by Zena Shapter
She shrugs. “Anything’s possible.”
“That’s what Mark used to say.”
“I know.”
“Okay.” I make a decision. “At the very least, something’s wrong with this.” I point at the autopsy report. “Do you know where the hospital stores its…people?”
“You mean its morgue? Yes. Pàll stayed there. Why?”
I stand. “I’m going to see Mark, in the flesh.”
Anna looks at the clock on the wall. “You don’t mean now? There won’t be anyone there.”
“Exactly. I want to see my brother, all of him—not just the bits of him some government official is happy for me to see. And the morgue won’t be locked, will it? Nothing in Höfkállur is locked.”
“Why not simply ask for some privacy in the morning?”
“I can’t wait until morning, Anna. Today is Wednesday.” I think aloud. “Director Úlfar asked me to return to Reykjavík by Friday. The text threat demanded I be back on the Austurleid tomorrow. Doctor Emil wanted me gone as soon as possible. Something’s happening in Höfkállur either tomorrow or Friday, something a lawyer like me shouldn’t see. So if I’m not on the Austurleid tomorrow someone is going to come looking for me. I have to examine Mark now. If I wait, someone could tamper with his body, or lose him entirely.” That could have been the very phone call Doctor Emil went to make when I left his office this afternoon. “All I need is a quick look. Take some photographs. It won’t take long. I won’t be able to sleep on this.” Not anymore. “It has to be now. People are keeping things from me, Anna, and I need to find out what. Given what you’ve shown me here,” I tap the reports, “my brother’s body is clearly the best place to start.”
“It…it’s not a good idea, Becky.” She pushes her empty mug to the centre of the island.
“Good and bad are just concepts, Anna.” Although I’ve never fully believed that until now. “They’re meaningless words people use to control others.” Arguments Mark once used flow from my memory. “Religions use the words good and bad. Law uses the words right and wrong. Science uses positive and negative. They’re all just words.”
Anna shakes her head, speechless. A white curl falls over her face.
“Mark said you believe in the Heimspeki?”
“Passionately. But…”
“The Heimspeki says that, although staying positive can include being ‘good’ and doing the ‘right’ thing, it can also include committing a wrong for a very good reason. Like lying to a murderer who wants to find their next victim. Did Mark tell you about that?”
Anna’s expression softens and she nods to confirm that, yes, he told her the conundrum that explained an aspect of his thesis: if a murderer were to demand you tell them the location of their next victim, you couldn’t tell them the truth, you’d have to lie. But religion says that lying is bad and, if you were in a courtroom lying would also be wrong. Yet in this situation, lying could be neither bad nor wrong because otherwise your actions could lead to an innocent’s death. Thus, according to the Heimspeki, lying would actually be a positive thing to do.
“I have good reason for going tonight,” I tell Anna; I tell myself, “and Mark said such acts produce the same amounts of positivity and negativity, Yin and Yang, and there’s nothing wrong with being equal, because then a single act of kindness can tip your equality towards being positive in the majority.” Mark said a majority was all that mattered. “So, my going to the morgue is neither ‘good’ nor ‘bad’.” The more I say it, the more I’m convinced. “It’s simply what I must do.”
“No, Becky, you don’t understand,” Anna finally tells me. “You don’t need to convince me going to the morgue tonight is, most probably, a positive thing to do. I don’t even think your life is in that much danger—Director Úlfar couldn’t have an Australian brother and sister die in the same town in the same week without attracting major international attention. It’s just…I’m worried about Jón.” Her expression fades into the beseeching look she gave me outside the Litrúm-Hús, only this time I’m close enough to realise my mistake. Her expression wasn’t pleading with me before—it was fearful. It is fearful. She’s both infatuated with her boyfriend, and afraid of him.
I catch the welling panic in her eyes as they flit across my face, searching for protection. A sour taste comes into my mouth. I’ve never really understood women who insist on staying with men who frighten them. Then again, I once stayed with someone who made me think of myself as worthless, and when he left me—knowing I believed life was nothing without him—I was frightened too. I shouldn’t judge. Having met Jón, and seen how charming he can be one minute, how intense the next, I understand both his appeal and the terror of not knowing which way he could flip. “You don’t need to come with me,” I tell her, “all I need from you is directions.”
“But,” Anna lowers her voice, “Jón said you asked for Mark’s briefcase to be delivered later.”
“It still can be delivered. When it comes, tell them I’m asleep and take it for me.”
She shakes her head. “Jón knows when I’m lying. He’ll figure it out, and you said you didn’t want any officials interrupting you at the morgue. He always follows up on his hunches.”
“Wait, Jón’s going to bring Mark’s briefcase here himself?”
Anna nods. “That’s why he was trying to get me to change my mind about staying here tonight, because he’s coming here anyway.” She pauses to think. “Yes, he definitely said he’d see me later.”
“What time did he say?” I glance at the clock.
“He didn’t. He usually texts when he’s on his way.”
“What time does he finish work?”
“About now. Though of course now he has to collect Mark’s briefcase from the hospital, and he said he might eat dinner there. They have a really good canteen. He made some sarcastic remark about my not letting him eat here. Do you think you could be back before 8pm?”
“How far away is the hospital?”
“A ten minute walk.”
“I should easily be able to get there and back within an hour, as long as I don’t get lost.”
“I’ve got a map, I’ll show you. Once you’re at the hospital, use the service entrance at the back. It’s the quickest way to the morgue—it’s down some stairs past the kitchen and laundry.”
“Okay.” I throw back the rest of my coffee.
She puts our mugs in the sink. “The morgue door’s next to the service lift. Don’t worry, the hospital is very small, you won’t get lost. What about dinner?”
“Not hungry. I had a big lunch.”
“Okay then, I’ll go get that map.”
“I’ll get my jacket.”
We both race up the stairs. At the top, Anna dashes one way, I dash the other.
“Becky,” she calls from her room as I’m stuffing my arms into my jacket. “Would you come here a second?”
I fold Mark’s autopsy report into my bag, grab a scarf to protect me from the cold night I know will be waiting for me, then hurry towards her voice. Poking my head around her bedroom door, I see she’s standing by the window with the light off. “What’s up?”
She points out the window.
I join her and follow her finger towards a black sedan parked opposite The Himinn. A lone figure sits behind its steering wheel. “I thought someone followed us from the Litrúm-Hús,” she mutters.
“It’s not a neighbour waiting for someone?”
“I don’t recognise the car.”
“And you know all the cars in Höfkállur?”
“He’s been there so long the back windows have steamed up.”
I suck a chunk of cheek flesh between my teeth and rock my molars back and forth over it. Why would someone have bothered to follow us here? I’m sure it’s common knowledge I’m staying at The Himinn.
“It cou
ld be someone sent to watch over you.” Anna steps back from the window and draws the curtains. “Maybe you should stay after all, go to the morgue in the morning?”
“I can’t. I need to see Mark now. I have to go.” Saying the words aloud reminds me of something.
Ari.
Ari said to call him if I changed my mind about going out. I step away from the window, find his number on my phone and dial. Mark wanted me to go with my instincts more, trust gut feelings. It’s time to test his theory.
“Who are you calling?” Anna asks.
“Ari.”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
But Ari’s already answering. I apologise for calling. “There’s someone outside The Himinn, watching us.”
“Where? Now? Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” I hear him rush into action: keys jangle and material rustles like he’s pulling on a jacket, “we’re watching him from Anna’s room.”
“Gott. Stay there, lock the door. I am on my way. Be there in ten minutes. You have a torch?”
“Anna will have one. Anna,” I whisper, “do you have a torch?”
She goes to her bedside table, yanks open the bottom drawer.
“She’s getting one,” I tell Ari.
“Gott. Go to the window and point it into the road. Turn it on and off three times fast, three times slow, three times fast. A man will come. Do not let him in unless he knocks the same code on your door. His name is, um, wait, it’s here somewhere.”
I hear Ari drop something. “If we’re signalling to a neighbour, Anna will know their name.”
“It’s not a neighbour,” he says. “They’re in a car on the road.”
“In a black sedan?” I ask him.
“Já.” It sounds as though he’s trying to find something. “You see them?”
Anna goes to pass me her flashlight. I dismiss it with a shake of my hand. “Ari, do you have someone watching The Himinn?”
“Já. Point the torch…”
“Ari, the man in the black sedan, that’s who I’m calling about. You sent someone to watch me?”
Silence. His fumbling stops.
Anna rolls her eyes.
“Ari?”
“Director Úlfar insisted,” Ari mumbles down the phone. “He didn’t want to take any chances with your safety.”
“With my safety?”
“From any activists.”
“Right, okay. You should have told me.”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t think…I have his name now if you want it. Gunnar Eyjólfsson.”
“Gunnar Eyjólfsson?” I repeat, certain I recognise the name.
“Já, he was very keen to take the first shift. You see, people in Höfkállur care about you too.”
Anna frowns, then flaps her hands as it comes to her. “Gunnar,” she whispers, “he’s Doctor Emil’s assistant.”
Of course he is. “I bet he was keen,” I mutter.
“Pardon?” Ari says.
“Nothing. I’ll see you tomorrow afternoon. I’m not going to the morgue in the morning now.”
“Oh, okay. Gunnar is there if you need him, or if you want to go anywhere,” Ari says before we hang up, “as am I.”
I put my phone in my pocket, wind my scarf around my neck and zip up my jacket. “Map please.” I hold my hand out to Anna.
“You’re still going?” She passes it to me, open on the correct page.
“Absolutely. Unless you think Doctor Emil’s assistant offered to take first watch out of the goodness of his heart?” I turn and jog back down the stairs.
“Wait!” Anna calls, catching up to me. “Use the back door. If you go through my neighbour’s garden, then out the street behind, he won’t see you. Here.” She shows me where to go on her map.
“If Gunnar moves, call me.” I tell her, moving into the kitchen. “Or if you hear from Jón.”
I open Anna’s back door and look out. Her white picket fence continues around from the front to border a long lawn. It’s low enough for me to climb over but Anna comes to help anyway. Once I’m over she hurries back inside, gives me a nervous wave and closes the door.
The second she’s gone, I realise I’m probably not making the wisest decision after all. It isn’t theft to take information that already belongs to you. But if I’m this desperate to know whether something underhanded has happened to Mark’s body, or if the government is somehow involved, how desperate might others be to ensure I don’t find out?
I tiptoe past Anna’s neighbouring house, bent low like a criminal even though there are no lights on inside. I reach the road parallel to Anna’s and survey it up and down, peering into its shadows. There’s no movement. The rest of my walk will be along main roads, so I hurry towards the sound of traffic, so fast that individual houses disappear in a blur.
Once on the main road, I glance over my shoulder every few paces to check for black sedans. There are none, though every time a vehicle zooms past I flinch. At the same time, the cacophony of their passing sounds so much like gushing water it serves only to remind me why I am doing this.
Mark.
I never thought the connection Mark and I had could get stronger. It did, though, after what happened with Riley. Every public holiday, we would synchronise activities. I got to know all his friends a little better; he got to know those I had left. We planned our New Years’ Eve together. We read each other’s research papers. We ate hangover breakfasts together. He knew Mum and Dad were a little unforgiving about my tenacity, so stuck up for me whenever the subject came up. I went to gay clubs with him and danced with abandon. We were there for each other, best friends. And I was supposed to find that best friend in Höfkállur. I was supposed to prove Director Úlfar wrong. Director Úlfar wasn’t wrong, though I haven’t had a moment yet to absorb that fact. Now I do, the thought weighs me down until my step thuds into the tarmac and I fade into a freezing cold daydream that splashes from boulder to boulder in some desolate river.
Mark is dead.
I am here alone, without him.
Busy traffic at junctions jars me into examining my immediate reality, but once safe on the footpath again my mind reels back to the wet coldness where I imagine Mark spending the last few moments of his life. I shiver. I’ve lost my only brother. Mum and Dad have lost their only son. Mark, my best friend, is gone.
“If you do not want to cause your parents further pain,” the man on the Austurleid said, “turn around.”
The chill of my daydream smashes into a wall of ice, making me gasp. As it ricochets backwards, I see my reflection mirrored. Slowly my clone fizzles into a likeness of Mark that thumps against the glass until I’m looking into my brother’s brown eyes.
Am I walking into a cold grave of my own? I ask the reflection.
A wave crashes onto a pebble beach somewhere and I hear shells and stones clattering against each other as the swell retreats. It reminds me of the sounds I heard on the Austurleid, by the Viking sculpture and in Doctor Emil’s office. I try to remember what the imaginary voices said. Only fragments come to me, finish reading, let’s go, to the glacier… Why am I even hearing voices? Should I be going to the morgue in this state?
The ocean surges back up the sand.
Really? That sure?
A passing tipper truck sounds its horn as if trying to parp-parp me back to the highway. I’m climbing a small hill and beyond its brow, down its other side, is a building that can only be Höfkállur Hospital. Sat in a block of coarse yellow grass, the building’s tall brown walls and vibrant jade roof resemble a tree, which would have been in keeping with its surroundings had it been set among the leafy stringybarks of Kakadu. Here in a tree-less Iceland, set apart from the rest of the town, it stands out like an abstract Dali creation in the centre of a pale pastel Monet monotone. Just like Anna said it woul
d.
I descend into its parking lot and hear a car reverse out of its spot, another car swing through the exit. Although it’s not dark yet, headlights pan across me like a prison searchlight. A nightshift nurse walks into the emergency department at the right side of the building, where an ambulance sits waiting. I look away but the image triggers memories I’d rather not have right now.
I am back in Sydney, Mark is stopping in to check on me but he’s too late. I see him crying, panicking, calling an ambulance then waiting, tears streaming. The vision fills me with something I cannot bear to feel.
Responsibility.
I shake the memory loose but it leaves me with a certainty that makes me straighten my back and walk with resolve. This isn’t a bad idea, it’s the best decision I’ve ever made. Mark would have done the same for me.
I pass the well-lit main entrance, step onto grass and head for the shadowy left side of the building. The service entrance is at the back. It’s the quickest way to the morgue.
Chapter 8
As I approach the tall brown walls of Höfkállur Hospital, I take comfort in the fact that my confident stride will convince passers-by that I belong here this late. I don’t want anyone thinking I’m lost or doing something negative. In fact, I don’t want anyone noticing me at all. I glance behind me, notice the silent windows of the factory across the road from the hospital—all black with their reflection of coming night—and speed up.
Once at the side of the building, I check behind me once more. Looming beyond the factory, a rise of lemon and grey smudges suggest the now barely visible hills that sit on Höfkállur’s outskirts. There are no black sedans or grey four-wheel drives in sight. So I pull my scarf high around my neck, stride around the corner and head for the back of the hospital. It’s then that Anna texts me. The ping makes me jump.
Her text is easy to read on the glowing screen, yet its words confuse me. Only after I re-read her message do I realise she’s communicating in code.
“Hope I didn’t wake u,” her text reads. “I’ve been looking out 4 Mark’s watch, like u asked, but don’t know where it is. Sorry. Perhaps it will turn up. Sometimes things do, when you least expect them!”