Yrsa Sigurdardottir - Ashes To Dust

‘I saw a photograph of your father, this Geiri and others at Kjartan’s office,’ said Thóra.‘One of them was the police inspector Gudni Leifsson, whom I understand was one of your father’s friends. As I understand it, their friendship was severed at some point.’

Leifur shook his head. ‘No, father and Gudni have been friends their whole life. But Kjartan took offence when he was connected to a case of liquor smuggling. He thought that Gudni should have turned a blind eye to his part in it, in the light of their being friends. Dad wasn’t involved in that, luckily. I don’t understand why Kjartan is still going on about it, since the case was dismissed and he never suffered at all because of it.’

Leifur cleared his throat and fiddled with a button on his shirt. Thóra got the impression that he wasn’t telling her the whole truth, but didn’t think he was lying, exactly. He looked quizzically at her. ‘Is Gudni making life hard for you?’

‘No,’ said Thóra half-heartedly. ‘At least, not yet. Hopefully this investigation will be over before he can.’

Leifur’s jaw clenched and he seemed on the verge of saying something, but at that moment Maria and Bella reappeared, trailing smoke behind them, so he stopped. Much to Thóra’s relief, the main course was leg of lamb. She was sure Leifur hadn’t told her everything. Those who are not used to hiding the truth always give themselves away.

Thóra put down her mobile phone and heaved a sigh. ‘No answer,’ she said regretfully to Bella.‘That was the last one.’ They were sitting in the hotel lobby, where Thóra had gone online to look for the telephone numbers of women Markus thought had been friends with Alda when she was young. Thóra had called him shortly after she got up to tell him that she was making no progress in the search for anyone who could back up his story about the box. Markus had told her some names, and judging by the list Thóra had scribbled down Alda had been extremely popular. Unfortunately Markus had difficulty remembering surnames, so after a long search Thóra ended up with only five names. Three had answered and they all told the same story. They had been great friends with Alda in the old days but hadn’t kept in touch, since unlike them Alda had moved to the Westfjords after the eruption and hadn’t returned to the Islands with her parents after a year.

According to the women, the majority of the refugees had lived in and around Reykjavik, but for some reason Alda’s family ended up out in the countryside. They didn’t know whether this had happened because of relatives or work, since they never spoke to Alda at the time, although they had all tried to find her. She hadn’t been in the‘Eruption Class’ that was put together in the Bustadur School for teenagers from the Islands, nor on the trip to Norway the summer after the eruption, to which all of the children from the Westmann Islands between six and sixteen had been invited. One of the women thought this was odd, saying that Alda had often spoken of how much she wanted to go abroad. None of them recalled Alda having entrusted a secret to them right before the eruption, nor had any of them been on board the same boat to the mainland as Alda on the night of the evacuation. So they could not bear witness to any conversation between Alda and Markus, although they all remembered Markus very well, and they all even mentioned how much of a crush he had had on her. The only thing that came out of these conversations was that one of the women professed herself amazed that Alda hadn’t accompanied her parents back to the Islands when they finally returned, instead choosing to move to Reykjavik and attend junior college there under the protective wing of her father’s family. The woman even thought it likely that Alda had never again set foot in the Islands after the eruption.

Thóra switched off her phone and put it into her handbag. ‘If it’s true that Alda never came back here, that’s a pretty good indication that something happened,’ she said.

‘Such as what?’ asked Bella indifferently. ‘What happens to make someone end up carrying round a head in a box?’

‘Good question,’ said Thóra. There was certainly something to what Bella said. What sequence of events had to take place for a teenage girl to come into possession of a human head? ‘In any case, I still find it very unlikely that she murdered someone at such a young age.’

‘Why?’ asked Bella. ‘I’ve never been more likely to kill someone than during my teenage years.’ She stared at Thóra. ‘I could probably have done it quite easily.’

Thóra smiled reluctantly.‘Hardly,’ was all she said, although in her heart she did not agree. She was in no doubt that Bella was capable of such an act, both then and now. Thóra had no time to consider this any further, because someone tapped on her shoulder. Behind her stood a woman of around forty. She was dressed in a blue trouser suit, and the name tag on her lapel read JóhannaThórgeirsdóttir. This must be Alda’s sister. Leifur had certainly stood by his word from the night before.

‘Hello, are you Thóra Gudmundsdóttir?’ said the woman in a low voice. Her eyes were reddened and her face haggard. ‘The woman on reception pointed you out to me.’

Thóra stood up and shook the woman’s hand warmly, but the expression in the eyes that met hers was anything but friendly. ‘Yes, hello. You must be Alda’s sister.’ She squeezed I he woman’s hand. ‘My condolences for the loss of your sister.’She released her hand, since the woman only held it limply. I didn’t expect you to come and see me, and I hope that Leifur didn’t press it on you.‘

The expression on the woman’s face tightened another notch. ‘I didn’t speak to Leifur. He spoke to the branch director, who sent me here. Leifur’s a close acquaintance of his, and close acquaintances get good service. As I understand it, he’s not to be offended.’

Thóra swallowed her irritation at Leifur. She had understood his words to mean that he knew Alda’s sister, and that he himself would speak to her. She hadn’t expected a woman who had recently lost her sister to be sent to her like a pizza delivery boy.

‘I am sincerely sorry,’ was all she could say as her anger subsided. She paused a moment. This degraded woman standing before her deserved better. ‘You don’t have to speak to me if you don’t want to. I understand that you’re suffering and I don’t wish to take advantage of Leifur’s insensitivity or that of the man you work for. They don’t run my errands.’

The woman looked up and squared her jaw.‘The branch manager is actually a woman.’ She looked around.‘And actually I’d be happy to sit down for a moment. Two of the four clerks called in sick this morning, but the bank’s work regulations stipulate that there must always be two cashiers out front. I’m one of the two who came to work today.’ She pointed at the sofa in front of the reception desk. ‘Let’s sit down there. Then my manager can decide whether she or the cleaning lady will fill in for me.’

Thóra smiled approvingly at Alda’s sister. ‘Good idea,’ she said. ‘But can I suggest that we sit in the cafeteria instead? It’s quieter and we’ve got a better chance of getting coffee there.’ She sent Bella away and they sat down over cups of coffee at a little wooden table in the farthest corner of the cafeteria.

‘First of all, I should warn you that I still haven’t recovered from the news about Alda,’ said Jóhanna as she took her seat.‘Although there were eight years between us, we were very good friends. We weren’t in daily contact, but we were close nevertheless.’ She took a sip of coffee, placed the cup back awkwardly on its saucer and adjusted it carefully. ‘I don’t believe she committed suicide. She would never do that. It must have been an accident, or something worse.’ She looked up. ‘I expect everyone who experiences a relative killing himself or herself thinks that way, but it’s not like that. Alda wasn’t the kind of person to commit suicide.’