‘He got around, then.’
‘And there are all the clubs and bars.’
‘Don’t you think it’s more likely that he picked women up at random, rather than targeting them specifically?’
The police officers had discussed this factor at length. Some felt that Runólfur’s modus operandi was fairly straightforward: he met a woman at a bar and invited her home. Some liked the look of him and went with him. It remained unclear whether he drugged any of them since there were no witnesses. Other officers reckoned that he had definitely used drugs and worked in a systematic manner. He did not trust to luck in picking up a woman. He had some acquaintanceship with them, though perhaps only very slight.
‘Maybe,’ said Elínborg. ‘Anyway, we have to find out how he met women. We haven’t dismissed the possibility that a woman was with him when he was killed, and that she may be the killer.’
‘The cut looks like that, at any rate,’ said the pathologist. ‘That was my first reaction when I saw it. My mind went to an old-fashioned straight razor, the kind where the blade folds into the handle. Do you know what I mean?’
‘What did you say about the cut?’
The pathologist looked down at the body. ‘It’s smooth,’ he said. ‘When I saw it I thought to myself that it was … almost feminine.’
9
It was dark in the bar. A large window that faced on to the street had been broken and was now boarded up with plywood. The repair looked recent. Elínborg thought it was probably a temporary measure, but perhaps not. The pane of glass in the door had also been broken, but longer ago. It was covered with black-painted plywood that was scratched and graffitied. It did not look as if the proprietor intended to install new glass. Given up trying, thought Elínborg to herself.
The owner was crouched behind the bar. She was about to ask him about the window but then she lost interest. No doubt there had been a fight. Maybe someone had thrown a table through it. She did not want to know.
‘Has Berti been in today?’ Elínborg asked the proprietor, who was arranging bottles in a fridge. All she could see was the top of his head.
‘Don’t know anyone called Berti,’ he replied without looking up from the beers. ‘Fridbert,’ Elínborg elaborated. ‘I know he hangs out here.’
‘A lot of people come in here,’ the proprietor replied, standing up. He was a thin man of about fifty with a haggard face and a ragged moustache.
Elínborg looked around. She counted three customers.
‘Always this busy, is it?’ she asked.
‘Why don’t you get out?’ he retorted, returning to his task.
Elínborg thanked him for his help. This was the second bar she had visited after she’d received a tip from the Drug Squad about where Rohypnol might be available. They were cooperating with the CID on the Thingholt case.
Elínborg knew that Rohypnol was a medication that was used to treat sleep disorders. Under strict Icelandic legislation it was obtainable only on prescription, from a doctor. Runólfur had not been registered with any GP but Elínborg was able to ascertain without much difficulty that he had been to two doctors since moving to Reykjavík. Three years had passed between the two occasions so Runólfur did not appear to have had any major health problems, just as the pathologist had said. Neither doctor would reveal any information about their consultations with Runólfur without a court order, but both were able to confirm that they had not prescribed Rohypnol. It was no surprise to Elínborg that she was unable to trace the Rohypnol concerned to a doctor. Runólfur could have bought the drug in another country, but he had not left Iceland in the past six years. So far as his colleagues remembered, his last trip abroad had been to Benidorm in Spain where he had spent three weeks. Airline manifests showed that he had not flown anywhere since then, so the likeliest explanation was that he had got hold of the drug in Iceland, on the black market.
Elínborg approached one of the bar’s customers, a woman of indeterminate age who sat sucking in the smoke of her roll-up. The tiny stub burned her lip and she flicked it away. On the table stood a half-full glass of beer, and next to it an empty shot glass.
All at the taxpayer’s expense, Sigurdur Óli would have growled.
‘Seen Berti around, Solla?’ Elínborg asked as she sat down.
The woman glanced up. She was wearing a grubby coat and a battered hat: she might well have been in her forties, or she could even have been getting on for eighty. ‘What business is that of yours?’ she replied hoarsely.
‘I want to talk to him.’
‘Why don’t you talk to me instead?’ retorted Solla.
‘Maybe later,’ Elínborg said. ‘Right now I’ve got to get hold of Berti.’
‘No one wants to talk to me,’ Solla grumbled.
‘Nonsense.’
‘It isn’t. Nobody does.’
‘Have you seen Berti recently?’ Elínborg asked again.
‘No.’
Elínborg eyed the other two customers: a man and a woman she had not seen before, sitting with their glasses of beer, smoking. The man said something, then stood up and put a coin in the fruit machine in the corner. The woman stayed at the table, drinking.
‘What do you want with Berti?’ Solla enquired.
‘It’s in connection with a rape case,’ replied Elínborg.
Solla turned her attention from her beer. ‘Did he rape someone?’
‘No, not him. I need some information from him.’
Solla took a gulp of her drink and watched the man playing the fruit machine. ‘Fucking rapists,’ she murmured.
Elínborg had come across Solla several times over the years. She no longer remembered the woman’s full name, if she had ever known it. From a young age Solla had lived a pitiful life: she had fallen in with losers, incorrigible drinkers and junkies, lived on her own, been in residential care and in halfway homes, slept rough. She had had the occasional brush with the law, arising from some minor incident such as shoplifting or pinching clothes off washing lines, but she was quite harmless except when she was very drunk. Then she became touchy and aggressive, which tended to get her into trouble. She had been beaten up repeatedly, was a regular at the hospital casualty department, and had spent the odd night in police cells.
‘I’m investigating an alleged rapist,’ said Elínborg, wondering if alleged would mean anything to Solla.
‘Hope you get the bastard,’ Solla said.
‘We’ve got him already. We want to find out who killed him,’ Elínborg explained.
‘He’s dead? The case is solved, then, isn’t it?’
‘We want to know who did it.’
‘Why? You going to give him a medal?’
‘It was probably a woman who killed him.’
‘Good for her!’ exclaimed Solla.
‘I hear Berti sometimes comes here …’
‘He’s an idiot,’ Solla exclaimed. She lowered her voice. ‘I don’t use that bloody filth he sells.’
‘I just need to talk to him. He hasn’t been at home.’
According to the Drug Squad, Berti ran a nice line in getting hold of prescription medicines. He spun a story to various doctors around town and some of them would prescribe whatever he asked for, no questions asked. Berti sold on the drugs he got this way for a decent profit. Rohypnol was one such substance. There was no conclusive evidence that any of his clients were using it as a date-rape drug, any more than that they were taking it to treat sleep disorders. Rohypnol was also effective for the withdrawal symptoms experienced by cocaine addicts. In Runólfur’s flat they had found no sign of any other drug use, which was taken to mean that he had used the Rohypnol for one purpose only — assuming that it had in fact belonged to the dead man.
Elínborg sat silently, watching Solla and thinking about prescription medications, coke, drug withdrawal and rape, and reflected on how sad and degraded human life could be.
‘Do you know anything recent about Berti?’ she asked. ‘Any idea where I might be
able to find him?’
‘I’ve seen him with Binna Geirs,’ Solla replied.
‘Binna?’
‘He’s got a thing for that hag.’
‘Thank you, Solla.’
‘Yeah, thank me, right … will you buy me a beer? So he doesn’t chuck me out,’ she said, with a nod at the bar where the proprietor was frowning at them.
It emerged that Runólfur had worked out. A surveillance camera in the gym where he had been a member showed that he had been there on the day of his death, at around one p.m. on the Saturday. He left an hour and a half later. He was alone, and to judge from the footage had not spoken to anyone: no member of staff, and no woman who might have left with him. The staff did not specifically remember Runólfur that day but they were familiar with him as a regular and had no complaints about him.
One of the owners, a personal trainer, spoke well of Runólfur, who had transferred from another gym about two years ago. Elínborg gathered that this was one of the most popular gyms in the city. She saw a range of exercise equipment: treadmills, weight machines, exercise cycles and other machinery that she did not recognise. On the walls were giant flatscreens to entertain the clients as they went for the burn.
‘He taught me, rather than me teaching him,’ said the personal trainer, with a smile at Elínborg. They were standing in the main gym. ‘He knew it all.’
‘Did he come here regularly?’ Elínborg asked. She was holding a gym membership card which they had found among Runólfur’s possessions.
‘Always three times a week, after work.’
‘He seems to have been in good shape,’ Elínborg said. A muscular man of about thirty, the instructor radiated joie de vivre and exuberance. He was tanned a deep sun-lamp bronze, and his teeth shone bright as strobe lights.
‘Runólfur was outstandingly fit,’ he answered, looking Elínborg up and down. She felt he was appraising her fitness and she suspected that she knew what his verdict would be: a life sentence on the treadmill.
‘Do you know why he changed gyms?’ she asked. ‘When he started here, two years ago?
‘No, I don’t. I should think he just moved nearby. That’s often the case.’
‘Do you know where he used to work out before that?’
‘I think he was at The Firm.’
‘The Firm?’
‘Someone mentioned it to me, someone who knew he used to go there. In this field people know each other a bit, at least by sight.’
‘Did he make friends here, do you know?’
‘Not really. He was generally on his own. He sometimes had a mate with him — I don’t know the guy’s name. A bit overweight, not at all fit. He didn’t work out. Just sat in the café.’
‘Did Runólfur ever talk to you about women when he was here?’
‘Women? No.’
‘So you don’t know of any women he spoke to, or met here at the gym, or knew from anywhere else?’
The trainer took a moment to search his memory. ‘No, I don’t think so. He didn’t talk much.’
‘OK,’ said Elínborg. ‘Thank you.’
‘You’re welcome. I wish I could be more help, but I hardly knew him. What a terrible thing this is. Terrible.’
‘Yes, it is,’ said Elínborg. She said goodbye to the bronzed man who smiled cheerfully, instantly forgetting Runólfur’s violent end.
Elínborg had reached the car park when a new idea occurred to her and she went back inside. She found the personal trainer leaning over a chunky woman of about sixty who lay prostrate in a gaudy tracksuit. Apparently stuck in one of the weight machines, she was explaining that she had strained a muscle.
‘Excuse me,’ said Elínborg.
The trainer looked up. Beads of sweat had formed on his forehead.
‘Yes?’
‘Did any women stop coming here after he joined?’
‘Stop?’
‘Did any woman suddenly cancel her membership? Without explanation? Someone who’d been a regular, and who left after Runólfur joined?’
‘Please …?’ said the big woman, holding out her hand to the trainer with a pleading look.
‘People are always cancelling memberships,’ he said. ‘I don’t see …’
‘I’m asking if you remember anything unusual. A woman who had always worked out here regularly, then suddenly stopped attending, perhaps.’
‘I didn’t notice anything,’ answered the trainer. ‘And I notice everything like that. I’m the owner, you know. Well, joint owner.’
‘I suppose it’s difficult to keep on top of exactly who signs up and who leaves. There are a lot of people, of course.’
‘Ours is a very popular gym,’ said the trainer.
‘Yes, of course.’
‘And no one stopped coming because of him,’ the trainer said. ‘Not that I’m aware of.’
‘Look, would you mind …’ The woman in the weight machine seemed to be quite helpless.
‘OK,’ said Elínborg. ‘Thanks. Do you want me to give you a hand …?’
The woman looked from one to the other.
‘No, no. No problem,’ answered the trainer. ‘I’ve got it.’
As Elínborg left she heard the woman shriek, then snap angrily at the man of bronze.
The police had interviewed several acquaintances of Runólfur, including neighbours and work colleagues. All of them described him in glowing terms and none had anything critical to say. His death and the circumstances in which it had taken place were quite incomprehensible to them. One of Runólfur’s colleagues knew he had a friend named Edvard; he did not work with them but Runólfur had occasionally mentioned him. Elínborg remembered that the name Edvard had appeared repeatedly in Runólfur’s phone records. Edvard did not deny knowing the deceased when they tracked him down but he did not see how he could help the police with their enquiries. Nonetheless, Elínborg asked him to come down to the station.
Edvard had learned about the date-rape drug from the media. He found this detail perhaps even more astonishing than the violent death of his friend: he said it must be some misunderstanding about Runólfur having used a date-rape drug — he wasn’t that kind of person. The twist that Rohypnol had also been found in Runólfur’s body had not yet been released to the media.
‘What kind of person would that be?’ asked Elínborg as she offered Edvard a seat in her office.
‘I don’t know. But not him, that’s for sure.’
Edvard gazed at her, wide-eyed, explaining that he had known Runólfur well. The two had become good friends soon after Runólfur had moved to Reykjavík. They had not been acquainted before. Edvard was a teacher, but had got to know Runólfur when they had worked together in construction during their summer vacations from college. They often went to the cinema, and both enjoyed English football. Both were single, and they had hit it off.
‘And did you go out on the town together?’ Elínborg asked.
‘Now and then,’ the man replied. He was in his early thirties, rather overweight, with a wispy beard, a jowly face, and thinning mousy hair.
‘Did Runólfur have a way with women?’
‘He was always very nice to them. I don’t quite know what you’re trying to get me to say, but I never saw him do anyone any harm. Neither a woman, nor anyone else.’
‘And there wasn’t anything in Runólfur’s behaviour that might explain the Rohypnol we found in his pocket?’
‘He was just a perfectly ordinary bloke,’ said Edvard. ‘Someone must have planted it on him.’
‘Was he seeing a woman at the time he died?’
‘Not so far as I know. Why? Has anyone been in touch with you?’
‘Did you know about any women in his life?’ asked Elínborg without answering his question. ‘Someone he was seeing, or lived with?’
‘I don’t know of anyone he had a steady or long-term relationship with. He’d never lived with anyone.’
‘When did you last see him?’
‘I spoke to him before
the weekend. We were thinking of meeting up. I asked if he had anything special planned but he said he was going to stay in.’
‘And you phoned him on the Saturday?’
The police had examined Runólfur’s phone records for several weeks before his death, both landline and mobile phones, and Elínborg had received the list earlier that day. Runólfur did not receive many phone calls. Most of them concerned his work, but there was a handful of numbers that the police intended to investigate further. Edvard’s name cropped up more often than any other.
‘I was going to suggest we watched the English football at the Sports Bar. We sometimes go — sometimes went there on Saturdays. He said there was something he had to do. He didn’t say what.’
‘Did he sound cheerful?’
‘Just the same as usual,’ Edvard replied.
‘Did you ever go to the gym together?’
‘I went with him now and then. I just had a coffee — I don’t work out.’
‘Did he ever mention his parents?’ Elínborg went on.
‘No. Never.’
‘Anything about his childhood, the village where he grew up?’
‘No.’
‘What did you talk about?’
‘Football … and all that. Films. The usual stuff. Nothing important.’
‘Women?’
‘Sometimes.’
‘Did you know what he thought of women, in a general way?’
‘Nothing unusual or abnormal. He didn’t hate women — his attitude was quite ordinary. If he saw an attractive girl or something like that, he’d mention it. As we do. All of us.’
‘He was interested in films?’
‘Yes. American action movies.’
‘Superheroes?’
‘Yes.’
‘Why?’
‘He just enjoyed them. Me too. It was one of the things we had in common.’
‘Do you have pictures of them on your walls?’
‘No.’
‘Don’t they all live a double life?’
‘Who?’
‘Those superheroes.’
‘I don’t know what you’re getting at.’
‘Aren’t they usually ordinary blokes who change into someone else? In a phone box, or whatever? I’m no expert.’
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