Arctic Chill Read online

  'Are you going to smoke?' said Sigurdur Óli, who was sitting in the back seat.

  'Gudný?' Elínborg said. 'She lived in Thailand for years. Goes there regularly, worships the place and the people, and works as a tourist guide during the summer. I think she's done a great job under difficult circumstances. I like her.'

  'She can't stand you,' Sigurdur Óli said to Erlendur.

  Erlendur lit his cigarette and tried to blow the smoke into the back seat.

  'Did you get anything else out of Andrés?' he asked.

  Sigurdur Óli had stayed behind in the interview room when Erlendur had leaped to his feet and run out. He told him how he had tried to get Andrés to name the man who had recently moved to the neighbourhood, but to no avail. Sigurdur described the interview to Elínborg; he thought Andrés was spinning a cock-and-bull story to shift the attention away from himself. It was a tired old ruse.

  'He refused to describe the man to me,' Sigurdur Óli said, 'or to provide any details about him.'

  'If he harmed Andrés when he was a child, then at least he must be quite a bit older,' Erlendur said. 'I don't know, he might be in his sixties by now. Actually, I don't think it was a paedophile. They're not murderers. Not in the literal sense anyway'

  The investigation was into its second day and they still lacked sufficient information to be able to draw any conclusions. No one had come forward who had seen Elías's movements that day. At the place where he was stabbed – the substation – there was an open path that narrowed to accommodate garages on one side. The scene was overlooked by the top flats of the nearby blocks but none of the residents had seen anything unusual or suspicious. Very few people were home at the time of day when Elías was attacked.

  Erlendur's interest focused on the school. Elínborg told them how, at the boys' previous school, Niran had been a member of a gang of immigrant children who were involved in fights. She wondered if he had imported the influences that he came under there to the new school. Erlendur pointed out that he was a member of a gang which, one pupil had told him, hung around the local chemist's shop and sometimes clashed with other pupils from the school.

  And then we have a paedophile and a repeat offender and an Icelandic boyfriend,' Sigurdur Óli said. 'Not forgetting a teacher who patently hates all immigrants and foments bad feeling at the school. Nice bunch.'

  Niran obviously had to be a key witness in the case, and the fact that he had disappeared or fled or gone into hiding with his mother underlined his importance. They had let him slip out of their grasp in the clumsiest way imaginable. Erlendur had plenty of strong words to say about that. He blamed himself for the way it had all turned out. No one else.

  'How could we have foreseen this?' Elínborg protested at his overreaction. 'Sunee was very cooperative. There was nothing to suggest that she would go and do something stupid.'

  'We need to talk to the boy's father and Sunee's mother-in-law and brother straight away,' Sigurdur Óli said. 'They're the people closest to her. They're the people who would want to help her.'

  Erlendur looked at them.

  'I think that woman called me today,' he said after a pause.

  'The missing woman?' Elínborg said.

  'I think so,' Erlendur said, then told them about the call he had received while he was visiting Marion in hospital.

  'She said: "It can't go on like this", then rang off

  '"It can't go on like this"?' Elínborg repeated after him. '"It can't go on like this." What does she mean?'

  'If it is the woman,' Erlendur said. 'Not that I know who else it could be. Now I need to go and see her husband and tell him that she's conceivably still alive. He hasn't heard from her all this time and then she goes and phones me. Unless he already knows everything that's going on. What does it mean, "It can't go on like this"? It's as if they're plotting something together. Could they be involved in a scam?'

  'Had she taken out a big life assurance policy?' Sigurdur Óli asked.

  'No,' Erlendur said. 'There's nothing like that in the picture. This isn't a Hollywood movie.'

  'Were you beginning to suspect that he'd killed her?' Elínborg asked.

  'That woman shouldn't still be alive,' Erlendur said. 'All the indications are that she's committed suicide. The phone call was completely at odds with the whole scenario up to now, with every aspect of it'

  'What are you going to tell her husband?' Elínborg asked.

  Erlendur had been grappling with that question ever since he received the call. He had a pretty low opinion of the man, which deteriorated the clearer his past became. This was a man who seemed driven by an insatiable urge to cheat. That was the only way to describe it. Adultery appeared to be an obsession with him. The man's colleagues and friends whom Erlendur had spoken to described him in quite favourable terms. Several said that he had always been a ladies' man, even a philanderer, a married man who had no scruples about trying to ensnare other women. One of his colleagues described how a group from work had gone out for a drink and the man had flirted with a woman who had shown an interest in him. He had surreptitiously taken off his wedding ring and thrust it deep inside a handy flower pot. The following day he had had to go back to the club to dig up the ring.

  This was before he met the woman who had now gone missing. Erlendur did not think she was the type to have an affair. The man had laid a trap for her, naturally concealing the fact that he was married, then the affair had gone further and further, much further than she could ever have imagined at first, until there was no turning back. They were stuck with each other and she was beset by profound guilt, depression and loneliness. The man refused to acknowledge any of this when Erlendur had asked about her state of mind before she disappeared. She was in good spirits, he said. 'She never said anything to me about feeling bad.' When Erlendur pressed him by asking about the woman's suspicions that he was having another affair only two years after they had married, he shrugged as if it were none of Erlendur's business and quite irrelevant. When Erlendur pressed him further the man had said that it was his private business and no one else's.

  There were no witnesses to the woman's disappearance. She had phoned in sick to work and was at home alone during the day. Her husband's children were with their mother. When he returned at around six, she was not there. He had not had any contact with her during the day. As the evening passed with no word from her he became uneasy and was unable to sleep that night. He went to work the following morning and telephoned home regularly but there was no answer. He called their friends, her colleagues and various places where he thought she might be, but could not find her anywhere. The day went by and he baulked at contacting the police. When she had still not turned up the following morning he finally called to report her missing. He did not even know what she had been wearing when she left home. The neighbours had not noticed her and it transpired that none of their friends or her old friends knew her whereabouts. They owned two cars and hers was still parked in front of the house. She had not ordered a taxi.

  Erlendur visualised her leaving her home and heading out alone and abandoned into the dark winter's day. When he first called at their house the neighbourhood was lit up with Christmas decorations and he had thought to himself that she had probably never noticed them.

  'There can never be any bloody trust between people who start a relationship against that sort of background,' Elínborg said, the disapproving tone entering her voice as always when she discussed this case.

  'And then there's the question of the fourth woman,' Sigurdur Óli said. 'Does she exist?'

  'The husband flatly denies having an affair and I haven't found any evidence that he did,' Erlendur said. 'We have only his wife's word about how she thought he was meeting another woman and her distress at the whole business. She appears to have deeply regretted her actions.'

  'And then she calls up one day when she sees your name in the papers because of the murder,' Elínborg said.

  'As if from the grave,' Erlendur said.


  They sat in silence and thought about the woman who had gone missing and about Sunee and little Elías in the garden behind the block of flats.

  'Do you seriously believe it?' Elínborg asked. About Niran? That he's to blame for his brother's death?'

  'No,' Erlendur said. 'Not at all.'

  'But she does seem to be trying to get the boy out of the way, otherwise she'd have stayed at home,' Sigurdur Óli said.

  'Perhaps he's afraid,' Erlendur said. 'Perhaps they're both afraid.'

  'Niran could have had an altercation with someone who threatened him,' Elínborg said.

  'Possibly,' Sigurdur Óli said.

  At least he must have said something to arouse such a strong reaction from Sunee,' Elínborg said.

  'How's Marion doing, by the way?' Sigurdur Óli asked.

  'It'll soon be over,' Erlendur said.

  He stood by the window of his office at the police station on Hverfisgata, smoking and watching the drifting snow swirl along the street. The light was fading and the cold continued to tighten its grip on the city as it slowed down towards evening before descending into sleep.

  The intercom on his desk crackled and he was informed that a young man was asking for him at the front desk. He gave his name as Sindri Snaer. Erlendur had him shown in immediately and his son soon appeared at the door.

  'I thought I'd drop in on you on my way to the meeting,' he said.

  'Come in,' Erlendur said. 'What meeting?'

  'AA,' Sindri said. 'It's down the road here on Hverfisgata.'

  'Aren't you cold, dressed like that?' Erlendur pointed at Sindri's thin summer jacket.

  'Not really,' Sindri said.

  'Have a seat. Would you like a coffee?'

  'No, thanks. I heard about the murder. Are you handling it?'

  'With others.'

  'Do you know anything?'

  'No.'

  Some time earlier, Sindri had moved to Reykjavík from the East Fjords where he had been working in a fish factory. He knew the story of how Erlendur and his brother had been caught in a snowstorm on the moors above Eskifjördur, and how Erlendur went there every couple of years to visit the moors where he almost froze to death as a child. Sindri was not as angry with his father as Eva Lind was; until very recently, he had not wanted anything to do with him. Now, however, he was in the habit of dropping in on him unexpectedly, at home or at work. His visits were generally brief, just long enough for one cigarette.

  'Heard anything from Eva?' he asked.

  'She phoned. Asked about Valgerdur.'

  'Your woman?'

  'She's not my woman,' Erlendur said.

  'That's not what Eva says. She says she's virtually moved in with you.'

  'Is she upset about Valgerdur?'

  Sindri nodded and produced a pack of cigarettes.

  'I don't know. Maybe she thinks you'll put her first.'

  'Put her first? Over whom?'

  Sindri inhaled the smoke and blew it out through his nose.

  'Over her?' Erlendur asked.

  Sindri shrugged.

  'Has she said anything to you?'

  'No,' Sindri said.

  'Eva hasn't been in touch with me for weeks. Apart from that call yesterday. Do you think that's the reason?'

  'Could be. I think she's getting back on her feet. She's left that dealer and told me she's going to get a job again.'

  'Isn't that the same old story?'

  'Sure.'

  'What about you? How are you doing?'

  'Fine,' Sindri said, standing up. He stubbed out his cigarette in the ashtray on the desk. 'Are you thinking of going out east this summer?'

  'I haven't thought about it. Why?'

  'Just wondered. I went to take a look at the house once when I was working out there. I don't know if I told you.'

  'It's derelict now.'

  A pretty depressing place. Probably because I know why you moved away'

  Sindri opened the door to the corridor.

  'Maybe you could let me know,' he said. 'If you do go out east.'

  He closed the door quietly behind him without waiting for an answer. Erlendur sat in his chair, staring at the door. For an instant he was back home on the farm where he was born and brought up. The farmhouse still stood up on the moor, abandoned. He had slept in it when he visited his childhood haunts for a purpose that was not entirely clear. Perhaps to hear again the voices of his family and recall what he had once had and loved.

  It was in this house, which now stood naked and lifeless and exposed to the elements, that he had first heard that unfamiliar, repulsive word which had become etched in his mind.

  Murder.

  14

  The girl reminded him slightly of Eva Lind, apart from being younger and considerably fatter; Eva had always been painfully thin. The girl was wearing a short leather jacket over a thin green T-shirt, and dirty camouflage trousers, and had a metal piercing through one eyebrow. She had on black lipstick and one of her eyes was circled with black. Sitting down opposite Erlendur, she looked like a real tough cookie. The expression on her face betrayed an obstinate revulsion towards everything that the police could possibly represent. Beside him, Elínborg gave the girl a look that suggested she wanted to stuff her in a washing machine and switch it to rinse.

  They had already questioned her elder sister, who seemed to be more or less the role model for the younger one. She was all mouth, a hardened character with a string of convictions for handling and selling drugs. Because she had never been caught with large amounts on her at any one time, she had only received short suspended sentences. As was customary, she refused to reveal the names of the dealers she sold for, and when asked whether she realised what she was doing to her sister by dragging her into the world of drugs, she laughed in their faces and said: 'Get a life.'

  Erlendur tried to make the younger sister understand that he did not care what she was up to at the school. Drug-dealing was not his department and she would not be in any trouble with him, but if she did not give satisfactory answers to his questions he would have her sent to a smallholding in the middle of nowhere for the next two years.

  'Smallholding?' the girl snorted. 'What the hell's that?'

  'It's where milk comes from,' Elínborg said.

  'I don't drink milk,' the girl said, wide-eyed, as if that could be to her advantage.

  Looking at her, Erlendur could not help smiling in spite of everything. In front of him sat an example of the most wretched depths that a human life could descend to, a young girl who knew nothing but neglect and squalor. The girl could do little about the state she was in. She was from a typical problem home and had largely been left to bring herself up. Her elder sister, her role model and possibly one of the people who were supposed to look after her, had talked her into selling drugs and naturally into taking them as well. But that was probably not the worst of it. He knew from his own daughter how the debts were paid, what it cost to buy a gram, what they sometimes had to do to buy their bliss, the kind of life this young girl lived.

  She was nicknamed Heddý and appeared to fit the profile that the police had of playground dealers. She was finishing compulsory schooling, lived in the neighbourhood and hung around with twenty-year-old men, her big sister's friends. She was the go-between and they had heard various unsavoury details about her at the school.