Arctic Chill

by Arnaldur Indridason

  'No thanks.' She smiled. 'I don't even believe in God.'

  Then she closed the door in his face.

  Sigurdur Óli stood thoughtfully for a while then rang the bell again.

  'You haven't heard the news, have you?' he said in a serious tone when the woman opened the door again.

  'What news?'

  'I'm from the police. One of your pupils has been found dead near his home. It looks as if he's been stabbed with a knife.'

  The woman's expression became one big question mark.

  'What?' she groaned. 'Dead? Who?'

  'Elías,' Sigurdur Óli said.

  'Bias?'

  Sigurdur Óli nodded.

  'I don't believe you! How? Why? What... what on earth are you saying?'

  'Perhaps you'd let me come inside,' Sigurdur Óli said. 'We need information about his class, his friends, who he went around with, whether he'd been in trouble at school, whether he had enemies. It would be great if you could assist us. We're short of time. The sooner we can gather information, the better. It's terrible to have to call on people like this but...'

  'I... I thought you were from one of those religious sects,' Agnes sighed. 'You're so ...'

  'May I come in and sit down with you for a moment?'

  'Sorry,' Agnes said. 'Please do.'

  As he entered the flat through a small hallway with a mirror, Sigurdur Óli could see the teacher's family eating dinner in the kitchen. Three children – two boys and a girl – eyed him curiously and their father stood up to shake his hand. Agnes took her husband to one side and in a low voice explained the unexpected visit to him, then showed Sigurdur Óli into their study.

  'What happened?' she asked once they had closed the door. 'Was the boy attacked?'

  'It looks that way.'

  'My God, that's ... the poor kid. Who could have done a thing like that?'

  'Can you imagine that anyone at school or in his class would have wanted to do him harm?'

  'Not at all,' Agnes said. 'Elías was a very sweet boy, always trying to please everyone. And he was a good pupil. Why do you want to link this to the school? Do you have any concrete lead?'

  'No, nothing,' Sigurdur Óli said firmly. 'We have to begin somewhere. You haven't noticed him being hassled in particular? No incident that could be linked to the attack? Nothing you've been worried about?'

  'Nothing,' Agnes said. 'As far as I know, nothing's happened at the school that could end like this. Nothing.'

  She gave a deep groan.

  'Do you know about a group of children who hang around by the local chemist's? Friends of the brothers, immigrants perhaps?'

  'No, I don't know of any such group. How is his mother taking it, the poor woman? I must call on her. Though I don't know what to say to her.'

  'I think she's bearing up, considering the circumstances,' Sigurdur Óli said. 'Do you know her at all?'

  'I can't really say I do,' Agnes replied. 'She's had trouble with speaking Icelandic so a supervisor was appointed for the brothers, a kind of liaison between the family and the school, a lovely woman called Gudný. That's not uncommon when we want greater contact with the pupils and their parents. Some come from Croatia, others from Vietnam, the Philippines or Poland. There are Catholics, Buddhists, Muslims. I've met Elías's mother a few times and she seems very nice. Things must be difficult for her, being single like that.'

  'How are the immigrants regarded?' Sigurdur Óli said. 'How well do they fit in?'

  'Actually, these days we try to talk about ethnic minorities,' Agnes said. 'Some take longer than others to adjust. The most successful ones are those who speak and understand Icelandic, who were born here and are, of course, just Icelanders as well. Like Elías. Niran was a different matter. You know that they're half-brothers?'

  'Yes,' Sigurdur Óli said. Erlendur had told him about his conversation with the interpreter. 'What about Niran?'

  'You should really talk to his form teacher about this,' Agnes said. 'They sometimes find it difficult, the children who come here when they're already quite old and know nothing of the language.'

  And Niran was like that?' Sigurdur Óli said.

  'Well, I shouldn't really talk about individual pupils but of course this is a special case. He doesn't seem interested in learning the language. Can hardly read Icelandic. Doesn't understand it too well. It's difficult for those poor kids when the languages are so different. They speak a tonal language and the meaning of words changes with the pitch. Icelandic's completely different, of course.'

  'You say Elías was a good pupil,' Sigurdur Óli said.

  'He was,' Agnes said. 'His mother clearly knows what she wants. She wants her sons to get an education and they are sharp, despite being different in many ways.'

  'Different how?'

  'I know Elías much better,' Agnes said, 'but I've taught his brother a bit as well. Elías is charming and tries to please everyone, he's always smiling and friendly, although I don't feel he has many friends, poor boy'

  'They've just moved into this neighbourhood,' Sigurdur Óli said.

  'His brother's quite different,' Agnes said.

  'How?'

  'I don't know him that well, like I said, but I get the impression that he's much tougher. He's not afraid to stand up for himself and he's proud of his origins, proud of being Thai. You don't find that among the children very often, not among any of them really; they seem to know precious little about their origins. I noticed that about him once when he was talking about his great-grandfather. Niran had great respect for him. And for his other relatives in Thailand.'

  Sunee's next-door neighbour was a man of about seventy who lived alone. He had not heard the news and said he was shocked to see the police cars and people milling around the block of flats when he came home. He wrangled with the police officers at the entrance when they wanted to know who he was and where he lived, because he did not like that kind of interrogation. The police would not tell him what had happened. So he was rather distraught when Erlendur greeted him on the landing below the top floor and introduced himself as a detective with the Reykjavík CID.

  'What's going on here?' the man asked, short of breath from climbing the stairs. He held a plastic bag in one hand, was of average height and wore a shabby suit and a tie that did not match, underneath a green anorak. Erlendur thought he looked haggard, like many of the solitary individuals he encountered. The man was thin, with a receding hairline, fairly large protruding eyes and delicate eyebrows below a high, intelligent forehead.

  Erlendur explained the situation to him and saw that he took the news badly.

  'Elías!' he groaned, looking over at the door to Sunee's flat. 'What are you saying? The poor child! Who did it? Have you found the person who did it?'

  Erlendur shook his head. 'Do you know the family?' he asked.

  'I don't believe it. All those police cars ... because of Elías ... What does his mother say, the poor woman? She must be devastated.'

  'They've been your next-door neighbours for . . . ?' Erlendur began.

  'Who could do a thing like that?'

  'You must have got to know them,' Erlendur said.

  'Eh? Oh yes, I've got to know them. Elías sometimes pops out to the shop for me, such a dear boy. He's up and down these stairs in a flash. I just can't believe this.'

  'I need to ask you a couple of questions, if you don't mind,' Erlendur said. 'As their neighbour.'

  'Me?'

  'It won't take a moment'

  'Come in then,' the man said, taking out a bunch of keys. He switched on the light inside his flat. Erlendur noticed a large bookcase, an old three-piece suite and a worn carpet. Two walls of the sitting room were decorated with white ribbed wallpaper, which was swollen in places and beginning to turn very yellow. The man, whose name was Gestur according to the small copper plate on the door, closed the door behind them and offered Erlendur a seat on the sofa. He sat down in the chair facing him. He had taken off his thick green anorak, put the plas
tic bag in the kitchen and turned on the coffee maker.

  'What can you tell me about Sunee and her boys?' Erlendur asked.

  'I have nothing but good to say of them. She works hard, their mother, she has to, being on her own like that. The boys have been nothing but polite to me. Elías has run errands and Niran . . . Where's Niran? How's he taking this?' Gestur asked with apparent concern.

  Erlendur hesitated.

  'Surely he hasn't been attacked too?' Gestur groaned.

  'No,' Erlendur said, 'but we don't know where he is. Do you have any ideas?'

  'About where he could be? No, I don't have a clue.'

  Erlendur was deeply concerned about the victim's brother but could only hope that he would come home or be found as soon as possible. He felt it was premature to put his photograph on television.

  'Hopefully he's just hanging around somewhere,' he said. 'What kind of relationship did the two brothers have?'

  'He really looked up to Niran – Elías, I mean. I think he worshipped his brother. He was always talking about him. What Niran said and did. How Niran won computer games and how good he was at football and how he took him to the cinema with his friends even though they were all older. Niran knew everything and could do anything in Elías's eyes. They're like chalk and cheese, the way brothers can be. Elías is quick to make friends but Niran is slower to get to know and more wary of people. Sharp as a knife. On the ball and quick to learn. He doesn't trust everything he sees and hears, plays it cautiously.'

  'You seem to know them very well.'

  'Elías is a bit lonely, the poor lad. He preferred living where they were before. Their mother often gets home late from work and Elías has been hanging around by himself in the corridor or down in the storage rooms and passages in the basement'

  'What about Sunee?'

  'There ought to be more people who work as hard as she does. Sunee provides for herself and her sons through sheer hard graft. I admire her.'

  'Is she completely on her own?'

  'As far as I know. I understand her ex-husband has little to do with her.'

  'Did Elías have any contact with anyone else on this staircase?'

  'I don't think so. There isn't much contact between the tenants. These are all rented flats and you know the kind of people who are in the rental market. Always coming and going, individuals and couples and single mothers like Sunee, even single fathers, students. Some get evicted. Others pay their rent on time.'

  'So does someone own the entire block?'

  'All the flats on this floor at least, some speculator I imagine. I've never seen him. When I moved in a woman from the rental agency handled the paperwork and gave me an account number. If anything crops up I get in touch with the agency.'

  'And the rent, is it high?'

  'I could well imagine it is for Sunee. Unless she's got a different deal from mine.'

  Erlendur stood up. The coffee was untouched in the coffee maker in the kitchen. The aroma filled the whole flat. Gestur stood up as well. He had not offered Erlendur any coffee. Erlendur peered into the dim hallway entrance. There was a peephole in the door, just above the nameplate. Looking through it, he could see the entrance to Sunee and the boys' flat. Erlendur looked Gestur in the eye and thanked him.

  5

  Erlendur's mobile rang yet again. He did not recognise the number but he knew at once who was calling when he heard the voice.

  'Is it a bad moment?' Eva Lind asked.

  'No,' said Erlendur, who had not heard from his daughter for some time.

  'I saw about that kid on TV,' Eva said. 'Are you on that case?'

  'Yes, me and other people. All of us, I think.'

  'Do you know what happened?'

  'No. We know very little.'

  'It's ... it's horrific'

  'Yes.'

  Eva paused.

  'You all right?' Erlendur said after a while.

  'I want to see you.'

  'Do. Come home.'

  Eva paused again.

  'Isn't she always there?'

  'Who?'

  'That woman you're with.'

  'Valgerdur? No. Sometimes.'

  'I don't want to interrupt anything.'

  'You won't.

  'Are you together?'

  'We're good friends.'

  'Is she all right?'

  'Valgerdur is very . . .' Erlendur hesitated. 'What do you mean, "all right"?'

  'Not as bad as Mum?'

  'I think...'

  'She can't be as bad as Mum or you wouldn't bother to be with her. And definitely not as bad as me.'

  'She's no better than anyone else,' Erlendur said. 'I'm not comparing you. You shouldn't either.'

  'Isn't she the first woman you've been with since you left us? She must have something.'

  'You ought to meet her.'

  'I want to see you.'

  'Do, then.'

  'Bye.'

  Eva rang off and Erlendur put his mobile in his pocket.

  He had seen Valgerdur two days before. She came round to his flat in the evening when her shift was over and he gave her a glass of Chartreuse. She told him she had applied formally for a divorce from her husband, the doctor, and had appointed a lawyer.

  Valgerdur was a biotechnician at the National Hospital. Erlendur had met her by chance during a murder investigation and found out that she was having problems in her private life. She was married but her husband had repeatedly cheated on her and she had eventually left him. She and Erlendur decided to take things slowly. They did not live together. Valgerdur wanted to live by herself for a while after her long marriage and Erlendur had not lived with a woman for decades. Nor was there any hurry. Erlendur liked being alone. Sometimes she telephoned him, wanting to visit. Sometimes they went out for a meal together. Once she had succeeded in dragging him along to the theatre, to see Ibsen. He had nodded off fifteen minutes into the play. In vain she tried to nudge him awake but he slept most of the time until the interval when they decided to go home. 'All that artificial drama,' he had said by way of an apology, 'it does nothing for me.'

  'Theatre is reality too,' she'd protested.

  'Not like this,' he'd said, handing her volume two of Stories of Rural Postmen.

  Erlendur had lent her some of his books that described ordeals in the wilderness and how people had frozen to death outdoors in Iceland in the old days, and others about death and destruction caused by avalanches. Although apprehensive at first, the more accounts she read, the more her interest had become aroused. Erlendur's interest in the topic was unquenchable.

  'The lawyer thinks we can divide everything up more or less equally,' she said, sipping her liqueur.