Hot tears are trickling down my cheeks, and I let them. I catch sight of her in the rear-view mirror. She’s staring at me, her red eyes now dry and grave. Then something happens to her face. The corners of her mouth twitch and slowly stretch upwards. Is that a smile? I wipe away my tears and gape at my daughter in astonishment. It is a smile. Small, crooked and freakish, but a smile nonetheless. I’ve never seen her smile before. Not at me anyway. She sometimes smiles when she’s playing, but never at me. Does she think it’s funny that I lost control of myself like that? I dry my face, turn round and gaze at her. She doesn’t take her eyes off me, still wearing what I believe is a smile on her face, despite the hiccupping sobs that break through at regular intervals. I turn back again and start the engine. I’ve come off worst in so many battles in my life recently, but this is one I have no intention of losing.
It was so boring. Totally pointless. She was never going to get a job that had anything to do with maths, that was for sure. So why on earth did she have to sit there and learn all those equations that the teacher wrote up on the board? Honestly, she couldn’t care less what X stood for. Beside her, Tinna was focusing intently on the teacher, while Dísa sat at the desk behind them, regularly throwing them notes containing dirty messages.
Hekla stole a glance at Tinna. She had one hand under her chin and was sucking her lower lip, as she often did while she watched the teacher. Hekla was always envious of her skin. She was one of those girls with a seriously good complexion, smooth, without a single blemish. Tinna didn’t even bother with foundation; she didn’t need to, though she used black eyeliner, creating a perfect little flick at the outer corners of her eyes.
‘Stop staring at me, you perv,’ Tinna whispered suddenly, without taking her eyes off the teacher.
Hekla hastily looked away but was relieved when she saw that Tinna was grinning. That was the trouble with friends: she never knew how she was supposed to behave around them and she was terrified of losing them. Things could change so fast. One day, for example, her friends might want to build a snowman in the garden or watch Mean Girls in bed; the next, they’d rather go for a drive with much older boys. Sometimes they’d get pissed off when Hekla wanted to go home early and started behaving as if everything she said was terribly childish and lame. Hekla would feel utterly depressed and sure they’d never talk to her again, only to wake up next day to messages full of hearts and smiley faces as if nothing had happened.
‘Guess what: Alfreð’s been staring at you the whole lesson,’ Tinna suddenly whispered in her ear. Hekla could smell her strawberry lip salve. Her stomach rumbled. She hadn’t eaten any breakfast and had only nibbled a rye flatcake at lunchtime.
‘Really?’ she asked, automatically glancing round. Alfreð dropped his eyes to his desk, embarrassed, and tucked his mousy hair behind his ears. Hekla quickly returned her gaze to the front, her thoughts wandering guiltily to Agnar.
Tinna pinched her arm. ‘Don’t look round, you idiot.’
Hekla rubbed her arm, making a face.
Tinna smiled. ‘Hey … leave it to me. We’ll go for a drive with him this evening. I’ll sort it.’
‘What about Agnar?’ The thought of dumping him made Hekla a little nervous.
‘I’ll take care of that too,’ Tinna whispered back.
‘Girls!’ The teacher was looking at them. His voice was sharp and a little weary. ‘Are you paying attention?’
‘Yes, of course.’ Tinna smiled innocently.
‘In that case, what was I saying?’
Tinna narrowed her eyes and considered the question on the board. The teacher sighed and was about to turn back to it when Tinna said: ‘The lowest common denominator of one thousand and fifty is forty-three.’
The teacher glanced at the board, then back at Tinna.
‘I’m right,’ Tinna said. ‘Just check it.’
The teacher cleared his throat. ‘That’s correct, Tinna. Maybe you’d like to come up to the board and show the other pupils how you arrived at that solution?’
Tinna gave Hekla an inconspicuous wink, pushed back her chair with a screech, and went up to the front. She solved the problem, quickly and confidently, before returning to her seat. Behind her, Hekla could hear Dísa smothering her giggles.
As they got out of the car, a cat sprang to its feet in front of the house and came over to rub against their legs, mewing pathetically. Elma bent down to scratch it behind the ears, only to whip back her hand when she noticed the state of its eye. It was so septic that the cat could hardly open it and yellow pus was seeping from a deep wound in the corner.
‘It’s a stray,’ Sævar said, with a low whistle. As if sensing their suspicion, the cat suddenly darted off towards a dilapidated warehouse that stood nearby. They watched it vanish into a bed of withered nettles.
Elma shuddered. She looked up at the house, which consisted of a basement, ground floor and attic, with curved, decorative wooden roof and window boards, and a balcony with a wrought-iron rail. Maríanna and Hekla used to live in the basement flat, but it appeared that new tenants had since moved in. Elma glimpsed movement behind the Venetian blinds and heard music coming from an open window. At the end of the garden was a sheer drop, from below which they could hear the crash of waves. The rain had eased up while they were driving to the house, as abruptly as if someone had turned off the taps hidden in the clouds, and now warm rays of sunlight were breaking through. Two ravens had perched on a nearby streetlight and were calling to one another, their harsh croaking echoing down the street, sounding preternaturally loud in the hush following the rain.
‘I’d never send my kids out to play in that garden,’ Elma said, looking towards the cliff.
Before Sævar could answer, the front door opened and a woman in a stripy jumper appeared.
She shook their hands, introducing herself as Elín. ‘Unnar should have been home by now – I don’t understand what’s keeping him. Come into the kitchen. Mum’s looking after my youngest boy, which should give us a bit of peace.’
They followed her inside. The house was old by Icelandic standards, with deeply scored floorboards and narrow doorways. Elma glanced into the sitting room as they passed and saw an older woman sitting in there with a child on her lap, reading a book together.
‘Mum comes and babysits during the day while we’re at work,’ Elín explained, after offering them both a soda water. ‘She’s retired, which helps us bridge the gap until they’re old enough to go to nursery school.’
‘Are there new tenants in the flat downstairs?’ Sævar asked.
‘Yes, unfortunately. Teenage girls who were full of promises about good behaviour when they moved in. Now, though, it looks as if we’ll have to throw them out. We can’t get any sleep at the weekends.’ Elín sighed as she put glasses on the table in front of them. ‘Is there any news about Maríanna? Was it really her they found?’
‘Yes, it was,’ Elma confirmed. ‘That’s why we’re re-examining everything and checking in case we missed something the first time round.’
‘Ah, right, I understand. I can’t believe anyone would have wanted to harm her. She was very nice.’
‘Did you know each other well?’
‘Yes and no. I mean, Maríanna had been living in the basement since before we bought the house. She’d rented it from the previous owner, then from us for the last two years. She used to knock on the door if she needed to borrow eggs or milk, and we’d take it in turns to mow the lawn in summer and that kind of thing, but our relationship never became any more personal than that. I don’t really know why – perhaps it was just the age gap. She was ten years younger than me. Unnar used to lend her a hand if something needed fixing in her flat. Drilling holes for screws, putting up shelves, that sort of thing. They got on quite well together, though she and I never really became close. But then Unnar gets on with everyone.’
‘What about Hekla? Did you have any contact with her?’
‘Maríanna’s daughter? No, she wasn
’t the outgoing type at all, I don’t think. She hardly even said hello when you met her outside.’ Elín gave a wry smile. ‘But they were good tenants and never gave any trouble, not like those girls who are living there now.’
‘Do you remember what time you got home on the Friday Maríanna vanished?’ Sævar asked.
‘Yes, I’d just gone back to work,’ Elín said, ‘so I’d have been home at around five.’
‘Did you notice any comings or goings after that?’
‘I don’t really remember.’ Elín wrinkled her brow. ‘It’s so long ago. But, yes … I told the police when they asked back in the spring that the basement door slammed just before suppertime. It sticks a bit and you have to slam it to make sure it closes properly. It’s enough to shake the whole house. You can just imagine what it’s like now that those girls are in and out at all hours.’
Sævar caught Elma’s eye, no doubt thinking the same as her. The long time gap since Maríanna’s disappearance made everything so much more difficult. People had started to forget, or to create new memories without realising it, since memories could be unreliable and hazy and had a tendency to change over time. Often what resulted was a mixture of truth and imagination.
‘Did you happen to see any cars outside?’
Elín sighed and shook her head. ‘No, I don’t think so.’
‘What about before that?’ Elma wasn’t prepared to give up yet. ‘Did you notice if Maríanna and Hekla often had visitors?’
‘Yes, sure. Maríanna sometimes had friends round, and from time to time I saw Hekla’s foster parents pick her up. I chatted to them briefly once – an extremely nice couple. I also saw Hekla getting into a car late in the evening several times. I couldn’t understand what her mother was thinking of to let her go out with a much older boy like that. But, having said that, I don’t actually know if Maríanna saw him, because he parked further up the street and Hekla always left the house in a hurry. To be honest, I did wonder if I should mention it to Maríanna, but I didn’t like to interfere.’
‘Did you get a good look at the boy?’
‘No, unfortunately. But he had a driving licence, so he must have been quite a bit older than her.’
‘Did you notice the make of car?’
‘A dark-green Volvo S80,’ Elín answered straight off. ‘Probably a 1999 or 2000 model. A complete wreck.’
Sævar frowned. ‘You don’t happen to remember the licence number too?’
Elín laughed. ‘No, I’m afraid not.’
Elma smiled and wrote down the make of car.
‘Ella, love, you don’t have a banana, do you?’ The grandmother came into the kitchen. ‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt. The poor little thing’s just so hungry. He’s asking for a “nana”.’
‘There should be one somewhere.’ Elín got up to look.
‘Hello, I’m Bryndís,’ the older woman said, holding out her hand. ‘Ella’s mother. The babysitter. And grandmother. Are you from Reykjavík? Or from Akranes, maybe? Is this about Maríanna? That was so awful. Don’t tell me someone did something to her?’
Elma decided to answer only the last question. ‘We’re trying to find out,’ she said. ‘Had you started babysitting by the fourth of May, when she went missing?’
‘Yes, actually,’ Bryndís said, taking the banana Elín handed her. ‘Thanks, dear. Yes, it was in March that I started babysitting, wasn’t it?’
Elín nodded.
‘Were you here on that Friday?’ Elma asked.
‘Yes, I expect so,’ Bryndís said. ‘Though I may have gone out for a walk with the pram. I can’t quite remember.’
Yet again Elma cursed the long interval of time that had elapsed. ‘Did you happen to see Maríanna or Hekla that day? Or anyone else, for that matter?’
Bryndís smiled apologetically. ‘Oh, I’ll have to think. Let’s see, it was Friday, the fourth of May … No, you know, I can’t possibly remember that far back.’
‘Well, if you do remember something…’
‘But Maríanna used to have Wednesday mornings off, and I’d always knock on her door and invite her up for a coffee. Silly for the two of us to be sitting here alone in our separate flats, not talking to each other. And I clearly remember the last time she came round, which must have been on, what, the second of May?’
‘I didn’t know that, Mum.’
‘I don’t have to tell you everything I do, dear.’ Bryndís gave her daughter’s shoulder a light squeeze.
‘Did anything strike you as unusual about her that day?’ Elma asked. ‘Anything she was worried about or…?’
‘No, nothing like that.’ Bryndís seemed surprised. ‘I’d have come to see you if I’d thought there was any reason to. Maríanna and I used to talk about this and that. I don’t think she’d have been interested in sharing stories about her love life with an old woman like me, but we talked a lot about the past. I told her about my years in Copenhagen and my time at boarding school, and Maríanna told me about her youth. Though the subject always seemed to stir up … what shall I say? … sad memories for her. But then of course she’d lost both her brother and her mother.’
Elma nodded, a little disappointed. ‘So nothing emerged that struck you as odd?’
‘Well … there was that phone call,’ Bryndís said at last. ‘Her phone rang and she looked at the screen, then switched it off. She didn’t want to answer.’
‘Did she tell you why?’
‘No, she just glanced at the phone and switched it off. I’ve no idea why.’
It would be a simple matter to find out who had called by going over her phone records again. Elma suspected that the caller had been Bergrún, as they had checked out everyone who rang Maríanna in the months before her disappearance. ‘Anyway, if you remember anything else, this is my number.’
Bryndís took the scrap of paper with Elma’s number and studied it thoughtfully. ‘I once asked Maríanna why she moved here. I always got the feeling she was a bit lonely. She didn’t have any family here, any relatives. She didn’t really answer, but I got the feeling that something bad had happened. At least, it was obvious she didn’t want to discuss it.’ She looked up. ‘Anyway, what am I rabbiting on about? I’d better go and give that young man his banana.’
Bergrún had indeed tried to ring Maríanna on the Wednesday morning before her disappearance. They had obviously fallen out, and tomorrow Elma would ask her what it had been about. When she got back to the office, she went through Maríanna’s social-media activity again but couldn’t find any messages from Bergrún. In fact, Bergrún didn’t have a Facebook account and there was very little information about her online. She seemed to be one of the few Icelanders who didn’t use social media.
But there were two things that attracted Elma’s attention when she examined Maríanna’s interactions. First, there were the messages from Sölvi. He had sent Maríanna daily messages, which usually began with questions about where she was and what she was doing. It may all have been perfectly innocent, yet it seemed unnecessarily intrusive to Elma. Why hadn’t he just asked how she was?
Second, all Maríanna’s interactions with Hekla consisted of reprimands or expressions of irritation. For example, Maríanna had frequently sent Hekla messages telling her to come straight home, to which she hadn’t received any reply. Some of the messages listed the chores awaiting Hekla at home: hoovering, stacking the dishwasher, cleaning the bath. Others were criticisms of things she’d done: left her clothes on the floor, finished the milk or forgotten to turn off the lights. Elma searched a long way back in time without finding a single positive comment from Maríanna, however trivial. It was as if the messages to Sölvi and to Hekla had been written by two completely different people.
As Elma lounged on her parents’ sofa, she tried to come up with reasons why Maríanna should have kept trying to get hold of Hekla the day she went missing. Hekla had had a swimming lesson, and her mother must have known that. What had Maríanna wanted and why had she go
ne over to Akranes?
She was distracted by the theme tune to the news, which suddenly resounded around the sitting room, after which a blonde woman appeared on screen and bid the nation good evening, in the firm, straight-talking manner that characterised newsreaders.
‘She lives in Akranes,’ Elma’s father remarked, without looking up from his book of sudoku.
Elma made a noncommittal noise in reply and at that moment her phone, which was lying on the sofa beside her, vibrated with yet another text message from Dagný. Feeling she didn’t have the energy to read it just then, Elma locked her phone, hoping Dagný wouldn’t be pissed off with her. The plan was to go into Reykjavík together on Saturday to buy their father’s present. Elma was dreading it, envisaging that the whole thing would be a disaster. There was so much she wanted to get off her chest, but she knew it wouldn’t be a good idea. When visiting Maríanna’s old home earlier that day, she had noticed a playground beside the house that had brought back an incident from her childhood. Or rather, it was a particular piece of playground equipment: the climbing frame. The dome-shaped kind that you could hang from, exactly like the one at the recreation ground near her parents’ house before it had all been torn down and replaced with new equipment.
‘Dad?’ she said.
Her father grunted, which meant he was listening. He was sitting in an armchair, his attention switching back and forth between his sudoku puzzles and the television. From the kitchen they could hear the sound of water boiling.
‘Do you remember when Dagný and her friends abandoned me at the playground and you had to come and rescue me?’
Her father grunted again, without raising his eyes from his puzzle.
‘Why…?’ Elma hesitated. ‘How old do you think I was then?’
Girls Who Lie Page 10
