by Chris Angus
His surprise showed—until he remembered how insular a city Reykjavik really was.
“Only met her a couple of times,” she went on. “Quite a brilliant scientist. Doing some sort of volcanic research up on Laki. I don’t know how often you’ll run into her at your boarding house, though. I’ve heard that lately, she prefers to camp out on site.”
This wasn’t good news. It would be hard to justify setting up his own tent right next to Sam’s in a half million acres of wilderness. She’d be suspicious immediately.
Eva looked at him. “What’s going on, Ryan? Who’s this mysterious new client? Are we going to see any of you? There are some problems you could deal with right now, you know.”
“I know, and I’m sorry. You’re just going to have to handle them yourself for the time being. This new deal will bring in some badly needed financing. I couldn’t afford to pass it up. Anyway, I have full confidence in you.”
Before she could speak, he added, “Look, why don’t you send Jon out into the field. Get him away from the office for a while. God knows there must be plenty for him to do.”
“I’ve tried, believe me. But he resists it. Says he’s behind in his own office work and geological studies, blah, blah, blah. Truth is, he likes the nightlife. I’m telling you, boss, he’s not worth what you’re paying him.”
“Probably not. But we have to have a full PhD geologist on staff or our clients won’t take us seriously. I’ll see if I can come up with something for him to do, okay?”
Reykjavik had perhaps the most spectacular setting for a city anywhere, with a backdrop of magnificent mountains set against the sharply contrasting blues of sky and ocean, at least when the weather allowed them to be seen. Located between the Arctic Circle and the warm Gulf Stream current, its climate constantly shifted back and forth, from balmy one day to wet and frigid the next. As if to compensate, the city rocked with a vibrant nightlife, crowded green parks, and a brisk salmon river that flowed through the center of town.
Much of this had been tempered, of course, since the collapse of the banking and financial industry in the fall of 2008. However, the hardship had declined over the succeeding years, and Icelanders refused to let it dampen their spirits.
He got to visit his Reykjavik office only once or twice a year. Under Eva’s management, they’d begun to acquire a number of new, high-level accounts. Geothermal technology was poised to take off on an international scale, and Ryan hoped they’d be in on the ground floor when that happened.
“Is that wonderful little seafood restaurant still down by the waterfront?” he asked.
She glanced at him. “It’s still there, all right, but under new management. They serve Middle Eastern food now. Owned by an Iranian chain. Truth is, you’ll see a lot of that. Sometimes it seems like the Iranians have bought up half of Reykjavik, apartment buildings, high rises, malls, restaurants.”
He raised an eyebrow. “I knew they were one of the foreign interests that had been capitalizing on the economic weakness,” he said. “But I didn’t realize it had gone that far.”
“After the collapse, things were available at fire sale prices, as you know,” said Eva. “There’s long been resistance to foreign investment in Iceland. The government has tried to keep it under strict control, but there’s been pressure to open things more and more. A lot of it has been surreptitious, locals partnering with foreign nationals to make it more palatable. The truth is, the Iranians like Iceland. Seem to find it exotic. They love the wildness of it.”
“I wouldn’t think they’d care for the cold weather and overcast skies.”
“Well, if they don’t, they’re doing an awfully good job of concealing their discomfort.” She pulled the car up to a small clapboard building with a bright red roof. “Here we are—Hildisdottir’s place.”
He got out and looked around. They were in the center of town. Ingolfsstraeti was a quiet street with a small park across the way. The National Theater and the waterfront were nearby. He took his bags out and gave her a hug.
“You have to at least come for dinner,” she said. “Saturday night?”
“Will David be able to fight the girls off long enough to stop by?”
“I promise.”
“Okay. Tell him I’ll give him a lesson in attitude adjustment that will help keep the young things at bay.”
She smiled. “You’ll want to rent a car. There’s a place just round the corner. See you, then.” She roared off, leaving him on the curb with his bags.
He went up the stoop and rang the bell.
An efficient, ruddy-faced woman greeted him. She wore a white apron and shook his hand with her own, lightly floured one.
“Sorry,” she said. “There is a pie, you see.” She took one of his bags and bustled him inside. “Expecting you. My name is Bjorg. Nice it will be to have a full house again.”
“How many others are there?”
“Only two. An Iranian business owner. Here to look for investments, he is, though Lord knows what is left to buy. He is gone most of the day. And a scientist, a woman. But she is out there somewhere.” She waved a hand, leaving Ryan uncertain if she meant to indicate the distant mountains or that the woman was a bit crazy.
“Gone for days at a time, almost a week this time. I do not know why she keeps a room at all. Perhaps it is subletting I should be doing.” She looked him up and down. “I do hope you will spend more time with us. It is a full English breakfast I am providing every morning at seven thirty.”
“That’s marvelous!” he said and meant it. He was addicted to the English idea of breakfast.
The house gave off a Victorian flavor with busy wallpaper, overstuffed furniture, and bric-a-brac everywhere. Upstairs, a hallway had three doors off it. She opened one and he stepped into a large, bright room with a queen-size bed, a sitting area, and a small balcony that looked out on the park.
“Beautiful,” he said. “I’ll be very comfortable here.”
“Oh, I am glad. The door at the end of the hall is the bathroom. With Miss Graham, you will share, when she is here. The Iranian gentleman has the downstairs toilet off his own bedroom.”
“Uh . . . what did you say his name was?”
“Hassan . . . something. I am not remembering. They are all named Hassan or Mohammad. Confusing, it is.”
He wondered if her remark revealed prejudice or simply discomfort with the new order in Iceland and decided to probe a little further. “I haven’t been back in some time. My friend said there’s been a lot more foreign investment.”
“Ya! That is putting it . . . how do you Americans say? Softly? Mildly? Bought up half the country, they have. Did you see all the new fuel tanks down by the docks? Iranian oil. Makes it hard for folks to complain, it does. Cheap fuel . . . they undercut the price of local gas . . . and hotels and businesses filled with Hassans spreading money around like water.”
“What’s in it for them?”
“I could not be saying. It is more money they have than good sense. Seem to enjoy the stark beauty of this place. Must be quite a change from the desert, I am thinking. But Hassan—he never takes off his down coat. Not adapted to the cold.” She gave him a smile and spun out one of her Americanisms. “It all beats me.”
Bjorg disappeared to continue with her pie. Ryan stepped out onto the balcony and stared at the distant mountains. In spite of his unusual mission, he felt the tension in his shoulders slip away. He loved this country and even thought he might make it his home someday. He started to turn away when he noticed a gray Land Rover parked across the street in front of the park. The two men sitting inside stared straight ahead. They weren’t conversing or consulting a map. There was just something a little . . . odd . . . about it. His security training kicked in. The men looked for all the world like they were on some sort of stakeout.
Looking for Sam?
The thought made him nervous. He kept an eye on them into the early afternoon as he unpacked and settled in. Bjorg brought a lunch to h
is room.
He decided to ask her directly. “Um . . . have you noticed those two men sitting in that car across the way? They’ve been there all day.”
She looked out the window. “I am forgetting about them,” she said. “Showed up three days ago, now, and been there ever since. A bit strange, I am thinking.”
He felt alarm bells go off. They had to be looking for someone and it made sense it would be Sam.
“Is there another way out of the house, Bjorg?”
She looked at him with a questioning tilt of her head. “Ya. The back door goes into the garden. There is a gate you will be taking to a path and then to Lindargata street. The way I go to market.”
“I think I’ll wander out that way if you don’t mind. I want to rent a car.”
“There is a shop right on that street. Turn left when you get to the end of the path.” She started to leave the room. “If you leave a light on,” she said. “They will be thinking you are still here.”
“Who will?”
“Why . . . anyone would,” she said, turning away with a smile.
The rental was a reasonably fuel-efficient 4WD vehicle. He threw in a pack with some warm clothes and a few bits of food he’d picked up at a local grocery. He wasn’t at all sure what he was doing, but the fact that someone seemed already on the lookout for Sam made him nervous.
Bjorg said she’d been gone almost a week, so Sam might walk right into something unexpected when she returned. Or potentially, she’d run into trouble already. That was something he didn’t want to think about.
He’d been to Laki once during a tour Eva had given him when he first came to Iceland to open his office. It was located in the barren south-central highlands near the Vatnajökull glacier in an area of volcanic fissures. Barren . . . but also incredibly beautiful.
He knew what he was doing was foolish. What were the odds he could find a single person in all that vast wilderness? Yet he recalled that Laki was at the end of a spur connecting with the Ring Road that encircled the entire country. Perhaps Sam’s car would be there, and he could figure out which direction she’d gone. You could see a long way in that open landscape. A colorful tent would stick out like a beacon.
It was after five when he reached the small parking lot at the end of Rt. 206, connecting the Laki Craters to the Ring Road. There had been several difficult river crossings he’d never have been able to negotiate without 4WD. Once or twice he feared he’d gotten mired in the water but he’d managed finally to get through, gears grinding. Sure enough, a blue 4WD pickup was pulled off to one side of the lot, its bed modified with fitted metal storage bins.
He got out, walked over to the truck, and peered in the window. Aside from a sweater and a few magazines or journals, there was nothing else inside that might identify the owner. But it had to be hers. Who else would be in such a place with night coming on?
He walked about the brown earth, a mixture of volcanic detritus and hardened lava flows, though a layer of gray moss covered much of the landscape. He knew the moss turned a vibrant green following a rainfall. After making two circuits, he found faint footprints in the moss leading up the side of the crater. It was hard to know if they were recent, but they seemed too small for a man’s.
He put his pack on. He had moved perhaps a hundred meters up the side when he heard another vehicle coming. He crouched behind a large boulder and waited.
In a moment, the same Land Rover that had been parked outside his boarding house chugged noisily to a halt beside the other two vehicles. Four men got out and scanned the surrounding slopes. One man with a stoop and a large nose seemed to be in charge.
There ensued a lengthy conversation, much peering into the cars and pointing in various directions. He wished he could hear what they were saying. But then it wasn’t necessary, as Big Nose pulled out a blade and carefully punctured the tires, all of them, on Ryan’s car and the pickup.
He stared in disbelief. The action left no doubt as to why the men were here. They intended that whoever owned those vehicles would not be able to leave. Not be able to escape.
If further evidence was needed, it was forthcoming. From the trunk of the Land Rover, one man issued rifles to each of the others. Ryan’s hand went down and felt the familiar weight of his SIG P229 pistol, the weapon of choice for the Secret Service. Without the help of the majority leader and his own record with the Service, he would never have been able to bring the firearm into the country. It gave him some reassurance, though a pistol against four men with rifles was small comfort.
He watched long enough to see the men study the ground and find the same tracks he was following. Then he scurried away, keeping behind the rocks. Cover was limited and darkness of any kind was still many hours away.
The tracks petered out, as the moss gave way to loose shale. He continued upward, finally out of sight, taking the path of least resistance, which he felt anyone would follow in the rough terrain. God, what a bleak place! Eva had barely allowed him out of the car when he’d visited before, simply pointing out the volcanic mountain as a tourist site. But from what he understood, tourism on Laki had taken a big hit following Graham’s published suggestions that an eruption might be imminent. That had not made her a popular figure in the tourism industry.
Laki was part of a volcanic system that centered on the Grímsvötn volcano and included the Eldgjá canyon and Katla volcano. It lay between the glaciers of Mýrdalsjökull and Vatnajökull, in an area of fissures that ran in a southwest-northeast direction. He knew that the volcanoes in this region had a long history of eruptions, so Samantha’s cautions undoubtedly had some basis in fact.
As the side of the crater grew steeper, he entered a region rent with fissures, rocky overhangs, treacherous drop-offs, and dangerous, slippery footing. He was now just two hundred feet below the rim. He peered over a boulder and could see the men far below, working their way slowly upward. They were clearly not mountaineering types. Their city shoes slipped on the uneven ground, and he heard Big Nose curse as he lost his balance and fell on the hard rock.
As he circled to the backside of the volcano, he saw a bright orange tent a hundred yards away, situated in a cluster of boulders near the rim. The sides of the tent were held down with rocks, the ground being too hard for stakes.
He picked up his pace, stumbling and cursing like the men behind. As he neared the tent, he saw sudden movement to one side. A woman carrying a heavily weighted pack was carefully making her way down from the rim. She looked up and saw him.
“Who are you?” she asked. She held her walking stick in both hands like a weapon. Ryan was struck by the intensity in her gaze. Her black hair had grown longer since the picture he’d seen. It was tied back in a ponytail, a pair of sunglasses resting on top of her head. From what little he could see beneath the pack and coat, she appeared very slight. She was completely and utterly alone in this wilderness and had just been confronted by a strange man. Yet he had no sense that she was afraid. Indeed, she seemed ready to interrogate him.
Before he could respond, the crack of a rifle split the air and a bullet ricocheted off a rock next to them. The sound reverberated in the vastness of their surroundings and seemed to echo away into the distance.
He looked back and saw that the four men had spread out and were making better time than he’d originally anticipated. When he turned back to the woman, he caught just a glimpse of her as she disappeared over the rim.
“Wait!” he cried, then cursed as another bullet smacked near his feet. He dropped his pack and took off up the crater after her. He considered firing a return shot, just to make them think twice, but rejected the idea. Better to let them think he was unarmed.
He struggled up the steep final feet to the rim, realizing that the quickness with which the girl had climbed while carrying a heavy pack was impressive. She was in good shape.
At the top, he was silhouetted against the sky for a moment and two shots nicked close to him before he ducked over the edge.
He whirled around, looking in every direction. There wasn’t a sign of her. She had vanished as completely as if she’d fallen down a rabbit hole. It was impossible.
“Damn!” He swore out loud. He had no option but to call out. “Samantha! Where are you? Sam?”
He stumbled lower. He needed to find a place to make a stand. Once the men topped the crater rim, they’d make quick work of him. He found a fissure that wound along the side of the crater. It offered some protection. But then the men were on top and they saw him before he could get out of sight. They opened fire in an almost continuous fusillade. Bullets rang and ricocheted off the rocks.
He worked his way along the fissure until he reached a small ledge that blocked further progress. He’d got himself trapped in a dead end.
The men were talking among themselves. They could see his predicament and began to spread out along the rim searching for a spot where they’d be able to fire down on him.
He looked about desperately for some way out. Then a voice whispered sharply from above.
“Up here!”
He looked up and saw a hand wave to him from the top of the ledge. It would be a tough scramble, and he’d have to hurry before the men got into position to fire on him.
He maneuvered until he was out of sight of the men, then began to pull himself up using a series of shale-like steps. Just before he reached the top, he heard the voice again.
“That’s far enough . . . now slip through here.”
A small depression existed near the top of the ledge, no bigger than a man’s waist. It looked like nothing more than a bit of rock of a slightly different color. He lowered himself into it, realizing that it was the opening of a venthole. He squeezed through a small entryway and found himself completely enclosed in a larger fissure that wound away, disappearing into darkness.