He would do what he could do.
Sharon Piper was frustrated as she returned to CID in Kensington police station on Earl’s Court Road. Virginie Rogeon was out. And her mobile phone was switched off. Sharon had knocked on doors until she finally found someone, another French woman, who thought that Virginie had just left on holiday for India. The husband, Alain, worked for an American investment bank.
Piper thought her best bet was to try to get to Virginie through her husband’s BlackBerry. Which meant she needed to call around the American investment banks in London to find him.
‘How’s it going, Sharon? Anything from Iceland?’
Piper looked up to see a short bald man hovering around her desk. DI Middleton, her boss. He looked worried.
She sighed. ‘I don’t know. Maybe. We might have a lead on the courier who was asking for Gunnarsson’s address. An Icelandic student at the LSE named Ísak Samúelsson. He fits the description, but without a firm ID we can’t be sure. I’m trying to locate the French neighbour who saw him, but she seems to have gone on holiday. To India.’
‘Well do what you can. We’re getting nowhere with Tanya and her Russian friends. Have the Icelandic police got anything on this kid?’
‘I’m not sure,’ said Piper. ‘Not really.’
‘If you want any help, just ask,’ Middleton said. ‘We need a breakthrough here.’
Piper watched her boss go into his small glass-encased office, and stare out of his window. It was all very well for Magnus to plead for her to keep his suspicions to herself. And he was right, they were no more than suspicions. But her loyalty to her boss must be stronger than her loyalty to the Yank, or Icelander or whoever he was. Besides which, Julian Lister was an important man. It was her duty to pass on any ideas or leads, however far fetched. It might stir up a hornet’s nest: MI5, SO15. Or they might just ignore her. But she had to do it.
She opened the door to his office.
‘Guv’nor. There is one thing.’
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
MAGNUS GRABBED A beer and turned on the TV. The investigation was swirling around his brain. He was frustrated. He knew there were connections out there but he just didn’t know where to find them. He had had Árni tracking down every bit of video footage of the January protests that he could. He needed to get a better picture of the younger man who seemed to be following Harpa, Björn and Sindri as they walked away from the demo.
He and Vigdís had been going through the police files on some of the so-called anarchists who had been involved in the protests. They had seen some of them on the video in balaclavas throwing flagstones at the police. Most were just troublemakers looking for an excuse to have fun. Some seemed to be following an ideology, but it wasn’t well expressed. One or two were friends of Sindri.
Possible leads to follow up, but Magnus doubted they would come to anything. Unless one of them had been with Sindri, Harpa and Björn that evening. That would be interesting.
He had been hopeful that Sharon would get an ID of Ísak as the courier in Onslow Gardens. She had called explaining that the neighbour had gone on holiday, and how she was trying to get in touch with her.
All they could do was wait. Once the witness’s husband checked in it would be easy for Piper to send the photograph she had taken of Ísak electronically. Once he checked in.
There was a discussion on TV about Julian Lister. The doctors were now saying there was a chance he might pull through. And all the Icelanders were falling over themselves to pass on their good wishes. The nation had been struck by a huge dollop of guilt.
There was no getting away from it, the Icelanders were essentially a peaceful, non-violent people, terrified by the thought that they should appear to be otherwise. Magnus could understand why the authorities would not want the slightest hint of a terrorist investigation. Because if Magnus was right, and there was a little group of Icelanders who had a list of powerful people they wanted to kill, that was what it was.
Terrorism.
His phone rang. ‘Magnús.’
‘Hey, Magnus, you’ve gone all Icelandic.’
‘Ollie! How the hell are you? I got your call yesterday. Sorry I didn’t get back to you.’
‘No problem. How is the land of our ancestors? Still bubbling away?’
‘I guess so. I’ve yet to see my first volcanic eruption. But the hot tubs are nice.’
‘How’s the course going?’
‘OK,’ said Magnus. ‘Although I’m working on a real live case at the moment.’
‘Someone jerked off in the skyr?’
‘Nice.’
‘Sorry. Hey, you know it was Dad’s birthday yesterday?’
‘Huh?’ Magnus sat up. ‘Was it? Yeah, I guess it was.’ He felt a twinge of guilt. He’d forgotten.
‘Yeah. He’d be sixty. I can’t imagine him at sixty, can you?’
‘I can, actually,’ said Magnus, smiling. His father had been in his mid-forties when he died. His fair hair had been turning quietly grey. The smile lines around his eyes had been deepening. ‘Yeah, I can.’
‘I’ve been thinking about him a lot recently.’
‘So have I,’ said Magnus. He took a deep breath. Ollie had a right to know, or as much of a right as Magnus.
Magnus talked for twenty minutes, telling his brother about Sibba and Unnur. And then about their grandfather’s reaction to Ragnar leaving their mother. And then about the deaths of the families of Bjarnarhöfn and Hraun over the years: Benedikt’s father, their great-grandfather Gunnar, Benedikt himself.
‘Christ!’ said Ollie. ‘So you think Grandpa might have had something to do with Dad’s murder?’
‘I don’t know yet. Unnur says definitely not. I need to do some more digging.’
‘Don’t,’ said Ollie.
‘What do you mean, don’t?’
‘I just don’t want you to.’
‘But I have to know! We have to know.’
There was silence on the phone.
‘Ollie?’
‘Magnus.’ Magnus heard his brother’s voice crack. ‘I’m asking you, man. I’m pleading with you. Just don’t go there.’
‘Why not?’
‘Look, you’re obsessed, Magnus. And that was cool when you were asking questions in America. But I can’t handle you dredging up all that shit in Bjarnarhöfn again. That’s buried and it’s buried for a reason.’
‘Ollie?’
‘I’ve spent most of my life, over twenty years, trying to forget that place, and you know what? I’ve just about done it. So as far as I am concerned it should stay forgotten.’
‘But Ollie-’
‘And if you do find stuff out, just don’t tell me about it, OK?’
‘Look, Ollie-’
‘Bye, Magnus.’
Five minutes later, the phone rang again. It was Ingileif, asking him round to her place. She would cook dinner.
‘Are you OK?’ she asked when he got to her flat. ‘Something’s wrong.’
‘Just got a phone call from my brother.’
‘What’s up with him?’
‘I told him what we found out over the weekend. About our father. And grandfather.’
‘And?’
‘And he wants to think about it even less than I do.’
Magnus could see Ingileif about to say something and thinking the better of it. ‘Yes?’ he said.
‘Sorry,’ Ingileif said. ‘I can see it’s a sensitive subject for you. And your brother. I can live with that.’
‘Good.’
Ingileif was frying some fish. ‘I got an offer today,’ she said.
‘What kind of offer?’
‘You remember Svala? From the gallery?’
‘Yes. Didn’t you say she has moved to Hamburg?’
‘That’s right. She’s teamed up with some German guy. They are selling Scandinavian stuff. Their gallery has only been open a couple of months, but she thinks it will do well.’
‘Even in the recession?’
‘
Apparently. And Germany isn’t as badly screwed as Iceland is. They are coming out of it there.’
‘Lucky them.’
‘Yes. Anyway, she wants me to join them. As a partner. She’s told this German guy that I am just what they need for the business to take off.’
‘Hmm.’ Ingileif had her back to Magnus. ‘Sounds like a good opportunity. But what about the gallery here?’
‘I’d miss it. But the prospects have to be much better in Germany.’
‘Do you speak any German?’
‘A bit. Enough to get me started. I could pick it up pretty quickly if I’m living there.’
Magnus felt his body tense. ‘So are you going?’
Ingileif didn’t answer as she scooped the fish on to plates, and placed them on the table. They sat down.
‘No,’ she said.
‘No? Why not?’
She leant over and kissed him. Deeply. ‘Because of you, stupid.’
There wasn’t much Magnus could say to that. He smiled.
‘How’s the case going?’ she asked. ‘Any new suspects?’
‘A couple,’ Magnus said. ‘Do you know Sindri Pálsson?’
‘That old windbag? Yes, I do.’
‘Why am I not surprised? But he can’t be a client.’
‘Oh, no. He’s part of Iceland’s version of a liberal intelligentsia. He shows up to book launches. Exhibitions. He’s a nice guy, despite all the “world-is-ending” crap.’
‘He seems to believe that violence is the only way to destroy capitalism.’
‘He’s all talk. He’s a big pussy cat. You don’t think he killed Óskar, do you?’
‘We think he might be involved.’
‘No,’ Ingileif said. She paused, thinking. ‘No. He’d never kill anyone. I can always ask him.’
‘I already have,’ said Magnus.
‘Yes, but he might tell me.’ Ingileif chewed her fish. ‘I’m serious. I’m pretty sure he fancies me. In fact I’d say he fancies anyone under the age of thirty – and Magnús, as you know, I am still under the age of thirty.’ Ingileif was twenty-nine and three-quarters. ‘He’d tell me if I asked him in the right way.’
‘And I’m serious,’ Magnus said. ‘It would screw up the investigation.’
‘Oh, don’t be so bureaucratic. It would be kind of fun. I could solve your case for you.’
‘No, Ingileif,’ Magnus said. ‘No.’
Several hours later, they were lying in Ingileif’s bed. Magnus couldn’t sleep. He was facing away from her. He could sense she was awake also.
He felt her touch his shoulder.
‘Magnús?’
‘Yes?’
‘Are you thinking about Bjarnarhöfn?’
‘Yes.’
She tugged at his shoulder so he rolled over on to his back. She kissed his lips gently. ‘Tell me. If you want to.’
‘OK.’ Magnus swallowed. ‘OK. I will.’
And so he told her.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
January 1986
Magnus slipped out of the farmhouse into the cold fresh air, and stumbled through the snow towards the sea. He had to be alone.
It was night. They had just eaten and Grandpa was giving Óli a lecture about wetting his bed.
Christmas hadn’t been so bad. The boys’ uncle, aunt and cousins had visited from Canada to the delight of their grandfather. Grandpa had entered one of his phases of exuberant high spirits. There was Christmas cheer everywhere. The Yule Lads had come, placing little gifts in Magnus and Óli’s shoes.
Christmas Eve dinner was a feast to remember: ptarmigan, browned potatoes fried in butter and sugar, which were Magnus’s favourite, followed by leafbread and ice cream. Magnus received an American police car with sirens and flashing lights from his Canadian uncle and aunt. A touch babyish perhaps, but he liked it. Óli, for the first time for months, seemed to be actually enjoying himself.
Then, as Magnus knew it would, things had soured. Óli got scared again and had started wetting his bed. Just after New Year the relatives had left, leaving the boys alone in the farmhouse with their grandparents.
And Grandpa was in an evil mood.
Magnus trudged past the little church down to the sea and sat on a stone. He scanned the familiar isolated lights, which burned nearly all day at this time of year, when dusk and dawn brushed in the gloom of midday. The bright lights of the farmhouse behind him. The lights at Hraun on the other side of the lava field. The lighthouse on one of the islands in the fjord. The bobbing winks of fishing boats returning to Stykkishólmur.
It was a clear night. The reflection from the half moon glimmered on the snow, and shimmered in the waterfall streaming off the fell looming behind the farmhouse. The tall triangular racks for drying stockfish were silhouetted against the gleaming swell of the sea, which rustled gently against the shore. Twisted stone reared up out of the white Berserkjahraun. A gleam of green hovered behind the mountains away to the north of the fjord. The aurora. And high above all this, the stars, pricking the cold clear night in their thousands. He remembered his mother telling him when they still lived in Reykjavík that there were two things in the world that could not be counted: the stars in the night sky and the islands in Breidafjördur.
Magnus hunched into his coat. He was cold, really cold, but the cold felt good compared to the angry heat inside the farmhouse.
Two years before, Magnus, Óli and his mother and father had all been living happily together in their little house in Thingholt with the blue corrugated iron roof and the whitebeam tree in the garden. Then things fell apart. There was arguing, anger, his father’s departure, his mother sleeping all the time, forgetting to get them dinner, not being able to speak properly. Within six months Magnus’s father was in Boston, his mother was in Reykjavík and Magnus and his little brother were at their grandparents’ farm at Bjarnarhöfn.
Magnus had never much liked his grandmother. She was a small woman, cool, detached, with a permanent look of mild disapproval on her face. His grandfather was scary but had a certain gruff charm. He would throw himself into playing games with his grandsons, and once they moved up to Bjarnarhöfn, took great pleasure in showing them the farm, the fells, the islands in the fjord. What Magnus and Óli enjoyed most was helping him collect the valuable feathers from the eider ducks’ nests among the dwarf willows by the stream.
And of course there was the Berserkjahraun. Hallgrímur led his grandsons through the fantastic twisted lava sculptures, telling them tales of the berserkers who had lived at their farm and at Hraun, and of the kind of games he used to play there as a kid. Óli was scared, but Magnus was fascinated.
But Grandpa liked to drink. And when he drank he became angry. And he became a bully.
Hallgrímur liked Magnus, at least at first. But Óli was weak and Hallgrímur detested weakness. Óli scared easily and Hallgrímur liked to scare him. He told him stories about the Kerlingin troll who took the babies of Stykkishólmur away with her, and might take Óli as well if he didn’t shape up. Of the berserkers who still tramped around the lava field at night. Of a man named Thórólfur Lame Foot who had been murdered centuries before, but roamed the fells terrorizing shepherds and their sheep. And of the fjörulalli, a sea monster with shells hanging from its fur, that cruised around the fjord just offshore, waiting to eat up small children who got too close to the sea.
Magnus stood up for his little brother. His grandfather didn’t like that. Scaring Magnus didn’t work, so Hallgrímur beat him instead. Hence the occasional visits to St Francis’s Hospital in Stykkishólmur, with lies about complicated farmyard accidents.
Then Hallgrímur would sober up, the sun would shine, and he would try to play with his grandchildren again. But Óli was too scared and Magnus too proud.
Throughout all this, their grandmother kept an aloof detachment, as though she didn’t care what happened to her grandchildren. As he got older, Magnus realized that she was beaten too.
The farm was isolated, cut off
from the rest of civilization by the lava field. It became a kind of hell. Magnus thought of escape. Sometimes their mother would come to visit and for a while everything would be better, although by this stage Magnus had realized she was drunk, not sleepy. When he tried to explain what was happening to them, his mother just told them that ‘Grandpa was a little stricter than Daddy.’
Sounds drifted across the snow towards Magnus from the farmhouse, his grandfather’s deep roar, the high pitched scream of his little brother. Poor Óli. Even though there was nothing much he could do, Magnus stood up and ran back towards the house, hoping that his presence might distract his grandfather.
When he reached the kitchen, his grandmother was scouring a large pan over the sink. The shouting seemed to have stopped.
‘Where’s Óli?’
‘In the cellar, I think,’ Grandma said, without turning around.
‘What’s he doing there?’
‘He is being punished.’
‘What’s he being punished for?’
‘Don’t be so impertinent,’ Grandma said. But she said it without force. She often said those words. It was her code for ‘I don’t know and I don’t want to know, so don’t ask me about it.’
Magnus ran down the stone steps to the cellar. It was cold with cement walls lit by a single bulb. It was used for storage, there were a couple of individual rooms, one filled with animal feed supplements and one with potatoes, most of which had rotted. The door to this last one was shut. Behind it he could hear Óli sobbing.
Magnus tried the door. It was locked. The key was upstairs on the door of the broom cupboard outside the kitchen, in plain view of their grandmother. ‘Óli! Óli, are you OK?’
‘No,’ said Óli between sobs. ‘It’s dark and its cold and the potatoes are slimy and I’m scared.’
‘Can’t you turn on the light?’
‘He’s taken away the bulb.’
Rage boiled up inside Magnus and he pulled at the door, hoping somehow to shake the lock loose. It didn’t work of course, so he began kicking at it.
‘Stop, Magnús, stop! He’ll hear you.’
‘I don’t care,’ shouted Magnus. He stood back and took a run at the door, throwing the entire weight of his nine-year-old body at it. He bounced off and fell on to the floor. He stood up, rubbing his shoulder.
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