The Commandments : A Novel (2021)

by Gudmundsson, Oskar

  Eventually she returned to the present as the glow of the cigarette reached her fingers. ‘Ach, I don’t know. I don’t want to remember all that.’

  ‘What makes it so tough to remember?’

  ‘It was a crazy time with the theatre group. I mean it was all supposed to be part of helping us, getting us problem kids back on the straight and narrow. It was fantastic to start with. I mean, we were on a stage. We were the centre of attention. The youth committee crowd, or whatever it was called, was there to get us back on an even keel in life. We were all teenagers and most of us came from lousy homes, with parents who were drunks or scroungers, all sorts. Everyone had some kind of baggage. The magic youth crowd were going to stuff us so full of bright blue happiness that we’d be able to dance and sing our way through life like star-spangled elves in an adventure,’ Marta said, adding a few theatrical gestures of her own.

  Salka couldn’t help warming to Marta when she saw this spark that suddenly appeared in her. It was as if her eyes filled with a smouldering passion and her face brightened with her heartfelt laughter. But without any warning, a bank of black cloud seemed to overshadow her.

  ‘That crowd ruined us. If some of us hadn’t already ventured into all kinds of temptation, then that was where we encountered it. And that bastard Helgi, he was notorious.’

  ‘Was he the director?’

  ‘Yeah,’ she said, glancing at Salka. ‘You know him?’

  ‘No. I’ve only heard his name mentioned,’ Salka said, trying to sound neutral.

  ‘He was a complete bastard. We kids realised far too late what was going on. He abused the boys, the fucker,’ Marta said, a sob developing in her throat. Tears trickled down her cheeks, and Salka turned to her, and put an arm around her shoulders. ‘But nobody said anything. It was all dust that the wind blew away.’

  ‘Stay strong,’ Salka said, arms around Marta, who laid her cheek on Salka’s chest and wept.

  ‘Rafn was never the same after his friend disappeared.’

  ‘Which friend?’ Salka asked.

  ‘Anton. They were close friends, and somehow something more than that.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I don’t mean like that. They weren’t a couple or anything. Sometimes it was like Rafn was his dad. He looked after him and took responsibility for him. Anton had terrible parents who didn’t look after him at all. Maybe because he had been adopted. In any case, they drank like fish and he was like a stray cat. He knocked around and stayed here and there, spent a lot of time at Rafn’s house.’

  ‘Was he adopted?’

  ‘Yes, or so Anton said, anyway. His parents never admitted it. But he was certain of it and used to talk about it with Rafn. I think Anton had started to look into it not long before he vanished. And then it was as if the earth had swallowed him whole.’

  ‘When was this?’

  ‘The Dynheimar years. I don’t remember exactly. ‘94 or ‘95. It was investigated. He was last seen in the Glerá church, and that was it. People here talked about him having thrown himself in the river, but Rafn always said that he had been murdered.’

  ‘Murdered? By whom?’

  ‘Well, the priest. You know Rafn went public with his accusations,’ Marta replied with a sharp sideways glance.

  ‘Yes, Hróbjartur and Helgi.’

  ‘And Gunnleifur,’ Marta said and Salka gave her a surprised look. ‘Yeah, I knew the case against Hróbjartur and Helgi made some progress through the system before it was all dismissed. But the case against Gunnleifur never went anywhere.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘No idea. Politics, I guess,’ Marta said, her smile twisted.

  Salka was about to say that she had never known there had been a case against Gunnleifur, but she kept quiet.

  ‘Why did Rafn think that Hróbjartur had murdered Anton?’

  ‘I didn’t say that. It was the one at the Glerá church. The Reverend Gunnleifur. Rafn was sure that he had murdered Anton. And he said that he could prove it.’

  ‘How?’

  Marta sighed and caught Salka’s eye before she continued.

  ‘When we were there at the shed, he was really anxious to get a look inside the bag. I thought it was because of the dope, or the money. But no. There was a diary in there he said he could sell for millions, if not more. His face lit up when he saw the book was there in the bag.’

  ‘So what diary is this?’

  ‘Anton’s diary.’

  24

  Salka immediately sent a patrol car to Gunnleifur’s house. After her conversation with Marta, she called the SÁÁ rehabilitation centre, where a counsellor agreed to collect her and to provide secure shelter. On the way out, Salka looked in on Valgeir and asked for temporary access to the LÖKE system, the inner circle of the police intranet.

  ‘What do you need that for?’

  ‘It’s part of the investigation.’

  ‘Yes. But why?’

  ‘Valgeir, I’m in a hurry. Would you please sort this out for me? It’s important,’ she said, trying to sound patient.

  She didn’t hear his reply as she was already halfway along the corridor, heading for the car.

  Salka parked in front of Gunnleifur’s house. Curiosity had brought the neighbours out, and a knot of them stood on the other side of the well-lit street.

  She got out of the car and stooped under the yellow police tape that a uniformed officer was using to fence off the drive. She walked up to the darkened house. She could see the full moon, which seemed unusually large on this starlit August night.

  ‘Are we too late?’ she asked the officer she met on the patio by the house.

  ‘No, I don’t think so. There was nobody home.’

  ‘Really?’ she asked. ‘So why the crime scene tape?’

  ‘There’s been a break-in. One of the windows has been forced.’

  Salka went into the house, a handsome building like most of those among the beeches above the golf course.

  ‘Has the whole place been searched?’ she asked the first officer she saw inside.

  ‘We’ve looked everywhere. But I heard some movement when I came in.’

  ‘So where’s Gunnleifur?’ she asked in annoyance, before realising she had spoken out loud.

  ‘He’s not here. We’ve tried to call him and he’s not answering. Birna has been called in and…’

  ‘Who’s Birna?’ she asked, and felt how wrong the question sounded. She felt awkward for not having yet figured out the names of everyone involved in the investigation.

  ‘She handles anything concerning phones and computers. She’s working on locating his phone.’

  ‘Ah, yes, Birna. Of course,’ Salka said, before he finished speaking. ‘Where’s Gísli?’

  ‘I’m not sure. In any case, I haven’t seen him here.’

  Salka quickly went from room to room until she found the bedroom. She checked the double bed, which appeared to be immaculately made up. It was disturbing that everything seemed to be in order. She stooped to check the legs of the bed, and saw no marks.

  She walked around again, and went to the bathroom. The mirror was clean and she looked into the shower cubicle, where she squatted down and ran a finger over the shower tray to find it was bone dry.

  ‘You’ve checked every room? And the garage? Is there an attic?’ she asked as she returned to where the uniformed officer stood in the living room.

  ‘We’ve looked everywhere, and there’s no attic space,’ he said, looking at Salka in some confusion.

  ‘No marks anywhere?’

  ‘Nothing at all. Maybe he took him away.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Maybe he took Gunnleifur away with him.’

  ‘Could be. Where’s Gísli? Sorry. I already asked that,’ she said, irritated. ‘I really want you to go over the whole house again. Check under every table, bed, and in every cupboard. Check the toilet as well if you like. Whoever came here was no fucking ghost. Someone could be hidde
n here. Was this door unlocked?’ she asked, turning the handle of the patio door.

  ‘I can’t be sure,’ the officer said, as he went over to her and looked at the locking mechanism that had a black button on top. ‘Was this up?’

  ‘It was,’ Salka said, feeling for a light switch behind the curtains beside the door. She pressed it and the lights outside came on. She opened the door, went out onto the deck and stopped at the end where a neat lawn began.

  ‘Are those footprints?’ she said, pointing to a patch where the grass looked to have been flattened.

  ‘Looks like it to me. Looks like someone went over there to the shrubs.’

  ‘Do you have a torch?’

  ‘It’s not much good,’ he said, handing it to her.

  Salka pressed the button but it wasn’t until she had smacked the torch twice against her palm that the light shone. She stepped out onto the grass to one side of the prints as far as the redcurrant bushes at the edge of the garden and squatted down. She played the light around their stems and looked down at the footprint with no pattern in the damp earth.

  ‘He’s been here in the house. The man who murdered Hróbjartur and Helgi. He heard you come in, made a break for it and went this way through the bushes.’

  Salka looked to one side when there was no response and realised that the police officer hadn’t followed her. She could see him talking to a colleague in the living room.

  She stood up, shone the beam of the torch between the branches, and squeezed through into the next garden.

  The light of the torch showed faint but definite tracks leading to the back of the next house. She followed them as far as the sun deck behind the house. She stopped and switched the torch off as she noticed a movement behind the living room window. The house’s occupant sat at the living room table and opened a laptop. The reflections on the inside of the windows meant that he had probably noticed nothing.

  Salka saw barely discernible prints on the decking left by feet that had been through wet grass. They tracked at an angle across the deck towards the corner of the house. Salka cautiously followed them. She peered around the corner of the building and looked into the gap between the house and the garage. There was a small window on this side of the house and a dim light found its way into the gap, but not enough to illuminate the complete darkness at the far end.

  She felt for the torch switch, knowing she was taking a risk turning it on.

  When she pressed the button, nothing happened.

  She slapped it hard against her palm and a narrow beam appeared.

  The first thing she saw was the wood wall that closed off the gap between the house and the garage.

  The light went off. She banged it against the flat of her hand, but nothing happened.

  The next thing she saw was the man who rushed at her from the darkness.

  He grabbed her by the neck, and threw her to the ground.

  25

  Salka left Gunnleifur’s house, sat in the jeep and slammed the door shut behind her. She leaned forward against the steering wheel and stared out at the brightly lit street in front of her. Looking up into the black sky, she hoped to see the moon.

  It was nowhere to be seen.

  She adjusted the rear-view mirror and examined her neck, left red by the attacker’s grip.

  She was dazed and annoyed. No, not annoyed. She was angry with herself for having allowed the man to take her unawares for the second time that day.

  She began to suspect that maybe she simply wasn’t in great emotional shape. Maybe she was far from prepared for an assignment such as this one; she needed more time.

  It wasn’t clear in her memory. The man had rushed at her like lightning and she hadn’t had a chance.

  Hell, she thought. She should have known, or at least expected, that there could be someone hiding there in the darkness. She recalled fighting for breath as the man’s fingers locked around her throat, and as she smashed the torch against his head.

  She saw once again the attacker raising a fist, ready to punch her. But he hadn’t. He hesitated, held back.

  Why on earth did he hold back? Salka thought, slapping the steering wheel with both hands.

  She was sure she had been close to blacking out when he had decided not to hit her.

  Was that it? Did he hold back? she wondered, and felt her own head with her fingertips.

  There was no pain.

  Yes, he held back.

  He had quickly stood up straight, staring into the darkness.

  Had she sensed a smell? She couldn’t remember exactly. Yes, there had been something. She tried her best to force vague, confused recollections into some sort of order. As soon as Salka felt that things were becoming clearer, they would slip beyond her grasp again, like elusive dreams.

  She was startled from her thoughts as a neighbour walked past her car.

  She started the engine and drove away.

  Back at the hotel apartment, Salka tried her best to get to sleep. But there were too many negative thoughts coming at her from every direction for her to get any peace.

  Sitting up in bed, she opened her laptop and saw that Valgeir had given her access to the LÖKE intranet. She logged in and searched for the case files referring to Anton’s disappearance. She had to search for a while, but was finally able to track down the file and open it. There was a basic outline of the case, and that was it. She decided that this was probably because the LÖKE system hadn’t been around until a good ten years after Anton’s disappearance in 1995. Or was it? She was sure that work had been done to upload older case files to the system.

  She closed the computer and dressed. She decided to jog around the centre of town to help clear her mind, thinking back to her poor physical condition when she had to run through the woods earlier. It was still and cool outside, and she enjoyed the feel of the fresh breeze around her neck.

  Salka ran through the alley and out onto Thórunnarstræti, then stopped in front of the police station. As she caught her breath, she noticed that there were lights at many of the station’s windows. At reception the officer on duty let her in.

  A group of officers were chatting in the canteen, and she went past them up to the second floor. It seemed that Sunday night was a quiet time. The upstairs offices had glass walls, so it was easy to see inside them. One of these was a large office with many desks, where Salka saw one of the staff sitting in front of an open laptop.

  ‘Good evening,’ she said, and introduced herself. ‘Do you know where I can look up old case files?’

  ‘How old?’

  ‘1995. I have access to LÖKE, but there’s not much there.’

  ‘That’s odd. Sure you searched well enough? I believe that all cases back to 1994 have been uploaded to the system, with all the documents scanned in. What case is it?’

  Salka knew the number.

  ‘It’s 4850/1995. And yes, I spent quite some time searching, but only found a case summary that isn’t much use.’

  ‘Yes. I can see that here. That’s strange,’ he said. ‘Come with me.’

  Salka followed him out of the office to a set of locked doors which he opened by punching in a four-digit code. He switched on the lights and they went into a room where document boxes and folders had been arranged in numerical order on heavy steel-grey shelves. The man sat at a computer by the door and used it to look up the case number.

  ‘It should be here,’ he said, stepping between the shelves and scanning the contents. ‘Aha.’

  He triumphantly took down a folder and handed it to Salka. She opened it, riffled quickly through the contents and saw that it contained a number of documents and some photographs.

  ‘What are you doing in here?’ asked Valgeir, appearing in the doorway, looking along the passage between the shelves.

  Salka walked purposefully towards him, suspecting that he was deliberately blocking the way, as she sidestepped past him and out into the corridor.

  ‘Case notes I need to look at,’
she said with a smile.

  ‘What case?’

  ‘Ach, an old case connected to Hróbjartur and Helgi. I just need to take a quick look. I’ll see you in the morning,’ she said, setting off along the corridor.

  ‘You mustn’t take that out of the station, Salka,’ Valgeir said firmly.

  ‘Of course not. Don’t worry. I’ll look through it here.’

  It was almost one in the morning when she returned to the hotel apartment with the stack of photocopies of the case notes that she had run off before leaving the station.

  She was exhausted by the time she sat on the bed with a glass of wine to look through the documents. She had forgotten to take her phone with her when she had gone out for a run, and when she looked at it she saw that Gísli had called – four times,

  ‘Hæ, Gísli. I saw you’d been trying to get hold of me.’

  ‘Yeah,’ he said, his voice hoarse. ‘That was… Salka, it’s almost one o’clock,’ he yawned. She was about to tell him not to be so fussy when he continued. ‘We’ve located Gunnleifur. He’s in Hveragerði.’

  ‘Hveragerði? What’s he doing there?’

  ‘He’s been at a health spa. I got hold of one of the staff. He’s been there two weeks and tomorrow’s his last day. He’s getting the midday flight home.’

  ‘That’s grand. You’ll have to meet him at the airport. Be discreet about it and make sure you take an unmarked car. Bring him straight to the station,’ she said, glancing over the paperwork she had distributed across the bed.

  She picked up one of the sheets, saw the signature at the bottom, and sighed. Valgeir had been the officer in charge and she was already dreading the morning.

  ‘Is that all?’ she heard the voice on the phone ask.

  ‘Sorry, Gísli,’ she said. She had forgotten he was still on the line. ‘No, one thing. Where were you while I was at Gunnleifur’s place?’

  ‘A group of us went up to the sheds to carry out a search and bring the cars down to the station. We went through the woods as well, the place I reckoned we heard a scream. Didn’t find anything.’