Arctic Chill de-7 Read online

  Erlendur inhaled the blue smoke. Trust, he thought to himself. He had to trust people. His thoughts turned to the woman he had been searching for over the past weeks. Cases piled up on his desk and one of the most serious was connected with marital infidelity, or at least so he thought. It involved a missing person and Erlendur’s theory was that it stemmed from unfaithfulness. Not everyone agreed with him.

  The woman, Ellen, had walked out of her home shortly before Christmas and had not been seen since. Before the boy was discovered behind the block of flats, Erlendur had been so absorbed in the case that Sigurdur Oli and Elinborg talked among themselves about the return of his old obsession. Everyone knew that Erlendur could not stand unsolved cases on his desk, especially if they involved missing persons. Where others shook their heads and convinced themselves they had done their best, Erlendur went on delving deeper, refusing to give up.

  The woman’s husband was understandably very worried about her. They were both aged around forty and had got married two years before, but both had been married to other people when they met. His former wife was a departmental manager in the civil service and they had three children aged between three and fourteen. Ellen had been married to a banker and had two teenage children with him. Both apparently lived happy lives and lacked for nothing. He had a good job with an ambitious computer company. She worked in tourism, arranging safaris through the Icelandic wilderness. They had first met when he took a small group of Swedish clients on a mystery tour to the Vatnajokull glacier. She arranged the trip and saw him at meetings, and then they both went with the group to the glacier. It resulted in an affair that they kept secret for a year and a half.

  At first it was merely an exciting digression from the routine, according to the husband. It was easy for them to meet. She was in the habit of travelling and he could always make up excuses, such as playing golf, which his wife was not interested in. Occasionally he even bought a cup and had it engraved with an inscription such as “Borgarholt Tournament, 3rd prize’, to show to his wife. He found it amusingly ironic. He played golf a lot but rarely won anything.

  Erlendur stubbed out his cigarette. He remembered the trophies at the man’s house. He had not thrown them away, and Erlendur wondered why not. They had only been the props for a lie and as such were now superfluous. Unless he kept on lying and told willing listeners that he had won them. Perhaps he kept them as mementos of a successful affair. If he was capable of lying to his wife and having an imaginary triumph engraved on a prize cup, could there be any limit to his lies?

  This was the question Erlendur had been wrestling with ever since the man telephoned to report his wife missing. What had begun as a kind of yearning for adventure or change, or even blind love, had ended in tragedy.

  Erlendur was startled from his speculations by a knock on the car window. He could not see who was there for the condensation that had built up on the glass, so he opened the door. It was Elinborg.

  “I must be getting home,” she said.

  “Just get in for a minute,” Erlendur said.

  “Mad bugger,” she groaned as she walked round the front of the car and got into the passenger seat.

  “What are you doing alone out here in your car?” she asked after a silence.

  “I was thinking about the woman who went missing,” Erlendur said.

  “You know she committed suicide,” Elinborg said. “We only have to find the body. It’ll be discovered on the beach in Reykjanes next spring. She’s been missing for more than three weeks. No one knows where she is. No one’s hiding her. She hasn’t been in touch with anyone. She had no money on her and we can’t see any card transactions anywhere. She definitely didn’t leave the country. The only trail leads down to the sea.”

  Elinborg paused.

  “Unless you think her new husband killed her.”

  “He had fake trophies made,” Erlendur said. “He knew his ex-wife wasn’t interested in golf, never read about any kind of sports and never talked about golf to anyone. She told me so. And he didn’t show the cups to anyone but her, because he needed to make up an alibi. Not until afterwards. Once he was divorced he started showing them off. If that isn’t being amoral…”

  “Are you concentrating on him now?”

  “We always come back to the same thing,” Erlendur said.

  “Missing persons and crimes,” said Elinborg, who had often heard Erlendur describe disappearances as a “distinctively Icelandic crime’. His theory was that Icelanders were indifferent about people who went missing. In the great majority of cases they believed there were “natural” explanations, in a country with a fairly high suicide rate. Erlendur went further and linked the nonchalance about disappearances to a certain popular understanding, extending back for centuries, about conditions in Iceland, the harsh climate in which people died of exposure and vanished as if the earth had swallowed them up. Nobody was better acquainted than Erlendur with stories of people who had frozen to death in bad weather. His theory was that crimes were easy to commit under the cover of this indifference. At his meetings with Elinborg and Sigurdur Oli and other detectives he had tried to fit the woman’s disappearance to his theory, but his words fell on deaf ears.

  “Get yourself home,” Erlendur said. “Take care of your little girl. Has Sunee come back?”

  “Yes, they’ve just got here,” Elinborg said. “Odinn was with them but I think he’s left again. Niran is still missing. Oh God, I hope nothing has happened to him.”

  “I think he’ll turn up,” Erlendur said.

  “You and your missing persons,” Elinborg said, opening the door. “Are you in contact with your daughter these days?”

  “Get yourself home,” Erlendur said.

  “I was talking to Gudny, the interpreter. She says Sunee emphasised that her boys should be brought up, as she was, to show respect for older people. That’s one of the fundamentals in the Thai upbringing and remains part of them all their lives. Responsibility is another point. The old people, the grandparents and great-grandparents, are the heads of the extended family. Older people pass on their experience to the younger ones, who are supposed to ensure their security in old age. It’s not an obligation but something they take for granted. And the children are …” Elinborg sighed heavily as she thought of Elias.

  “She says that in Thailand, grown-ups stand up for children on buses and give them their seats.”

  They were silent.

  “This is all so new to us. Immigrants, racial issues… we know so little about it,” Erlendur said eventually.

  “That’s true. But I do think we’re trying our best”

  “Doubtless. Now get yourself home.”

  “See you tomorrow,” Elinborg said, then stepped out of the car and slammed the door behind her.

  Erlendur wished he had another cigarette. He dreaded having to go back to see Sunee. He thought about his daughter, Eva Lind. She had dropped in at Christmas but he had not seen her since. The man she was with had been sent to prison just before the Christmas holidays and she thought Erlendur could do something about it. Her partner supplied her with dope. He was given three years for smuggling cocaine and ecstasy into the country and Eva foresaw hard times while he was in confinement.

  Eva and Erlendur’s relationship had gone from bad to worse recently. Erlendur could not really see why. For a long time, Eva had shown no willingness to cut back on her drug habit and had distanced herself from him. She had been in rehab, but not of her own accord, and when that was over she immediately slipped back into her old ways. Sindri, her brother, tried to help her, but to no avail. The siblings” relationship had always been close. But it was up and down between Erlendur and Eva, generally depending on Eva’s mood. Sometimes she was fine, talked to her father and let him know how she was coping. At other times she had no contact and did not want anything to do with him.

  Erlendur locked the Ford and looked up to the top of the six-storey block of flats that towered menacingly into the da
rkness. He made a mental note to talk to the landlord in case he could shed any light on Sunee and the boys” circumstances. Yet again he delayed going up to her, and instead walked round to the back of the block and into the garden. The search of the crime scene had been completed. Forensics had packed up their equipment and everything was as before, as if nothing had ever happened at the site.

  He walked out to the swings. The frost bit his face and he thrust his hands deep into his pockets and stood motionless for a long time. Earlier that day he had heard that his old boss from the Reykjavik CID, Marion Briem, had been admitted to the terminal ward of the National Hospital. It was many years since Marion had retired, and now the life was slowly ebbing from his old colleague. Their relationship could hardly be described as friendship. Erlendur had always been rather irritated by Marion, probably because Marion was almost the only person in his life who did not tire of asking questions and forcing Erlendur to justify himself. Marion was also one of the most inquisitive creatures ever to walk the earth, a living database of Icelandic crime, and had often proved useful to Erlendur, even in retirement. Marion had no relatives. Erlendur came closest to being at once friend, colleague and family.

  A freezing wind pierced Erlendur’s clothes as he stood by the swings where Elias had died, and his mind roamed over the mountains and moors to another child who had once slipped from his grasp and now followed him through life like a sad shadow.

  Erlendur looked up. He knew that he could not postpone sitting down with Sunee any longer. Turning round, he strode out of the garden. When he reached the entrance to the flats he noticed that the door to the rubbish store was open. Not wide open, just ajar. He had not noticed the rubbish store before. The door was set into the wall by the entrance and painted the same colour as the block of flats itself. Although the door had come open, that need not mean anything. Anyone could have gone there to empty their rubbish into the bins. The policeman who was guarding the door was standing inside the hallway, warming himself.

  After a moment’s pause Erlendur went over to the rubbish store and threw the door wide open. It was pitch dark inside and he searched for the switch to turn on the lights. A naked bulb hung from the ceiling. Dustbins stood in rows along the walls, and beneath the chute was a bin chock-a-block with rubbish. It was cold and there was a sour stench of old food and other refuse. Erlendur hesitated. Then he turned off the light and pulled the door to.

  It was then that he heard the whimpering.

  It took him a while to work out what the sound was. Perhaps he was mistaken. Perhaps he had not interpreted it correctly. He tore open the door and switched the light back on.

  “Is there anyone in there?” he called.

  Receiving no answer, he went inside the storage room, shifting dustbins about and searching between them. He pushed the bin away from beneath the chute and behind it discovered a black-haired boy sitting huddled up with his head buried between his knees, as if trying to make himself invisible.

  “Niran?” Erlendur said.

  The boy did not move.

  “Is that you, Niran?”

  The boy did not answer him. Erlendur knelt down and tried to make him look up, but the boy buried his head even deeper between his knees. He was clasping his legs together in a locked position that could not be budged.

  “Come along out of here,” Erlendur said, but the boy behaved as if he was not there.

  “Your mother’s looking for you.”

  Erlendur took hold of the boy’s hand. It was as cold as an icicle. The boy bowed his head down to his chest. It was as if he thought Erlendur would just go away and leave him be.

  After a while Erlendur felt he had tried everything, so he stood up slowly and walked backwards out of the rubbish store. He rang Sunee’s entryphone. The interpreter answered. Erlendur said he thought he had found Niran. He was safe but his mother would have to come down and talk to him. Sunee, her brother and mother-in-law and the interpreter soon came running down the stairs. Erlendur met them at the door and showed Sunee alone the way into the storage room.

  The moment she saw the boy hunched up beneath the chute she gave a little shriek, ran over to him and hugged him. Then for the first time the boy released his grip on himself, and burrowed into his mother’s arms.

  Some time later that evening Erlendur returned home to his lair, as Eva Lind had once called his flat when he thought that their relationship was improving. She said that he crawled into it to celebrate his misery. Those were not the words she used; Eva had a very limited and monotonous vocabulary, but that was the gist of it. He did not switch on the light The illumination from the street cast a pale glow into the living room where his books were and he sat down in his armchair. He had often sat alone in the dark, looking out of the large living-room window. When he sat like that, looking out, there was nothing in the window but the endless sky. Occasional stars glittered in the winter stillness. Sometimes he watched the moon riding past his window in all its cold and distant glory. Sometimes the sky was dark and overcast, like now, and Erlendur stared into the blackness as if wanting to be able to disperse his weary thoughts out into the void.

  He pictured Elias lying in the back garden of the flats, and once again an old image entered his mind, of another boy who all those years ago, that unfathomable eternity, had died in a raging blizzard. It was his brother, eight years old. He did not realise until he was sitting at home in his own living room, alone in the calm of night, how profound an effect the discovery of the boy’s body by the block of flats had had on him. Erlendur could not help thinking about his own brother. The wound that his death left behind had never healed. Guilt had gnawed at Erlendur ever since, because he felt that he was to blame for his younger brother’s fate. He was supposed to take care of him, and he had failed. No one but Erlendur himself made this unfair judgement. No one had ever mentioned that he could have done better. If he had not lost his grip on his brother in the blizzard, they would have been found together when the search party was sent out and Erlendur was dug out of the snowdrift in remarkably good shape.

  He thought back to Niran when Sunee led him in tears out of the rubbish store. Did he feel that he should have been his brother’s keeper?

  Erlendur heaved a sigh and closed his eyes. All those endless thoughts that cut into his mind like shards of glass on his descent into a dreamless sleep.

  He thinks about Elinborg snuggling up exhausted against her little daughter, as if to protect her from all harm.

  He sees a worried-looking Sigurdur Oli creeping into his house, taking care not to wake Bergthora.

  Elias lies in the back garden of the flats in a ripped anorak, his broken eyes watching the snow drifting past.

  Odinn paces the floor on Snorrabraut.

  Niran lies in his room, his lips trembling in silent anguish.

  Sunee sits alone on the sofa, weeping quietly beneath the yellow dragon.

  The woman he is searching for bobs gently in the lapping waves.

  His eight-year-old brother lies frozen in a blizzard that will last for ever.

  In a sun-drenched dream, a little bird flicks its tail in its new bird-house and sings for its friend.

  9

  When Erlendur arrived at the school the following morning with Elinborg and Sigurdur Oli, the bell had just rung for break. The children were walking quietly along the corridors. Teachers and assistants were controlling the flood and all the exits stood wide open. It had snowed towards morning. The younger children intended to use every second of the break to play outside. The older ones were more blase, huddling by the walls or strolling in small groups down to the shop.

  Erlendur knew that trauma counselling was available for the children in Elias’s class and that some of the parents had taken advantage of it. They had accompanied their children to school and told the teachers of their concerns. The principal had decided to gather all the pupils and staff in the assembly hall at lunchtime for a period of quiet reflection in memory of Elias. The loc
al clergyman was going to address the pupils and a representative from the police would ask anyone who knew about Elias’s movements, or had any information that might prove useful in the investigation into his death, to notify a teacher, the principal or the police. An emergency telephone number would be given for anonymous callers. All leads would be investigated, however trivial they might seem. Sigurdur Oli and Elinborg were going to ask Elias’s classmates about his last day alive, although this process was complicated by the fact that parental permission was required before a child could be questioned. Agnes, Elias’s form teacher, had been very helpful and telephoned the parents first thing, and had received permission from most of them to allow the police, in cooperation with the Reykjavik Child Welfare Agency, to gather important information. She emphasised that this would not involve proper questioning, only information collection. Some parents wanted to be present when their children were interviewed and stood in the corridor with anxious expressions on their faces. Sigurdur Oli and Elinborg were already sitting down with the children, one at a time, in an empty classroom they had been allocated for the purpose.

  Erlendur met the principal and asked specifically about the woodwork teacher. He understood that, like the Icelandic teacher, Egill had expressed some antipathy towards Asian women who immigrated to Iceland. The principal, who was rather stressed about preparing for the lunchtime meeting with the police representative, showed Erlendur to the woodwork room. No one was there. Erlendur returned to the staff room and was told that the woodwork teacher was probably sitting in his car out in the car park. This was a long break and he had the habit of going out to his car sometimes to smoke a cigarette or two, Erlendur was told.