The Quiet Mother

38

Nothing in Valborg’s flat had been moved following the murder. Her belongings were scattered across the floor. Cupboards were open and drawers had been pulled out, books had been torn from their shelves and simple ornaments broken during the incident. The murderer had trashed the flat in search of valuables, but it was hard to determine what had been stolen or what the murderer was after.

Marta had changed her mind. Maybe she didn’t feel like listening to Konrád’s nagging any longer. She called and told him that she might be able to let him into the flat if he promised not to stay longer than ten minutes. Konrád accepted her offer, with thanks. He had told Marta what he knew about Sunnefa, who had been forced to abandon her midwifery studies, been in some sort of contact with a religious sect and possibly delivered Valborg’s child and placed it in foster care.

Marta had launched an investigation into the child’s fate, but it was in the early stages. Sunnefa J. Ólafsdóttir was the name of a woman who had stopped studying at the Midwifery College in 1968. She died in the first decade of the new century, single and childless. She’d lived in a rented flat and it wasn’t known what had become of her possessions, so no answers were to be found there that could help in the search for Valborg’s child. Sunnefa seemed to have been completely on her own; she had no family around her, and no evidence was found of any links between her and Valborg or any other expectant mothers whom she might have known. Nor did anything come to light regarding the sect she belonged to or had worked for.

Looking over the flat, it appeared to Konrád that Valborg had lived a rather modest life. There was nothing flashy. An old radio that could well have been from the 1970s stood on a table in the living room. The television was hardly a recent model, either. Most of the books remaining on the shelves or lying on the floor were old. She’d collected the works of respected Icelandic poets and books on Icelandic culture and history. Thrillers and love stories were on the bottom shelf, almost invisible. It seemed to him a simple and uncomplicated life. No travel brochures about sun-kissed destinations. No family Christmas photos. Nothing that testified to exciting hobbies. It was more like stagnation. A life that had stood still.

He recalled once again how grateful Valborg had been when he finally agreed to meet her. How downcast she’d become when he refused her request at the Ásmundur Sveinsson Museum, amid all the beautiful works of art. Amid the mothers chiselled in stone. He imagined how she must have returned here after their meeting feeling more hopeless than ever. He thought he bore some responsibility for it. Instead of lifting her up out of the greyness, he’d pulled her down even further, and what was worse, he thought, was that he didn’t know why he was so indifferent to her.

‘Why are you doing this?’ Marta asked as she watched Konrád rummaging through the desk in the living room, looking carefully at documents and papers belonging to the deceased. She immediately grew impatient and looked at her watch. ‘What exactly are you looking for?’

The answer wasn’t encouraging.

‘I don’t know,’ Konrád said. ‘What will happen to her flat?’

‘We found a will that’s probably valid,’ said Marta. ‘We spoke to the lawyer who helped her draft it. The flat will be sold and the proceeds will go to various charity organisations that Valborg designated. Mainly organisations connected with child welfare. She appears to have spent most of her disposable income on that cause.’

In the desk, Konrád found receipts going back many years. Old tax returns and Christmas cards from co-workers. Cinema and theatre tickets, an empty metal box that had once held sweets, a deck of cards, a glasses case.

‘This lawyer, did he know about the child she had?’

‘The lawyer is a she, and she didn’t know anything about it. She didn’t know Valborg at all.’

Konrád continued pulling out the desk’s drawers.

‘Valborg wasn’t in a sect, was she?’ Marta asked. ‘Is that what you’re looking for?’

‘No, well, I could be. I don’t know. I don’t think so.’

‘What about you? You’re a heathen, aren’t you?’

‘Yes.’

‘I was always sent to Sunday school,’ Marta said, taking out her damp cig, as Konrád sometimes called it. ‘I can’t recall doing anything more boring. I think Mum and Dad just sent me there so they could... you know... on Sunday mornings...’

‘What?’

‘You know...’

‘What?’

‘Jesus, do I need to spell it out to you?’

‘What?’

‘Do it, get it?! Do it on Sunday mornings! God, you’re thick.’

Konrád smiled to himself and continued rooting in Valborg’s papers. Then he gave up on the desk and went to her bedroom, the bathroom, back to the living room, and then to the kitchen. As he’d sometimes felt before, when still a policeman, he was half ashamed going through Valborg’s private life like this, but knew at the same time that it was just a part of the work of law enforcement. The kitchen cupboards and drawers had also been ransacked. Various packets of food lay scattered about, and even perishable items had been pulled from the fridge.

‘We’ve looked over everything pretty closely here,’ said Marta, who’d been following his travels through the flat.

‘Yes, I know that,’ Konrád said.

‘If you could just tell me what you’re looking for.’

On the table lay a worn plastic folder of recipes. Konrád took a look at it, and it appeared to him that Valborg had collected cake recipes from newspapers until the end. The latest clipping was from around a week before she died, and was of a delicious-sounding American apple cake.

‘Have you seen this?’ Konrád asked.

‘Yeah, aren’t those just recipes?’

Konrád was about to say yes when, among the recipes, he saw other types of newspaper clippings. Travel stories that Valborg had found curious. One told of a couple’s trip to see the Egyptian Pyramids. Another clipping was from the business section. About a young woman who was starting a pharmaceutical company in partnership with foreigners. Her father, looking proud, appeared with her in a photo. The never-failing backer.

Konrád stared at the photo. Then went back to the narrative from the desert. The couple at the Pyramids. It was the same man. Konrád looked at the date. The articles had appeared eight years apart, around and after the turn of the century.

Konrád put the clippings back and took out other, more recent ones. They showed more cakes and pastries, making him wonder if Valborg had ever baked any of them. Then he found the third, most recent reference to the family: an article that was also about the man’s daughter. Published two months ago or so. The woman was selling her and her father’s shares in the pharmaceutical company to the foreign parties. The article focused on the large profit that they, as owners of the company, had made in just a few years. The daughter and her father. This time, though, he wasn’t in the photo. Only she was. Dressed in an elegant, expensive woman’s suit. A beige blouse. A modern woman holding all the threads, standing in front of a large desk and smiling at the world as if the world had always smiled at her. With her arms crossed. The perfect champion in business life. Her joy at the sale shone from her face.

‘Did you find something?’ Marta asked, blowing out vapour. At work, they’d started calling her ‘the steam jet’. Konrád didn’t know if he should tell her that.

‘Do you know anything about these people?’ he said, handing Marta the clippings.

Marta took them and looked at the photos, checked the dates and ran her eyes over the texts.

‘No, no better than anyone else,’ she said. She vaguely recalled a news report about the company over the years. The owners rarely appeared in the media. ‘They didn’t make a króna on that drug rubbish. Could that be the correct amount? Did Valborg know those people?’

‘How old do you think the woman in the photo is? The man’s daughter.’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Born around 1970?’

‘Yeah, possibly. Maybe. I don’t know. Do you mean... no, do you think she’s her child? Valborg’s daughter?’

‘She said she didn’t know what became of the child,’ Konrád answered.

‘Do you think she found her in the papers?’

Konrád didn’t answer. He was thinking about Ísleifur, in his basement flat.

‘These clippings might have nothing to do with it,’ said Marta. Nothing.

‘But for some reason, she kept them,’ Konrád said, taking back the clippings. ‘Maybe it’s something you should look into. The company is on Borgartún Street,’ he added, seeing in his mind’s eye the name of the pharmaceutical company whose offices were on the top three floors of the glass palace that Ísleifur had visited, wearing his coat and carrying a plastic bag.