66 Degrees North

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

AS FRIKKI DROVE along the busy Miklabraut his heart was singing. He and Magda had taken the bus back from the airport to Reykjavík, and another out to Breidholt, and then they had spent the afternoon in bed, screwing. Seeing the sun outside, Magda had said why don’t they go down to the Grótta beach on Seltjarnarnes to walk and see the sunset? It was something they used to do after their shifts at the hotel. Frikki wasn’t going to argue, and his mate Gunni had lent him his car.

Frikki glanced across at Magda. She was glowing. She always glowed. She always had this incredible goodness about her, like she was always looking on the bright side, everything was wonderful, everyone was a good person, he was a good person. And he could tell that today she was really happy. She had put on a little weight, she was always soft and round and cuddly and now she was softer and rounder, but he didn’t care. She had got herself a job in a hotel in Warsaw. A bloody miracle when there were all those other Poles coming back from hotels all over Western Europe. Except it wasn’t really a miracle. Any hotel manager would be able to tell what an amazing girl she was.

Frikki already felt a better person, and she had only been with him for a few hours. If only she could stay; her strength would rub off on him. He was a fucking good cook, none of his bosses could deny that, and with Magda around employers would give him the chance to prove it. But she was staying one week, that was all. He was determined to enjoy every second of it.

Magda smiled as she caught him glancing at her, and put her hand on his thigh as he was driving. ‘Do you remember that bakery in Seltjarnarnes? The one with those delicious strawberry pastry things?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Can we stop there on the way? We might get there just before it closes.’

Once again, Frikki wasn’t going to argue. Ten minutes later he pulled up on Nordurströnd, and they both went inside the warm shop. Magda let out a little squeal of delight when she spotted the only two strawberry delicacies still left, and Frikki asked the woman behind the counter how much they were.

Then he froze. As did the woman.

‘Hello,’ she said.

‘Hello,’ said Frikki.

‘You remember me?’

‘Yes.’

The woman smiled nervously. ‘How are you doing?’

‘All right,’ said Frikki. ‘Still haven’t found a job.’

‘As you can see, I have,’ said the woman. ‘Took a while though. Have you seen any of our friends?’

‘No,’ said Frikki. ‘And you?’

‘I see Björn every now and then. I’ve had people stop by asking me questions recently.’

‘The police?’ Frikki asked in a low voice and with a glance towards Magda, who seemed preoccupied with the cakes.

‘Yes. Don’t worry, I haven’t told them anything. They don’t know anything about you, do they?’

‘No, I don’t think so,’ said Frikki. ‘I’ve never spoken to them.’

‘Good.’ The woman smiled. ‘Let’s hope it stays that way. That will be four hundred and fifty krónur.’

Frikki handed her the money. ‘Nice to see you,’ he said.

‘And you.’

‘Who was that?’ Magda asked as they left the bakery. Frikki and she spoke a mixture of English and Icelandic to each other, and Magda could understand Icelandic reasonably well. ‘You Icelanders never introduce people!’

‘Sorry. It’s a woman I met last winter during the protests. I haven’t seen her since then. Her name is Harpa.’

‘What was that about the police?’ Magda asked.

‘Nothing,’ Frikki said.

‘What do you mean, “nothing”?’ Magda said. ‘I could see it was something.’

Frikki hesitated. A dozen different stories flashed across his brain, but he didn’t want to lie to Magda. Then again, he didn’t want to tell her the truth either.

‘There was some trouble after the demonstrations. The police asked some questions.’

‘What kind of questions?’

‘I don’t want to talk about it, Magda,’ Frikki said.

‘OK,’ Magda shrugged, although Frikki could tell she wasn’t happy. They got into the car. ‘Let’s go. And I will try to save this pastry for when we get to the beach.’

On the long drive back to Reykjavík Magnus thought about what Unnur had said. She had been quite convincing that his grandfather was actually glad that Ragnar had been caught in an affair with her. Yet there was no doubt that Hallgrímur must have disliked Ragnar intensely.

Could his grandfather really be responsible for his father’s death?

Hallgrímur would have been in his sixties when Ragnar was stabbed in Duxbury. Magnus knew he was still farming actively at that age, and he would have been fit and strong enough to stab Ragnar. Especially in the back. The medical examiner’s report was etched on Magnus’s brain. The first stab wound was probably taken in the back, with the two subsequent ones in the chest, after Ragnar had fallen. This, together with the lack of any sign of a break-in, suggested that Ragnar had not felt threatened by whoever had called on him that day. It also meant that the murderer did not have to be big and strong enough to overcome him.

Stabbed in the back. Yes, Magnus could imagine Hallgrímur stabbing someone in the back.

But was Hallgrímur in the United States at the time? Magnus had never checked on that specific point. His grandfather seemed embedded in Bjarnarhöfn, part of the soil. Magnus could scarcely imagine him travelling as far as Reykjavík, let alone Boston. When he had visited Iceland himself just after his father’s death, there had been no mention of any travel to America. That was something he would have to check up on. Since 2001 he was sure US Immigration records would show everyone who had come into the country. But Ragnar was killed in 1996.

There should be a way of checking it out.

It didn’t quite feel right, though. Magnus knew that Hallgrímur was a cruel and vindictive man. For that reason he could imagine the pleasure that the old man would have felt at the discovery of Ragnar’s affair, even if it hurt his daughter. It was true that when his father had come back to Iceland to retrieve Magnus and Óli, the two men had had almighty rows; in the heat of the moment Magnus could just about imagine Hallgrímur killing his father then.

But eight years later? It didn’t feel right.

The key thing would be to figure out whether Hallgrímur was in the States at the time. If he was, that would be pretty conclusive.

But Magnus had the strong feeling he was heading up yet another blind alley. A blind alley with his grandfather at the end of it.

His spirits lifted as he drove south. The sun was setting to the west, burnishing the endless silver flatness of the Atlantic. The hillsides glowed. As he emerged from the tunnel under the Hvalfjördur, with Mount Esja looming above him, his phone rang.

‘Magnus?’

‘Yes?’

‘It’s Sharon Piper.’

Magnus could detect the excitement in her voice.

‘Hi, Sharon, did you get back OK?’

‘I went straight into the station. I’ve been checking the interview notes. You remember Óskar had a Venezuelan girlfriend, Claudia Pamplona-Rodríguez?’

‘Yes.’

‘When she was interviewed, she mentioned a woman coming around to the house in Kensington once over the summer. She thinks some time in July. An Icelandic woman. She wanted to speak to Óskar in private, so they went into the living room with the door shut. It only took about a quarter of an hour. Afterwards the woman came out looking angry and left. Óskar didn’t seem too bothered.’

‘Let me guess. The woman was tall and thin with dark curly hair?’

‘You’ve got it. In her thirties. Quite attractive. Or attractive enough for Claudia to be suspicious.’

‘You don’t have a photo of Harpa, do you?’

‘No, but if you send me one I can get Claudia to ID her.’