Chilled to the Bone

by Quentin Bates

  ‘Well, we stayed together, sort of . . .’ Sara said and her words tailed off as she looked at the closed kitchen door. ‘I’d go and stay with him a couple of nights sometimes, but it’s a shitty place in a block full of immigrants, so I didn’t really want to go over there too often. People stare at you.’

  ‘So Magnús came here?’

  ‘Sometimes. My room’s downstairs in the basement and it’s self-contained. So sometimes I used to let him in through the back window and he’d stay until the olds had gone to work. But my parents really didn’t like him. Dad thought he was an idiot with no future.’

  Gunna made notes; she was starting to wonder if Magnús Sigmarsson’s death could be related to events at his workplace, or if Sara’s father could be responsible. It was easy enough to pick up on the man’s clearly intense dislike for his daughter’s boyfriend, and she wondered if that dislike could have been enough to result in violence. Instinct whispered to her that Óskar was a normal enough citizen, but common sense also told her that there was an aspect of the case that needed to be checked.

  ‘Sara, when was the last time you saw Magnús?’

  ‘A couple of days ago. He came here in the evening while the old folks were out and we were watching TV when they came in. Dad went nuts and was about to throw him out, but Magnús left right away and we talked on the steps outside.’

  ‘What did you talk about?’

  Sara sniffed and a new set of tears rolled down her plump red cheeks. ‘He wanted me to move in with him again. Or at least come and stay more often.’

  ‘And what was your answer?’

  ‘I told him I’d come and stay if he cleared his flat up and unpacked all the boxes in the hall. He’d been there more than a month and still hadn’t got round to unpacking.’

  ‘How was he? Was he worried about anything? Nervous?’

  Sara shrugged and shook her head. ‘I don’t know. He was upset because I didn’t move in with him after we left the old flat.’

  ‘But not so angry that he didn’t come round and sneak in the window sometimes?’

  ‘Well, yeah.’

  ‘He didn’t talk to you about his work, did he? Nothing he was concerned about there?’

  ‘No, I don’t think so. He was worried about money because he couldn’t afford the flat on his own and his friend Kolbeinn was thinking of moving in with him.’

  ‘Kolbeinn? Who works at the Gullfoss Hotel?’

  ‘Yeah. That’s him.’

  ‘They worked together?’

  ‘I guess so. That company moves people around all the time.’

  ‘And have you worked there as well?’

  Sara nodded, still looking down at her fingers, which were twisted together in her lap. ‘That’s where we met. I was in the kitchen at the Harbourside for a few months right after it opened.’

  ‘But you didn’t stay long?’

  ‘No, I didn’t like it there.’

  ‘And are you working now?’

  ‘I’m a rep at AquaIce.’

  ‘Which does what?’

  ‘We supply water-cooler refills to offices, mostly. But it’s pretty quiet at the moment, so I’m only working four days a week.’

  Gunna scanned her notes and listened to the silence from the kitchen, wondering if Sara realized that their conversation was probably being listened to.

  ‘The last time you saw Magnús, what happened exactly?’

  Sara took a deep breath and Gunna could see her collecting her thoughts. ‘Well,’ she began, ‘he called me and asked if he could come round and I said yes, because Mum and Dad were out. We were in here when they came home and Dad hit the roof, said he didn’t want to see Magnús here again, and then Dad went out.’

  ‘And how long did Magnús stay?’

  ‘Not long. We talked on the steps outside for a while and I said I’d go and stay with him over the weekend. Then he got in his car and drove away.’

  ‘You saw him drive away, did you? Which direction did he go in?’

  Sara hesitated. ‘I don’t know. I don’t think I saw him get in the car.’

  ‘You didn’t look out of the window?’

  ‘The last thing I said to him was that he ought to leave before Dad came back,’ she said, dropping her head and howling.

  Eiríkur smoothed out the credit card statement on the counter in the exclusive goldsmith’s shop. There were five transactions on Jóhannes Karlsson’s credit card, one a cash withdrawal for the maximum amount the ATM would dispense, followed by one at a clothes shop, one at a decidedly upmarket shoe shop and two at jewellery shops.

  The elderly woman behind the counter eyed Eiríkur suspiciously and her disapproval could be seen behind a thick mask of makeup. She lifted a pair of glasses that hung on a chain around her neck and held them up in front of her eyes to examine the entry on the credit card statement.

  ‘Well, that’s here,’ she said dubiously. ‘But I don’t see what this has to do with the police.’

  ‘We’re investigating a stolen credit card, and this may be one of the transactions on that card.’

  ‘That’s ridiculous,’ the woman snapped. ‘We would never serve anyone using a stolen card.’

  ‘Even if you didn’t know the card had been stolen?’ Eiríkur asked gently. ‘This transaction was only a few days ago. Do you know who served this person?’

  ‘Of course not. This is a busy shop, you know.’

  Eiríkur looked out of the window past the display of rings and necklaces, the gold gleaming against black velvet, at the practically deserted street outside as a truck with a snow plough on the front went past, scraping a layer off the road and piling it into a neat strip at one side.

  ‘It doesn’t seem busy at the moment.’

  The woman sniffed. ‘It’s early.’

  ‘Look, were you serving on that day?’ he asked, his patience starting to wear thin. ‘If not, who was?’

  ‘This kind of thing never happened before these damned credit cards were invented. It was cash or cheque, and we only dealt with respectable people.’

  ‘This may be awkward for you, but these things happen. Is there anyone else here? Can I speak to the manager?’

  ‘I am the proprietor,’ the woman said in a voice as icy as the wind blowing along the street outside.

  ‘In that case, you must have issued a receipt with this transaction, and it seems unlikely that you don’t remember it, considering there’s no small amount of money involved – several hundred thousand krónur.’

  The door at the back of the shop creaked open and a younger face peered around the door.

  ‘Is everything all right?’

  ‘Actually, no.’ Eiríkur said, thankful to see a cheerful face that might be more cooperative, as his patience with the woman behind the counter finally evaporated. The younger face belonged to a middle-aged man in a pullover that looked as if it had been inherited. ‘This transaction,’ Eiríkur explained as the man lifted a pair of glasses to his eyes. ‘Anything you can tell me about it?’

  ‘And you are?’

  ‘He says he’s from the police,’ the elderly woman said in a tone that dripped scorn.

  ‘Eiríkur Thór Jónsson. I’m with the city force,’ Eiríkur said, placing his identification on the counter next to Jóhannes Karlsson’s credit card statement.

  ‘Áki Sandvík,’ the man in the pullover said, folding his glasses. ‘Let’s go to the back room, shall we? It wouldn’t do to have the police here if a customer were to come in, would it, mother?’

  Jóel Ingi felt slightly sick, but hoped the nausea would pass as the morning progressed. He’d work through lunch and go home early, maybe. For the first time since before Christmas, he felt calm and more in control, as if a switch had been flipped inside his head. The buzzing in his ears had receded to an almost unnoticeable hum and the stinging pain deep in his belly that he treated with handfuls of painkillers and which tended to sneak up on him unawares had so far failed to make an appearance.
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  He read through a draft report prepared for the department by an outside consultant, adding his own observations in the generous margins, answered dozens of emails, and felt he had earned his salary by clearing his in tray.

  His heart lurched as Már appeared, frowning, in the doorway.

  ‘It’s all right, nothing to worry about,’ Már assured him as Jóel Ingi felt an immediate tell-tale tightening across his belly.

  ‘Is there anything going on?’

  ‘Our boy’s in a foul temper. He’s chewed out half a dozen people already this morning over that Korean millionaire applying to buy land in the east. He’s dead set against it, but it’s as clear as day the man has some friends somewhere.’

  ‘On a purely legal basis, he’s quite right,’ Jóel Ingi said slowly. ‘There’s no precedent for it and the minister has an obligation to be cautious.’

  Már winked. ‘There’s cautious and there’s deciding who to piss off the most, the voting public or the people who run the show.’

  ‘Who knows where he’ll go next?’ Jóel Ingi said with a thin smile. ‘Do you understand why politicians do the things they do?’

  Már spread his arms in a wordless reply. ‘And until then, we selfless public servants are doomed to be the messengers who get shot for bringing bad news. Speaking of which, Ægir was talking about you earlier.’

  ‘What? Really?’

  ‘Yes. And not in a bad way. So when you get a roasting next time, just batten down the hatches and let it blow over, will you?’

  Jóel Ingi sighed. ‘I’ll try. You’ll be there tonight, won’t you?’

  ‘Tonight?’

  ‘Gallerí 12. Agnes is expecting you.’

  ‘How could I forget?’ Már slapped his own forehead in slow motion. ‘Duh. I’ll be there.’

  He went through a batch of receipts held together with a clip that had hung on a peg over the desk.

  ‘Here it is,’ he said. ‘This time of year’s pretty quiet and there were only a couple of sales that day. An eighteen-carat white gold chain, sixty-five centimetres, three hundred and twenty thousand krónur. A good day for January.’

  Eiríkur nodded and agreed that the figure tallied with the credit card statement. ‘Who served this person, do you know?’

  Áki gestured at the receipt. ‘My sister Stella, judging by the handwriting. She runs the shop a couple of mornings a week.’ He looked up as the door opened. ‘And right on time,’ he said.

  A younger, better-made-up version of the elderly woman from the shop looked enquiringly down at Eiríkur.

  ‘This gentleman’s from the police, Stella,’ Áki explained. ‘Wants to know about the white gold necklace you sold the other day.’

  Stella settled herself on a stool and Eiríkur sensed that she was wondering what to say.

  ‘Do you remember the person who bought it?’ Eiríkur prompted, unfolding Jóhannes Karlsson’s credit card statement again. ‘It cost three hundred and twenty thousand, according to this.’

  ‘It was a woman, not someone I’ve seen before. Why? Is there a problem?’

  ‘There should be a problem considering there aren’t many women around called Jóhannes Karlsson.’

  ‘Oh,’ Stella said, crestfallen. ‘I, er, I see. I can’t have checked the name. We don’t normally look at it.’

  ‘Any particular reason?’

  ‘Well. These are exclusive items,’ she floundered. ‘You don’t expect dishonest people to come in here.’

  Eiríkur sighed. ‘All right. Tell me what happened. What time was it? Morning?’

  ‘Around eleven, I think.’

  Áki hunted through a sheaf of receipts held together by another clip. ‘Eleven forty-one,’ he said, holding up a receipt that the credit card had generated.

  ‘That’s right,’ Stella agreed. ‘She came in, looked for a few minutes and I supposed she must have decided what she wanted before she came in here as she just asked for the chain and bought it. She was only here for a few minutes.’

  ‘No small talk? She didn’t say anything?’

  ‘She said something about being in a hurry. She had a big bag and had to hunt in it for her purse to find the card, so it didn’t occur to me that it wasn’t genuine.’

  ‘Or that it would be worth looking at the name?’ Eiríkur suggested; Stella looked down at the floor in dismay at the reminder. ‘All right, let’s have a description of this person. Age? Height?’

  ‘Mid-thirties, I’d guess. I’m one-seventy, and I think she was quite a bit taller than me, maybe one-eighty or eighty-five?’

  ‘Not wearing heels?’

  ‘I’m not sure, but I don’t think so.’

  ‘You don’t have CCTV in here, do you?’

  ‘It’s switched off at the moment,’ Áki put in, a morose look on his face. ‘It broke down before Christmas and they still haven’t been along to fix it.’

  ‘So no pictures. What was she wearing?’

  ‘A black coat. She didn’t unbutton it, so I don’t know what she was wearing underneath.’

  ‘Trousers?’

  ‘I’m not sure, but I don’t think so. The shop isn’t big and when you stand behind the counter you don’t tend to see anything below the waist.’

  ‘Hair?’

  ‘Fair, nicely cut.’

  ‘Covering the ears? Above them?’

  Stella paused. ‘You could see her ears, because I was admiring the pearl earrings she was wearing.’

  ‘Pierced ears, then?’

  ‘Yes. Small earlobes as well, I think. You notice these things when it’s your business. Small ears make the earrings look bigger.’

  Eiríkur scribbled notes as quickly as he could. ‘And the face? Anything special?’

  ‘No. I don’t think so. Just an ordinary face, but with quite a big nose. Well, not big, but not small either, if you get my meaning.’

  ‘I think so. Eyes?’

  ‘Er. Green, I think.’

  ‘Sure?’

  ‘No, not really.’

  Eiríkur stowed Jóhannes Karlsson’s credit card statement away and took one of the CCTV screenshots of the mystery woman from his folder. ‘Look familiar?’ he asked.

  Stella stared at the two pictures.

  ‘That’s nothing like her,’ she declared finally.

  ‘You’re certain?’ Eiríkur asked and carefully placed a piece of paper over the photograph, showing the woman with black hair, but covering the face from the eyebrows upwards.

  ‘It could be,’ Stella said grudgingly.

  Eiríkur placed a finger over it to mask the hair. ‘We’ve established that the hair is fake. And now?’

  ‘Those are the same earrings,’ Stella said immediately. ‘No question.’

  ‘And the face?’

  ‘Yes, I think so. That beaky nose looks about right.’

  He put the picture of the blonde in front of her. ‘And this one?’

  ‘Yes,’ Stella said. ‘That’s her.’

  ‘In that case, that’s all I need from you,’ Eiríkur said, putting the photographs away and standing up. ‘I’ll give you a crime reference number, as this was a stolen card so no doubt the insurance company will want to ask you a few questions as well.’

  He had to admit to himself that there was something magnetic about the man. Gussi looked through the window of the café and saw the hard-faced man whose real name he still didn’t know sitting with a cup and saucer in front of him as he sat back reading the cultural supplement of last weekend’s newspaper.

  Flustered, Gussi walked around the block, which was quiet at this time, between morning rush hour and the lunch break that saw people reappearing on the streets. He thought about Hekla and how many years it had been since he’d seen her last in person. A good ten, twelve years, he decided, although it could be more and he had seen her several times on television in bit parts and recognized that soft voice more than once in adverts and radio drama. As a senior player at the theatre, he had a room of his own and didn
’t notice many of the bit-part players, but Hekla had attracted so much attention. It wasn’t just her looks, he recalled. She hadn’t been beautiful in any classical way, although the young men certainly appreciated those bouncing tits and long legs, judging by their crude jokes, he thought with distaste. There had been a quality to her bearing that simply clicked as she walked into and inhabited a part to become that person. The girl had a real, God-given talent, he admitted to himself, trying not to remind himself that his own skills had been the product of sweat and hard work, not something to be simply switched on and off at a whim.

  Walking fast along the half-empty pavements that took him in a circle past the tourist shops and closed nightclubs and bars, Gussi wondered if Hekla had been aware of her own talent. It was a terrible shame that she hadn’t been able to find work and had had to search elsewhere after such a promising start. But it’s a tough business, he reminded himself bitterly. Upset someone high up in the cultural mafia and you’re screwed; second chances are as rare as a blue moon, unless you have a foot in the door via someone with connections or a bit of clout.

  He stopped outside the café, having walked a full circle; the fresh air had cleared his mind, or so he hoped. The man who called himself Jón spied him immediately over the top of his newspaper, closing and folding it with precision.

  Gussi sat down and immediately felt uncomfortable under the steady gaze that was neither friendly nor hostile, but which made him feel that his innermost thoughts were being scanned.

  ‘What can I get you?’ A deferential voice asked and Gussi realized that Jón must have signalled to a waitress without his noticing.

  ‘A coffee.’

  ‘Ordinary?’

  ‘Yes,’ he said and looked at the man waiting for him. ‘Please. And you?’

  ‘The same as before, Alma, please. Could you bring us a few pastries as well?’

  On first name terms with the staff here, Gussi thought. That doesn’t happen too often.

  ‘Good morning, er, Jón,’ he finally greeted Baddó, extending a hand that was crushed for a second until the grip was released.

  ‘So, you have something useful for me?’

  ‘You don’t waste time, do you?’ Gussi grumbled and got a cruel smile in return.