Michael Ridpath - 66 Degrees North

‘Thanks for telling me about it,’ said Magnus. His mind was a turmoil of confused judgements, against his father, against his mother, against the woman sitting opposite him. But he wanted to find out the truth, so he suppressed them, at least for now.

‘Then Margrét began to suspect something. Your father thought the best thing to do was to be honest, admit everything. I thought that was a really bad idea, but he didn’t listen to me.’ Unnur shook her head. ‘So he told her. It tipped her over the edge as far as drinking was concerned. She kicked Ragnar out. Ragnar dumped me. He went to America by himself. The whole thing was horrible.’

‘I can imagine.’

‘Margrét wouldn’t speak to me, unsurprisingly. I never saw her after that. Of course I heard about her, the drinking, her parents looking after you and Óli, and then her death.’

Magnus swallowed. He knew his mother had drunk half a bottle of vodka and driven into a rock. ‘Was that suicide, do you think?’ It was a question he had asked himself countless times.

‘I think so,’ said Unnur. ‘But I really don’t know. That’s no more than an opinion. Your grandparents swore that she didn’t crash on purpose. The rumours around Stykkishólmur were that she did. But no one really knows. When someone is that drunk they don’t know what they are doing anyway, do they?’

‘No,’ said Magnus. ‘They don’t.’

They sat in silence for a moment. ‘What about my father?’ he asked. ‘What was he like?’

‘He was a fine man,’ said Unnur. ‘Kind. Considerate. Very smart. Very good-looking.’

That was too much for Magnus. ‘He can’t have been that fine a man,’ he said. ‘Screwing his wife’s best friend.’

Unnur tensed. ‘No,’ she said coldly. ‘He can’t have been.’ She looked directly at Magnus. ‘Perhaps you had better go now. You are right, this is painful for both of us.’

‘I’m sorry,’ said Magnus, fighting to control himself. ‘The thing is, I thought he was a wonderful man too, and then I find out he did this to Mom. But I do appreciate you telling me.’

Unnur hesitated. ‘It must be tough for you,’ she said. ‘And I suppose that wasn’t such a wonderful thing that we did, was it?’

‘What happened to you?’

‘I met a doctor in Reykjavík. We got married, had children. I moved back here to teach, and he works in the hospital. I’m OK. No, better than OK, happy.’

‘Unlike my parents.’

‘Unlike your parents,’ Unnur said. ‘It’s not really fair, is it? I mean, it was me who caused all this. I remember them both very fondly, before everything got messed up, before I messed everything up.’

Magnus remained silent. Despite his instincts, who was he to apportion blame? But Unnur’s sense of guilt seemed justified. He wasn’t going to absolve her either.

‘I heard about Ragnar, of course,’ Unnur said. ‘Did they ever find out who did it?’

‘No,’ said Magnus. ‘They think that a random stranger drove into town, stabbed my father, and then left leaving no trace.’

‘I suppose that happens in America,’ Unnur said.

‘Not really,’ said Magnus. ‘I ended up becoming a homicide detective there. And usually there is a reason why one person kills another. It may be a stupid reason, but there is a reason.’

‘Just not in this case.’

Suddenly the suspicions that had been bubbling deep under the surface of Magnus’s consciousness ever since he had first heard of his father’s infidelity forced themselves into the open. He couldn’t ignore the connections his detective’s brain was making, couldn’t order it to stop doing what it had been trained to do.

But unlike the rush of excitement he usually experienced when things slipped into place, he now felt suddenly cold. His throat was dry, and when he spoke the sound that came out was little more than a croak.

‘I wonder.’

Unnur noticed something was wrong; she was watching him closely. ‘What do you wonder?’

‘Whether Grandpa was in some way responsible.’

Unnur frowned for a moment and then smiled.

This irritated Magnus. ‘What’s so funny?’ ‘There is no chance of that,’ Unnur said. ‘I mean, he’s a nasty old man, for sure, and he had a terrible hold over your mother. And he didn’t like Ragnar at all. But that’s the point. He was glad Ragnar went to the States and left Margrét here. In fact, that was what he wanted all along.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Well, at first Margrét was very excited about MIT. She had always wanted to live abroad and this seemed like a great opportunity for both of them.’

‘So she intended to go with Dad?’

‘Absolutely. But when she told her parents, they went ballistic, both of them. I don’t know why exactly, they got it all out of proportion. Hallgrímur demanded Margrét stay in Iceland, but she insisted on going with Ragnar. It became a trial of strength. Her parents used every psychological weapon at their disposal. Made her feel guilty, refused to speak to her, that kind of thing. They were difficult people to oppose.’

‘I remember,’ said Magnus.

‘At first Margrét held out. But it was eating her up. She began to drink a lot. She fought with Ragnar, she was just totally unreasonable. And in the end she changed her mind. Said that Ragnar should go by himself, and that she would stay in Iceland with you and Óli.

‘Ragnar was furious. That’s when… well… it happened between me and him.’

Unnur paused. Sighing.

‘So, when Margrét found out about the affair her parents were overjoyed. They had won, Ragnar lost, their daughter and grandchildren stayed in Iceland.’

‘I see,’ said Magnus. But the thought that his grandfather might have been responsible for his father’s murder, once expressed, could not be easily abandoned. ‘That’s not quite the story that I heard from my cousin. She said that it was the affair that caused Margrét to drink. That led to her death.’

‘That’s not right,’ said Unnur. ‘Like I said, she had been drinking seriously for several months before then. I’m sure it’s the story Hallgrímur made up. He was hardly likely to admit that he drove his own daughter to drink, was he?’

‘No,’ said Magnus. ‘But do you not think that later, after my mother had died, and especially after my father took us away from them, my grandfather might have wanted revenge?’

‘Perhaps. I mean, as I said, he certainly didn’t like your father. But I get the impression that there are many people whom your grandfather doesn’t like. And I don’t think he kills all of them.’ She frowned, thinking. ‘And anyway, why wait? I mean it was ten years after your mother died, wasn’t it?’

‘Eight,’ said Magnus. ‘And that is a good point. I don’t know. But I can imagine him capable of it.’

‘That’s true.’

Unnur paused, as if considering whether to say more. Magnus recognized the signs. He waited. Eventually she spoke. ‘Did you know Hallgrímur’s father murdered someone?’

‘What! I never heard anything about that.’

‘Of course you didn’t. It was his neighbour at Hraun. Jóhannes.’

‘How do you know?’

Unnur stood up and searched her shelves. She handed Magnus an old paperback. Moor and the Man by Benedikt Jóhannesson.

‘What’s this?’

‘Read chapter three.’ They were interrupted by the sound of a car pulling up. ‘You’d better go now, that’s my husband.’

Still trying to make sense of all he had heard, Magnus stared dumbly at the book in his hands. Another murder in his family?

‘Magnús?’

‘All right, I’ll go,’ he said. ‘Thanks for the coffee. And for speaking to me so honestly.’