Chilled to the Bone

by Quentin Bates

  Ástrós was nervous, frightened and reluctant to speak. Gunna pondered her words as she drove through the city centre, past the slipways and old whaling ships to where the square block of the Harbourside Hotel occupied what had once been a hardware shop with shipping companies on the floors above. The shipping companies had long ceased to exist, although a few of their crests were still displayed prominently high on the walls, and the hardware store had moved to shiny new premises in an industrial park on newly reclaimed land across the road.

  Inside the building nothing remained of what had once been there, as if everything had been stripped from the shell of the building and replaced. Gunna guessed that this was roughly what had been done. A smooth tiled floor stretched into the distance to a reception desk where, not that many years earlier, there had been shelves of nails, shackles and cans of paint.

  ‘I’m looking for the manager. Is he on duty today?’ she asked, taking advantage of the empty lobby and bored receptionist.

  ‘Uh. I think so.’

  Gunna waited. ‘Where can I find him, then?’

  The receptionist shook herself from her reverie and tapped at the computer.

  ‘He should be here.’

  ‘Right here?’

  ‘Yeah. He’s in charge of reception today.’

  ‘But he’s not here?’

  ‘No. Can I ask who wants him?’

  The girl looked sharper having seen Gunna’s ID and took a decision. ‘You need to see the operations manager,’ she said.

  After some whispered phone calls, Gunna found herself in a plush office, an aromatic coffee at her elbow.

  ‘Símon Arnarson,’ the short man with a grey-streaked goatee and a twinkle in his eye introduced himself, extending a hand to be shaken. ‘What can I do for you?’

  ‘My name’s Gunnhildur Gísladóttir and I’m with the city CID. We have an investigation in progress and I’m looking for someone who may or may not be involved with the death of a guest at the Gullfoss. I take it you’ve heard about that?’

  Símon nodded enthusiastically. ‘Nothing official, but I heard from my colleagues. Word gets around fast. You know both hotels are owned by the same company? Part of the same group, not that we like to use that word too much these days.’

  Gunna put the pictures on the desk, next to the rapidly cooling coffee. ‘This is the person I’m looking for, and I have reason to believe there was a similar incident here as well yesterday?’

  ‘I . . .’ Símon hesitated. ‘I was away yesterday and Magnús was the duty manager. He didn’t leave anything in the notes about an incident,’ he said, looking at the two pictures. ‘Which one?’ Símon asked, looking from the elegant blonde to the track-suited brunette, clearly perplexed.

  ‘I’m working on the theory that they’re the same person. So either version.’

  ‘This was taken at the Gullfoss. I recognize the bar. So was this, on the back stairs.’

  ‘You know the Gullfoss well, do you?’

  ‘There aren’t that many hotels in Reykjavík, not smart ones, whatever the tourist industry likes to tell people. There are a few of us who have worked in most of the city hotels at one time or another,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘I was the bar manager at the Gullfoss Hotel a few years ago and came here when this place was opened. Then the company that owns this and several other hotels bought the Gullfoss as well. We tend to swap staff between hotels when it’s convenient, so I could find myself back there.’

  ‘Why’s that done? Any particular reason?’

  ‘Not really. It’s just easier to rotate staff to where they’re needed rather than taking on new people temporarily and then having to lay them off. I like it because it keeps standards high across the group. Sorry,’ he apologized with a wry smile. ‘That 2007 word again.’

  ‘Seen this person?’ Gunna asked, hauling Símon back to the here and now.

  ‘No. It’s not a face I recall seeing, and now that you mention it, once you disregard the different hair, they do look similar,’ he said, laying an envelope over the top of the head of the woman with the black wig. ‘Do you want me to ask the staff?’

  ‘Actually I wanted to speak to one of your staff. Magnús Jóhann Sigmarsson. His name came up in conversation with staff at the Gullfoss and I understood that he’d be working here today.’

  Símon grimaced. ‘He’s not here, unfortunately.’

  ‘Any idea why?’

  ‘Well, let’s say he’s a decent enough member of staff when he’s here and a pleasant young man . . .’

  ‘But?’

  ‘But he’s not punctual. He likes to sleep,’ he said with a return of that wry smile. ‘He should have been here at twelve. He’s not here and instead of trying to get hold of him, I asked someone else to take his shift. So if he shows up at three, which is quite possible, he’ll be told he’s not working today after all and he’ll be given his first written warning.’

  ‘All right. In that case, you have his address, phone number and so forth?’

  Símon hesitated. ‘I’m not supposed to give anyone outside the company personal details, you understand.’

  ‘It’s up to you. I’ll track him down anyway. Tell me where he lives and it just saves me an hour or so of enquiries elsewhere.’

  Símon clicked and tapped at his computer, and wrote on a sheet of headed notepaper. ‘It’s in Hafnarfjördur. He’s only lived there a couple of weeks, so I may have saved you more than an hour’s enquiries,’ he said. ‘Is it only Magnús you wanted to talk to?’

  ‘To start with,’ Gunna said, and Símon hid a rapid grimace. ‘I expect I’ll need to speak to a few more of your staff, but not today.’

  ‘We’re more than happy to help with enquiries, but of course we’d prefer them to be as discreet as possible. The last thing any hotel needs is its reputation damaged, and that can happen very easily.’

  ‘Not a problem. Kicking down doors isn’t exactly my style,’ Gunna assured him. ‘Not unless it’s absolutely necessary.’

  Gunna hammered at Magnús Sigmarsson’s door, and it remained resolutely locked and silent. It was on the third floor of a fairly old block of flats that had seen better days. There was no lift, and while there were buzzers by the outside door at ground level, there was no intercom and the door had been wedged open. Gunna peered the wrong way through the peephole in the door, but could see only the blank walls of a shadowy interior distorted through the lens. She could sense that the flat was deserted.

  Not wanting to leave empty-handed, she knocked smartly on the door of the flat next door, from which the smell of frying onions and the sound of a radio indicated that it was definitely occupied.

  ‘Good day, I’m a police officer,’ Gunna began as the door opened a crack and a suspicious face peered out.

  ‘No more trouble, please,’ a voice inside pleaded in a thick accent. ‘You here for the boy again?’

  ‘I don’t know which boy you have in mind, but it’s your neighbour I’m enquiring about,’ she said and could sense the relief from the far side of the door as it opened and an olive-skinned woman surveyed her.

  ‘You have . . . ?’ She asked, miming showing an identification card. Gunna opened her wallet for the woman to check. She stared at it for some time and nodded, apparently satisfied.

  ‘Your neighbour, Magnús. Have you seen him today?’

  ‘No, not seen him.’

  ‘When did you last see him? Was it long ago?’

  ‘Two. Three days, maybe.’

  ‘Do you know him well? Speak to him at all?’

  The woman shook her head in a way that made it clear she had little time for her neighbour.

  ‘He hasn’t lived here long, has he? When did he move in?’

  ‘Three weeks.’

  ‘And you haven’t seen him today or yesterday?’

  ‘No. Not seen him.’

  Gunna gave up and fished in her pocket for a card. ‘This is important. You understand?’ She asked, wondering if the woman was t
aking in everything she said. ‘If you see him, can you give me a call? Thanks for your time and apologies for disturbing your meal.’

  The woman took the card and nodded as Gunna turned to leave.

  ‘Not see him today. But we hear him,’ she said suddenly.

  ‘So he was there today?’

  ‘This morning. Walls are this thin,’ she said, holding up a hand with a minuscule gap between her thumb and forefinger. ‘We hear plenty. Too much,’ she announced with evident disapproval.

  ‘What did you hear and when was this?’

  ‘Ten. Ten thirty. He have friend there. In the bath.’

  ‘They were in the bath together?’

  ‘I don’t know. Maybe. Noise from bathroom.’

  ‘Did this go on for long?’

  ‘I close the door. Don’t want to hear.’ The disgust in her voice was overwhelming and Gunna understood why there had been no neighbourly contact. ‘I hear the door bang. Half hour, maybe. Then nothing. Quiet.’

  ‘I see,’ Gunna said thoughtfully. ‘All right, thanks for your time,’ she repeated. ‘But please give me a call if you see him come back, won’t you?’

  Jóel Ingi found it impossible to concentrate during the afternoon; he found himself gazing blankly at the screen of his PC several times, with his hands idle on the desk in front of him. Már looked in on him a couple of times without saying anything and carried on towards the printer.

  In the middle of the day his mobile hummed discreetly and he squinted at the picture on the screen, where an image of Agnes looked back at him with that stern expression he rather liked.

  ‘Hæ, darling.’

  ‘What time will you be home? You’re not working late again, are you?’

  It was an instruction rather than a question.

  ‘No. I’m not feeling great. I’ll do another hour or so and then I’ll be home. Do you need the car?’

  ‘No. Why?’

  ‘I thought I’d walk home if you don’t need it.’

  ‘All right then.’ She sounded dubious. ‘I’m going to my sister’s for an hour. Text me when you leave work and I’ll be home at the same time as you. All right?’ Agnes asked, sounding brighter.

  ‘No problem, darling. Will do.’

  He did nothing but sit at his computer for the following hour, and at the end of it he stood up, knotted his white scarf around his neck and pulled on his coat.

  ‘Not feeling well. Not sure I’ll be in tomorrow,’ he said to the girl at reception and was gone before she could reply.

  Outside on the street he looked around him, watching out for the parka and baseball cap. Neither could be seen so he set off uphill, slowly, stretching his legs with each step after his day in the cramped office. With the car left behind he hoped to have thrown off his pursuer, but it also meant that he would have to forgo his visit to the gym in the morning. Maybe a workout at lunchtime would be in order? His head was roaring and he felt slightly faint, but he carried on all the same, glancing to the left and right, occasionally stopping to look in the window of a shop so he had an opportunity to look behind him.

  A blonde woman with a small backpack and a purposeful look about her strode smartly past him, stepping with one booted foot into the slush of the gutter as she passed. Once she had gone, Jóel Ingi seemed to have the street to himself. Relieved, he pushed open the door of a smart block of flats, where his apartment occupied the top floor, and waited for the lift to arrive, just as the woman with the backpack peered around the corner, nodded to herself and quickly thumbed a text message into her phone.

  Eiríkur wrote down instructions as Gunna barked them out, his head down over his pad.

  ‘Any questions?’ she asked once Helgi and Eiríkur had been given their orders.

  ‘Straight away?’ Eiríkur asked.

  ‘Straight away. You’re on shift until tonight, so you can start with the hotels this afternoon. This isn’t serious enough to warrant any overtime, so just do what you can. All right?’

  ‘Do you think it could get that way?’ Helgi asked.

  Gunna ran her fingers through her hair and sat back. ‘You know, I’m really not sure. I’m trying to decide whether this is a bizarre one-off of the kind that we won’t see again for twenty years, or if there’s something bigger going on that we haven’t had a sniff of until now. That’s why I want a few questions asked, quietly. I really don’t want to ring any alarm bells.’

  ‘You mean you don’t want to get hauled over the coals again for upsetting people with important friends?’

  ‘It’s not so much that. I don’t want to get a roasting for something you two reprobates have done. Right. Tomorrow. Helgi and I are on an early shift, Eiríkur. If you’re starting at twelve, I suggest we meet at the bus station for lunch, compare notes and move on from there. Show of hands?’

  Helgi and Gunna put their hands up. Eiríkur sat on his. ‘Why do you two always want to meet up at places full of old people?’

  ‘Because they serve sheep heads and mashed swede at the bus station,’ Helgi said, almost salivating at the thought. ‘Proper old-fashioned food. The kind I don’t get at home any more.’

  ‘Plus you can park at the bus station. It’s not far from here and it’s not full of yuppies and terrible music. So, motion carried two to one. The bus station it is.’

  Baddó leafed through the phone book. There were a few Haraldur Samúelssons there, but only one outside Reykjavík. Using a mobile phone with a pay-as-you-go SIM card bought that morning at a petrol station, he dialled the mobile number next to Haraldur Samúelsson’s phone book listing and waited. There was no answer and the number switched to voicemail and a pleasant avuncular voice. Baddó closed the connection.

  Next he tried the landline and was rewarded with yet another voicemail, this time a pleasant female voice informing him that there was nobody home right now, and inviting him to leave a message for Halli or Svava.

  So he’s married, Baddó thought with delight, hoping that the repeated ducking had concentrated Magnús’s mind enough to remember the name right. It was just as well, because when he called the hotel at four, an irritable woman had simply told him that Magnús had called in sick. He thought of using his usual trick of hinting at something official without saying outright that he was a police officer, but instead he thanked her politely and left it at that.

  Wheels. I need to get some wheels, he thought. He had borrowed María’s car that morning to pay Magnús’s flat a visit, but he wouldn’t be able to do that often as it could be traced back to him. Besides, María needed the car to get to her lousy minimum-wage job that just about paid the rent.

  He took the bus, an unlikely passenger among the few elderly and very young people making their way home on a cold evening. It was just as well that Magnús’s girlfriend only lived in Kópavogur. His guess was right. Outside her parents’ house a shabby Golf had been badly parked between a Volvo and a bright yellow Toyota.

  Baddó wondered how long he might have to wait. Waiting wasn’t a problem after what must have added up to several years of solitary confinement; he generally preferred his own company. What could be a problem was to be observed waiting, especially if the weather turned even colder. As it happened, there was no need to wait for long. Baddó stood motionless in a bus shelter across the road for almost an hour watching the house. A corpulent man in a sheepskin coat emerged and kicked the tyre of the badly parked Golf before reversing the Volvo out into the street and driving away. Another half an hour and a light in one room clicked off. Then another, over the front door, clicked on before the door opened a crack.

  Baddó left the shelter and was across the road in a few steps, squatting on the Golf’s passenger side out of sight as he listened intently to two people arguing on the steps.

  ‘Come on, Sara. We’re adults now, aren’t we?’

  ‘You heard what my dad said. I’m sorry, Maggi.’

  Baddó wondered if Magnús had told his girlfriend about his uncomfortable experience th
at morning and waited.

  ‘I’ve had a fucking shit day. Now you’re chucking me out and I don’t want to go home.’

  Baddó frowned in the shadows. Maybe he had told her.

  ‘Oh, don’t be so stupid, Maggi. I’ll come and stay at your place over the weekend, but I’m not staying if you haven’t cleared up all that stuff in the hall.’

  ‘Æi. It’s not that simple. Look, I have to leave and find somewhere else. The landlord wants me out already.’

  Baddó heard Sara sniff dismissively. ‘Don’t be so silly. He can’t throw you out if you have a rental contract. He must know that.’

  ‘Yeah. It’s not that easy . . .’ Magnús said plaintively.

  ‘Call me tomorrow, will you? At work, not at home. I don’t want to upset them any more. Come on. You’d best be gone before my dad comes back,’ Baddó heard her say and imagined her standing behind a half-closed door, ready to shut it.

  ‘Oh, all right,’ Magnús finally said in a sulky tone that made Baddó want to laugh. The door closed with a click and he could hear footsteps descending the flight of steps down from the front door. He counted six steps across the frozen gravel of the drive. The Golf’s central locking opened all the doors simultaneously, and as Magnús got into his car, he found himself staring incredulously at Baddó grinning at him from the passenger seat.

  ‘Hæ, Magnús. Didn’t expect to see me so soon?’ Baddó greeted him and shot out a hand that grabbed Magnús by the throat as he turned to open the door. ‘Less of the hurry, young man. Let’s go for a little drive, shall we? Nothing hasty, Magnús, or I might have to do something unpleasant.’

  As soon as Gunna left the city behind her and passed the aluminium plant at Hafnarfjördur, all the worries and concerns that had plagued her came flooding back. What was Gísli going to do, and how was she going to tell Svanur that her son had made his stepdaughter pregnant – assuming he didn’t know already.