Fox Goes Hunting

by Paty Jager

  “You did have an altercation with him four years ago at the conference that is happening right now.” Hawke took off his hat, shoved his hair back with the other hand, and replaced his hat. “Kind of makes one wonder...”

  “That guy was a nerd. He could have told my dad quietly what he thought, but he blabbed it to everyone who would listen and then some. He deserved the beating I gave him four years ago.” Weston’s hands clenched and unclenched.

  “But that wasn’t enough. You waited. Came back when things seemed to have simmered down and waited for your chance for retribution.” Hawke glanced at Böðvarsson. He didn’t seem to care that Hawke was doing all the talking.

  “I didn’t need retribution. Dad is suing the conference. Money is better than boiling someone up.” Weston grinned smugly.

  “How do you know he was boiled?” Böðvarsson asked.

  “Because I saw it on the news. You can’t blame this on me. I didn’t do it.” Weston was starting to get antsy.

  “Where were you Wednesday afternoon?” Hawke asked.

  “Driving around.”

  “Where were you driving?” the detective asked.

  “I don’t know. Just driving. There isn’t a law against driving.”

  “Do you have a rental car?” Hawke asked.

  “No, I borrowed one.” The man started sweating. “I don’t remember the girl’s name. I met her Tuesday night at a bar, mentioned I wanted to drive around and see more of the country. She spent the night and I drove her to work and used her car.”

  Hawke rolled his eyes. He’d never been that stupid even in his teens.

  “What bar and where did she work?” Böðvarsson had a notepad in his left hand and a pen in his right.

  “I met her at the bar at Harpa,” Weston said.

  Hawke took a step forward. “Nonni and his friends were in that bar that night. You sure you didn’t recognize him and past anger resurfaced?”

  “I didn’t see Nonni or anyone else I recognized.”

  “Why did you go to the place where the conference was being held?” Böðvarsson asked.

  Weston whipped his gaze to the detective. “I didn’t know the conference was there. Four years ago it was someplace else.”

  Hawke stared at Weston. “You didn’t see the banner and the signs welcoming the attendees to the SAR conference?”

  Weston stared back at him, his mouth pinched shut.

  Looked like he needed to try a different tactic. “Why did you come to Iceland now? There are other times during the year that would be better for a vacation.” Hawke could only think of one reason the man came now, during the conference—to harm Nonni.

  “It was cheaper now. Off-season and all.”

  “Why did you want to come here?” Böðvarsson had his pen poised over the notepad, which reminded Hawke that Weston had yet to answer the question of where the girl worked.

  “When I was here during the conference, I liked the people and wanted to see more of the country. I saved up to get here now. I’m not going to let you ruin my trip.”

  “What was the girl’s name and where did she work?” Hawke pushed.

  “Asa, Ashta, I don’t know. She worked at an office in the government building.” He ran a hand over the back of his neck. “I didn’t know I needed to keep a list of the women I met here.”

  Hawke’s head whipped up at the name that sounded like Nonni’s girlfriend. But she had been with Nonni that night. Or had she? He’d seen them early in the evening. Had Billy won her away from Nonni? In which case, Nonni would have wanted revenge, not Weston.

  “We will check this out with, did you say Ásta?” Böðvarsson asked.

  “That sounds right,” Weston said. “I don’t know which office she works in. She has reddish hair that’s long and curly. Freckles and a funny laugh. She also has a birthmark on the inside of her thigh.” The man’s grin twisted into a goofy smirk.

  Böðvarsson’s pen punctuated the last thing he wrote and he stood. “We may have more questions for you.”

  Hawke had plenty but this wasn’t his country or his jurisdiction. He did breathe a sigh of relief. The description of the woman wasn’t close to the Ásta he knew as Nonni’s girlfriend.

  <<>><<>><<>>

  “Did you get anything out of the woman?” Hawke asked Sigga as Böðvarsson drove them to the government building.

  “She met up with Billy last night. Thought he was a lot of fun and was hanging around to show him the sights, go to dinner, and hook up again tonight.” Sigga’s tone reflected she was still unhappy with him believing she had anything to do with Nonni’s death.

  Until he was certain she and a possible lover, like Largess, whose car had been at the parking lot, hadn’t worked together to kill Nonni, he wasn’t going to trust her completely. The car in the parking lot after the body was found still bothered Hawke. If the killer walked to the parking lot ahead of him, but didn’t leave in the rental car, until after Hawke had written down the license plates, had they still been walking around, mingling with others to take suspicion off? He knew Sigga hadn’t driven the car there, she had been on the bus and she had ridden back to town with him and Böðvarsson. Who drove the car there and who brought it back?

  Böðvarsson stopped in a parking lot in front and to the side of a long white older building that Hawke had walked past several times while following Nonni’s friends from bar to bar.

  “This is a government building?” He stepped out of the car and studied the architecture.

  “It is now. Before it was a prison.” Böðvarsson walked to the entrance. Inside, he showed his identification and asked to see Ásta.

  “Last name? We have three who work in this building,” the woman at the information counter said.

  “She has red curly hair and freckles.” Hawke left off the other distinguishing mark, figuring the woman in her sixties hadn’t had the pleasure of seeing Ásta’s inner thigh.

  “I’ll give her a call. Is she in trouble?” The woman picked up the phone.

  “We just have some questions for her,” Böðvarsson said, smiling.

  The woman nodded, spoke into the phone, and smiled at them. “She’ll be right down.”

  They moved to a small area with a few chairs and stood, waiting.

  A robust young woman with long curly red hair and freckles, sauntered down the hall toward them. She smiled and held out a hand when she stood in front of Sigga.

  Böðvarsson cleared his throat and extended his hand. “Ari Böðvarsson, from the CID.”

  Ásta shook his hand and glanced at Hawke. She started speaking in Icelandic.

  Hawke held up his hand. “Could you speak in English, please.”

  “I asked what you wanted to see me about?” She smiled at him and studied Böðvarsson.

  “Were you at the Bergmál on Tuesday night?” the detective asked.

  “Yes. I’m a big girl. I can go out for a drink on a work night.” She winked at Hawke.

  “Did you meet anyone?” Böðvarsson asked.

  Her grin grew larger and her eyes sparkled. “I did. He was American. Very talented.” She glanced at Sigga. “If you know what I mean.”

  “Did you spend the night with him and lend him your car the next day?” Hawke wasn’t interested in the woman’s love life.

  “I did both. He wanted to do some sightseeing and I didn’t need the car while I was cooped up in here.” She glanced at Sigga again. “Besides, I wanted him to be available another night. You know, owing me a favor.”

  “Did he say where he’d gone that day?” Böðvarsson asked.

  “I think he traveled south. He talked about the two of us going north this weekend.”

  Hawke wondered if she realized he’d picked up another woman last night. “Where south? Any place in particular?”

  “Why are you asking all of these questions about Billy?” She no longer grinned. Her eyes had narrowed and she studied them with suspicion.

  “We’re looking into t
he homicide that happened near Lake Kleifarvatn,” Böðvarsson said.

  Her eyes widened. “You think Billy had something to do with that? No! I don’t believe it. He is kind and funny. He couldn’t kill someone.”

  “Could we look inside your car?” Böðvarsson asked.

  “I’ll have to get my keys. But I’m telling you. He wouldn’t do something like that.” She hurried back down the hall.

  “What do you think?” Böðvarsson asked.

  Sigga shook her head. “She wouldn’t be the first woman to think a man she hooked up with was a saint.”

  Hawke studied the woman and said to the detective, “He went south. The lake is south and he had a motive. But why was Largess’s car taken if Weston had access to Ásta’s car?”

  “That’s why we are going to check the miles it has been driven since its last trip to a mechanic.” Böðvarsson stood by the door waiting for the woman to return.

  Chapter Fifteen

  After looking all through the car and not finding anything out of the ordinary, Böðvarsson wrote down the miles, asked Ásta where she lived and who worked on her car, and they drove back to the police station.

  Hawke sat in Böðvarsson’s office making a list while the detective found some officers to decipher the information he’d written down about the car.

  Sigga sat in a corner. She was still sulking. “What are you doing?” she asked.

  “Making a list of what we don’t know.”

  “Which is everything.” She sighed. “I know I didn’t kill him. You can take me off your list.”

  He studied her. She appeared truthful if not a bit subdued.

  Böðvarsson entered the office. “The surveillance tapes arrived. From the Marina Hotel and the Center Hotel.”

  Hawke sat up. “Are they in the same room where I watched them before?”

  “Yes. We are still trying to find information on Wanza and her mother. Though I doubt it has anything to do with our homicide.” Böðvarsson sat down behind his desk. “I have to catch up on some paperwork.”

  Hawke stood. “I’ll be looking at surveillance tape.” He didn’t wait to hear what Sigga would be assigned.

  The room he sat in the previous day had the same young woman in charge of the technology. She had the Marina Hotel tape ready for him to view.

  He stared at the tape, stopping and re-watching every time someone stepped up to the desk to see if they left the keys and note. It would help a lot if he had an idea of what time the keys had been dropped off. He knew when they were taken up to the rock climber’s room. The staff would have returned the keys shortly after receiving them, would be his guess.

  Hawke fast forwarded the tape to half an hour before Tinna slipped the keys under the door.

  The tape showed her leaving the counter. Someone, in a big fluffy coat with a fur-lined hood, walked up to the desk, placed the key and note down and walked out with their head down. There wasn’t a clear image of the person’s face. He replayed the tape over and over trying to determine if it was a woman or a man. The hands had on gloves, no skin showed anywhere. The fur trimmed hat hid the face. The shoulders could have been broad or slender. The coat was so fluffy it was hard to distinguish if the person was slender or overweight. Even the waterproof pants gave no clue to the size or gender of the person. The hiking shoes. Maybe.

  Hawke caught the young officer’s attention. “Could you get me a blown up shot of this person and their shoes, please.”

  She popped that tape out of the machine.

  “And could you hand me the other tape?”

  She handed the Center Hotel tape to him and wandered over to another machine in the room.

  Hawke inserted the tape and found the time stamp for noon yesterday. He didn’t have a clue when the letter had been delivered since he’d been out running around all day.

  The door opened.

  “You want some lunch?” Böðvarsson asked.

  “Yeah, I’ll get something when I find—” There was the same person entering the Center as had left the key. “There. The same person who left the key at the Marina Hotel.”

  Böðvarsson leaned down, staring at the monitor. “Not much to go on. They are dressed as if it were winter. We haven’t been that cold. You would think someone would have noticed them.”

  Hawke continued to watch the video. The person walked in, placed the envelope on the counter with gloved hands and turned away from the camera, walking out. In both instances, it was as if the person had known where the surveillance cameras were and turned the opposite direction to keep from getting a photo of them.

  It had to be someone local to know that. Or this person was working with someone else. Frustration rippled through Hawke. “Damn!” He shoved back from the monitor. “There has to be some way to catch this person. He is either the murderer or is helping the murderer.”

  “Do those clothes look local?” Hawke knew that was a long shot. Was the person local or had someone here for the conference purchased them.

  “I’ll get an officer to look these photos over and see if they can determine that. The clothes look new to me.” Böðvarsson pointed to the monitor. “Except the shoes. Those look worn.”

  “They look familiar too.” Hawke leaned back toward the monitor, studying the shoes.

  Böðvarsson slapped him on the shoulder. “Let’s get something to eat.”

  Hawke shoved away from the monitor and said to the technician, “Take a print of this person. too. I’ll collect them after I eat.”

  “And make copies,” the detective added.

  <<>><<>><<>>

  During lunch, Böðvarsson asked Hawke a million questions about his life and job. While he was happy to answer the questions, in the back of his mind Hawke was trying to piece together what little information they had so far.

  “I will bring my family to Oregon some day and look for you,” Böðvarsson said as he parked behind the police station.

  “Let me know and I’ll get time off to show you around.” Hawke stepped out of the car and walked to the back door of the building.

  A man in his forties sat in a chair by the detective’s office.

  “Detective Inspector, this man would like to talk to you.” An officer hurried out of the room next to Böðvarsson’s.

  Böðvarsson walked over to the man. “Why did you wish to speak with me?”

  “You are the one looking into the death at Krýsuvík?” the man asked.

  “Yes. What do you know about the death?” Böðvarsson motioned for the man to enter his office.

  Hawke kept on their heels to not miss a word.

  The detective settled the man in a chair and moved to his seat behind the desk.

  Hawke closed the door and sat in the only other chair.

  “I thought it was odd when it happened, but after talking it over with my wife, she says, I should say something.” The man wrung a stocking cap in his hands.

  “What was odd?” Böðvarsson asked.

  “Wednesday, I picked up a person at Harpa. He or she kept their face hid behind a fur-lined hood on the coat.”

  The hair on the back of Hawke’s neck tingled. He wanted to ask questions, but refrained. The detective knew best how to handle a fellow countryman.

  “What about this person? Did the voice sound like a man or a woman?”

  “I couldn’t tell. Husky enough to be a man but it could have been a woman.”

  “What did they want?”

  “They asked me to take them to the parking lot at Krýsuvík. I asked why they needed to go there, it was dark and they wouldn’t be able to see anything. They said their car had broken down and they had the part to fix it.” He stared at Böðvarsson and then Hawke. “I told them to wait until morning, but they insisted they must go tonight.” He shook his head. “I tried to talk on the drive, but the person kept their head turned, looking out the side window and didn’t reply.”

  “What happened when you arrived at the parking lot?” Hawk
e asked.

  “They handed me money and got out, keeping their face turned away. I called out, ‘Sure you don’t want me to wait in case the part doesn’t work?’ The person just walked away.”

  “When was this?” Böðvarsson asked.

  “I picked the person up around eight. That was the other strange thing. Why would they want to be left out there after dark?”

  “Were there any cars in the parking lot?” Hawke asked.

  “Yes. Just one.” The taxi driver studied Böðvarsson.

  “What type of car was it?” Böðvarsson asked.

  “A smaller car than my taxi. In the dark, I am unsure of the color. Perhaps blue, maybe black? Is that helpful?”

  “Yes. Thank you for coming in. Can I get your name, address, and phone number?”

  While the man recited his information, Hawke ran through the events of the day after finding the body. Had the killer ridden the bus back to Harpa and then went back to pick up the car? But who? And why weren’t they noticed if they hadn’t ridden the bus out? He was missing something. Neither he nor Sigga were on the bus back to town. When he’d interviewed the others, no one said anything about someone new riding back with them.

  There hadn’t been any time for someone who rode out with them to get ahead, knock Nonni in the head and dump him in the mud pot, and get back to the group.

  The man left and Böðvarsson tapped his pen on his desk. “That has to be the person who used the rental car.”

  “Same clothing as the person who left the keys and the note for me.” Hawke wasn’t sure where to look next. “We don’t know if it’s male or female, what nationality—” He sat up. “We didn’t ask the taxi driver if the person spoke in English or Icelandic or if they had an accent.”

  Böðvarsson picked up his phone and dialed.

  “Dagur, this is Ari Böðvarsson. The person you picked up at Harpa, you said you couldn’t tell if it was a man or a woman.” He listened. “Did they speak in English or Icelandic?” He listened. “Did the person have an accent of any kind?” Böðvarsson’s head nodded. “I see. Thank you. Yes. If you think of anything else, give me a call.”

  “What did he say?” Hawke asked, leaning forward in his chair.