Reykjavik Nights

30

The woman who had gone missing from Thórskaffi was called Oddný. She was thirty-four at the time. She was born in Reykjavík and had been brought up in the old Thingholt district. After finishing secondary school she had moved on to college but quit after a couple of years and took a job instead. Before becoming an estate agent she had worked in a variety of places, including the supermarket on Hafnarstræti where she met her future husband. He was studying business at the university but had taken a summer job there. They got married but didn’t have any children. After graduating he had been offered a position at the People’s Bank and later at a pension fund, and with their combined salaries they had been able to scrape together the money to build their own house in Fossvogur. They had moved in three years before Oddný vanished.

‘They both worked very hard, no question’ said the woman with a smile. ‘Pity they never had children. She wanted them so badly. Often talked about it. From what she said I gather they’d been for all kinds of tests but, well, I don’t know if I should be gossiping about this...’

‘What?’ asked Erlendur.

‘It’s just that she once hinted that the problem lay with him. At least that’s what she said. I don’t know if it’s true.’

Erlendur nodded. Behind the woman hung a large poster of central London and three clocks showing the time in Moscow, Paris and New York respectively. The woman worked for a large travel agency and sold tours all over the world. She had known Oddný from way back and later worked with her at the estate agency, but had been offered better pay and conditions in the travel business.

‘Actually, I got her the job at the estate agency,’ said the woman. ‘She was very good — had an amazing gift for talking to people and winning their trust.’

The woman, whose name was Ástrídur, was one of the chief witnesses. She had met up with her old work mates at Thórskaffi and was one of the last people to see Oddný alive. Erlendur had reread the case file, noting down the names of several witnesses and other people with some connection to the case. The inquiry was still ongoing, so Erlendur’s questions did not arouse suspicion; all he had to do was mention that he was from the police. There was no reason to treat it as a criminal investigation yet, but not everyone was satisfied with this.

Although Erlendur was not officially involved in the inquiry, he didn’t see why this should stop him conducting his own private investigation. Nor was he particularly concerned about how his superiors would react when they learned what he’d been up to. Anyone was free to gather information if they wanted to. Besides, he believed he was acting in Hannibal’s interests. If there was fallout, he would explain about the earring. Indeed, that was his plan, but first he wanted to try to establish whether Hannibal had played any part in the woman’s disappearance.

He wanted to avoid a situation where the press heard that the tramp had probably been the last person to see Oddný alive, and then printed a story about Hannibal being responsible for her death. Erlendur hoped to dispel any rumours of that kind but knew it would be difficult. He would not be able to hush up the discovery of the earring much longer. The moment he informed CID who it belonged to and where it was found, the case would be promoted from a missing-person inquiry to a full-blown murder investigation.

‘Did it affect their relationship?’ he asked now.

‘What?’

‘The fact they couldn’t have children.’

‘No, well, actually only the other day at our sewing circle we were discussing whether she had found herself a new lover. You hear so many stories — that sort of gossip’s always doing the rounds, you know what I mean? So I can’t vouch for it. I knew her very well and wasn’t aware of it, so... in my opinion it’s rubbish. But we were discussing whether he might have been the man she met at Thórskaffi that evening.’ Ástrídur lowered her voice. ‘The man in the drawing.’

Erlendur nodded again. Oddný’s family had commissioned an artist’s impression of one of the men at the nightclub, based on a description by her childhood friend, and circulated it to the papers and the television station. The friend in question had seen Oddný talking to the man just before she left. The picture had resulted in a few leads from the public, among them customers from Thórskaffi, but none of these could be substantiated.

‘It did emerge that she’d once been unfaithful to her husband,’ said Erlendur. ‘In connection with that drawing.’

‘Yes, that came out in one of the papers,’ said Ástrídur in disgust. ‘It’s terrible, printing something like that. Poor couple.’

‘The circumstances were similar. It seemed significant.’

‘Admittedly, she did meet that guy at a nightclub,’ said Ástrídur, ‘but it was the only time.’

Three years before her disappearance Oddný had slept with a man after meeting him at Rödull, a nightclub. After two or three more encounters she had decided to break it off, but the man didn’t want to let her go. Then Oddný’s husband had found out. He had gone berserk and threatened to leave her, but they had managed to sort it out and, as far as anyone knew, she had never met the man again.

‘Why did she have a fling?’ asked Erlendur.

‘Your guess is as good as mine,’ said Ástrídur. ‘The first I heard about it was when I read it in the papers.’

‘But you think she may have done it again — cheated on her husband?’

‘Well, it’s possible that the man she met in Thórskaffi wasn’t just a casual acquaintance. Maybe there was something more between them and they really did leave together. The girls in my sewing circle think it’s very strange that he’s never come forward.’

‘Was their marriage in trouble?’

‘For all I know, it was fine. At any rate, she didn’t complain to us. I get on all right with her husband. We sometimes take our partners along when we go out together, and he was always very nice. He doesn’t come out any more, though. We’ve invited him but he... naturally he’s been going through a very tough time and...’

‘What?’

‘Oh, just, I think he’s coped really well, considering.’

‘Does he still live alone?’

‘I believe so. As far as I know. For the moment, anyway. But life goes on.’

‘Yes,’ said Erlendur, looking up at the large poster of London behind her. ‘I suppose it does.’