He looked away from the old-fashioned set of shelves, which appeared to him to be starting to lean a little. They weren’t the only thing in the room that mirrored the family’s declining fortunes. Leifur gazed at his sleeping father, but everything that had once characterized the old man’s face was now gone. His complexion was pale and his strong jaw hollow, making his lips and teeth seem unnaturally large. There were liver-spots on his cheeks and lips. Saliva glistened at the corner of his mouth, and Leifur averted his eyes. This was the reason for everything they had done; his father must live at home as long as he was able. Leifur couldn’t picture the old man living alongside people who had known him back when he was one of the pillars of local society, people who would now have to care for him as though he were a small child. He would have none of the child’s irresistible charm that makes people happily change their nappies and wipe up their drool and vomit. His wife Maria had tried to convince him that if they moved to Reykjavik they could put his father in a home where no one knew him. Leifur had pointed out that they couldn’t get him into a nursing home in Reykjavik, where the waiting lists were long. They’d be at the bottom of the list, no matter how much they were willing to pay. So it was better this way; they wouldn’t gain anything by moving to Reykjavik. Of course, one thing would change: Maria would have more to occupy her time there, and less time for her father-in-law.
There was a lot of pressure on Maria. She was the one who spent the most time looking after her father-in-law, and although it might have seemed hard to believe, she did it without complaining or demanding any appreciation or credit from Klara and Leifur. She did deserve new furniture, and he would agree immediately next time Maria raised the subject. It would catch her completely unawares. Maybe he’d suggest they buy an apartment in one of the new apartment blocks on Skulagata Street, so she could make quick trips to Reykjavik to visit their son and get a brief respite from everything here. In any case, it was time to hire some help; it would be best if he could find a nurse or care assistant, perhaps a foreign one. It wasn’t as if anyone needed to spend time chatting to his father - Leifur’s mother could take care of that. The nurse could sleep in his room, so they’d no longer need to lock the old man in there at night. Leifur had started worrying that something might happen while they were all asleep, although he wasn’t sure exactly what. In his father’s room there wasn’t much he could easily injure himself on, but his outbursts had become completely unpredictable; just recently he had pushed the family television off its stand, breaking it. When Leifur asked him why he’d done it his father had simply stared at him and shaken his head, like a small child denying he’d made a mess. It had only been a few years since he’d brought home the television and invited Leifur and Maria round in order to show it off, since Leifur’s parents didn’t often spend money on luxury items. Leifur still remembered how proud his father had been, how beautiful he’d thought the colours looked on the huge screen.
His father muttered something and Leifur turned back to him. The old man opened his eyes and smiled faintly. His bottom lip was so dry that the smile made it crack, and drops of blood appeared. The blood welled up slowly and did not spill beyond the edges of his blue-tinged lips.
It was as though the blood in his veins was as exhausted as his brain. The smile disappeared as quickly as it had come, and Leifur thought it must be the pain of his cracked lip. But that wasn’t the case. He looked straight into Leifur’s eyes with rare lucidity, his stare unwavering. ‘That was a nasty trick we played on her,’ he said, gripping his son’s upper arm tightly. Feeling his bony fingers, Leifur thought that if he closed his eyes it would have been easy to imagine a skeleton had taken hold of him.
‘On who, Dad?’ asked Leifur calmly. ‘Were you having a bad dream?’
‘Alda,’ replied the old man. ‘You forgive me, don’t you?’
‘Me?’ asked Leifur, surprised. ‘Of course I forgive you, Dad.’
‘Good,’ replied the old man. ‘I know how much you like her, Markus.’ He shut his eyes. ‘Don’t be late for school, my boy,’ he said, letting go of Leifur. ‘Don’t be late.’
Leifur had long ago given up taking it personally when his father didn’t recognize him, though he remembered how much it had hurt the first time it happened. His father had been telling his secretary that he was going to take a week off and that Leifur would fill in for him, but when he came to his son’s name he had stood gaping at Leifur, just as surprised as his son at his inability to recall it.
‘I won’t be late,’ said Leifur, and went to stand up. His father was already asleep, and it would only upset him to sit with him any longer.
‘Do you think the falcon will be all right?’ said a weak voice as Leifur was trying to open the door without the hinges creaking.
‘Yes, Dad,’ whispered Leifur. ‘The falcon will be fine. Don’t worry.’ He shut the door behind him, confused. He’d never known his father to have much interest in birds, with the exception of puffin, which had been his favourite food. Now that they had to force-feed him everything he never got puffin, only whatever was easiest to get into his mouth and least likely to get caught in his throat. Leifur had never heard his father talk about falcons before. It could be random nonsense, jumbled memories, even fragments of some television programme that were still floating around in his dusty mind. Whatever this bird meant to him, it was a shame his father seemed unable to forget the bad things in his life and remember only the positive. It certainly wasn’t fair that he should have to remember Alda.
Not fair at all.
Chapter Twenty-five
Saturday 21 July2007
As the boat left the jetty, Thóra waved at two boys who were swimming around the harbour in wetsuits. One winked back but the other, who appeared to be several years older, acted as though he didn’t see her and kept swimming after a little boat that had left the harbour at the same time as Thóra, Bella and their guide.
‘Haven’t they banned puffin-hunting now?’ Thóra asked the weather-beaten man at the tiller when she saw the pocket- nets lined up in the other boat. ‘I read somewhere that they were having trouble nesting, for the third year in a row,’ she added, wondering if she sounded like a resident of the Islands.
‘Yes, yes,’ said the man, clearly unimpressed. ‘It’s not a ban, just a recommendation. People can hunt puffins for their own consumption as long as they don’t affect the stock.’
‘Is that what those men are doing?’ she asked, pointing at the little boat about to overtake them.
Paddi the Hook waved at the three men, who lifted their hands in return. None of them smiled or showed any emotion. Thóra watched Paddi at the helm as he stared out to sea. When they met him she had been relieved to see he still had both hands, since she’d been wondering why he had the nickname ‘Hook’. As they sailed past Heimaklettur Cliff they saw a young man sitting at the top, many metres above them. He was surrounded by dead puffins. At his side lay a pocket-net, and he had stuck a yellow flag into a grassy patch just behind him. Puffins were circling all around him. ‘What’s the flag for?’ asked Thóra, expecting it to be some sort of security measure.
‘Puffins are curious by nature,’ replied Paddi the Hook, after looking up to see what Thóra was pointing at. ‘They want to see the flag, which makes it easier for the boy to catch them.’
‘Does he have a large family?’ said Thóra, surprised at the number of birds lying like felled saplings around the young hunter.
‘Lining up the dead birds like that calms the fear of the ones still flying around,’ replied Paddi, choosing to ignore Thóra’s snide remark about the number of puffins. ‘They don’t know what happened to their comrades so they think it’s safe to come near.’
Thóra decided to stop asking about puffin hunting. She knew the man saw her as a typical city mouse who knew nothing about hunting and didn’t really have the right to comment. She knew how he felt; it really got on her nerves when foreign whaling activists protested against Icelanders
hunting whales. She didn’t want to offend the skipper, so she settled for silently watching the boy on the cliff edge as he swept the net in wide arcs over his head. She smiled to herself when the puffin he had his eye on narrowly avoided capture and continued its ungainly flight. She was on the puffin’s side; there was something quite appealing about it, the clumsy little thing. The booklet Thóra had read while waiting for Bella to get changed said that the puffin mated for life. In the autumn each member of the nesting pair went its own way, but the male would return several weeks ahead of the female. Thóra was particularly impressed that the male used the time to clean the cave and make it presentable for his spouse. When their palace was fit for a queen, he would sit at the entrance and wait for his mate. She was equally struck by the fact that if the female did not come back the male took a new mate, who he kicked out immediately if the first one returned. ‘Are we going far?’ she asked as they entered open water.
‘If you want to catch anything we’ve got to go a bit farther out,’ said Paddi, scanning the horizon as if he expected leaping schools of fish to appear any second.
‘It doesn’t bother me if we don’t catch anything,’ chirped Bella. ‘I don’t eat fish. I think it’s disgusting.’ Thóra turned to her and scowled meaningfully — they had to keep Paddi sweet, and that wasn’t the way to do it. Bella gave her a sharp look in return, but added: ‘I think puffin is absolutely delicious, though.’ Thóra breathed easier.
Paddi the Hook muttered something unintelligible and continued to scrutinize the calm water. They couldn’t have asked for better weather. The rays of the sun bounced off the shallow waves, creating a glittering sea of light.
Paddi stopped the boat just beyond Bjarnarey Island. On the tall, sheer cliff walls rising from the sea they could see the ropes that were used to clamber up to the grassy area at the top of the island, where there was a handsome hunting shed. Thóra didn’t know what would induce her to climb up there. If she ever did go up, she would have to live there forever — she would never make it back down. ‘Let’s try here,’ said the old sailor, wiping his hands on his tattered jeans. ‘We should be able to catch something.’ A gaggle of seagulls that had been hovering above the boat drifted down and settled on the sea, where they rocked in the waves. They were obviously hoping for a free lunch.
‘Well then, now the great hunt begins,’ said Paddi, and he showed them to the lower deck where several large, powerful rods were set up next to an open barrel. Paddi handed each of them their own leather belt with a holster for the rod, and helped them to fasten them. Luckily the belt just reached around Bella, who took all Paddi’s comments about it calmly, without blushing. He showed them how to position themselves before strapping on his own belt and taking his place next to them. ‘You’ve got to make sure you let the line go all the way to the bottom,’ he said, taking a pinch of snuff. ‘That’s where the fish are,’ he said, and watched them critically. Thóra’s sunglasses had slipped down her nose, but she didn’t dare let go of the rod for fear that it would fall into the sea.
Thóra silently prayed no fish would bite her hook, and tried to avoid letting her line sink all the way to the bottom as Paddi had recommended. This was difficult, as she had no idea where the line was located. For all she knew she could be scraping the bottom in the middle of a hungry school of fish. She looked back at Heimaey, where the new lava could be seen clearly. ‘That was quite a disaster,’ she said, directing her statement at Paddi.
‘You mean the eruption?’ he asked. His rod jerked slightly and he started to reel the line in.
‘Yes,’ said Thóra, sweeping her rod clumsily over her shoulder and back out over the gunwale as Paddi had shown them. ‘Did you live here back then?’
‘Yes, I’ve lived here all my life,’ he answered, still reeling his line in. ‘It’s been great.’
Thóra didn’t understand what he meant by this. ‘What did you take with you from home, in the evacuation?’ she asked curiously. What would a man like this choose to save? A fishing rod, or his favourite bottle of whisky?
‘I took my wife,’ replied Paddi, tautening his line. ‘And it was a good thing I did, because my house was one of the first to disappear beneath the lava. I would have had a tough time finding a new wife.’ He leaned into his line and turned the reel with enormous effort. Up came two haddock. Paddi removed the hooks and threw the wriggling fish into the barrel. Thóra and Bella gawped at it as a knocking sound came from inside. They had both expected the man to knock the fish out, not let them die slowly. Paddi wiped his hands on a stained towel tied to the ladder rail and turned back to the women, who were still staring dumbly at the barrel. ‘You need to grip tighter,’ he said, and came over to them, whereupon they immediately made a feeble effort to perform correctly. ‘You don’t want me to do it all for you.’
Bella let out a shout as her line suddenly tautened. ‘I’ve got one!’ she yelled, as if she wanted the occupants of the hunting shed to hear them, hundreds of feet above. ‘What do I do?’ The old man went over to her. He was so bow- legged that the fish barrel would have fitted easily between his knees. He helped Bella reel in her catch; a redfish, so small it would barely make a canape. The seagulls cried out, excited now that something was happening.
‘Can’t we throw it back?’ implored Thóra. ‘It’s so tiny, poor thing.’ She pitied the poor fish, which dangled from the hook. ‘Is the wound too deep for it to live?’
‘No, no,’ said Paddi calmly, putting on rubber gloves. Thóra recalled that redfish could be poisonous if they came into contact with an open wound. She had no idea where this poison was to be found on the fish, but judging by how carefully Paddi freed it from the hook, it must have been on its skin. He lifted the gaping fish. ‘Should I let it go? It’s your call.’
Thóra and Bella nodded in unison and watched happily as Paddi threw the fish overboard, but instead of darting away it just floated on its side. It seemed to be trying to swim with the fin that was poking up. ‘Why won’t it swim off?’ asked Thóra, trying to remain calm. ‘Is it more injured than you thought?’ She was furious at the man.
‘Oh,’ said Paddi, unconcerned. ‘It’s a deep-sea fish, and it fills with air when it comes up from the bottom. It can’t sink. I forgot about that. It would have been better off in the barrel.’
‘How could you not remember that?’ cried Thóra.
‘I’m not in the habit of releasing my catch, dear lady,’ said Paddi grumpily. Thóra wasn’t sure whether he was irritated with her or with himself.
The seagulls surrounded the wretched fish, which still lay half submerged on its side, trying to swim with the fin that was above the water. They drew nearer. Thóra couldn’t help watching, though she had no desire to witness what happened next. She felt uncomfortable, and was beginning to regret having had a drink in the bar. Suddenly the movement of the boat and the smell of the catch in the barrel were making her nauseous. She closed her eyes and breathed through her mouth, which helped a little. Her queasiness erupted again when she opened her eyes and saw that the fish was still locked in a drawn-out but hopeless fight to the death. One of the seagulls stretched out its neck and pecked at the fish’s side. The three of them stood side by side on the boat, watching silently.
Thóra wished that either she’d kept her mouth shut when the fish was reeled in or she had a net to fish it out again. Suddenly all the seagulls flocked around the redfish in a feeding frenzy. The fish could be seen twitching a few times before it finally died, much to Thóra’s relief. When the seagulls flew up again, full and contented, there was almost nothing left of it. Paddi turned to look at Thóra and Bella, noting their identical expressions of horror. ‘Are you sure you like deep-sea fishing?’ he asked. ‘We could easily change this into a sightseeing trip if you’d rather.’
‘Maybe that would be best,’ replied Thóra, and Bella nodded. ‘We’re not going to make good fishermen.’ She smiled at him. ‘Why don’t you take us on a short tour? The reason I booked a trip was a
ctually to ask you about a couple of things - we were told that you’re the man who knows the most about people in the Islands.’
Ashes to Dust Page 25
