The Polar Bear Killing

Chapter two

It was a long journey from Reykjavík to Raufarhöfn and Detective Vigdís Audardóttir had decided to drive the whole way, taking the northern route via Akureyri and Húsavík. She had left before breakfast and it was now mid-afternoon. Raufarhöfn was in the far north-east of the country, and the last stretch of road there hugged the north coast to a point a kilometre south of the Arctic Circle. To her left the sea was a ruffled greyish blue; to her right the land was a ruffled brownish green. Farms were few and far between. It was a fine day; the sun shone down a weak yellow on the eerie remoteness of the Melrakkaslétta.

She couldn’t see any foxes, but the seashore and the lakes were teeming with bird life of all shapes and sizes. The area was an important hub in the transatlantic aerial migration network.

She felt alone. She felt good.

When Inspector Baldur, the head of the Violent Crimes Unit, had asked for volunteers to travel to Raufarhöfn to help out with a murder investigation, she had jumped at the chance to get out of Reykjavík. For once she could afford to leave her alcoholic mother for a couple of weeks. Vigdís knew she should be visiting her, but she wanted to get away from the constant reminder that she had failed in keeping her mother off the booze, and the growing realization that she would always fail: that whatever rehab programmes she went on, however much money Vigdís spent, her mother Audur would always come back to the drink.

At least her mother was somewhere safe now. Somewhere she couldn’t get hold of a drink. Somewhere where if she hit someone, it was someone else’s problem.

Vigdís’s mother was in prison.

She had struck one of her boyfriends too hard over the head with a candlestick during a drunken fight. The boyfriend had ended up unconscious and in hospital, and yes he did want to press charges. So Audur was spending two months in prison.

But Vigdís wasn’t just running away from the unsolvable problem of her mother. She was also running away from her boss, Sergeant Magnús Ragnarsson.

She turned a corner around a headland and Raufarhöfn came into sight. A classic Icelandic church with white walls and a red metal roof stood by the sheltered harbour, behind which disused fish factories and a ribbon of houses ran along the main road. Raufarhöfn had been a boom town in the 1960s when herring had been harvested from the surrounding seas, but with the disappearance of the herring the town had shrunk, leaving abandoned fish-processing plants and houses, and an oversized graveyard of white dots behind a white wooden fence on a hillside overlooking the town. The Arctic Henge guarded the town from its little citadel on another hill, oddly modern, like a screenshot from a fantasy computer game, especially when compared to the run-down twentieth-century decay of the town itself.

After the peace of the desolate drive, Vigdís steeled herself for the hurly-burly of a murder investigation. Raufarhöfn may be a sleepy little town, but Vigdís suspected that the murder of the local policeman had woken it up.

The police station was easy to find — a low white shed by the shore that looked more like a warehouse than a government building, with a number of police vehicles, marked and unmarked, outside it. Inside, half a dozen police officers from Húsavík and Akureyri milled about the two desks in the cramped quarters, as did two plain-clothes officers: Ólafur, the inspector who was head of CID in Akureyri, and Björn, one of his young detectives. Vigdís had worked with Björn on a case in Snaefellsnes. She hadn’t been impressed — his ambition exceeded his abilities. Ólafur she knew little about, having only met him a couple of times when he had visited police headquarters in Reykjavík.

They knew Vigdís. She was, after all, Iceland’s only black detective.

Ólafur had commandeered one of the two desks, so Vigdís took a collapsible chair opposite. The detective inspector was in his late thirties, lean, with buzz-cut black hair and small blue eyes under a frown that seemed to be permanent. Although Ólafur was significantly senior to Vigdís, Vigdís had more experience of murder investigations as part of the Violent Crimes Unit in the Metropolitan Police. There was just more crime in Reykjavík with its population of 180,000 people than in Akureyri, with 18,000.

‘Wasted your time, Vigdís,’ Ólafur said. ‘I called Baldur to send you back, but you were already at least halfway. Mind you, we will still need some help wrapping the case up, so you may as well stick around.’

‘You’ve made an arrest?’

‘Two,’ said the inspector. ‘Alex Einarsson, twenty-two, from Gardabaer, and Martin Fiedler, twenty-five, a German citizen from a place called Siegen. They are both extreme animal-rights activists who rushed here when they heard about the polar bear getting shot.’

‘Have they confessed?’

‘Not yet. I’ve interviewed Alex. A nasty piece of work. He denied shooting Halldór, but he said he was glad he had been killed. Said he deserved to die for shooting the polar bear.’ Ólafur’s voice was laden with contempt, a sentiment Vigdís shared.

‘Bastard.’

Ólafur glanced at her and nodded grimly.

‘We are waiting for an interpreter to interview the German. He doesn’t speak Icelandic, of course. She’s coming from Húsavík, so should be here soon.’ Húsavík was about an hour and a half away.

Vigdís nodded. The rules were that interviews with foreign nationals had to be conducted in Icelandic through official interpreters. Which was cumbersome since most police officers under the age of forty spoke fluent English, as did most foreign suspects.

Her colleagues disliked the regulation but it suited Vigdís, whose English was poor. In fact, she refused to speak the language.

‘What evidence do you have?’ she asked.

‘No direct evidence yet,’ said the inspector. ‘But the forensic team have arrived from Reykjavík and they are at the scene now. You may have seen it when you came into town — the Arctic Henge on the brow of a hill.’

‘I saw it,’ said Vigdís.

‘I’m sure they’ll find something.’

‘If you have no evidence, why have you arrested them?’ Vigdís asked.

‘Because they are the only people in town who could have shot Halldór.’

‘I don’t understand.’

‘This is a very small town. Halldór has been here for four years and he is well liked. There are a few people who thought he was a bit officious, but there was no scandal around him, no motive to kill him.’

‘How can you be sure?’ asked Vigdís.

‘He was shot through the eye. Four days ago, he shot a polar bear through the eye. You cannot tell me that is a coincidence. So we know the motive. And there were two foreigners who showed up in town who were very angry about the polar bear. This isn’t Reykjavík; we don’t have a couple of hundred thousand people to choose from. It can only be them.’

Vigdís really didn’t like the complacent Icelandic assumption that it must be the foreigners who had committed the crime, but in this case she had to admit it had some logic. They would need to find some real evidence, though, if they were going to keep the two men in custody for more than twenty-four hours.

‘When the interpreter comes do you want to join me interviewing the German? Good cop, bad cop?’ Ólafur smiled. ‘I’ll be the bad cop.’

There was a small interview room in the police station. In it were crammed Ólafur, Vigdís, the interpreter — who was a middle-aged schoolteacher from Húsavík named Sonja — and the suspect, Martin Fiedler. He had curly light brown hair, a neatly trimmed reddish beard and soft brown eyes. He seemed, to Vigdís, patient rather than angry.

Bad cop went first.

‘Did you shoot Constable Halldór?’ Ólafur asked in Icelandic. He then waited while the question was translated into English — Martin Fiedler had opted for that language rather than German. The interpreter spoke both.

‘No,’ he said calmly.

‘You are aware that he shot a polar bear through the eye four days ago?’

‘I’m aware of that,’ said Martin.

‘Do you approve of that?’

‘No. Not at all. I think it was totally unnecessary. The Icelandic government should have shot the bear with a dart gun and returned it to Greenland.’

‘All right. And do you think Constable Halldór deserved to die for killing the bear?’ The detective’s eyes were burning with anger.

‘Of course not,’ said Martin. ‘I don’t believe in violence against people any more than I believe in violence against animals. He should have been arrested for a criminal act and tried. But not shot. No.’

‘Your friend Alex said that he should have been shot.’

‘Well, Alex is wrong,’ said Martin. ‘But before you ask, Alex didn’t shoot the policeman.’

‘How do you know?’

‘Because he was with me all afternoon.’

‘And where was that?’

‘At the farm we were staying in. We returned from a drive along the shore at about lunchtime. We thought the young bear that had been shot may have been with its mother. But if it was, we didn’t find her. We were disappointed; we were supposed to fly back to Reykjavík the next day. So we hung out in our room for a couple of hours. Then, later on that afternoon, we saw the fog had cleared and so we decided to go up to the henge to see what we could see. That’s when we saw the body.’

‘But no one saw you at the farm?’

‘Apparently not. Gústi — that’s the farmer — was off somewhere, and so was his wife.’

Halldór had been found by the two men at six-thirty. Halldór had last been seen in town at four-thirty, heading north out of town in his car. During that two-hour break, the two men had no alibi apart from each other.

‘You have a criminal record, don’t you? Two months in jail in England last year for breaching the peace and assaulting a police officer during a protest at an animal-testing laboratory.’

‘I didn’t assault the police officer,’ said Martin, still calm. ‘But I didn’t defend myself. I wanted to go to jail.’

‘Why didn’t you defend yourself?’ said Ólafur.

The German smiled. ‘Solidarity with the cause. With the others who were arrested with me.’

‘So is that why you shot Constable Halldór? Solidarity?’

‘I didn’t shoot him,’ said Martin.

‘You did shoot him!’ said Ólafur. He stood up, leaned over the desk and began shouting. ‘You killed him because he shot the polar bear! That’s why you hit him through the eye, just like he shot the bear! Admit it!’

Vigdís watched her colleague getting nowhere. The German was remarkably self-possessed. Although he was in a foreign country and accused of such a serious crime, he seemed to be handling the situation very well. Part of the effect of Ólafur’s yelling was dispelled by Sonja’s careful translation, but the bad cop stuff wasn’t working.

Eventually Ólafur turned to Vigdís. It was her turn.

‘Why did you come to Iceland?’ she asked.

Martin turned towards her, his soft brown eyes assessing her. As always when people first met her, Vigdís could tell he was trying to decide what to make of her. No one knew what to make of a black Icelander, especially other Icelanders.

‘I heard about the polar bear shooting. Then I saw that there was a chance that there may be another bear at risk. I thought it would be cool to fly out here to try to save it.’

‘Heard? How did you hear?’

‘Online. A Facebook group. We keep one another informed about what’s going on.’

‘What’s going on?’

‘Cruelty to animals. Protests. Torture in labs. When people are needed to make a noise to help animals.’

‘What was the name of this group?’

Martin hesitated. ‘Animal Blood Watch,’ he said eventually.

‘And they told you about the polar bear?’

‘They asked for volunteers to come to Raufarhöfn. In the end it was just Alex and me. It’s a long way and it’s expensive.’

‘How did you afford it?’

‘I have some money. My father left me some when he died.’

Vigdís examined the German. He returned her gaze. He wasn’t afraid; more curious about her. She enjoyed talking to him, hearing his calm, considered replies. She hated the idea of shooting polar bears on sight as well. Other countries found ways of tranquilizing them — in Canada it was an offence to kill a polar bear, even if it was attacking you. If Martin Fiedler really had killed the police constable, then he deserved everything the Icelandic state could throw at him, but already Vigdís didn’t believe he had.

But she shouldn’t let her bias slant the investigation. She wondered what Magnus would do. Get as complete a statement as he could of everything the two men were doing, and then check it for holes — that would be his answer.

She looked at her notes. ‘When you say “hung out in our room”, what were you doing?’

For the first time, the German looked mildly embarrassed. ‘Alex was reading a book. And I was playing a computer game.’

‘What was the book?’ Vigdís asked.

‘Something about the Rainbow Warrior.’

‘And the computer game?’

Martin Fiedler looked uncomfortable. ‘Call of Duty,’ he admitted.

Ólafur leaped on it. ‘That’s a bit violent for someone who believes in peace and love and veggie burgers, isn’t it?’

Martin regained his composure. ‘It’s a cool game. I enjoy it.’

‘So people killing people is OK, but people killing animals isn’t?’ There was a note of triumph in Ólafur’s voice.

‘They are not real people, Inspector. It’s pixels killing pixels. I’m cool with that.’

Vigdís thought a moment. She had seen her colleagues playing Call of Duty at the station. ‘Who were you playing with? The computer?’

‘No. I was playing online,’ Martin said.

Vigdís made a note. Then she got Martin to take her through everything he had been doing since he arrived in Raufarhöfn, despite the frustration of her superior officer, who insisted on lobbing random accusations at Martin whenever he got bored.

Eventually they finished, and Martin Fiedler was taken back to one of the two police cells. They thanked the interpreter and asked her to stay in town overnight.

‘He’s a cool customer,’ said Ólafur.

‘He may be innocent,’ Vigdís said.

‘Of course he’s not innocent!’ said Ólafur. ‘In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if he did it rather than the Icelander. He’s much more calculating; much more dangerous.’

‘Well, we have a lot to check on,’ said Vigdís.

‘Let me see how forensics are getting on.’ Ólafur whipped out his phone and called Edda, the forensics team leader. It was still light and, at this time in May, it would be for a couple more hours.

Ólafur spoke to her briefly. ‘No luck yet,’ he said to Vigdís when he had finished the call. ‘I’m going for a run. Doing the Triathlon in Oslo in August. Do you run?’

‘No,’ said Vigdís, lying. The last thing she wanted to do was puff along beside the inspector for a few kilometres’ humiliation before he set off up a hill. ‘It was a long drive and a long interview. I’ll have some supper at the hotel and go to my room.’

The only hotel in town looked like a dump from the outside: paint flaking on the metal cladding, the car park a square of cracked tarmac. But inside it was warm and cosy, and the supper was delicious.

The hotel was full — not just with the policemen from Akureyri and Húsavík, but also a number of journalists had made the trek, together with the odd bewildered tourist who hadn’t figured out what was happening.

Vigdís managed to ignore everyone else at supper, although it took work to brush off the RÚV television crime reporter who recognized her.

She went up to her room and unpacked her case. Her phone vibrated and she picked it up, checking the display.

Magnus.

She hesitated. Should she answer it? No. No.

Yes.

‘Hi, Magnús.’ She did a good job of making her tone indifferent.

‘Hi,’ said the familiar voice. ‘How’s it going? Solved the case yet?’

‘Inspector Ólafur had two men locked up by the time I got here.’

‘Are they the right two men?’

‘Probably not,’ said Vigdís. She gave him a quick rundown of what had happened. It was clear that Magnus wished he was out there with her. There were few murders in Iceland, and Magnus, who had spent seven years as Sergeant Detective Magnus Jonson working in Boston Police Department’s Homicide Unit, didn’t want to miss one. Which was why Baldur hadn’t sent him. That, and he didn’t want Magnus to upstage his old friend Ólafur.

Vigdís relaxed as she chatted to Magnus.

‘Keep me posted,’ he said as she finished describing the day’s events.

‘Sure. Er, Magnús?’

‘Yes?’

What? What was she going to say? What could she say? She should say nothing.

‘Nothing.’

She hung up. She was sitting on her bed. She stared out of the window. There were still a few fishing boats that worked out of Raufarhöfn, and four of them were in port. Over the water, she could see the graveyard with all those previous generations of fisherman on the patch of hillside opposite.

Halldór would be joining them soon.

She sighed.

Magnus.

She had liked him when she first met him straight off the plane from America several years before. He had had experience of dozens of murder investigations in Boston and he was willing to teach her and her colleague Árni. He was smart, he was patient with her, and he was kind. He had his faults — he rubbed his superiors up the wrong way, he didn’t necessarily do things the Icelandic way, and a few people had been hurt as he solved those crimes he had come across. He was a loner. He kept himself to himself. But Vigdís liked all that. They respected each other.

Except in Vigdís’s case it was more than just respect. She was rubbish with men. They seemed to find her attractive, but for all the wrong reasons. There had been an Icelander living in New York, a television executive, but that hadn’t worked. Vigdís’s work had screwed that relationship up before it had had a chance to take hold.

There had been a few casual affairs, one- or two-night stands. But then Vigdís had overheard one of them, a handsome moron called Benni, talking to his mates about what it was like to screw a black girl.

That had put her off.

And the previous week, she had gone out for a drink with Magnus after work. His girlfriend Ingileif was in Hamburg for a couple of weeks. Magnus liked a couple of beers after work, a hangover from his Boston days, and Vigdís thought, why not humour him?

Both of them had had more than a couple of beers. Vigdís had enjoyed letting go of her habitual self-discipline. After so many years working together, they understood each other well, but as they both got drunker, they both confided things. Magnus talked about his brother, Vigdís about her mother, but with affection not frustration.

They had left the bar unsteadily. Walked up an empty side street. Laughed.

And then Vigdís had kissed him.

For a moment he had responded, but then he had broken away. Laughed it off. They had gone home to their separate beds.

It had been a mistake. A big mistake. Why had she done it? Why?

It was all right at work. Magnus behaved as though nothing had happened. He was still friendly to Vigdís, allowing her to respond in kind.

But things had changed for Vigdís. She had enjoyed letting her guard down. She had enjoyed the sense that she was putting her career at risk by doing something she wanted to do. It enthralled her. It also scared the hell out of her.

That weekend she had gone out with some of her girlfriends and got blind drunk. There was nothing odd about an Icelander getting drunk in Reykjavík on a Saturday night, but it was odd for Vigdís.

She pulled out the full bottle of vodka she had packed in her suitcase.

Vigdís didn’t drink alone. Her mother drank alone and Vigdís had seen what had happened to her. They said alcoholism ran in families. Was her black father an alcoholic, Vigdís wondered? She had no idea, no way of knowing anything about the black American serviceman who had met her mother at Keflavík airbase one night in the eighties.

Her life was crap. No matter how many rules she followed, how often she did the right thing by her mother or Baldur or Magnus or even the lowlifes she arrested, her life was still crap. Being careful, being sober didn’t help.

She got a glass from the hotel bathroom, opened the bottle and poured a tot into it. She knocked it back. That felt good. She poured another.