. No such luck.

  ‘How come?’ asked Marion. ‘What were you up to?’

  ‘I had a meeting in connection with a matter I’m looking into.’

  ‘What are you looking into?’

  ‘A case you’re aware of – I’ve told you about it.’

  ‘Which one?’

  ‘The Camp Knox case.’

  Marion regarded him in surprise. ‘You mean the girl from the Women’s College?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You’re finally doing something about it?’

  ‘I’m not sure. I spoke to her aunt. It went all right.’

  ‘Was she helpful?’

  ‘Yes, she was, as a matter of fact. What have you got there?’

  ‘This,’ said Marion, opening the fridge door wide to show Erlendur the cache within.

  The interior was jam-packed with well-known American brands of beer and vodka, as well as eight cartons of cigarettes. Forensics had left the freezer compartment open too so they could see an old cigar box containing more than twenty roll-ups which, they were informed, contained marijuana.

  ‘Seems to have slipped his mind that beer’s illegal in Iceland,’ commented Erlendur. ‘You won’t find gallon bottles like those in the state off-licence either.’

  ‘And certainly not cigarettes like these,’ said Marion, sniffing a roll-up. ‘Probably smoked them himself. We found dog ends in an ashtray in the sitting room.’

  ‘All from the base, I’d guess,’ said Erlendur, picking up one of the cigarette cartons.

  ‘The question is how big a scale was he operating on? Was this just the tip of the iceberg?’

  ‘Aren’t these the same brands as the stash we found in the brothers’ shed? The vodka and cigarettes, I mean?’

  ‘Looks like it.’

  ‘Reckon they’ve got contacts on the base too?’

  ‘We’d better ask them. What did the aunt say?’

  ‘Aunt?’

  ‘The girl’s paternal aunt,’ said Marion, closing the fridge. ‘Haven’t you just come from seeing her?’

  ‘She doesn’t believe the girl had a boyfriend,’ said Erlendur. ‘Or he’d have come forward during the search.’

  ‘Unless he bumped her off himself.’

  ‘She reckons there was too big a class difference. That the girl would never have got mixed up with a boy from Camp Knox.’

  ‘What would she know about it?’

  ‘She claims she knew her niece well.’

  ‘Bit of a snob, is she?’

  ‘She said she was trying not to be prejudiced but that’s the way it looked to her. Her niece would never have associated with a boy from the slum.’

  Marion had long been aware of Erlendur’s fascination with Dagbjört’s story; had discovered it during a quiet period at work. Erlendur had been talking about his hobby of collecting accounts of people getting lost in violent storms and barely making it home alive or never being found; about accidents at sea, avalanches and other natural disasters. Marion was intrigued by this unusual pastime and found that Erlendur was especially interested in missing-persons cases and had read up exhaustively on Dagbjört’s disappearance. Was obsessed by it, in fact. Marion only knew about the case by hearsay but immediately recognised that Erlendur was in earnest, and got the impression that he felt the police could have done a better job at the time. Marion didn’t necessarily agree an
d argued the point with Erlendur, before eventually encouraging him to take action instead of endlessly shilly-shallying. Erlendur implied it was too late. Marion dismissed this as nothing but a pretext: the longer he delayed, the more time would pass, and it was never too late to reopen a cold case. So it was in large part due to Marion that Erlendur had finally taken the plunge and contacted Dagbjört’s family.

  ‘So, what now? What’s your next step?’ asked Marion, sniffing at one of the dog ends.

  ‘Maybe talk to the girl who heard Dagbjört refer to a boyfriend,’ said Erlendur and followed Marion out onto the balcony. ‘Could Kristvin have been operating a smuggling racket from the base and got into a spot of bother as a result?’

  ‘I’m wondering what his sister knows,’ said Marion. ‘Whether she’s told us everything.’

  Marion leaned over the balcony railing and peered down at the car park belonging to the block. The balcony faced north and Erlendur lifted his eyes to the icy slopes of Mount Esja.

  ‘Could he have fallen from here?’ Marion wondered aloud.

  ‘Wouldn’t people have noticed?’

  ‘I don’t know. If it happened at night, no one about, a silent fall. Bearing in mind he could have been dead already. Or unconscious.’

  ‘There are no signs of a struggle in the flat,’ Erlendur pointed out.

  ‘No, true.’

  ‘And why was his body taken all the way out to Svartsengi?’

  ‘Search me,’ said Marion. ‘We should have another word with his sister.’

  ‘Did you notice her hair?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Didn’t it look like a wig to you?’

  ‘That was obvious,’ said Marion.

  That evening it was reported on the news that two men had gone missing on the Eyvindarstadir Moors in the north of the country. They were hunters from Akureyri, who had failed to return home at the expected time. Conditions in the area had deteriorated since they set out and the north Iceland rescue teams were preparing to launch search parties. According to the report the two men were friends, in their twenties.

  Erlendur and Marion were listening to the radio in the office. Otherwise the local news was dominated by the coming elections. The Conservatives’ slogan was: ‘War on Inflation’. The Commies had twisted this into ‘War on Living Standards’. The announcer gave the latest on the hostage crisis in Teheran: Ayatollah Khomeini was refusing to receive Jimmy Carter’s negotiators. A British art historian in the royal household had admitted to spying for the Russians. Polish dissidents had been sentenced to prison.

  ‘Same old,’ said Marion, switching off the radio.

  They had not yet managed to get hold of Kristvin’s sister to question her about the goods in his flat, but Erlendur had spoken to his boss and arranged to meet him at the Icelandair premises at Keflavík airport the following day.

  ‘I just hope to God they’re well equipped and know the area. No one should go on a trip like that without the proper gear,’ muttered Erlendur after the announcement about the two missing men.

  ‘It wouldn’t be the first time,’ said Marion.

  ‘People should take proper precautions,’ said Erlendur. ‘It’s madness to go charging up into the mountains at this time of year, trusting in luck. You never know what might happen.’

  He said this with such a chill in his voice that Marion turned to look at him.

  ‘Are you talking from experience? Is that why you’re so obsessed with all those stories?’

  ‘People should just take care,’ said Erlendur, dodging the question. ‘Or things can go badly wrong.’

  Marion said goodnight and headed home, stopping off on the way at a popular Danish-style smørrebrød place to buy a prawn sandwich. Once home, Marion sat in the quiet house, eating this takeaway accompanied by a glass of port, and thought about Kristvin and the milky-blue lagoon, his sister’s wig and the stash in the fridge. As so often, once the day’s hectic business had receded, memories of Katrín began to intrude, of their intermittent relationship that had ended so abruptly. Marion had met her at a TB sanatorium in the 1930s and they had shared painful recollections of their time there and the lasting impact of the disease.

  She had stayed on in Denmark but travelled a great deal, and over the years she had sent Marion an assortment of little souvenirs from all over the world. But now those days were over and their correspondence had dwindled until in the end she had stopped writing altogether.

  Towards midnight Marion finished the port and went to bed feeling a faint sense of misgiving, without knowing why.

  12

  Kristvin’s sister Nanna could not hide her surprise when Marion Briem and Erlendur turned up early next morning at the nursery school where she worked, asking to speak to her. She was busy dressing the children in their outdoor clothes and after a bit of a tussle she beckoned the two detectives to come out into the playground with her as they were short-staffed due to illness and she had to supervise. Marion asked if she shouldn’t be taking time off; it must be tough coping with her brother’s death, all the more so given the circumstances and the news coverage. Nanna replied that she preferred being at work to moping around at home with nothing to do: she had to keep herself busy. This seemed sensible to Erlendur.

  Nanna was Kristvin’s next of kin. The day before, she had asked Erlendur when the post-mortem would be completed so she could start planning the funeral, but he hadn’t been able to inform her. She repeated her question as the three of them stood by a large sandpit, watching the children play, but again received a vague reply. She also wanted to know how the investigation was progressing and was told that naturally it would take time and no results could be expected just yet.

  The bitter north wind had dropped, giving way to milder weather. It was still early and the city was dark under an overcast sky. A two-year-old boy started howling, turning a pained gaze on Nanna as a little girl hit him over the head with a pink plastic spade, then shovelled sand over him. Nanna moved the toddler out of harm’s way and comforted him, before putting him down in another, more peaceful sandpit.

  ‘She’s a little terror, that one,’ Nanna said apologetically as she came back, nodding towards the girl who appeared to Erlendur to be already casting around for a new victim.

  ‘Yes, she’s quite something,’ said Marion. ‘We’ve talked to your brother’s neighbours. They speak well of him. Say he was quiet. They weren’t aware of many visitors. There was an elderly man living opposite him on the third floor –’

  ‘Yes, Jóhann,’ said Nanna.

  ‘You know him?’

  ‘I’ve seen him about. Kristvin had a lot of time for him.’

  ‘Jóhann obviously felt the same. He told us your brother was very kind; used to carry his groceries upstairs for him and would always ask if he needed anything when he was going out to the shops himself. He mended the old man’s kitchen sink for him.’

  ‘They got on well. Kristvin told me Jóhann found it tough at times, living on the third floor.’

  ‘I take it your brother moved there when he came home from America?’

  Nanna nodded. ‘He stayed with me for a while to begin with, but then he found this flat on the top floor of a block without a lift, in the back of beyond. The cheapest place he could find. He took out a mortgage. Owed a lot on his student loan as well.’

  ‘But he had a good job,’ Erlendur chipped in.

  ‘Yes, he was on a decent wage once he started work at the airport.’

  ‘Was he involved in smuggling?’

  ‘Smuggling?’

  Nanna was momentarily flustered, but quickly realised that this was the intention.

  ‘We found various items in his flat that we have reason to believe came from the naval base,’ said Erlendur. ‘Cigarettes, beer and vodka.

  ‘Oh, that. I don’t know if any of it was smuggled – yes, probably. It was mostly for his own use but he sometimes gave me some. I asked him to buy me stuff from time to time – gave him the mo
ney. You can get it dirt cheap down there compared to the prices at the state off-licence, and of course you can’t get beer here.’

  ‘And the dope?’ said Marion.

  ‘Dope?’

  ‘We found cannabis in his flat. Marijuana.’

  ‘Oh, the grass,’ said Nanna. ‘Was it in the freezer?’

  ‘Was he dealing in drugs from his flat?’

  ‘No, he wasn’t. Not drugs. Occasionally beer and vodka. Jóhann bought some, for example. And one or two other people he knew.’

  ‘Any idea who they were?’ asked Marion.

  ‘Is it important?’

  ‘Could be.’

  ‘Were you aware he used drugs?’ asked Erlendur.

  ‘Yes, of course. We both did. Mostly me, though.’

  ‘You?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What …?’

  ‘It helps with the pain.’

  ‘What pain?’ asked Erlendur.

  Nanna looked at them searchingly.

  ‘You must have noticed the wig.’

  They didn’t react.

  ‘This here.’ She pointed to her head. ‘Do you think I wear it for fun?’

  They still didn’t say anything.

  ‘I have cancer,’ said Nanna. ‘It’s not long since I finished the second lot of chemotherapy and they say it went well but they can’t promise anything. Just like the first time. Kristvin’s grass helped – it made me feel less sick during the treatment. When he was in America he’d read that marijuana can help cancer patients, so he thought it was worth giving it a try.’