Yrsa Sigurdardottir - Last Rituals

"Who?" Thora asked.

"Yours truly," said Gunnar, then fell silent. He looked at them, his eyes daring them to challenge his innocence.

"I see," Thora said, looking Gunnar firmly in the eye, then added: "Excuse me for asking, but why should she have suspected you?"

"As I said, there was an administrative error. According to the records I was the last person to have examined the letter, but I never touched it. Either someone used my name, or the entry numbers were mixed up. Brynjolfur Sveinsson does not interest me and it never occurred to me to look for documents related to him. What made the matter even more unfortunate was that the girl tried to take advantage of this to make me help her through her course. She said straight out that she'd keep quiet if I gave her a helping hand, as she so tastefully put it. I discussed it with Harald and he promised to talk her out of this nonsense. I contacted my friends at the archives and demanded an inquiry. I didn't want some silly girl thinking she could blackmail me. But they found nothing because it was such a long time ago, a decade or so. In the end they admitted that it must have been a mistake on their part, the letter had presumably been filed away with another and would eventually come to light. Briet had the sense not to mention it to me again."

"What was this letter anyway?" asked Thora. "What was it about, I mean?"

"The letter was written in 1702 from one of the clergymen at Skalholt, to Arni Magnusson. It appears to be a reply to his inquiry about what had happened to part of the foreign manuscript collection owned by Bishop Brynjolfur, who had died some time before, in 1675. So there's no doubt the letter was in the archive. Many people remember it. It was old news."

"Nothing else?" Thora persisted. "Nothing about hidden manuscripts or attempts to spirit them away from Skalholt?"

Gunnar studied her face. "Why do you ask if you already know the answer?"

"What do you mean?" Thora exclaimed. "All I know about that letter is what you've just told me." Her eyes returned to Gunnar's tiepin. Why the hell was it bothering her? And what was the man driving at?

"It's a remarkable coincidence," said Gunnar dryly. He clearly believed she and Matthew knew more than they actually did. "We can go on beating about the bush if you want. The letter contains a cryptic passage about safeguarding valuables from Danish colonial officials and storing them beside the ancient cross. This is generally agreed to be a reference to the holy cross in the church at Kadlanes, which was removed during the Reformation when places of worship were stripped of their icons."

"You seem to know an awful lot about this letter," said Matthew, chipping in for the first time. "Considering that you've never seen it."

"Of course I acquainted myself with it when the accusations were made against me," Gunnar snapped. "The letter is well known among historians, and several fine papers have been written about it."

Thora stared at his tie as if in a trance. The pin was unusual, quite irregular in shape and apparently made of silver. "Where did you get that tiepin?" she asked suddenly, pointing to his chest.

Gunnar and Matthew both looked at her, dumbfounded. Gunnar grasped his tie and examined the pin. He released it and looked again at Thora. "I must admit I don't understand the direction this conversation is taking. But since you seem so interested, it was a fiftieth-birthday present." He stood up. "I don't think there's any point in talking furtherI have no particular interest in discussing my appearance. I have a less than pleasant meeting awaiting me with the director of the Manuscript Institute and I can't waste any more time on such nonsense. I sincerely wish you all the best with your investigation but I suggest that you stick to the present, because the past has nothing to do with Harald's murder."

He accompanied them to the door.

Matthew looked at Thora and shook his head. They were standing in the lobby of the faculty building. "That went well."

"Didn't you notice his tiepin?" Thora hissed. "It was a sword. The pin had a silver base with a silver sword on it, lying across the tie. Didn't you notice it?"

"Yes. So?" replied Matthew.

"Don't you remember the pictures of Harald's neck? The mark that looked like a dagger or a cross? What was it the doctor said? 'If you look closely you can see it resembles a little dagger.'"

"Oh, yes," Matthew responded. "I see what you're driving at. But I'm not sure it's the same object. The photos weren't that clear, Thora." He sighed. "The man's a historian. The Viking sword on his tiepin is obviously connected with his specialist field, the settlement of Iceland. I wouldn't read too much into it. The mark on Harald's neck looked more like a cross to me." He smiled. "Maybe he was killed by a mad vicar."

Thora hesitated. She reached for her mobile. "I want to talk to Briet. There's something funny about all this."

Matthew shook his head, but Thora went ahead undeterred. Briet answered on the fourth ring, grumpily. When Thora told her the news of Halldor's arrest, the girl relaxed a little and agreed to meet them at the student bookshop in a quarter of an hour. Matthew mumbled a protest, but when Thora told him he could buy something to eat there, he gave in. He was busy devouring a pizza when Briet appeared.

"What's Dori told the police?" she asked in a quavering voice the moment she sat down at the table.

"Nothing," replied Thora. "But he's told me bits and pieces about that night and your part in what went on. I wouldn't be terribly surprised if he tells more people before long. He thinks you killed Harald."

All the color drained from Briet's face. "Me?" she squeaked. "I had nothing to do with his death."

"He said that you vanished from the group that night and acted strange when you all found the bodynot like your usual self."

Briet's jaw dropped and she sat gaping for a while before she spoke. "I nipped out for twenty minutesmax. And I was in total shock when we found the body. I couldn't even think, let alone string a sentence together."

"Where did you go?" asked Matthew.

Briet gave him a suggestive smile. "Me? I went to the bathroom with an old friend of mine. He can vouch for that."

"For twenty minutes?" Matthew asked doubtfully.

"Yes. So? You want to know what we were doing?"

"No, thanks," interrupted Thora. "We can guess."

"What do you want from me, anyway? I didn't kill Harald. I just stood beside Dori while he fixed the body. Andri's the only one in deep shit if Dori tells the cops. He helped. I didn't even touch Harald." Briet was trying to reassure herself, without much success.

"I'd like to ask you about a project you did with Harald on Bishop Brynjolfur Sveinsson, and the missing letter," said Thora. "Dori told me you and Harald quarreled over it. Is that right?"

Briet looked blank. "That crap? What's that got to do with this?"

"I don't know, that's why I'm asking," Thora replied.

"Harald was pathetic," said Briet suddenly. "I had Gunnar by the balls. He got nervous when I went to him and told him I knew he'd stolen a letter from the national archives. He definitely did it, whatever anyone says."

"In what way was Harald pathetic?" Matthew asked.

"At first he thought it was funny and dared me to have a go at Gunnar. We even sneaked into his office to look for it after the old bastard threw me out. It was really weird. We were inside and then Harald suddenly changed his mind. He found some old article about Irish monks and flipped like I've never seen before."

"How do you mean?" asked Thora.

Briet shrugged. "It was some research paper by Gunnar in one of the cabinets. Harald found it and got me to tell him what the captions said. He was incredibly excited about two of them. One was a cross and the other some fucking hole. Then he wanted to know all about another drawing. I was shitting bricks because I was afraid Gunnar would come. I didn't want to hang around there translating for Harald. In the end he stuffed the article in his pocket and we stopped searching. We just ran."