Cold Comfort (38 page)

“I’m sorry. We can talk in my office,” he said apologetically, leaving his wife mouthing impotently in the middle of a bitter whispered tirade. Gunna was struck by how drawn the man appeared, with black bags under his eyes and a look of not having slept for many nights.

He ushered them into a small room and stood behind the door as Helgi sat on the small sofa against one wall and Gunna took the deep leather chair by the desk.

“I’m sorry,” Bjarki apologized, gesturing at the door. “Kristrún will listen …”

“We can take this to the station if that’s a problem.”

“No, no,” Bjarki protested with fright in his eyes.

“On the eleventh, the day that Svana Geirs was murdered, you stated that you were with her all morning.”

“Until soon after eleven. I don’t remember exactly when I left,” he said guardedly, then jumped as Helgi’s phone rang.

“Yup?” Helgi answered and listened. “OK, mate. That’s great. Yeah, you’d best tell her yourself.”

He handed the phone to Gunna. “Eiríkur for you, chief.”

“Any luck?” Gunna asked sharply.

“Oh yeah, chief. Jónas Valur had lunch at City Café. I got the manager to go through a stack of receipts and there it was. He has a tab there, pays once a month, lunch for two on the eleventh, clear as day. He definitely left the office that morning and the manager confirmed having seen him there.”

“Good. Doesn’t tell us much other than that he’s lying,” Gunna said. “Yeah, but that’s not all, chief,” Eiríkur went on.

Gunna listened, before handing the phone back to Helgi. She looked up at Bjarki as he hovered by the door.

“So what did the Svana Syndicate have to discuss on the evening before Svana died?”

“What do you mean?”

“You all had dinner together at City Café, you, Jónas Valur and Hallur, the night before her death. The only one missing, it seems, was Bjartmar Arnarson, leaving the three of you to talk something over, as you were there until close to midnight.”

“He was in America,” Bjarki said, a look of misery on his pale face as he leaned back on the door.

Suddenly he lurched forward as the door opened and his wife appeared.

“D’you want coffee?” she demanded.

“No, Kristrún, of course not. We won’t be long, dear,” he added, flustered.

“Actually, I’d like a cup if you’re making some,” Gunna said with a sly smile. “You too, eh, Helgi?”

“Yeah, definitely, chief.”

With a look of fury, the woman departed to make the coffee that she had been certain nobody would want.

“Right. You have two minutes while your wife’s not listening at the door. Talk,” Gunna instructed.

“Svana had called us all. She said that she didn’t want to continue with the syndicate any longer as she was going to be back on TV. I was … upset, to say the least. The others didn’t seem too concerned, except Hallur. He was furious.”

“Why?”

“Svana told me that someone had been pestering her, someone who clearly knew about the … the arrangement.” He gulped. “I told Hallur and he went wild.”

Gunna looked at Bjarki expectantly.

“We were all terrified of publicity. Well, Hallur and I, at any rate. I can’t deny that … my wife …” He left the sentence unfinished. “Jónas Valur was almost amused, I think. He seemed to think that Svana was spinning us a yarn.”

“In what way?”

“He’s very shrewd and can be extremely suspicious. He seemed to think that Svana was looking for a payout.”

“Blackmailing you all?”

Bjarki blanched. “That’s an ugly word.”

“So is murder,” Gunna reminded him. “And Bjartmar?”

“I didn’t speak to him myself, but Jónas Valur had called him earlier in the day. He said that Bjartmar’s marriage was a wreck anyway, so he wasn’t concerned on that score, but if we wanted to split the price of her silence four ways, such as the flat she was living in, that was fine with him. That was the message, anyway.”

“So the ones with something to lose were you and Hallur?” Bjarki nodded miserably.

“Coffee!” called an angry voice beyond the door.

“Yes, dear,” Bjarki replied.

“Make it quick, before she comes to get you,” Gunna growled.

“If the story came out, it would wreck my marriage,” Bjarki said with wide eyes. “My wife … her social position, you understand …”

“Yes. Go on. And Hallur?”

“God, it would destroy his career. He’s always had ambitions, but he was fishing for something higher up the ladder and would probably have got it fairly soon.”

“Until he wound up in intensive care.”

“What … ?” Bjarki Steinsson’s eyes reminded Gunna of saucers. “On the news they said he’d been in an accident, and I couldn’t get through to Helena Rós last night. You mean … ? Will he be all right?”

“Who knows? What happened? What did you decide between yourselves?”

“We tried to talk it through with Jónas Valur, but he’d had a few drinks by then. Hallur was beside himself, asked what the hell they could do to keep Svana quiet, and he pressed Jónas Valur harder than I would have done, asking whether she would keep quiet even if she’d been paid off, whether the whole thing would start up again next time she ran out of money.”

“And?”

“Jónas Valur said we could …” He hesitated and looked up. “We could all start screwing her again if she hadn’t got too slack by then,” he quoted in a clear voice. “Hallur was beside himself, said that it was all right for the rest of us, but it was different for him with a career ahead of him to think about.

So Jónas Valur just said, ‘Well you’d better sort it out then.’ That was it. He left. I saw him sign the chit at the bar and that was it, the last I saw of him.”

“So who killed Svana Geirs?” Gunna asked, staring straight at him.

“I don’t know,” he whispered almost soundlessly as a tear threatened to overflow the corner of one eye.

T
O
B
JARKI
S
TEINSSON’S
dismay, the dining table’s deep shine had been covered by a cloth, on which were arranged plates of cakes and biscuits, cups and little jugs of cream and milk.

“Please, now you’ll have to stay for a while,” he whispered to Gunna, staring at the table. She saw Helgi’s eyes light up and her heart softened.

“Certainly. Actually, there’s another matter I wanted to speak to you about,” she said, settling herself in one of the matching high-backed chairs as Bjarki Steinsson’s wife poured coffee into dainty cups and Helgi filled a delicate-looking plate with slices of cake.

“What’s that?” Bjarki asked, still blank-eyed after the conversation in his office.

“Kleifaberg. You did the accounts for Kleifaberg?”

“You mean Kleifar, Jónas Valur’s company?”

“No,” Gunna corrected, sipping the aromatic coffee and nodding her thanks to Bjarki’s wife, off whom anger still coming in waves. “The company that Jónas Valur, Bjartmar Arnarson and Sindri Valsson ran between them until a few years ago.”

“Oh, Kleifaberg,” Bjarki said, as if a ghost had come back to haunt him. “Yes. We prepared their accounts for several years.”

“Good. What really went on there? They bought property, developed it and it sold. Nothing unusual about that. But as far as I can make out, the real profits came from buying some plum sites at extremely low prices.”

“Yes …?” he said uncertainly. “I really think you’d have to speak to them about that.”

“Bjartmar is dead, Sindri Valsson has disappeared somewhere in southern Europe and Jónas Valur is far from inclined to be co-operative right now. Off the record, I’d like you to tell me what went on. It would be, let’s say, helpful on your part.”

“Strictly off the record?”

Gunna nodded and sipped while Helgi popped another delicate biscuit into his mouth and smiled his appreciation.

“Well,” Bjarki sighed. “It was one of those things that wasn’t strictly speaking illegal, but …” He tailed off sadly.

“Less than ethical?” Gunna finished for him, and watched him nod in glum agreement.

“Hallur was on a lot of committees and he made sure some sales of land went through quietly to Kleifaberg without being discussed or advertised. Like I said, it wasn’t illegal, but it wasn’t exactly acceptable either. Kleifaberg developed some sites themselves with housing complexes, and other parcels of land they just sold on after a while.”

“You did the accounting for this scam?”

“I don’t know if I’d call it a scam,” Bjarki said with the first sign of any kind of authority that Gunna had seen.

“What do you call it, then? What would the newspapers have called it if they had found out? What about Steindór Hjálmarsson?” she asked suddenly, and Helgi looked up quickly.

“Who?”

“Come on. A young man who was a bookkeeper at Kleifaberg. He died in 2000 after smelling a rat.”

“Oh, him. Very sad. Didn’t he get beaten up or something? It was a long time ago now.”

“It was sad. But he’s no less dead for it having been ten years ago.”

“I, er, I don’t know. It’s not something I could safely comment on.”

“I assume Kleifaberg made a considerable amount of money out of this,” Gunna said flatly, and Bjarki nodded.

“It was a highly profitable venture,” he said finally.

“Where did all the cash go?”

“That’s not for me to say.”

“We’re off the record, don’t forget. I know you did the tax returns for Jónas Valur and Bjartmar’s companies. So where did it go?”

Bjarki shrugged helplessly. “Abroad, mostly. Bjartmar was already running Landex, and a lot of his cash went into setting up Sandex in Spain. Sindri bought two hotels and a golf course in Portugal. It’s a delightful place. We’ve been there a couple of times,” he said wistfully, and then regretted his words.

“I hope you had a lovely time,” Gunna said acidly. “What I want to know is how Sindri Valsson was made aware that Steindór Hjálmarsson found out about this scam—because I have no doubt as to who battered him to death.”

“No? Surely not?”

“There’s enough evidence to make a case,” Gunna lied as Helgi coughed discreetly. “Maybe you weren’t aware of quite how ruthless these people are? Come on, Helgi, I think we’d better be on our way.”

Helgi dusted crumbs from the front of his jacket and rose unwillingly to his feet, taking a longing glance at a banana and chocolate cake on the table that he had already done some serious damage to.

“This was off the record, Bjarki,” Gunna warned him. “That goes for both of us, and there’s no need for you to pass any of this conversation on to Jónas Valur or anyone else, otherwise what you’ve told me might suddenly be on the record. Understood?”

“Understood,” the accountant said, looking miserably after them as they made for the door and he clicked it shut behind them.

“There’s a man who’s in the shit up to his neck,” Helgi said knowingly, as they heard the muffled sound through the heavy door of Bjarki Steinsson’s wife asking him questions of her own. “Where now, chief?”

T
HE DOCTOR ON
duty was a woman with greying roots and serious eyes behind unfashionable glasses in heavy frames.

“How’s the patient?” Gunna asked as she matched her pace to keep up with the striding doctor and Helgi scurried behind.

“As good as can be expected,” the doctor said, an answer that they both knew meant nothing. “But there’s something I really think you need to see.”

Hallur Hallbjörnsson lay in a pristine hospital bed. An oxygen feed was connected to a tube leading into one nostril, and his face appeared peaceful.

“Is he … ?” Gunna asked, but lapsed into silence as the doctor put a finger to her lips.

“He’s heavily sedated but may be able to hear us,” she murmured, beckoning Gunna closer and gently rolling Hallur’s head to one side to part the brown hair.

“See?”

A livid bruise was visible beneath the thick waves.

“This is recent? You mean he was smacked on the head?”

“Hit or fell,” the doctor said. “Could be either.”

Gunna stared at the discoloured bruise.

“That puts a whole new complexion on things,” she said. “You’re certain this happened prior to the incident in the car?”

The doctor folded Hallur’s hair back and stepped away, beckoning Gunna to follow.

“The question is, did it happen while he was being manhandled out of the car?” she said severely. “Because it certainly didn’t happen after he was brought in here.”

Gunna thought back frantically to the events outside Hallur’s house.

“I grabbed his jacket and pulled him out of the seat. When he was leaning half out of the car, I gripped him under the arms and hauled him out,” she said, half to herself and half to the doctor, putting out her arms to demonstrate. “I dragged him backwards away from the car and laid him down. No, he certainly didn’t receive a blow to the head then, I’m certain of that.”

The doctor nodded slowly. “In that case, I think you might have some investigation ahead of you, because with a blow to the head like that, it’s doubtful that he’d have been able to tie his own shoelaces, let alone rig up a car with a hosepipe and get in it.”

“Attempted murder, not suicide, then?”

“You’re the detective,” the doctor replied. “But it looks that way to me.”

G
ULLI ÓLAFS WA S
alone in the Verslun office, picking at a laptop with one hand and holding a sandwich in the other. “Busy?” Gunna enquired.

“Hell! You took me by surprise,” he said, his headjerking back as the sandwich dropped from his hand.

“Sorry. The door was open. Where’s the rest of the staff?”

“There’s some kind of team-building exercise going on for an hour or two. Rubbish, really, but I said I’d look after things to get out of going.”

“Sensible man,” Gunna said. “I won’t keep you. Which newspaper were you working on when Steindór came to you with the story you told me about the other day?”

“Dagurinn,” Gulli Ólafs answered. “My first proper job. It was very new then, back when it was a real newspaper and not a freebie propaganda sheet.”

“So who did you tell about the story?”

“The editor was Arnar Tómasson. He died a couple of years ago. He was getting on a bit and smoked like a chimney, so it wasn’t a surprise. I think he’d had three or four heart attacks already by then.”