Michael Ridpath - 66 Degrees North

‘So you killed him on my account?’

‘Yours, mine and every other ordinary person in Iceland.’

Harpa pursed her lips. Anger flared through the couple of tears that had gathered in tiny pools around her eyes. ‘So what are you doing with me? Holding me prisoner?’

‘I’d like you to stay here for the next twenty-four hours.’

‘Until the next guy on the list is shot?’

Björn shrugged.

‘And what happens after that?’

Björn sighed. ‘I think it’s inevitable they catch us. The others think there’s going to be a revolution, but I don’t know. It’s just not the way the Icelanders do things. So I guess I’m going to jail.’

For a moment Harpa almost felt sorry for him. But only for a moment. ‘You deserve to,’ she said.

‘Maybe. Perhaps I should pay for what I’ve done; I knew the consequences when I did it. I will just have to accept them.’ His voice was calm.

‘Perhaps you should.’

‘One more day, and then it won’t matter. The others think they’ve still got a chance. I’d like you to keep quiet for a couple of days, until the police have caught us. Then you can say what you like. I’ll make sure you aren’t implicated in any of this.’

‘You’re mad if you think I would go along with that.’

‘Please, Harpa,’ Björn said. ‘For my sake.’

Harpa glared at him. ‘You make me sick,’ she said. ‘Now give me my phone and let me make a call.’

‘No,’ said Björn.

‘In that case, I’m leaving now,’ Harpa said, pulling herself to her feet.

‘You have to stay in the hut,’ said Björn. ‘No, I don’t,’ said Harpa. ‘Are you going to stop me?’

She walked a couple of paces towards the door. Björn leapt to his feet, grabbed her from behind, twisted her around and pinned her to the floor. Harpa screamed and kicked. Björn stretched out and grabbed the length of rope that was lying on a chair.

He wrapped it around her body, pinning her arms to her sides, and tied a firm knot. Harpa screamed louder as she writhed against the rope. Björn left her on the floor and stood by the cooker watching her.

‘I hate you, Björn!’ Harpa yelled. ‘I hate you!’

The screams were muffled by the walls of the hut and the mist outside, so by the time they reached the rocky slopes of the valley they were scarcely powerful enough to create an echo.

MAGNUS WOKE UP thinking about Ingileif. Or rather he didn’t know what to think about Ingileif.

Her accusation that he was jealous of her, that he suspected her of seeing other men, was ironic. In Magnus’s previous relationship, with Colby, the lawyer in Boston, he was always the one who was being controlled. Colby wanted to regularize the relationship, to get married, to send Magnus off to law school. He was relieved to get away from that, and indeed that was one of the many things that attracted him to Ingileif. She was independent, she did what she wanted, and she allowed him to be the same way.

So if she went off to parties with her beautiful friends, what business was that of his?

Except he didn’t like the idea of her sleeping with other men. And he wasn’t even sure whether her anger with him was because she did occasionally do that and she thought it none of his business, or because he didn’t know her well enough to trust her to stay away from other men.

Which all showed she had a point. He didn’t really know her.

She wanted to go to Germany. He was likely to be sent back to the States. It was fun while it lasted, but it was over. Face it. Move on.

But rather than be braced by this thought, it depressed him.

Ingileif was part of the life he was building in Iceland. Unpredictable, beautiful, untameable.

Mind you, he had been right to be angry at her. A defence lawyer in the States would run rings around a prosecution if they ever found out what she had done. Iceland had a less adversarial system, it would be a judge who would question the evidence and how it had been obtained. But if the whole case collapsed because of Ingileif’s activities, Magnus would be buying a one-way ticket back to Boston.

Yet she had found out something. There was to be another victim: Ingólfur Arnarson.

There was a slight chance that this might be the target’s real name, a very slight chance. Much more likely it was a codename.

Ingólfur Arnarson was famous as the first settler in Iceland. He had sailed there from Norway in 874, and as he approached the island he had cast his wooden ‘home pillars’ into the sea, vowing to settle wherever they washed up. It took three years for his slaves to find them, but eventually they were discovered in a smoky bay, Reykjavík: reykur meaning smoke and vík bay. A fine statue of the Viking stood on a mound downtown.

The question was, who did the name Ingólfur Arnarson represent in the twenty-first century?

There were a number of obvious candidates. The young men who had built up business empires overseas in the previous decade were known in Iceland as útrásarvíkingar – literally ‘Outvasion Vikings’. They recalled the great Vikings who had set forth from Norway a thousand years before to use their youth, vitality and aggression to make their fortunes. Men like Ingólfur Arnarson.

And like Óskar Gunnarsson. As he himself had recognized by commissioning the sculpture of a Viking riding a Harley Davidson in the lobby of his family office.

The trouble was there were several other candidates for Ingólfur. But which one did Sindri have in mind?

People would have to be warned, which meant that Magnus was going to have to admit how he came upon the information. He could imagine Baldur’s ridicule, quite justified, of Magnus’s investigative techniques. For a moment Magnus thought about claiming that the information came from a confidential informant. But that wouldn’t wash.

He made himself a cup of coffee and called Vigdís at the station. She had just got in. He told her what Ingileif had been up to the previous night.

‘Impressive work,’ said Vigdís. ‘Unconventional.’

‘Damn stupid, if you ask me,’ said Magnus.

‘And probably if you ask Baldur,’ said Vigdís. ‘But at least we know for sure Sindri is involved.’

‘Any ideas who Ingólfur Arnarson might be?’ Magnus asked. He outlined his own view that it might be one of the Outvaders.

‘I think you are right,’ said Vigdís. ‘I don’t know whether one of them is more like Ingólfur than any of the others. I don’t know them well enough, they all seem like a bunch of greedy fat cats to me. The Special Prosecutor might have an idea.’

‘Yes, I remember him talking to me about them. Or there’s Óskar’s sister Emilía,’ said Magnus. ‘She probably knows them all personally. Find out what she thinks.’

‘OK. We should also go through the phone book, just in case. There are bound to be some people whose real name is Ingólfur Arnarson.’

‘Worth checking. And you could ask Frikki when you speak to him again this morning. Let’s hope he’s more talkative after his night in the cells.’

‘We’re going to have to tell Baldur,’ said Vigdís. ‘These people are in danger. Or at least one of them is. And we don’t know which one.’

‘Leave it with me,’ said Magnus.

‘Before you go, I saw Björn’s brother yesterday. He was in Tenerife for a week with his girlfriend, came back Monday. Iceland Express confirms it. They both flew out, they both flew back.’

‘Well, that pretty much rules him out,’ said Magnus. ‘Speak to you later.’

He took a deep breath and called Baldur. He told him about Ingileif, Sindri and Ingólfur Arnarson. He got the ridicule he expected, but not for the reason he expected it.