Michael Ridpath - Where the Shadows Lie

Baldur frowned. ‘We don’t know for sure that this is the same Isildur that Steve Jubb is working for. And anyway, he won’t talk. Why should he? Steve Jubb isn’t saying anything, and we have him in custody.’

‘Depends how I ask him.’

Baldur shook his head. ‘It will cost money. I’m not sure I can get authorization for a trip that will probably be a waste of time. Haven’t you heard of the kreppa? ’

It was impossible to spend more than a few hours in Iceland without hearing about the kreppa. ‘Just an economy fare and perhaps one night in a motel,’ Magnus said. He looked at the bodies around the table. ‘You’re putting a whole lot of resource into this investigation. An airplane ticket won’t make much difference.’

Baldur glared at Magnus. ‘I’ll think about it,’ he said, giving Magnus the distinct impression that he wouldn’t.

‘OK,’ Baldur continued, addressing the group. ‘It looks like someone calling himself Isildur was behind the negotiations with Agnar. If this Lawrence Feldman was that man, he had the cash to back a significant deal.’

‘But what could they have been negotiating over?’ said Vigdis.

‘Something to do with The Lord of the Rings?’ Magnus said. ‘Or the Saga of the Volsungs, maybe. I read it again last night. A magic ring plays an important part in both books. There’s a theory that Tolkien was inspired by the Volsung Saga.’

‘All the old copies of the saga will be in the Arni Magnusson Collection at the University of Iceland,’ said Baldur. Arni Magnusson was a Danish-educated antiquarian who travelled around Iceland in the seventeenth century gathering up all the sagas he could find. He transported them to Denmark, but they were returned to Iceland in the 1970s, where they were housed in an institute bearing the great collector’s name. ‘Are you saying Agnar had stolen a copy?’

‘He might have switched it for a facsimile,’ suggested Vigdis.

‘Perhaps,’ said Magnus. ‘Or perhaps he had some wacko theory that he was selling to Isildur. Maybe he was going to do some research for him.’

Baldur frowned and shook his head.

‘It could be narcotics,’ Rannveig said. ‘I know it’s boring, but in Iceland, if it’s an illicit deal, it’s nearly always drugs.’

There was silence for a moment around the table. The assistant prosecutor had a point.

‘Was there anything in Agnar’s papers suggesting what this deal could be?’ Rannveig asked.

‘No, I checked most of them myself,’ Baldur said. ‘Apart from those e-mails on his computer, there is nothing about a deal with Steve Jubb. And the files on his laptop are all work related.’

‘What was he working on?’ Magnus asked.

‘What do you mean?’

‘I mean what was he researching when he died?’

‘I’m not sure he was researching anything. He was marking exam papers. And translating a couple of sagas into English and French.’

Magnus leaned forward. ‘Which sagas?’

‘I don’t know,’ Baldur said, defensively. He clearly didn’t appreciate being interrogated in his own meeting. ‘I didn’t read through all his working papers. There are piles of them.’

Magnus restrained himself from pushing the point. He didn’t want to put Baldur’s back up any more than he had to. ‘Can I take a second look? At his working papers, I mean.’

Baldur stared at Magnus, making no attempt to hide his irritation. ‘Of course,’ he said drily. ‘That would be a good use of your time.’

There were two places to look: Agnar’s room at the university, or the summer house. There would be more papers at the university, and it was closer. On the other hand, if Agnar had been working on something relevant to Steve Jubb it was likely to be at the summer house where it would be available for his meeting.

So Arni drove Magnus out to Lake Thingvellir. ‘Do you think Baldur will let you go to California?’ he asked.

‘I don’t know. He didn’t seem excited by the idea.’

‘If you do go, can you take me with you?’ Arni glanced at Magnus sitting in the passenger seat and noticed his hesitation. ‘I did my degree in the States so I am familiar with US police procedures. Plus, California is my spiritual home.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘You know. The Gubernator.’

Magnus shook his head. Arni would be demanding a personal interview with Arnold Schwarzenegger next. Besides, Magnus would rather approach Lawrence Feldman in his own way without his Icelandic puppy at his heels. ‘We’ll see.’

Deflated, Arni drove over the pass beyond Mosfell Heath and down towards the lake. It wasn’t actually raining, but there was a stiff breeze that ruffled the surface. Their approach was watched by a posse of sturdy Icelandic horses from the farm behind the cottages, their long golden forelocks flopping down over their eyes.

Magnus noticed a boy and a girl playing by the shore of the lake – the boy was about eight, the girl much smaller. Again, only the one summer house with the Range Rover was occupied. Agnar’s property was still a crime scene, with yellow tape fluttering in the wind and a police car parked outside, in which sat a solitary constable reading a book. Crime and Punishment by one F.M. Dostojevski, it transpired. Magnus smiled. Cops everywhere liked to read about crime; it wasn’t surprising that the Icelanders had a more literary approach to it than their American counterparts.

The policeman was glad of the company and let Magnus and Arni into the house. It was cold and still. Fingerprint dust covered most of the smooth surfaces, adding to the sense of desolation, and there were chalk marks around the traces of blood on the floor.

Magnus examined the desk: drawers full of papers, most of them printouts from a computer. There was also a low cupboard just to the left of the desk, in which more reams of paper lay.

‘OK, you check out the cabinet, I’ll check out the desk,’ Magnus said, slipping on a pair of white latex gloves.

The first bundle he examined was a French translation of the Laxdaela Saga, on which were scribbled comments in French. These only covered the first half of the manuscript. Magnus had learned some French at school, and he guessed that Arni had been correcting or commenting on the work of another translator, probably an Icelandic-speaking Frenchman.

‘What have you got, Arni?’

‘ Gaukur’s Saga,’ he said. ‘Have you ever heard of it?’

‘No,’ said Magnus. That wasn’t necessarily a surprise. There were dozens of sagas, some well-known, some much less so. ‘Wait a minute. Wasn’t Gaukur the guy who lived at Stong?’

‘That’s right,’ said Arni. ‘I went there when I was a kid. I was scared out of my wits.’

‘I know what you mean,’ said Magnus. ‘My father took me there when I was sixteen. There was something really creepy about that place.’

Stong was an abandoned farm about twenty kilometres north of the volcano, Mount Hekla. It had been smothered in ash after a massive eruption some time in the middle ages, and had only been rediscovered in the twentieth century. It lay at the end of a rough track which wound its way through a landscape of blackened destruction: mounds of sand and small outcrops of lava twisted into grotesque shapes. When Magnus read of the apocalypse, he thought of the road to Stong.

‘Let me take a look.’

Arni handed the manuscript to Magnus. It was about a hundred and twenty crisp, newly printed pages, in English. On the cover were the simple words: ‘Gaukur’s Saga, translated by Agnar Haraldsson’.

Magnus turned the page, scanning the text. On the second page he came upon a word that brought his eyes to an abrupt halt.

Isildur.

‘Arni, look at this!’ He flicked rapidly through more pages. Isildur. Isildur. Isildur. Isildur.