Yrsa Sigurdardottir - Someone to Watch Over Me

‘What?’ Thóra couldn’t disguise her amazement. Suddenly, she remembered having made a note to find out why there were six rooms but only five residents, given the supposed demand for places, and she kicked herself for not asking Glódís during their meeting. ‘Where is she now? Do you think it’s possible to speak to her?’

‘I have no idea where she ended up. At least, I didn’t see her the few times that I went to other centres to do some filming after the fire.’ He pointed at the equipment around her bed. ‘She’s seriously disabled and there’s no way of communicating with her unless you know how – she only signals with her eyes. I’m not sure whether she’s all there, mentally, but she seemed quite alert to me. Her eyes followed me every time I went into her room, though that might not mean anything.’

Thóra would have to dig around for information about her, from Glódís or someone else at the Regional Office for the Disabled. If that didn’t work, she would go to Einvarður and remind him of his promise to assist them. But what would someone so severely disabled be able to add to what they already knew? She seemed unlikely to have any information Thóra wasn’t already aware of, and she couldn’t possibly have been present when Lísa’s child was conceived. Yet it was incredible that this was the first they’d heard of her; up until now no one had said a single word about her, nor had Thóra seen her mentioned even once in the case files.

When Sveinn started the video again, Thóra was distracted and had difficulty focusing on what she was seeing and hearing. It was different for Matthew, who watched with great attentiveness; probably precisely because her own concentration had lapsed. ‘Rewind just a bit.’ Matthew had cocked his head sideways. ‘Could you turn it up? I thought I heard something.’ Sveinn did so, and they watched as an employee bent over a huge towel in a bathroom. ‘Did you hear that?’ Matthew looked at Thóra, who shook her head – she wasn’t sure. ‘One more time,’ he said.

The man unfolded the towel with jerky movements as Sveinn rewound the tape. Then he began moving normally again, but Thóra’s attention wasn’t directed at what he was doing, but at what she could vaguely hear being repeated angrily in the background.

‘ Look at me ! Look at me !’

The traffic on Skólavörðurstígur Street had started to build up again. The rumbling of the cars carried in through the half-open window and the exhaust fumes worked their way into Thóra’s office. After one ill-advisedly deep in-breath she exhaled and grimaced, held her nose until she’d shut the window and then used the sheet of paper in her hand – which happened to be a list of the residence’s employees and specialists – as a fan. That seemed to disperse most of the stink, but perhaps she had just grown impervious to it. Nonetheless, she felt a bit better when she sat down again. It was hard enough to form an opinion on who from the list she should speak to next, without suffering respiratory failure into the bargain. Glódís had included far too many people, fourteen full-time and ten part-time, and there was no way of knowing in advance which of them might provide any useful information. Thóra was still waiting for the director to answer her e-mail requesting the name of the man who had looked after Tryggvi. Thóra had also put a cross by one name: Glódís herself. And actually, she could also cross out Friðleifur Guðjónsson, the night watchman who had died in the fire. It wasn’t as though she’d get anything from speaking to his gravestone, but Thóra still hesitated to cross out his name. Her pen hovered over the black lettering without touching the paper as she stared contemplatively at the letters. The young man had been hit at the base of the skull before the fire was lit. Was it to prevent him from helping the residents get out, or was there some other reason?

Thóra reached for the file containing the autopsy report in order to reassure herself that she’d remembered the sequence of events correctly. Indeed she had. The man had been hit from behind and died of smoke inhalation in the blaze, probably as he’d lain unconscious. She tapped her pen lightly against the edge of the table. Might the fire have been designed to kill the night watchman? The filmmaker had mentioned that Friðleifur had received visitors at the home, so it was possible that he’d fallen out with a guest that night. Nocturnal visits weren’t permitted, but who was supposed to enforce that rule when the watchmen were alone on duty? It was also entirely possible that the criminal had thought he’d killed the night watchman and had set the place on fire in a desperate attempt to conceal the evidence. People in extremis can do the most unbelievable things, and what better way to conceal a murder than to make it look as though the violence had been directed at someone else? It could be that the same man had impregnated Lísa, which might have led to a fatal argument with Friðleifur. Thóra couldn’t quite imagine it, since the watchmen could hardly have allowed their visitors to roam freely around the apartments at night, but it was just about conceivable. She knew nothing about Friðleifur Guðjónsson other than the little information contained in the testimony in the case files, and the good opinion of the filmmaker, although that was of little use. People rarely spoke ill of the dead, even though they might have cultivated less than flattering thoughts about them while they were still above ground.

On the other hand, it would be easy to speak to the man who shared shifts with Friðleifur, since his name was readily available in the files. Thóra looked up his mobile number and rang it, but he didn’t answer and it didn’t go to voicemail. Until she could reach him, the only way to determine whether she was on the right track was to speak to Friðleifur’s relatives. She looked at the clock – almost five – and hurried to dig out the names of the man’s parents from the files. No one answered the landline, and the mother’s mobile was either turned off or out of range. However, Friðleifur’s father Guðjón answered his at the second ring. It sounded like he was driving.

She introduced herself and offered to call later if it was inconvenient.

‘Inconvenient? What do you mean?’ The line was crackly, but she could hear his surprise.

‘It’s just that I can tell you’re driving.’

‘That’s no problem. I’m about to park.’ A moment later she heard the engine shut off. ‘Did you say you were a lawyer? Are you from the bank?’ Thóra explained carefully who she was and who she worked for. There was a long silence. For a moment she thought the man was going to hang up, but then he suddenly started speaking again, his voice now a great deal sharper. ‘What the hell do you want from me?’

‘I’m trying to get to the bottom of how this fire occurred and part of that process involves speaking to the employees of the centre and the families of those who died.’

‘As if we know anything. You must be pretty desperate if you think that the family members are holding on to some sort of secret information. Do you really think we wouldn’t have told it to the police when they were investigating the case?’

The man was going to be a tricky interviewee, that much was certain. ‘A lot of what you discussed with the investigators back then didn’t find its way into the reports. They don’t include every little detail from the interviews. But just so you understand where I’m going, I have to rule out the possibility that the fire was directed at Friðleifur.’

‘No one would have wanted to harm him. He was just an ordinary guy. He’d never got on the wrong side of the law, never even got into a fight.’ The man’s voice faded, but then he added sadly: ‘Not even as a kid.’