Arnaldur Indridason - Silence Of The Grave

And then one day the words started to come out, the summer after the world went to war and the British army set up camp on the hill. When Simon was carrying Mikkelina back indoors out of the sun. She had been exceptionally lively during the day, wiggling her ears and opening her mouth and poking out her tongue. Simon was about to put her back on the divan in the kitchen, because evening was falling and the weather was cooling, when Mikkelina suddenly made a noise that startled her mother into dropping a plate into the washing-up bowl, where it broke. Forgetting for an instant the terror that would usually fill her after such clumsiness, she spun round and stared at Mikkelina.

"EMAAEMAAA," Mikkelina repeated.

"Mikkelina!" their mother gasped.

"EMAAEMAAA," Mikkelina shouted, rolling her head around in wild rejoicing at her achievement.

Their mother walked slowly towards her as if unable to believe her own ears, then looked, open mouthed, at her daughter, and Simon thought he could see tears filling her eyes.

"Maammmmaa," Mikkelina said, and her mother took her out of Simon's arms and laid her slowly and gently onto her bed, stroking her head. Simon had never seen their mother cry before. No matter what Grimur did to her, she never cried. She shrieked in pain, called for help, pleaded with him to stop or otherwise suffered his blows in silence, but Simon had never seen her cry. Thinking that she must be upset, he put his arm around her, but she told him not to worry. This was the best thing that could ever have happened in her life. He could tell that she was crying not only about Mikkelina's condition, but about her achievement as well, which had made her happier than she had ever before allowed herself to feel.

That was two years ago, and Mikkelina had steadily added to her vocabulary since then and could now say whole sentences, her face like a beetroot from the strain, poking out her tongue and dangling her head back and forth in such furious spasms from the effort that they thought it would drop off her withered body. Grimur did not know that she could talk. Mikkelina refused to say anything within his hearing and their mother concealed it from him, because she never tried to draw his attention to the girl, not even such triumphs. They pretended that nothing had happened or changed. A few times Simon heard his mother very guardedly mention to Grimur whether they ought to try to find help for Mikkelina. That she could become more mobile and stronger with age, and seemed to be able to learn. She could read and was learning to write with her good hand.

"She's a moron," Grimur said. "Don't ever think she's anything more than a moron. And stop talking to me about her."

So she stopped, because she obeyed Grimur's every word; the only help that Mikkelina ever received was from their mother, and what Simon and Tomas did for her by carrying her out into the sunshine and playing with her.

Simon avoided his father as far as possible, but from time to time he was forced to go out with him. When Simon grew up he proved more useful to Grimur, who took him to Reykjavik and made him carry provisions back to the hill. The trip to town took two hours, down to Grafarvogur, crossing the bridge over Ellidaar and skirting the Sund and Laugarnes districts. Sometimes they took the route up the slope to Haaleiti and across Sogamyri. Simon kept four or five of his little steps behind Grimur, who never spoke to him or paid him any attention until he loaded him with supplies and ordered him to carry them home. The return journey could take three or four hours, depending upon how much Simon had to carry. Sometimes Grimur would stay in town and not return to the hill for days.

When that happened, a certain joy reigned in the household.

On his trips to Reykjavik, Simon discovered an aspect of Grimur that he took a while to assimilate and never wholly understood. At home, Grimur was surly and violent. Hated being spoken to. Foul-mouthed if he did speak, and coarse in the way he belittled his children and their mother; he made them serve his every need and woe betide any shirker. But in dealing with everyone else, the monster seemed to shed its skin and become almost human. On Simon's first trips to town he expected Grimur to act the way he always behaved at home, snarling abuse or swinging punches. He feared this, but it never happened. On the contrary. All of a sudden Grimur wanted to please everyone. He chattered away merrily to the merchant and bowed and scraped to people who entered the shop. He addressed them formally, even smiled. Shook their hands. Sometimes when Grimur bumped into people he knew he would break into guffaws — not the strange, dry and raucous laugh that he occasionally let out when he was vilifying his wife. When people pointed to Simon, Grimur put his hand on the boy's head and said yes, he was his son, grown so big. Simon ducked at first as if expecting a blow, and Grimur joked about it.

It took Simon a long time to grasp this incomprehensible duplicity on Grimur's part. His father's new countenance was unrecognisable. He could not understand how Grimur could be one person at home and a completely different man the moment he left the house. Simon could not fathom how he could be sycophantic and subservient and bow politely, when at home he ruled as the ultimate dispenser of life and death. When Simon discussed this with his mother she shook her head wearily and told him, as always, to be wary of Grimur. Be wary of provoking him. No matter whether it was Simon, Tomas or Mikkelina who sparked him off, or whether it was something that had happened when Grimur was away and which threw him into a rage, he almost invariably attacked their mother.

Months would sometimes pass between assaults, even a whole year, but they never stopped altogether and were sometimes quite frequent. A matter of weeks. The intensity of his fury varied. Sometimes a single punch out of the blue, sometimes he would fly into an uncontrollable rage, knock their mother to the ground and kick her mercilessly.

And it was not only physical violence that weighed down upon the family and home. The language he used was like a lash across the face. Denigrating remarks about Mikkelina, that crippled moron. The sarcastic tirade that Tomas suffered for not being able to stop wetting the bed at night. When Simon acted like a lazy bastard. And all that their mother was forced to hear and they tried to close their ears to.

Grimur didn't care if his children saw him beating up their mother or humiliating her with words that stabbed like stilettos.

The rest of the time, he paid them virtually no attention. Normally acted as though they did not exist. Very occasionally he played cards with the boys and even allowed Tomas to win. Sometimes, on Sundays, they all walked to Reykjavik and he would buy sweets for the boys. Very seldom Mikkelina was allowed to go with them and Grimur arranged a ride in the coal lorry so they did not need to carry her down from the hill. On these trips — which were few and far between — Simon felt his father was almost human. Almost like a father.

On the rare occasions when Simon saw his father as something other than a tyrant, he was mysterious and unfathomable. He sat at the kitchen table once, drinking coffee and watching Tomas playing on the floor, and he stroked the surface of the table with the flat of his hand and asked Simon, who was about to sneak out through the kitchen, to bring him another cup. And while Simon poured the coffee for him, he said:

"It makes me furious thinking about it."

Simon stopped, holding the coffee jug in both hands, and stood still beside him.

"Makes me furious," he said, still stroking the surface of the table.

Simon backed slowly away and put the jug down on the stove plate.

Looking at Tomas playing on the floor, Grimur said: "It makes me furious to think I couldn't have been much older than him."