The Reckoning: Children's House Book 2 (Freyja and Huldar)

by Yrsa Sigurdardottir

  Freyja walked out into the corridor, where she felt revived by the fresh air. She muttered goodbye. She had gone a few paces towards the lift when she heard Huldar call: ‘Sorry about this morning. It was out of order.’ She raised a hand and waved behind her, without looking back. It seemed he wasn’t going to give up. But as far as she was concerned it was over between them, before it had even started.

  As she stood waiting for a taxi outside the police station, her thoughts returned to Thröstur and Sigrún. She was forced to confront the possibility that she had been wrong. They had both denied it so categorically, as if offended or outraged by the question. Perhaps their father had never laid a finger on them and his assault on Vaka had been a one-off. Perhaps everything she’d thought she knew about the case was wrong. And – and this would be worse – perhaps the same was true of Huldar and the inquiry team: perhaps they were all barking up completely the wrong tree.

  The taxi drew up and Freyja climbed in, feeling more confused than she had for a very long time.

  Chapter 29

  Huldar was so shattered he was afraid that if he so much as let himself blink, he’d be out like a light. The dream of getting an early night, then waking at the crack of dawn and going to the gym for a workout was not to be. Sadly. He’d intended to put on a pair of boxing gloves and beat the hell out of the punch-bag in the basement, to find an outlet for all the pent-up frustration of the last few days and weeks. Frustration that was entirely directed against himself. But at this rate he’d be lucky if he got home at an even vaguely reasonable hour. And even luckier if he made it to the gym any time before the case was solved.

  There was nothing to look forward to but relentless work, sleep deprivation and bottomless guilt. Still, he could be thankful for one thing: at least his stomach had more or less recovered by the time he’d arrived at the scene and laid eyes on Kolbeinn Ragnarsson’s body.

  ‘I’m going to order a pizza. What kind of topping do you want?’ It was hard to hear what Gudlaugur was saying behind his gas mask. As the youngest in the group, he was invariably landed with this kind of task, but he gave no sign of regarding it as beneath his dignity. Eventually he would rebel, but by then there’d probably be a new, even younger rookie to take over the role.

  ‘Anything with a bloody ton of meat and cheese. And a beer.’ Huldar zipped up his parka and prepared to step outside. It was his turn to stand guard. People didn’t usually fight for the honour, but in this instance it was by far the most desirable job. None of them were in any fit state to relish working in close proximity to a recently deceased man, especially when the body was a gruesome mess like that. Whenever Huldar happened to glance into the kitchen where Kolbeinn had met his end, he couldn’t help thinking it would have been better if that heart attack had finished him off.

  ‘OK, another meat feast and a beer.’

  ‘I was joking about the beer. Get me a Coke. Two Cokes. No, make it three.’ Huldar pulled on his woolly hat. He couldn’t wait to get outside into the cold, fresh air. Even the gas masks couldn’t block out the throat-catching stench. Erla had ordered them to open all the windows, though this contravened the guidelines. They had no choice. The team were reluctant to enter the house for fear of being poisoned, but they couldn’t afford to wait until morning when the worst of it would have dispersed.

  ‘Three Cokes.’ Gudlaugur added three lines to a much-scribbled-on scrap of paper, then looked up, resembling a huge insect in his mask.

  ‘You can take that thing off out here.’ They were standing in the entrance hall; the inner door to the house was closed and the front door stood open a crack.

  ‘Oh.’ Gudlaugur’s gaze widened behind the two large bug eyes. Instead of ripping off the contraption like Huldar, he considered for a moment, then methodically loosened the ties. ‘Phew, it’s good to get out of that.’

  Huldar pushed the front door open wide, stepped outside and drew in great lungfuls of the night air. Gudlaugur, who had followed him out, copied his example, carrying the mask over his arm. Huldar had dropped his on the floor.

  ‘How could anyone do that to a living person?’ Gudlaugur took out his phone to call in the pizza order.

  ‘Don’t ask me. It’s incomprehensible.’ Huldar inhaled deeply again. This was better than any cigarette. ‘Do you know how long Forensics are going to be?’

  ‘No. Erla’s with them now but everyone’s impatient for some news. She screeched at me when I opened the door to ask what kind of pizzas they wanted.’

  Normally Huldar would have smiled at this but Erla’s name provoked no particular amusement at the moment. ‘How are you lot planning to arrange this pizza feast then? Are we supposed to eat in there? With our masks on?’

  ‘No, we’ll have to eat in the car.’ Gudlaugur still hadn’t dialled the number. He seemed keen to spin out the conversation for as long as possible to delay his return inside. ‘It’ll be fine. I don’t suppose they’d have any appetite in there.’ He turned abruptly and surveyed the small detached house that had been home to Kolbeinn and his wife. Huldar guessed the wife would seize the first opportunity to sell. According to the police officer who had spoken to her, the grieving process was unlikely to be a protracted one. When she received the news over in London, where she was holidaying with friends, she had cried down the phone for a bit, then started asking about the kitchen. Had the sulphuric acid that had been poured over her husband also destroyed all the furnishings? She was especially concerned about the floor … Callous though it sounded, this practical question was probably a sign that her mind was groping for something it could understand. Anyone whose spouse had suffered a horrific fate like that would have found it difficult to take in. It made sense to focus on the flooring.

  Sufficiently revived by the frosty air to risk smoking again, Huldar rummaged in his pocket for what was left of yesterday’s cigarettes, a crumpled packet that had been marinated in beer. When he lit up, the smoke tasted of it. ‘Aren’t you going to call? People are dying of hunger here.’

  Gudlaugur selected the number. ‘I’m in a queue,’ he informed Huldar, who hadn’t been asking for a commentary. ‘We can talk while I’m on hold.’

  Huldar took another puff and wondered what to say. He wasn’t about to start whining about his women troubles to Gudlaugur, though it was clear that he would have his undivided attention if he so much as hinted at them. His night with Erla was the juicy gossip of the day. Since none of the team dared raise the subject with her, Huldar was the butt of all their jokes. He repeatedly denied his little adventure and reckoned he had got away with it so far, since no one was very focused right now. Once they had recovered though, he was afraid the teasing would carry on mercilessly. They were all trained to see through lies, but Huldar knew the pitfalls and might yet get away with it. ‘Where does someone get hold of sulphuric acid?’

  ‘Not from the shops, at any rate. It was a huge amount.’ Gudlaugur made a face.

  ‘With any luck it should be possible to trace the purchase through the importer. Or the shop where it was bought – if anywhere really sells it by the litre.’ Then Huldar remembered the chainsaw – hardly standard equipment for your average Icelandic home or business. Yet so far the police had had zero success in tracking down the buyer. Nor had they managed to identify a suspicious purchase of several metres’ worth of steel chain. Perhaps it would be the same story with the acid. The next step would be to check if the saw, the chain and the acid had all been stolen, once the police had figured out what kind of business would stock all three. He would guess at some sort of workshop or contracting firm, of which there were hundreds.

  ‘I’ll fucking kill you if you spill any of that dip in my car.’ Erla was sitting behind the wheel with a slice of pizza in one hand and a can of Coke in the other. Since she had been in the kitchen most of the time, breathing down the necks of the forensic technicians and pathologist while they worked, she had become inured to the reek of sulphur in her clothes and hair. Huldar and Gudlaugur,
on the other hand, were struggling not to hold their noses while they ate. Huldar got the full force of it in the front passenger seat. Despite his determination not to end up in the car with Erla, she had beckoned him imperiously to join her, giving rise to much nudging and winking among the other members of the team. So much for Huldar’s efforts to quash the rumour. In a last-ditch attempt to avoid being alone with her, he had resorted to dragging poor Gudlaugur along with him. There was no way he felt up to discussing anything but the inquiry with her.

  On the way to the car he had muttered to Gudlaugur that if he didn’t keep up a non-stop flow of conversation, he would have him to answer to. His attempt to steer the boy to the front seat had failed, however, since the moment Gudlaugur opened the door, Erla had barked at him to get in the back. Poor Gudlaugur hadn’t won any brownie points with his boss for that, still less with his constant chatter, but Huldar certainly owed him a big favour.

  ‘Do they know when he died?’ Gudlaugur asked with his mouth full.

  ‘Late yesterday evening, or last night.’ Erla selected another slice from the box perched between the front seats. ‘We’ll have a more precise time of death after the post-mortem. Though God knows how they think they’re going to perform one. The bulk of the body will have to be scraped off the kitchen floor with a spoon.’

  ‘No fingerprints?’

  ‘No. Nothing. Plenty on the furnishings, of course, but nothing on the empty canisters or the ties used to lash him to the chair. The labels had been removed too, and I’m hoping that means the murderer was afraid they could be traced back to him. That’s promising. We’ll find out where it came from. There can’t be many possible outlets.’ Erla gazed out at the empty street; the inhabitants of the neighbouring houses had finally given up trying to spot any clue that would explain the police presence. ‘Fingerprints would have been too much to hope for. These days even a child must know how to avoid leaving them.’

  The brief silence that fell was Gudlaugur’s cue. ‘Was it a mistake not to post a police guard outside his hospital room?’

  Erla twisted round and shoved her head between the seats. Although Huldar couldn’t see her expression, he doubted it was benign. ‘That wouldn’t have changed a fucking thing. Just you remember that. We’ll be facing enough criticism without adding to it ourselves.’ She turned back to face the front. ‘If anyone’s to blame, it’s the hospital. How were we supposed to know that they’d discharge him without alerting us? Late in the evening too. As long as he was in hospital he wasn’t in any danger.’

  ‘Mmm.’ Huldar had contributed little so far but felt he could no longer leave poor Gudlaugur to bear the brunt. ‘Is the hospital still claiming that he was picked up by someone from his firm?’

  ‘The nurse who was on duty is adamant about that. But the CEO of the accountancy firm – the man she claims rang the hospital – flatly denies having sent a car for Kolbeinn. It must have been the killer who rang, posing as him. It’s not as if the CEO’s name is a secret, and Kolbeinn didn’t take the call himself. The whole thing’s a total fuck-up.’

  ‘Have we uncovered any link to Jón Jónsson?’ Huldar looked at the pizza crust in his hand: he had no memory of eating the slice. He had been overwhelmed with drowsiness as soon as he had finished the first and was now struggling to keep his eyes open.

  ‘No. Not yet. The house search didn’t throw up any evidence and Kolbeinn’s wife claims not to know a thing. There’s no sign of any child porn on his computer, so they can’t have met through a paedophile ring. But there’s a link somewhere. You saw his face when you mentioned Jón Jónsson’s name to him. The bloody man would have done better to come clean to us. Maybe we should take a picture of his corpse and show it to Thorvaldur, since he’s being just as pig-headed. That might loosen his tongue.’ Erla drained the last of her Coke and crushed the can in her hand. ‘It might help persuade the other people who’ve refused to talk as well. God, I’d do it like a shot.’

  ‘You’d be fired.’ Although he was almost too sleepy to speak, Huldar thought he had better nip that idea in the bud. There was an outside chance Erla might be serious.

  ‘Bullshit. Name one police officer who’s been fired.’ When Huldar didn’t reply, she said: ‘Exactly.’

  ‘What about Thorvaldur? Is anyone guarding him?’ Gudlaugur chipped in as he reached forward for another slice of pizza.

  ‘No. The stupid prick turned down the offer. He swears this has nothing to do with him and if we insist on a guard, it’ll imply we don’t believe him. And that could bugger up our relations with the Prosecutor’s office.’

  ‘I’d send someone anyway. This is almost certainly about revenge and you don’t have to actually deserve it for people to want to get even with you. Especially if it’s your job to prosecute people.’

  ‘Who asked for your opinion?’ Erla snapped. Gudlaugur had not only had the gall to cast aspersions on her leadership skills but had also forced his way uninvited into her car. ‘We’ve spoken to the Prosecutor’s office and this is what they want. If they get involved any further they could all end up having to declare a conflict of interest. In which case they’d have to appoint new prosecutors, and the office is having enough trouble staying within budget as it is. The same applies to us. We don’t have the funds to provide that jumped-up twat with a twenty-four-hour guard. Besides, his initials aren’t on the hit-list.’

  Gudlaugur shrank back into the shadows and Erla turned to Huldar. ‘I told them in no uncertain terms that they’d better get all the files relating to the earlier trial to us tomorrow. Even if it means the whole office having to search all night. That sodding useless lot at Reykjanes District Court say they can’t find any records, so there’s no point putting pressure on them. Un-fucking-believable. So the Prosecutor’s office had better get their arses moving.’

  Erla’s optimism notwithstanding, Huldar doubted any files would turn up that weekend. The police were unlikely to receive a single piece of paper before Tuesday or Wednesday at the earliest. By which time it might already be too late to save the next victim. ‘What about Jón’s lawyer? He may not have the files any longer but he’s bound to remember the case. He might know the identity of the child or children involved. There’s a possibility he might even be able to tell us where to find Jón. And if he won’t talk to us, we could try the judge. I’ll get on to that, if you like. I’m not bothered about disturbing them on a Sunday. They’re unlikely to be at church.’ This short speech had drained the last reserves of Huldar’s energy and he broke off to yawn.

  ‘If anyone’s listening to the word of God tomorrow, you can bet it’s the judge,’ said Erla. ‘But you’d need a psychic to communicate with him. I asked to speak to him when I talked to those fuckwits at the district court, but no go. He left years ago to become a judge at the Supreme Court, and now he’s pushing up the daisies.’

  Huldar was about to make some pertinent remark but couldn’t remember what it was. He sank back, blinking rapidly, and felt the pizza crust slipping from his hand as he succumbed to sleep.

  So he didn’t hear when Erla chased Gudlaugur out of the car.

  Chapter 30

  Of those who had been ordered in to work that Sunday, Huldar was the last to turn up. He’d had to catch up on the sleep he’d missed the night before. His body kept an exact account of the hours he rested and if there was a deficit, its demands were merciless. The alarm on his phone was powerless in the face of this audit when it rang at the appointed time, long before sunrise. With a fumbling hand he had knocked the phone off the bedside table and now there was a crack right across the screen. When at last he surfaced properly he felt restored and even his sense of guilt was receding. After a hot shower and a shave, he felt almost human again.

  His good mood didn’t last long. At first he thought his colleagues were calling him Sleeping Beauty because he’d overslept. It wasn’t until he’d sat at his desk for an hour that he realised they were referring to the nap he’d taken in Erla’s car t
he day before. He had woken to find himself alone; Gudlaugur and Erla had gone back into the house along with the rest of the team. As he sat rubbing his stiff neck, he had a vague memory of her trying to wake him, hazy recollections of a hand stroking his hair and cheek. What a stroke of luck that he hadn’t stirred.

  ‘Hey, Huldar! Sleeping Beauty!’ One of his colleagues was grinning at him mockingly from a nearby desk, coffee mug in hand. ‘Erla’s pissed off today. Did someone fail to do his duty last night? Too sleepy, eh?’ This was accompanied by a snigger. Huldar didn’t answer but could feel his patience depleting by the minute. The next person who made that kind of comment would get his head bitten off. A punch-bag wasn’t the only way to let off steam.

  Erla’s decision to let him sleep in her car while the others were labouring away in the horrific stench had destroyed any chance Huldar might have had of pretending that nothing had happened. Normally she would be more likely to empty a coffee mug over the man who fell asleep on his desk than shush those present so they didn’t disturb him. ‘What are you looking at?’ Huldar glanced up irritably from his screen, then, remembering that he owed Gudlaugur a favour, added in a friendlier tone: ‘Sorry. I’ve got to make a phone call that I’m not looking forward to.’

  ‘Oh, sorry.’ Gudlaugur gave an embarrassed smile. ‘I was just going to tell you that I think I know how that judge died, that Yngvi Sigurhjartarson. It’s only a guess, but I’m fairly sure.’

  ‘Spit it out then.’ Huldar was grateful for an excuse to delay picking up the receiver; the conversation with Erla wasn’t the only one he was dreading. Through a fog of tiredness yesterday evening it had seemed no big deal to disturb a lawyer on a Sunday, but now the moment had come, he was having trouble deciding what to say. He was in no mood to put up with being patronised or abused for having the presumption to ring outside office hours. But since the documents from the Prosecutor’s office still hadn’t turned up, there was no alternative.