Strange Shores

7

Erlendur found Ezra outside in a shed that stood diagonally down the slope from his house. After knocking in vain at his front door, Erlendur had followed the sound of hammering to a ramshackle shelter with slatted sides, built from offcuts of timber and corrugated iron. The door, from which hung a piece of string to fasten it, was standing ajar when Erlendur approached, revealing a bowed figure sitting on a stool with a heavy mallet in his hand. Ezra had placed a fillet of dried haddock, or hardfiskur, on a grimy stone slab and, holding it by the tail, was beating it rhythmically to tenderise the flesh, sending up a puff of crumbs with each blow. The old man did not look up from his task or notice Erlendur, who waited in the doorway, watching him work. Drips kept forming at the end of Ezra’s nose and every now and then he wiped them away with the back of his hand. He was wearing woollen mittens with double thumbs, an oversized leather hat with ear flaps that covered his cheeks, brown overalls and a traditional Icelandic jumper. A straggly beard sprouted from his unshaven jowls and he was muttering under his breath through a swollen lower lip, scarred from an ancient injury. His eyebrows jutted in tufts over small, grey eyes that seemed to be perpetually watering. Ezra was certainly no looker: his face was abnormally wrinkled, with a massive, powerful chin and fleshy nose, yet he had obviously once been a man of presence.

When he finally took a rest from beating the fish, he glanced up and saw Erlendur standing in the doorway.

‘Have you come to buy hardfiskur?’ he asked in a hoarse, threadbare voice.

‘Have you got any to spare?’ Erlendur felt as if he had briefly stepped back into the nineteenth century.

‘Yes, a little,’ Ezra replied. ‘Some of this is headed for the shop but it’s cheaper to buy direct from me.’

‘Is it good?’ Erlendur asked, moving closer.

‘I should say so,’ said Ezra, his voice gaining strength. ‘You won’t find better anywhere in the East Fjords.’

‘You still use a mallet?’

‘For small quantities like this it’s not worth investing in machinery. Anyway, there’d be no point as I’m bound to kick the bucket any day now. I should have gone a long time ago.’

They agreed on an amount and exchanged small talk about the weather, the fishing season and, inevitably, the dam and smelter — a subject that clearly bored Ezra.

‘For all I care they can destroy the environment,’ he said.

Hrund had told Erlendur that Ezra had always been a recluse, never married or had children — at least not as far as she knew. He had lived in the village for longer than the oldest residents could remember, largely keeping himself to himself and respecting other people’s privacy. He had done a variety of jobs on land and sea, mostly working in solitary occupations. Recently he had slowed down a bit; it was unsurprising, given that he was nearly ninety. Well-meaning neighbours wanted him to go into a home but he was having none of it. Ezra had no qualms about discussing his imminent death with all and sundry, and gave the impression that he looked forward to meeting his end. He had been trotting out the same old excuse for putting things off for years — that he would die soon, so it would all be a waste of time. Hrund said it was the oddest form of apathy she had ever come across.

Erlendur gradually steered the conversation round to tales of ordeals in the wilderness as Ezra resumed his pounding of the hardfiskur.

‘I’ve been doing a bit of research into stories about people who’ve got into difficulties in the mountains around here.’

‘Oh yes?’ said Ezra. ‘Are you a historian?’

‘No, it’s just a hobby really,’ Erlendur replied. ‘I was reading about the British servicemen who were planning to cross the Hraevarskörd Pass. I suppose that would be, what, more than sixty years ago now?’

‘I remember it well,’ said Ezra. ‘I met some of them. Fine lads. They got caught in a freak storm. Some of them died but they were all found in the end, dead or alive. Which is not always the case, I can tell you.’

Erlendur agreed.

Ezra touched his mitten to his nose and asked if Erlendur would like a coffee while they were settling up. Erlendur thanked him and they went up to the house and into the kitchen where Ezra put on an old percolator that belched and hissed but produced good, strong coffee. The kitchen was neat and tidy, with an old-fashioned fridge and an even more ancient Rafha cooker. From the window the head of the fjord and the brooding swell of Eskifjördur Moor were visible. Ezra fetched two cups and poured the coffee, dropping four sugar lumps into his, then offering the bowl to Erlendur who declined. After they had talked about the tragedy of the British soldiers, the conversation moved on to the young woman who had disappeared the same night.

‘That’s right,’ Ezra said with slow deliberation. ‘Her name was Matthildur.’

‘I gather you were friends with her husband, Jakob.’

‘Yes, we knocked around together. In those days.’

‘So you knew her too, you knew both of them?’

‘I did indeed.’

‘Did they have a good marriage?’

Ezra had been methodically stirring his coffee but now he stopped, tapped his spoon several times against the cup and laid it on the table. ‘I’m not the first person you’ve discussed this with, am I?’

‘No,’ Erlendur admitted.

‘Who did you say you were again?’

Erlendur had not introduced himself but did so now, explaining that he lived in Reykjavík but had been born here and had a special interest in stories of people who got lost in the wilderness and died of exposure, especially people who were never found and whose fates remained a mystery. When Ezra grasped that his visitor had local roots, he immediately wanted to know where Erlendur had lived and the names of his parents. Erlendur duly gave them and Ezra said he certainly recalled Sveinn and Áslaug from the tenant croft which had always been known as Bakkasel.

‘Well, you know all about me then,’ said Erlendur. ‘So, what can you tell me about Matthildur?’

‘They had to move,’ Ezra said, leaning forward over the kitchen table. ‘Sveinn and Áslaug. They couldn’t face staying on in the shadow of the moors. Not after all that. I gather you come here from time to time and go walking up there.’

‘That’s right,’ said Erlendur. ‘I’ve made several visits.’

‘They’re both buried here in the churchyard, aren’t they? Your parents?’

‘Yes.’

‘Fine, upstanding people,’ the old man remarked, sipping his coffee. ‘Good people. He taught music at the school — occasionally, anyway, if I’m not mistaken. Played the fiddle too. Dreadful what happened. Someone said you’d become a policeman in Reykjavík. Is that why you’re asking about Matthildur?’

‘No,’ said Erlendur. ‘I’m just curious on my own behalf. I’m interested in that sort of case.’

Ezra sat lost in thought, his eyes on the distant moor. It was still cloaked in the same cloud as when Erlendur had arrived several days earlier, having driven the entire journey from Reykjavík non-stop. He had felt the urge to head out east that autumn after reaching a dead end in his investigation of the alleged suicide of a woman at Thingvellir. The case had hinged on hypothermia and this had had the odd effect of stirring up memories of his brother perishing in the mountains above Eskifjördur.

‘Jakob wasn’t quite what he seemed,’ Ezra said at last. ‘I don’t judge people. I’m in no position to — I’m far from perfect myself. But Jakob had some quality that put people on their guard. I wouldn’t call it dishonesty, exactly, but he was a tricky customer. And people sensed it. They all knew him. But then everybody knows everyone else around here. I suppose Reykjavík’s grown so big you don’t even know your own neighbours.’

Erlendur nodded.

‘Over the years all sorts of rumours circulated,’ Ezra continued. ‘That he’d thrown her out of the house, driven her away and so on. You’ll have heard them, of course.’

‘Some.’

‘Then he drowned in the fjord here and that was that. He didn’t marry again after Matthildur died. Took to drink and let himself go to seed. Then he had the accident — his vessel went down. They managed to drag Jakob and the other man ashore but the boat was smashed to pieces.’

‘And that was here in Eskifjördur?’

‘Over on the other side of the fjord, there. They were coming home in a terrible gale and the boat capsized. It was the middle of winter.’

‘Tell me one thing — is it possible that someone didn’t want Matthildur to be found?’

‘I expect you’d have a better idea about that than me,’ Ezra said, regarding him with small, watery eyes.

Erlendur smiled suddenly. ‘What did people guess had happened?’

‘They didn’t have far to look for an explanation. The rivers were running high — both branches of the Thverá — and the Eskifjördur River had turned into a raging torrent. It’s possible she was washed away. Maybe you know that one of the British soldiers was found in the sea after being carried downstream. They only discovered his body by chance.’

‘Yes.’

‘I suppose she must have gone the same way,’ Ezra said, his eyes wet. ‘It seems the most likely explanation to me.’