“This what?” Sigurdur Oli asked.
“That I was with Gulli in the old days,” the man said.
“What do you mean, he was with Gudlaugur in the old days?” Erlendur butted in again. “What could he mean by that?”
“That’s the way he phrased it,” Sigurdur Oli said.
“That he was with Gudlaugur?”
“Yes.”
“What does that mean?”
“That they were together.”
“You mean Gudlaugur was …?” Countless thoughts rushed through Erlendur’s mind, all screeching to a halt at the stern expressions on the faces of Gudlaugur’s sister and his father in the wheelchair.
“That’s what this Baldur guy says,” Sigurdur Oli said. “But Gudlaugur didn’t want anyone to know.”
“Didn’t want anyone to know about their relationship?”
“He wanted to hide the fact that he was gay.”
27
The man from Thingholt told Sigurdur Oli that his relationship with Gudlaugur began when they were about twenty-five. It was during the disco era when Baldur rented a basement flat in the Vogar district. Neither of them had come out of the closet. “Attitudes to being gay were different then,” he said with a smile. “But it was starting to change.”
“And we didn’t really live together,” Baldur added. “Men didn’t live together then like they do today, without anyone giving it a second thought. Gays could hardly survive in Iceland in those days. Most of us felt compelled to go abroad, as you may know. He often used to visit me, shall we say. Stayed the night with me. He had a room of his own in the west of town and I went there a couple of times, but he was maybe not quite houseproud enough for my taste so I stopped going there. We were mainly at my place.”
“How did you meet?” Sigurdur Oli asked.
“There were places where gays used to meet then. One was just off the city centre, in fact not far from here in Thingholt. Not a club, but a sort of meeting place we had in someone’s house. You never knew what to expect at the clubs and you sometimes got thrown out for dancing with other men. This home was a hotchpotch of everything, a coffee bar, guesthouse, night club, advice centre and shelter. He came there one evening with some friends. That was the first time I saw him. Sorry, silly me, can I offer you coffee?”
Sigurdur Oli looked at his watch.
“Maybe you’re in a terrible hurry,” the man said, carefully smoothing down his thin, dyed hair.
“No, it’s not that, I wouldn’t mind a cup of tea if you have any,” Sigurdur Oli said, his thoughts on Bergthora. She sometimes got angry when his time-keeping failed. She was very petty about punctuality and would nag him long afterwards if he turned up late.
The man went into the kitchen to make the tea.
“He was awfully repressed,” he said from the kitchen, raising his voice so that Sigurdur Oli could hear him better. “I sometimes thought he hated his own sexuality. As if he still hadn’t fully admitted it. I think he was partly using his relationship with me to help find his way along. He was still searching even at that age. But of course that’s nothing new. People come out in their forties, maybe having been married with four kids.”
“Yes, there are all sorts of permutations,” said Sigurdur Oli, who had no idea what he was talking about.
“Oh yes there are, my dear. Do you like it well brewed?”
“Were you together for long?” Sigurdur Oli asked, adding that he did like his tea strong.
“Three years or so, but it was very on and off towards the end.”
“And you haven’t been in touch with him since?”
“No. I knew about him, sort of,” the man said, returning to the sitting room. “The gay community isn’t that big.”
“In what way was he repressed?” Sigurdur Oli asked while the man put two cups on the table. He had brought in a bowl of cookies, which he recognised as the sort Bergthora baked every Christmas. He tried in vain to remember what they were called.
“He was very mysterious and rarely opened up, or only if we got drunk. It was something to do with his father though, I think. He had no contact with him or with his older sister, who had turned against him, but he missed them terribly. His mother had been dead for years when I met him, but he talked more about her than the rest of his family. He could go on for ever about his mother and it could be very tiring, to tell the truth.”
“How did she turn against him? His sister?”
“This was a long time ago and he never described it exactly. All I know is that he fought what he was. You know what I mean? As if he should have been something else.”
Sigurdur Oli shook his head.
“He thought it was dirty. Something unnatural about it. Being gay.”
“And fought it?”
“Yes and no. He wavered about it. I don’t think he knew which foot to stand on. Poor thing. He didn’t have much self-confidence. Sometimes I think he hated himself?
“Did you know about his past? As a child star?”
“Yes,” the man said, then he stood up to go to the kitchen and returned with a pot of piping-hot tea which he poured into the cups. He took the pot back to the kitchen and they sipped their tea.
“Can’t you speed this up a bit?” Erlendur said to Sigurdur Oli, making no attempt to conceal his impatience as he sat at his hotel room desk listening to the account.
“I’m trying to make it as detailed as possible,” Sigurdur Oli said with a glance at his watch. He was already three-quarters of an hour late for Bergthora.
“Yes, yes, get on with it…”
“Did he ever talk about it?” Sigurdur Oli asked, putting down his teacup and helping himself to a cookie. “His childhood brush with fame?”
“He said he lost his voice,” Baldur said.
“And was he bitter about that?”
“Terribly. It happened at an awful time for him. But he would never tell me about it. He said he was bullied at school for being famous, and that got him down. But he didn’t call it being famous. He didn’t regard himself as ever having been famous. His father wanted him to be, and apparently he came very close to it. But he felt unhappy, and on top of that these feelings started to come out, his gay side. He was reluctant to talk about it. Preferred to say as little as possible about his family. Do have another cookie.”
“No, thanks,” Sigurdur Oli said. “Do you know of anyone who may have wanted to kill him? Someone who wanted to hurt him?”
“Good Lord, no! He was such a pussy cat, he would never have harmed a fly. I don’t know who could have done it. The poor man, going like that. Are you getting anywhere in your enquiries?”
“No,” Sigurdur Oli said. “Did you ever listen to his records, or do you have them?”
“You bet,” the man said. “He was absolutely brilliant. It’s wonderful the way he sang. I don’t think I’ve ever heard a child sing so well.”
“Was he proud of his singing when he was older? When you knew him?”
“He never listened to himself Didn’t want to hear his records. Never. No matter how I tried.”
“Why not?”
“It was just impossible to get him to. He never gave any explanation, he just didn’t listen to his own records.”
Baldur stood up, went to a cupboard in the sitting room, fetched Gudlaugur’s two records and put them on the table in front of Sigurdur Oli.
“He gave them to me after I helped him move.”
“Move?”
“He lost his room on the west side of town and asked me to help him move. He got himself another room and put all his stuff in there. He never really owned anything apart from records.”
“Did he have a lot?”
“Tons of them.”
“Was there anything special that he listened to?”
“No, you see,” Baldur said, “they were all the same records. These ones here,” he said, pointing to Gudlaugur’s two records. “He had loads of these. He said he’d acquired all the copies.
”
“So, he had boxes full of these?” Sigurdur Oli said, unable to conceal his eagerness.
“Yes, at least two.”
“Do you know where they might be?”
“Me? No, I haven’t the foggiest. Are they a hot number these days?”
“I know of someone who might be prepared to kill for them,” Sigurdur Oli said.
Baldur’s face was now a huge question mark.
“What do you mean?”
“Nothing,” Sigurdur Oli said, looking at his watch. “I must be going. I might need to contact you again to fill in a few details. It would also be helpful if you phoned me if you remember anything, no matter how trivial it may seem.”
“To tell the truth we didn’t have much choice in those days,” the man said. “Not like today when half the population is gay and the other half pretends it is.”
He smiled at Sigurdur Oli, who choked on his tea.
“Excuse me,” Sigurdur Oli said.
“It is a little strong.”
Sigurdur Oli stood up and so did Baldur, who followed him to the door.
“We know that Gudlaugur was bullied at school,” Sigurdur Oli said when he was about to leave, “and they called him names. Do you remember if he ever mentioned that to you?”
“It was quite obvious that he’d been bullied for being in a choir and having a beautiful voice and not playing football, and being a bit girlish. He gave the impression of being a little unsure of himself with other people. He talked to me as if he understood why they teased him. But I don’t remember him mentioning any names …”
Baldur hesitated.
“Yes,” Sigurdur Oli said.
“When we were together, you know…”
Sigurdur Oli shook his head vacantly.
“In bed…”
“Yes?”
“Sometimes he wanted me to call him “my Little Princess”,” Baldur said, a smile playing across his lips.
Erlendur stared at Sigurdur Oli.
“My Little Princess?”
“That’s what he said.” Sigurdur Oli stood up from Erlendur’s bed “And now I really must be going. Bergthora will be going bananas. So you’ll be home for Christmas?”
“And what about the boxes of records?” Erlendur said. “Where could they be?”
“The guy didn’t have any idea.”
“The Little Princess? As in the Shirley Temple film? How does that all fit together? Did that man explain it?”
“No, he didn’t know what it meant.”
“It doesn’t have to mean anything in particular,” Erlendur said, as if thinking out loud. “Some gay patois no one else understands. Maybe no stranger than a lot of other things. So, he hated himself then?”
“Not much self-confidence, his friend said. He was indecisive.”
“About his homosexual feelings or something else?”
“I don’t know.”
“You didn’t ask?”
“We can always talk to him again, but he didn’t really seem to know that much about Gudlaugur.”
“And nor do we,” Erlendur said languidly. “If he wanted to hide the fact that he was gay twenty or thirty years ago, do we assume he went on hiding it?”
“That’s the question.”
“I haven’t met anyone else who mentioned that he was gay.”
“Yes, well, I’m off anyway” Sigurdur Oli said, moving to the door. “Was there anything else for today?”
“No,” Erlendur said. “That’s fine. Thanks for the invitation. Give my regards to Bergthora, and try to treat her decently.”
“I always do,” Sigurdur Oli said and hurried out. Erlendur looked at his watch and saw that it was time to meet Valgerdur. He took the last tape from the bank out of the video player and put it on the top of the stack. Immediately his mobile began to ring.
It was Elinborg. She told him she had spoken to the State Prosecutor’s office about the father who assaulted his son.
“What do they reckon he’ll get?” Erlendur asked.
“They think he might even get off, Elinborg said. “He won’t be convicted if he stands firm. If he just denies it. Won’t spend a minute inside.”
“What about the evidence? The footprints on the stairs? The bottle of Drambuie? Everything suggests that—”
“I don’t know why we bother. A case of assault came up for sentence yesterday. A man was repeatedly stabbed with a knife. The attacker got eight months in prison, four of them suspended, which means that he goes to jail for two months. Where’s the justice in that?”
“Will he get the boy back?”
“He’s bound to. The only positive thing, if it can be called positive, is that the boy seriously seems to miss his father. That’s what I don’t understand. How can he feel attached to his father if the man beats the shit out of him? I just can’t figure this case out. Something must be missing. Something we’ve overlooked. It just doesn’t add up.”
“I’ll talk to you later,” Erlendur said and looked at his watch. He was late for his meeting with Valgerdur. “Can you do one thing for me? Stefania Egilsdottir said she was with a friend at the hotel the other day. Would you talk to the woman and confirm it?” Erlendur gave her the woman’s name.
“Aren’t you going to get yourself back home from that hotel?” Elinborg asked.
“Stop nagging me,” Erlendur said and rang off.
28
When Erlendur went down to the lobby he saw Rosant, the head waiter. He hesitated, uncertain whether to make a move. Valgerdur was bound to be waiting for him. Erlendur looked at his watch, pulled a face and went up to the head waiter. This shouldn’t take long.
“Tell me about the whores,” he said without preamble. Rosant was talking courteously to two hotel guests. They were clearly Icelandic, because they looked at him in astonishment.
Rosant smiled, raising his little moustache. He apologised politely to the guests, bowed and took Erlendur aside.
“A hotel is just people and our job is to make them feel good, wasn’t it some kind of crap like that?” Erlendur said.
“It’s not crap. They taught us that at catering college.”
“Did they also teach head waiters to be pimps?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I’ll tell you then. You run a little knocking shop at this hotel”
Rosant smiled.
“A knocking shop?”
“Has it got anything to do with Gudlaugur, your pimping?”
Rosant shook his head.
“Who was with Gudlaugur when he was murdered?”
They fixed each other’s gaze until Rosant backed off and stared down at the floor.
“There was no one I know of,” he finally said.
“Not you?”
“One of your people took a statement from me. I have an alibi.”
“Was Gudlaugur involved with the whores?”
“No. And there are no whores under my charge. I don’t know where you get these stories from about pilfering from the kitchen and whores. They’re nonsense. I’m not a pimp.”
“But—”
“We have certain information for people, for visitors. Foreigners at conferences. Icelanders too. They ask for company and we try to assist. If they meet pretty women at the bars here and feel good about it—”
“Then everyone’s happy. Aren’t they grateful customers?”
“Extremely.”
“So you’re an escort provider, so to speak,” Erlendur said.
“I…”
And how romantic you make it all sound. The hotel manager’s in it with you. What about the head of reception?”
Rosant hesitated.
“What about the head of reception?” Erlendur repeated.
“He doesn’t share our desire to fulfil the customers” diverse needs”
“The customers” diverse needs,” Erlendur mimicked. “Where did you learn to talk like that?”
“At catering college.
”
“And how do the head of reception’s views fit in with yours?”
“There are occasional conflicts”
Erlendur remembered the man from reception denying that there were prostitutes at the hotel, and thought to himself that he was probably the only member of the management who tried to safeguard the hotel’s reputation.
“But you’re trying to eliminate these conflicts, aren’t you?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Does he get in your way?”
Rosant did not answer.
“It was you who set that whore on him, wasn’t it? A little warning in case he was planning to say anything. You were out on the town, saw him and set one of your whores on him.”
Rosant stalled.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he repeated.
“No, I bet you don’t.”
“He’s just so awfully honest,” Rosant said, his moustache lifting alarmingly. “He refuses to understand that it’s better for us to run this ourselves.”
Valgerdur was waiting for Erlendur at the bar. As at their previous meeting, she was wearing light make-up that accentuated her features, with a white silk blouse under a leather coat. They shook hands and she gave a faltering smile. He wondered whether this meeting would be like a fresh start to their acquaintance. He couldn’t work out what she wanted from him, after apparently saying the final word about their friendship the time they met in the lobby. With a smile, she asked him if she could buy him a drink from the bar, or was he perhaps on duty?
“In films, cops aren’t supposed to drink if they’re on duty,” she said.
“I don’t watch films” Erlendur smiled.
“No,” she said. “You read books about pain and death.”
They took a seat in one corner of the bar and sat in silence, watching the people milling around. As Christmas drew closer, Erlendur felt that the guests were growing noisier, there were endless carols playing over the sound system, the tourists brought in gaudy parcels and drank beer as if unaware that it was the most expensive in Europe, if not the world.
“You managed to get a sample from Wapshott,” he said.
“What kind of guy is he anyway? They had to knock him to the floor and force his mouth open. It was awesome to see the way he acted, the way he fought them off inside his cell.”
Voices de-5 Page 22