Ashes to Dust (20 page)

He wondered briefly whether he should phone
his lawyer and speak to her — that always made him feel better. She
always managed to come up with something to quash any negative thoughts he was
having about the case. Sometimes she did this by telling him good news about
the other case that she was handling for him, making the hospital in
Isafjördur realize that unfortunately they would not be able to wriggle
out of paying Adolf compensation for his mother’s death. He smiled just
thinking about the sum she’d mentioned. He couldn’t complain about
his financial situation; he had inherited his parents’ mortgage-free
house and everything that they had managed to scrape together in the course of
their lives, for the most part unconditionally, if you didn’t count that
wretched inheritance tax. The additional compensation would just be the
icing on a delicious cake that had pretty much landed in his lap. Nevertheless,
he decided not to call. She would probably start talking about Alda and he
didn’t want to hear it right now. He’d gladly never hear her name
again, especially right now. He didn’t want to think about what had
happened when they’d met. Nor did he want to have to explain to his
lawyer that Alda would not be testifying for him as they had been hoping.
Not a hope in hell of that, now.

‘Tomorrow,’ replied Thóra,
in answer to her daughter’s usual question: When are you coming home?
‘Early, in fact.
Probably before
lunch.’

‘Good,’ said Sóley,
happily. She dropped her voice to a whisper, so Thóra had to strain to
hear her. ‘Grandma’s making those disgusting meatballs wrapped in
leaves.’

‘Aha,’ said Thóra, smiling
to
herself
. Cabbage-balls hadn’t been her
favourite either when she was Sóley’s age. ‘I’ll make
you something for lunch. Don’t worry.’ She said goodbye to her
daughter, who told her that Gylfi wanted to talk to her. Her son’s husky
voice took over.

‘Can you find me a place to stay in the
Islands for the festival?’ he said, without saying hello or wasting time
on small talk. Ah, the August Bank Holiday festival, thought Thóra.
She’d forgotten that was coming up. The Westmann Islands were famous for
it. ‘Everything’s fully booked and I can’t stay in a tent
with Sigga and Orri,’ he went on.

‘I would have thought the main obstacle
to staying in a tent would have been you,’ replied Thóra. Gylfi
was hardly an outdoors man. ‘And it’s out of the question that you
take the baby to the festival with you. He’s far too little.’ She
looked up at the ceiling. ‘In fact, you’re too young
yourselves.’ It was extremely unfortunate that the human body matured so
early. It had no doubt been a benefit when people died around thirty, but it
was absurd for longer lifespans. ‘It’s a bad idea for you to come
here.’

‘I thought maybe you’d come with
us,’ said Gylfi quickly. ‘We could rent an apartment for all of us
to stay in, including Sóley. Then you could look after Orri if Sigga and
I need to go off somewhere, food shopping or whatever.’

At first Thóra was amazed and pleased
to hear that Gylfi wanted to have her with them, but then the penny dropped.
She was supposed to pay to rent an apartment, do the cooking and cleaning and
take care of Orri as well. She had to hand it to Gylfi: she could hardly say
he’d been sneaky about it. He’d
got
straight to the point, at least, which was a definite plus. ‘I’ll
see what I can do, but I think it’s pretty much impossible to find
an apartment here now,’ said Thóra after thinking for a moment.
She could think of far worse things than a little holiday with her children for
the Bank Holiday weekend. Mind you, she was pretty sure she wouldn’t have
been invited to go with Gylfi and Sigga if they hadn’t had the baby.

‘Awesome,’ said Gylfi.
‘Check on a flight for us too,’ he added, as a parting shot.
‘It looks like they’re all booked too.’

Thóra rolled her eyes and said
goodbye. In the wake of this call she made several unsuccessful attempts to
find accommodation for the weekend in question. She was in her hotel room,
so she started by ringing reception in the hope that two rooms might be free.
Her question was actually met with laughter, and the same occurred when she
tried other accommodation in the Islands. One woman who ran a guesthouse
felt sorry for her and offered to check on whether there were still any
apartments open. There were always people willing to rent their apartments that
weekend, to families rather than groups of teenagers. She took down
Thóra’s number but told her not to get her hopes up. Thóra
didn’t feel like checking on flights or sea crossings until it was clear
they could get accommodation. It wasn’t much good being able to come to
the festival if they’d be out on the street. She was getting ready to go
down to meet Bella for something to eat when the phone rang again. It was
Matthew. His voice sounded cheerful even though he hadn’t yet decided
whether he would take the job in Iceland. Reading between the lines,
Thóra thought he was waiting to see if she would make his decision
easier: he would come if she encouraged him, but would stay put if she
indicated that she would rather he didn’t.

He seemed to have resolved not to discuss his
decision, although it made conversation embarrassing and awkward. She wanted
him to come, but was nervous about how it would go if their interest in each
other started to dwindle over time. She decided to change the subject so that
there would be no danger of her giving in and asking him to take the job.
‘Why would you cut someone’s genitals off and stuff them in their
mouth?’ was the only thing that she could think of saying. The part of
the autopsy report concerned with the head was preoccupying her. It had stated
that the mouth of the severed head had contained a man’s reproductive
organ, likely from the same person. That was the unexpected element Gudni had
hinted at.

There was a long silence at the other end of
the phone.

Finally Matthew spoke: ‘I’m just
wondering what it
is
you wanted to say, whether
I’ve misunderstood. I can’t come up with anything, so I’m
starting to think I didn’t mishear you at all.’

‘No,’ said Thóra.
‘You didn’t mishear me. At the moment I’m working on a case
that concerns, among other things, a head in that very same condition.’

‘A head?’ said Matthew, clearly
baffled. ‘I see you haven’t yet switched over to divorce cases,
like you were thinking of doing. Or is this one of them?’

‘I wish I knew whose head it
was,’ replied Thóra sadly, before running through the case swiftly
with him. When she had finished she repeated her original question. ‘If I
knew what would drive a murderer to do such a thing, perhaps I could narrow
down the number of possible suspects.’

‘It sounds to me as if this case is one
of those that will never be solved,’ said Matthew, tacitly declining to
discuss the mutilation. ‘So much time has passed that I doubt
you’ll get anywhere.’

‘That would be bad news for my
client,’ said Thóra. ‘He doesn’t want this allegation
hanging over his head for the rest of his life, which is what might happen if
the truth doesn’t come out.’ She paused before adding: ‘I
mean
,
it’s the best he could hope for in the
event that the guilty party isn’t found.

He could very well be charged or sentenced.
For the moment there are no other suspects and this investigation has all the
makings of a media circus. It’s not the kind of case that brings out the
best in the police or the justice system
.‘

‘You take on the strangest jobs,’
said Matthew. ‘Is that deliberate?’

‘No, far from it,’ said
Thóra emphatically. ‘At least I have to believe it’s not. I
didn’t go searching for the man. When I took this case on I expected the
worst, but not that heads would roll, literally…’ She exhaled.
‘But you haven’t answered my question about the way this head has
been treated. Have you ever heard of such a thing?’

‘Well, I’m no expert,’
replied Matthew, and Thóra could hear his voice taking on a more serious
tone. ‘But of course I’ve heard and read about similar
cases.’

‘Of course,’ said Thóra.
‘It happens all the time, silly me.’

Matthew sounded insulted. ‘You know
what I mean. These things aren’t unheard of in wartime; in fact I
wouldn’t be surprised if it happened in prehistoric times. Its purpose is
almost certainly to deprive the victim of his
masculinity,
and at the same time to display the perpetrator’s revulsion towards the
individual in question. The Mafia also used to do it to traitors.’

Thóra raised a sarcastic eyebrow,
although Matthew couldn’t see her. ‘I doubt the Mafia had anything
to do with this. This is a small community dependent on fishing, with little to
interest the Mafia.’

‘I imagine there’s a harbour
there?’

‘Yes, as a matter of fact there is, but
I still don’t think this has anything to do with the Mafia,’ said
Thóra confidently. She had seen photos of the Westmann Islands taken
around the time of the disaster, and cigar-wielding Mafiosi in suits would have
fitted into them about as naturally as astronauts in full spacesuits.
‘True, the Cod War between Iceland and Britain was in full swing at the
time, but it wasn’t a war in the usual sense, so this is unlikely to be
related to any battle.’

‘I think this type of treatment also
occurs in hate crimes, when people are killed because of their race, religion
or sexual preference. Would that fit?’

‘I don’t know, damn it,’
replied Thóra. ‘The bodies haven’t been identified, which
makes the case impossible. Hopefully that will be resolved soon, since
I’m sort of stranded here until I know more.’

‘I know this much, Thóra,’
sighed Matthew, ‘what this person has done displays enormous hatred,
spite and cruelty. If whoever did it is still alive, I don’t like the
look of this. They won’t be too happy about people digging around in the
past.’

Thóra tried to lighten the mood.
‘Ah, bless you. The culprit is either six feet under or a senior citizen.
I don’t think I’m in any danger.’

Matthew was silent for a moment. ‘You
can’t grow out of hatred. Not that kind of hatred, Thóra. You
should watch your step.’

After the phone call she sat for a
moment, staring into nothing. She tried to imagine herself cutting off a
man’s penis and putting it in his mouth, but she couldn’t. She
realized that there was a lot of truth in what Matthew had said. This crime
showed unbelievable hatred; the kind of hatred only possible in someone who no
longer held company with civilized men. But what could cause that?

Wednesday 18 July
2007

There was no one in reception when
Thóra came to return the keys. Bella was nowhere to be seen, so she sent
her a text message telling her she ought to hurry if they wanted to catch the
plane. Thóra had no interest in missing the morning flight and having to
wait until evening for another, since there was so much waiting for her at home
and at work. She threw her key forcefully onto the table in the hope that the
receptionist would hear her, but in vain. Spying an old-fashioned bell, she
rang it loudly. It didn’t take long for the young woman who seemed to be
on duty at the reception desk round the clock to appear with a smile on her
lips and check Thóra out. However, there was still no sign of Bella. Had
she perhaps gone out again last night, and was still asleep next to some random
sailor? Looking at her watch Thóra saw that there was no reason to panic
yet, so she plonked herself down in an easy chair and grabbed some newspapers.
They turned out to be from the day before, but that was good enough for her.

After a while Alda’s
sister
 Jóhanna
walked into the hotel lobby and came over.
Thóra quickly put down the paper she was reading and greeted her.

‘Oh, good,’
said
 Jóhanna
as she shook Thóra’s hand loosely,
trying to catch her breath. ‘I was so sure I’d missed you.
You’re taking the morning flight, aren’t you?’

‘Yes,’ replied Thóra,
looking over at the clock again. ‘The girl who’s with me is a bit
late.
Luckily, because otherwise I’d be at the
airport.’
She smiled
at  Jóhanna
.
‘Did you want to talk about something in particular?’

‘I found something last night. After
talking to you I started to think about Alda and what you said about the bodies
in the basement. If my sister was murdered then I want to help in any way I
can.’ She lifted a plastic bag that she’d brought with her and held
it out towards Thóra. ‘That’s why I went looking for these.
I want you to see them.’

Thóra looked down at the bag,
surprised. She took it
from  Jóhanna
.
‘What are they?’

 Jóhanna looked apologetic and
rubbed at her chin. ‘Alda always kept diaries and I knew they were kept
in storage, with other things, at Mother and Father’s. Our house was one
of those that wasn’t buried completely and was dug up later. After Father
died, Mother put the house up for sale, but no one was interested. I helped her
go through stuff and throw some of it out, so the house could be shown without
her feeling ashamed of all the junk in the basement and the garage. I found
these among some of Alda’s things that she left behind in the evacuation.
I was going to bring the diaries to our meeting last weekend.’ She smiled
apologetically. ‘Mother is in Reykjavik because of Alda’s death,
and she doesn’t know I took them. I’m not sure she’d remember
them, in all honesty.’