Yrsa Sigurðardóttir - I Remember You

Even today his heart ached at the thought; what had he been thinking, not going straight home? Of course what awaited him at his office had appealed to him more than the idea of helping Sara and her sister bake and prepare for the birthday party. But still. He had never regretted anything more, though there was nothing he could do about it now; the best he could do was push the thought of it firmly aside.

‘It was a terrible day in every way,’ he said. On his way home he’d been delayed even more; he’d been in an accident with a trailer and become even more stressed about the frosty welcome he’d face from Sara. He hadn’t noticed the trailer attached to the back of a car he needed to overtake at the exit from Ártúnsbrekka. His car wasn’t badly damaged, though the trailer had been dented and its coupling rather bent out of shape. In fact the only time that he hadn’t had the paper bag containing the prescription within reach was when he’d got out of his car at the petrol station to speak to the angry driver and fill out insurance papers while the man examined the damage to his trailer. The bag had been lying on the front passenger seat, and he had thought nothing of it. ‘I think either the drug was missing from the box from the start, or else it was stolen at the petrol station, though that’s less likely. Surely I would have noticed if someone had sneaked into the car while I was standing next to it.’

‘Nothing showed up on the petrol station’s security cameras?’

‘No, I’m afraid not. We parked all the way at the end of the forecourt, since there wasn’t enough space for two cars, and only the car with the trailer appears in the video. But as I said, I doubt very much that anyone could have got into the car without my knowledge, and even if they did manage to, they would probably have taken the bag and not bothered to get the syringes out of their box.’

‘Yes. Probably.’ Dagný’s expression was unreadable. ‘It’s not really relevant now. I was just curious. It struck me when I read it.’

As Freyr watched Dagný leave the room he tried to imagine what sort of person could have treated the disappearance of his own child with the sort of disregard that Bernódus’s father had shown. He couldn’t understand it in the light of his own experience. The man hadn’t even bothered to report his son missing; that task had fallen to the school nurse. She’d complained to the boy’s teacher when he didn’t turn up for a medical check-up and was told that the boy hadn’t shown up for school that morning. The nurse then called his home and was informed by the father that he wasn’t in his bed. It was then that he reported it to the police, who went straight to his house. In the first statement taken from the father, he said that he hadn’t even noticed whether his son had come home from school the previous day: he’d fallen asleep over a bottle he’d managed to get his hands on and when he woke up he assumed the boy had gone to school. He’d only realized that something was wrong when the school called to ask whether his son was ill. He’d looked into the boy’s room and noticed that the bed hadn’t been slept in that night.

Although the officer who’d written the report had clearly put some effort into wording it carefully, without passing judgement, it was obvious how much the negligent father disgusted him. It would have been impossible to hide it completely, except by leaving out anything said by the man, who neither had any idea where his son might be nor appeared to be in any particular rush to find out. In the father’s final statement, taken about two weeks after the disappearance, the police force’s patience with him appeared to have worn thin. Among other things, he had said it might be for the best if his son wasn’t found, as then he wouldn’t have to pay for his funeral. Freyr was so flabbergasted that he had to read this again to be sure he hadn’t misread it. He would personally give anything in the world to have the bones of his son returned and lay them to rest in consecrated ground.

Of course the man had been ill. As a psychiatrist, Freyr was interested in learning about his history, but he doubted any data on him was available. There was nothing in the reports about what had become of Bernódus’s mother, or whether she’d been similarly unfortunate. Freyr could probably find out by asking some of the town’s older residents, and he immediately thought of the old teacher who was his patient. However, the father and his son had only lived a short time in Ísafjörður and there was nothing in the files about where they’d moved from. Hopefully the old man would have a better recollection of the boy’s story, which must have been a topic of conversation at the school after his disappearance. Freyr hadn’t been interested in discussing this with him when he’d visited him that morning, but he would tomorrow.

The noise of the photocopier, which had carried into the meeting room, stopped. ‘Would you like a coffee, maybe?’ Dagný appeared in the doorway with two sets of paper, the yellowed originals and the bright white copies. ‘I don’t need to brew it or anything. We’ve got a coffee machine.’

Freyr shook his head. ‘No thanks.’ For the moment he wanted nothing. The memory of how Sara had wasted away after Benni’s disappearance suddenly resurfaced. She’d only eaten when he ordered her to, and their sex life had evaporated completely. Her apathy was total. He felt his heart contract when he compared in his mind the old, curvy Sara, full of happiness and life, with the husk that remained, living only out of habit. Although his fears that he could end up on the same path might be unfounded, he had to remain conscious of the danger. Sara hadn’t realized where she was heading when she declined her first cup of coffee.

Freyr stretched. ‘Actually yes, I will.’ He forced himself to watch Dagný turn in the doorway to go and fetch the coffee, and admired her slim hips and the shapely backside her loose-fitting police uniform didn’t quite conceal. With that he felt a bit better, and relaxed even more when he took a sip of the strong coffee.

‘It’s not clear from this whether Halla had any ties to Bernódus other than being his classmate at the primary school.’ Dagný sat back down next to him and started putting the old reports back into folders. ‘Or if she did, it escaped the notice of the officers investigating the case.’ She shook her head as if to jolt her brain into proper working order. ‘Something caused Halla to become obsessed with the boy.’ Dagný ran a hand through her cropped hair. ‘But no matter how I try, I can’t think of any sort of connection that might form between kids of that age that would last for decades after one of them had died. Even if they’d been best friends, which I find rather unlikely. According to the school’s information, Bernódus was unsociable and mostly kept to himself. I’m sure someone would have mentioned if he’d had a close friend.’

Freyr agreed. He also knew that children like Bernódus, who had no support from relatives and were emotionally neglected, were usually social outcasts. They hardly ever had a ‘best friend’ and were lucky not to be constantly bullied. ‘Of course it’s possible that his disappearance traumatized her at the time and that the shock resurfaced when her mental health started to deteriorate. Children are sensitive at that age, and serious events in their formative years can leave permanent scars.’ He looked at Dagný. ‘And of course it’s also possible that someone was responsible for Bernódus’s death and that she witnessed it or knew about it.’

‘No, that can’t be it.’ Dagný frowned. ‘Why wouldn’t she just have said something?’

‘There could be many reasons. Maybe she was afraid of being next; maybe she didn’t realize what she’d seen until afterwards, when it was too late; maybe she felt ashamed that she hadn’t done anything to help Bernódus, or wanted to protect those who played a part in his disappearance.’