‘No, that was another thing. He and his wife – Helena’s sister – said a lot of things they shouldn’t have. Things I know they regretted later – or at least my brother did. Asked him straight out if he’d been drinking, because they knew he could be reckless and couldn’t really handle alcohol. But he hadn’t touched a drop. Of course, I could testify to that, but there was an inquest too which removed all doubt. In spite of that, they couldn’t get over their anger, and my brothers hardly ever spoke again. Mind you, I’m convinced Helena’s sister had a say in that. I never liked the woman.’
‘When you heard Hannibal was dead did you think of them at all?’ asked Erlendur.
‘Them?’
‘Your older brother.’
‘No. How do you mean?’
‘That they might have had an argument?’
‘That’s what you said the other day.’
‘Yes.’
Rebekka thought.
‘You don’t seriously believe he could have killed Hannibal? After all these years? No, it’s utterly absurd. I don’t understand … don’t know how it could even cross your mind. Nothing I’ve said has given you any reason to make allegations like that.’
‘No, of course not,’ said Erlendur. ‘By the way, he rang me after you and I talked the other day. He was none too happy.’
‘No, I … I told him the gist of our conversation. He and Hannibal hadn’t had any contact. None at all. Not for decades.’
‘Did they turn up to the funeral?’
‘Yes. Well, he did. She stayed behind up north. Which is typical of her. Not an ounce of forgiveness in her heart. But you mustn’t think that about my brother. Seriously. He’d never have been capable of hurting Hannibal.’
‘But he did, didn’t he? Indirectly?’
Rebekka stared at Erlendur, startled and indignant. He immediately regretted it.
‘How can you imagine … how can you talk like that? How dare you?’
‘I’m sorry, I –’
‘Why are you so curious about Hannibal anyway?’
‘Because I’d got to know him a bit. There was something about him – the way he chose to live. Perhaps more than anything it was what he said the last time I saw him. He’d been beaten up and we took him down to the station where he and I had a chat. He talked about his misery, said it didn’t matter if he lived or died. I wondered what it would take to make a man talk like that.’
‘He said that?’
‘Yes. Honestly, I didn’t mean to accuse anyone. Please forgive me if it came across that way.’
Rebekka studied Erlendur; the resolute mouth, the deeply entrenched lines of sadness around his eyes.
‘This isn’t just about Hannibal,’ she said. ‘There’s more to it.’
Erlendur did not respond.
‘Did something happen?’ she asked.
‘What do you mean?’
‘What exactly was it about my brother that caught your imagination?’
‘I told you.’
‘No, you haven’t told me anything. Whereas I’ve been open with you and told you all about my family. I feel you owe me an explanation for your curiosity. For why we’re sitting here discussing my brother. I don’t think you’re being straight with me.’
She waited for an answer.
‘Well?’
Erlendur remained silent.
‘Then we’ve nothing more to discuss.’ Rebekka stood up. ‘Goodbye. I hope you’ll honour my request to treat what I’ve told you about my family in strictest confidence.’
She walked off towards town, leaving him staring across the lake. Eventually he rose to his feet.
‘I … I had a brother once, like you,’ he called after her.
She halted and turned.
‘A brother?’
‘He went missing,’ Erlendur said. ‘In the mountains out east, where we grew up. We got lost in a blizzard. I was found; he never was. When you say you can hardly bear to remember how you went with them on that outing … I know the feeling. When Hannibal talked of his misery, it struck a chord with me.’
He sat down again and Rebekka came back.
‘And you’re still suffering?’ she asked, after a while.
‘I think about it almost every day.’
‘I’ve tortured myself over the years, constantly brooding about what happened,’ Rebekka said. ‘If only I hadn’t gone with them, hadn’t been standing in the drive when they set out. If only I’d been playing with my friends instead … I used to brood like that endlessly when I was younger. What if he hadn’t had to worry about his sister in the back seat? Surely then he’d have had time to save her? Was it my fault she died? Was it all my fault?’
‘I’m familiar with those thoughts,’ Erlendur admitted quietly.
‘Then one day I realised I was being too hard on myself,’ she went on. ‘Using the incident to torture myself unnecessarily. I’ve stopped now. There’s no point. He saved my life and his own life fell apart. I struggled with that knowledge for years but I’ve learned not to connect the two things.’
‘I don’t suppose Hannibal ever stopped,’ said Erlendur. ‘Torturing himself with thoughts like that.’
‘No. They were his constant companions.’
‘And destroyed him in the end.’
‘Yes,’ Rebekka said, her eyes on Erlendur. ‘And destroyed him in the end.’
24
After meeting Rebekka, Erlendur headed towards the hostel on Amtmannsstígur. Thurí was not in, nor did he see the three women who had been playing Ludo last time. It turned out that Thurí had not been by for several days, but as far as the warden was aware she was still sober.
Erlendur asked two residents if they knew Thurí or had any news of her. Neither could help. One remembered something about her renting a room with another woman in the west end, but didn’t know the address.
Erlendur walked down to Austurvöllur. A few drinkers had congregated on the benches in the square, screwing up their eyes against the afternoon sun. They varied in age, shabbiness and degrees of intoxication. The youngest was about twenty; long hair, muscular build, the rolled-up sleeves of his shirt revealing tattoos running up his arms. The eldest, clad in a thick, traditional Icelandic jumper, was a frail, bearded, toothless old man. The rest were somewhere on the spectrum between youth and decrepitude. When Erlendur turned up to disturb the peace, they were variously baking in the sun, talking with their neighbours or quietly watching the world go by with knowing expressions.
‘Any of you seen Thurí?’ he asked on the off chance that they might be familiar with the name.
The men appeared for the most part indifferent. But a couple looked up and squinted at him.
‘Who are you?’
‘I need to find her,’ said Erlendur. ‘Any chance you might know where she is?’
‘Thurí who?’ said the young man with the tattoos.
‘She was staying at the hostel on Amtmannsstígur,’ said Erlendur. ‘But she’s gone.’
‘You shagging her then?’ asked the tattooed man.
His companions sniggered. Their interest roused, they watched Erlendur intently.
Erlendur smiled. A troublemaker, he thought.
‘Nope, I just need to get in touch with her.’
‘To shag her?’ the young man persisted.
He was in his element. The older men sitting around him laughed.
‘Do you know where she is?’ asked Erlendur, addressing them instead.
‘Hey, talk to me,’ said the young man, rising to his feet. ‘Why are you asking them? What’s with you and this Thurí anyway? You together or what? She cheating on you? Doesn’t want to shag you any more?’
Erlendur looked him up and down and concluded that he must be high. His eyes were bulging.
‘Reckon I saw her earlier,’ the young man said. ‘She was screwing Stebbi here.’ He pointed at the toothless old man.
There was a chorus of guffawing. The young man jabbed a finger at Erlendur.
‘Why don’t you fuck off?’ he said. ‘And leave us alone. Before I deck you.’
‘You’re not going to deck anyone.’
‘Oh, yeah? Want to bet? Eh?’
‘Take it easy.’
‘Take it easy yourself.’ The man lunged at him. If Erlendur hadn’t been ready, the blow would have caught him right on the jaw. But he danced on his toes and dodged the punch as his training came into play. The young man’s fist met thin air. Fear of losing face in front of his comrades made him even angrier, but as he was bracing himself to take another swing at Erlendur, the man gasped from a heavy blow to his stomach, followed immediately by a second. Two powerful strikes in a row, just as Erlendur had learned to aim at the punch bag, and the man collapsed to his knees, doubled up, gripping his stomach and gasping helplessly. Erlendur steadied him to make sure he didn’t fall flat on his face.
‘So none of you know her?’ he said calmly to the men who had been watching the abrupt end to the hostilities.
‘I do,’ announced the toothless man, eyeing his friend, who was still struggling for breath. ‘Haven’t seen her for ages though. Reckon she must have dried out. Friend of hers runs Póllinn. Name’s Svana. You could try asking after Thurí there.’
‘I’ll do that.’
The others came forward to tend to the winded man, but he shoved them away, watching resentfully as Erlendur walked off down Pósthússtræti.
Erlendur was familiar with Póllinn, ‘The Pole’. It was a pub for hardened drinkers, run by a buxom woman who had once lived in Copenhagen’s notorious Christiania district. She liked to side with her regulars, calling them customers when others labelled them scum. They included homeless men like Hannibal, the women from the hostel and the men who lined the benches of Austurvöllur Square.
The place was empty when Erlendur put his head round the door. He wasn’t even sure it was open, but he caught sight of the owner bending down behind the bar, shifting crates of clinking bottles.
‘Svana?’
The woman looked up from her task.
‘Yeah.’
‘I’m told you know Thurí and might be able to tell me where to find her.’
‘And you are?’
‘I spoke to her at the hostel on Amtmannsstígur a couple of days ago and need to get a message to her.’
‘It’s a while since she’s been in.’ Svana returned to shifting crates. ‘She’s on the wagon. Doesn’t show her face in here when she’s off the booze.’
‘I heard she rented a place on Brádrædisholt. Would you happen to know it?’
‘Why do you need to see her?’
‘It’s personal.’
‘Are you a relative?’
Erlendur thought quickly. Lying would be the simplest option given that the excuse had been handed to him on a plate. The alternative would be sharing information that was none of Svana’s business.
‘Yes.’
‘Poor Thurí. She’s a nice girl but a hopeless alky. I was so pleased when I heard she was trying to quit. She’s tried so often but always ends up back on the bottle. It’s like some demon just takes over. She lives near the fishery. On Brádrædisholt, by the football ground. Tell her I said hi. Hope things are working out for her. Hope she hasn’t lapsed again.’
Having got the house number from Svana, Erlendur tracked Thurí down to a basement room in a two-storey building with bare concrete walls. The room had its own entrance, facing a garden that had completely gone to seed. When Erlendur tapped on the door he was surprised to find it open a crack. Muffled groans were coming from inside. Worried that Thurí might be in trouble, he pushed the door open.
It was more of a broom cupboard than a room, full of rubbish Thurí had accumulated. Old clothes, food containers and plastic bags cluttered the floor. There was a shopping trolley in one corner. The only pieces of furniture were an old armchair and a stained divan bed on which Thurí was now lying, trying to neck a bottle of meths, while Bergmundur, still wearing his filthy coat, was pounding away on top of her, raising loud groans of protest from the springs.
25
Neither of them noticed Erlendur. He crept out again, pushing the door to behind him, then walked round the house and out into the street. He would rather not have had that image burnt onto his retinas but it couldn’t be helped. Two things were clear: Bergmundur had found his Thurí, and Thurí had lapsed again.
Twenty minutes later Bergmundur rounded the corner and swaggered off down the street towards town. He didn’t observe Erlendur tucked between the buildings, watching him until he turned onto Hringbraut.
Erlendur loitered for another five minutes before going back into the garden and rapping on the door, much louder than before. This time it was shut and he had to knock three times before he heard a rustle and Thurí opened up.
‘What’s all this bloody racket?’ she slurred.
‘Remember me?’ said Erlendur. ‘We talked the other day down at the hostel.’
‘No,’ said Thurí. ‘Who’re you? Why should I remember you?’
She was dressed in a skimpy jumper and skirt, smoking a cigarette. The ash dropped onto the floor at her feet.
‘I was asking you about a man called Hannibal.’
Thurí peered more closely at Erlendur, still none the wiser.
‘I knew Hannibal.’ She wandered back inside, leaving the door open. Erlendur followed. She bent down and picked up a clear glass bottle containing the dregs of some cloudy liquid and took a long drink. Then, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand, she sat down on the divan. There were several containers of methylated spirits on the floor. The wages of love, he supposed.
‘You told me you went to visit him before he died,’ Erlendur began, ‘at the pipeline where he was sleeping. And you kept something you found there later on, after he drowned. I wondered if you’d let me see it. You did say I could come round and have a look.’
Thurí stared at him and eventually the fog seemed to lift a little.
‘You?’ she said. ‘Hannibal’s friend. It’s coming back to me now. What did you say your name was?’
‘Erlendur.’
‘A mate of Hannibal’s?’
‘That’s right. You picked up an earring under the hot-water pipe. A gold one. You offered to show it to me.’
Thurí raised the bottle to her lips again. She seemed in low spirits.
‘I lapsed,’ she said, full of self-hatred. ‘Was dry for months but now I’ve lapsed. I’m pathetic. Totally bloody pathetic. That’s the worst thing. That I’m such a pathetic piece of shit. Back in the day, I didn’t drink with just anyone, you know. Used to associate with nice people. With a good crowd. Used to have fun, drank classy stuff. Now I’m like a dog drinking out of a ditch.’
She brandished the bottle for emphasis.
‘Nothing but sodding piss.’
Erlendur didn’t know what to say so thought it best to keep his mouth shut. He surveyed the dingy little room. Her situation was grim. She had tried to claw her way out of the mire but kept falling back into it.
‘Do you remember the earring?’ he asked, eager to cut short his visit. There was an unpleasant smell that he associated inescapably with the image of Thurí and Bergmundur on the bed.
‘’Course I do,’ said Thurí. ‘I found it, didn’t I? Think I’d forget? No way. It’s my lucky charm.’
‘Could I possibly see it?’ asked Erlendur. ‘Do you have it here?’
‘What’s it to you?’
‘You do still have it?’
‘I lent … pawned it.’
‘You what?’
Thurí waved the bottle again.
‘Got to drink something.’
‘You sold it for booze?’
‘Home-made spirits,’ she clarified. ‘Anyway, I didn’t sell it. I pawned it. I’ll get it back when I have the cash. Then you can see it. Why the hell do you want to see it anyhow? It’s none of your business. I’m the one who found it. It’s mine. If I want to sell
it, I will and I don’t need your permission.’
Erlendur could tell she wanted to pick a fight, so he tried the conciliatory approach. It took him a while to win her over, but in the end, he persuaded her to reveal the address of her supplier.
‘Did you know Hannibal was married once?’ he asked when she had calmed down.
‘Yeah.’
‘Did he ever tell you about the accident that happened when he was young?’
‘I know how he lost Helena,’ Thurí said. ‘Though he didn’t like to talk about it. Not to just anyone. He did tell me, but it wasn’t easy for him. He wasn’t one to open up about himself.’
‘No, I don’t suppose he was,’ said Erlendur. ‘Did he ever mention his elder brother? Or his sister-in-law?’
‘No. Were they in contact? Hannibal never mentioned them.’
‘So you don’t know if his brother was in town when Hannibal died?’
‘How would I know that? What the hell are you on about?’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ Erlendur said. ‘I heard from him, that’s all. He wasn’t exactly friendly.’
‘Well, I don’t know a bloody thing about him.’
Thurí slouched on the bed, bottle in hand, fumbling with a crumpled cigarette packet. She was not having much luck. Erlendur took the packet, extracted one and lit it for her.
‘Maybe you should go down to Amtmannsstígur,’ he said in parting.
‘Yeah, yeah, yeah,’ she said. ‘Just leave me alone.’
* * *
Thurí’s supplier had a place in Skerjafjördur, near the domestic airport. If Thurí was to be believed, he had an illegal still in a small garage, from which he was emerging when Erlendur arrived. They exchanged greetings, the man a little warily. He was short, with an impressive gut.
‘What can I do for you?’ he asked, locking the garage door.
‘Thurí sent me,’ Erlendur explained, working on the assumption that she was one of his regulars.
‘Thurí, eh? How’s she doing?’
‘Bad. Your poison’s put her in a foul mood. Have you got the earring she sold you?’
‘Earring?’
‘The gold earring she gave you in exchange for booze. She told me you had it.’
Reykjavik Nights Page 11
