The sensations that the project aroused were unfamiliar to her. Much as she loved architecture, the other buildings she had designed had not made her feel this way, but she knew exactly why. This hotel was far and away her most successful project. From the moment she began sketching the first draft at her studio in Reykjavík, she had realized that she was on the right track. The building was so much better than all her previous efforts. She realized that she would make a name for herself at last. She would become sought after.
She had often wondered why this project had seized her imagination so immediately and why the outcome had been such a success. There was nothing remarkable about the old house or the land, although the house was unusually grand for its age. It had also been exceptionally well maintained, considering no one had lived in it for about fifty years. She soon realized that someone had looked after the house over the years, perhaps intending to use it as a holiday home or to get away from the city, but those plans had never materialized. Inside the building, there was nothing to indicate that the twenty-first century had begun. A thick layer of dust had covered everything, but mousetraps here and there showed that someone had made sure that the interior and furnishings escaped unnecessary damage. The first time Birna went there, she had found it difficult to look at the tiny skeletons in some of the traps, but otherwise the house had impressed her, inside and out.
Birna looked at her watch. What was wrong with the man? Had he been delayed at that stupid séance? The message had been clear enough. She took out her mobile and scrolled through the texts. Yes, perfectly straightforward: “Meet me @ cave @ 9 2nite.” What a load of shit. Before putting her mobile back in her pocket, she double-checked that the cove was out of range. It was. That was one of the most annoying things about this area, she thought, bad mobile reception.
She decided to walk back to the cave. Maybe he was there. Although the cave was high up on the shore, visibility was so poor that she could have missed him. Also, the screeching of the birds drowned out everything else, so she wouldn’t have heard him arrive. She set off, taking care to look down because it was easy to lose one’s footing on the stones. They crunched together beneath the weight of her feet. Hopefully he had finally come around to her way of thinking. She had expended enough energy on this whole business. She didn’t really think he’d changed his mind, as he’d been so adamantly opposed. If by any chance he had, she knew she had herself to thank for his change of heart. She had given in and slept with him. The sex was intended to influence Jónas’s decision in her favor; she had certainly not done it for her own pleasure. It was important to have several projects on the go when the competition came around. Although she had the prize pretty much in the bag, she needed to be sure, so she had to take on that burden. What did one quick shag matter, compared with winning the competition? She would be the talk of the town and, more important, her peers. Birna smiled to herself at the thought.
An unusually loud squawking from the cliff pulled her out of her reverie. It was as if all the birds of the heavens were calling out in unison. Perhaps they wanted to remind the world beyond the fog that they existed. Birna sighed. It had turned cold and she wrapped her anorak more tightly around her. What sort of summer was this, anyway? She reached the cave but could see no one. On the off chance that he was there she called out, but no one answered. Ten minutes. She would give him ten minutes and then leave. This was just plain rude. Anger flared inside her, warming her slightly. How dare he make her wait like this? It wasn’t like being late for a meeting at a café in Reykjavík. There she could flick through magazines to kill the time, but here there was nothing to do. And beautiful as the area was, right now there was nothing to see but fog.
Five minutes. She would give him just five minutes. She wanted to get back and she was dying for a piss. An odd thought struck her, nothing to do with the beach or being made to wait alone in the freezing fog. She felt suddenly sad that she had not learned more about the geology of this area and other parts of Snæfellsnes. For example, how was Kirkjufell, the mountain that fascinated her, formed? It stood alone in the sea on the northern shore of the peninsula, and she knew enough geology to tell that it was not volcanic. She wished she had taken more interest in her studies when she was at school. When she got back home, she was going to look it up, just as she had planned to do the first time she had seen the mountain.
Birna jumped as the noise of the birds got louder again, raucous cries from farther up the cliff she was leaning against. She took two steps away from the wall of rock. She shuddered, gripped by a feeling of unease, not for the first time. There was something about this place. Not just the obvious, those weirdos who worked at the hotel and claimed to be spiritual assistants to the guests. The guests too. All nutcases, but not quite as bad as the staff. No, there was something else wrong here. Something that had slowly but surely intensified, making its presence known on her first inspection and beginning with goose bumps on her upper arms when she saw the skeletons of the mice. It had now transformed into a persistent unease that Birna found difficult to identify. It wasn’t the rubbish about ghosts that scared her—she was pretty sure the hotel staff made those stories up, although only God knew why.
Birna tried to smile as she recalled the behavior of Eiríkur, the resort’s aura expert, when she had arrived a week before. He had grasped her upper arm and whispered that her aura was black. She should watch out. Death was after her. She frowned at the memory of his foul breath.
Five minutes had passed. He’d be getting a piece of her mind for this. She could have been working: there was a lot to do and her time was precious. If she had not received the text message, she would have spent this time working on the plans for the new building, and maybe she’d have reached a conclusion by now. It was supposed to stand by itself, a short way from the main building. For some reason she had still not been able to decide on the exact location. There was something about the place she had chosen that disturbed her. That wasn’t quite it: there was something about the spot that struck her, something that did not quite fit, although she had no idea what it was. She had asked several of the hotel employees whether they could see anything odd about that patch of land, but in vain. Most of them had answered the question with a more obvious one: “Why don’t you choose another place if this one disturbs you? There’s plenty of land here.” But they didn’t understand her. They understood the relative configurations of the constellations. Birna, on the other hand, understood the relative configurations of buildings. This was the location; any other was out of the question.
The birds’ squawking intensified again, but Birna was too deep in thought to notice properly. She threaded her way carefully along the rocks toward the gravel path above the beach. Suddenly she stopped in her tracks and listened. She could hear crunching in the pebbles behind her. She began to turn, looking forward to venting the anger that had been building up inside her since she got there. About fucking time.
Birna did not manage to turn around completely. Even over the noise of the birds on the cliff she clearly heard the rock swishing through the still sea air toward her head, and caught a glimpse of it as it struck her forehead with terrible force. She did not see anything more in this life, but she felt many things. In a vague and dreamlike state, she felt herself being dragged along the rough terrain. She felt the goose bumps that the cold fog brought out on her bare flesh as her clothes were removed, and she felt nauseous as she tasted the ferrous tang of blood in her mouth. Her socks were pulled off and she felt a terrible pain on the soles of her feet. What was happening? It was all like a dream. A voice she knew well was ringing in her ears, but given what was happening, that couldn’t be right. Birna tried to speak, but couldn’t produce the words. A strange groan came out of her throat, but she had not groaned. How very strange all this was.
Before everything turned black, it occurred to her that she would never read about the origin of Mount Kirkjufell. Oddly enough, this hurt the worst of all.
The same pair of gulls that Birna had watched plunging into the sea for food were waiting farther along the beach, watching what was done to her through the mist. Patiently they waited for calm to return. The beach and the sea look after their own. No one here has to starve.
CHAPTER 3
Friday, 9 June 2006
I can’t understand what’s become of Birna,” muttered Jónas, reaching for a floral-patterned cup containing the elixir whose praises he had just been singing to Thóra. This was a special brew of tea from local herbs that, according to Jónas, cured all manner of ailments and ills. Thóra had accepted a cup and taken a sip, and judging from the taste, the tea must have been exceptionally wholesome.
“I would have liked the two of you to meet,” he added, after taking a mouthful and placing the cup down carefully on the saucer. There was something quite ridiculous about this, for the cup and saucer were so oddly delicate, bone china with a slender handle that looked even smaller in Jónas’s big hands. He was far from delicately built—big-boned without being fat, weather-beaten and with an air of one who would rather swig strong coffee from a mug onboard a trawler than sip undrinkable herbal tea from a ladylike cup following a yoga class.
Thóra smiled and made herself comfortable in her chair. They were in Jónas’s office at the hotel, and her back ached after driving up west. The Friday traffic had been heavy, and it didn’t help that she had had to drive her children to their father’s house in Gardabær on her way out of town. The traffic had crawled along as if every single resident of the capital were on exactly the same route. Although this was not officially his weekend to have the children, Hannes had offered to swap because he would be abroad at a medical conference the following weekend. Consequently Thóra had decided to take Jónas up on his offer and spend the weekend at the New Age spa hotel on Snæfellsnes. She was going to use the opportunity to relax, have a massage and unwind, as Jónas had suggested, but the main purpose of her trip was of course to dissuade him from claiming compensation for the supposed haunting. Thóra wanted to end the conversation as quickly as possible and go to her room for a nap.
“She’ll turn up,” Thóra said, just for the sake of saying something. She knew nothing about the architect; the woman could easily be a raving alcoholic who had fallen off the wagon and would not be seen for weeks.
Jónas huffed. “It’s not like her. We were meant to go over the draft plans for the new building this morning.” He flicked through some papers on his desk, clearly annoyed with the architect.
“Couldn’t she just have popped back to Reykjavík to fetch something?” Thóra asked, hoping he would stop talking about this woman. The ache in her back was beginning to spread to her shoulders.
Jónas shook his head. “Her car’s outside.” He slammed down both hands on the edge of the desk. “Anyway. You’re here at least.” He smiled. “I’m dying to tell you about the ghost, but that will have to wait until we have more time.” Glancing at his watch, he stood up. “I have to do my rounds. I make it a rule to talk to my staff at the end of every day. I have a better sense of the operations and the situation if I know about any problems from the very start. That makes it easier to intervene.”
Thóra stood up, delighted to be free. “Yes, by all means. We’ll talk about it tomorrow. Don’t worry about me. I’ll be here all weekend and there’s plenty of time to discuss it.” As Thóra slung her bag over her shoulder, she noticed an awful smell and wrinkled her nose. “What’s that stink?” she asked Jónas. “I smelled it out in the car park too. Is there a fish-oil factory near here?”
Jónas took a few deep breaths. Then he looked at Thóra with a blank expression. “I can’t smell anything. I suppose I’ve got used to the goddamn stench,” he said. “A whale has washed up just down the beach from here. When the wind’s in a certain direction, the smell wafts over the grounds.”
“What?” Thóra said. “Do you just have to wait for the carcass to rot away?” She pulled a face when another wave of the stench swept in. If only the problem she was here to deal with was something like this, it would be a cinch.
“You get used to it,” Jónas said. He picked up the telephone and dialed a number. “Hi. I’m sending Thóra over. Have someone show her to her room and fix a massage for her this evening.” He said goodbye and put the receiver down. “If you go to reception, I’ve reserved you the best room, with a lovely view. You won’t be disappointed.”
A young girl accompanied Thóra from the reception to the much-praised room. She was so small that she barely reached up to Thóra’s shoulder. Thóra disliked letting such a slip of a girl carry her bag for her, but had no say in the matter. She was glad that her luggage was not that heavy, even though, as always, she had brought far too much with her. Thóra was convinced that different laws applied on holiday from everyday life, that she would wear clothes that she normally neglected in her wardrobe, but she always ended up in the same clothes as usual. She followed the girl down a long corridor that appeared wider than it was because of the skylight that ran its length. The evening sun shone on the thin, fair hair of the girl in front of her.
“Is this a fun place to work?” Thóra asked, making small talk.
“No,” replied the girl without turning around. “I’m looking for another job. There’s just nothing going.”
“Oh,” said Thóra. She had not expected such a frank answer. “Are the people you work with boring?”
The girl looked back over her shoulder without slowing her pace. “Yes and no. Most of them are all right. Some are real idiots.” The girl stopped by one of the doors, fished a plastic card out of her pocket, and opened it. “But I’m probably not the best judge. I’m not too keen on the bullshit they try to feed the guests.”
For the hotel’s sake, Thóra hoped that this girl did not have much contact with the customers. She wasn’t exactly the world’s best sales-woman. “And is that why you want to quit?” she asked.
“No. Not exactly,” the girl answered, showing Thóra into the room. “It’s something else. I can’t explain exactly. This is a bad place.”
Thóra had entered the room first and couldn’t see the girl’s face as she said this. She couldn’t tell if she was serious, but the tone of her voice suggested that she was. Thóra looked around the beautiful room and walked over to a wall of glass overlooking the ocean. Outside was a small terrace.
“Bad in what way?” she asked, turning to look at the girl. The view implied quite the opposite; the waves glistened beyond an empty, peaceful beach.
The girl shrugged. “Just bad. This has always been a bad place. Everyone knows that.”
Thóra raised her eyebrows. “Does everyone know that? Who’s ‘everyone?’ ” If the place had a bad reputation that the sellers knew about but had neglected to mention, it might provide some flimsy grounds for a compensation case.
The girl looked at her with the scorn only a teenager can muster. “Everyone, of course. Everyone here, anyway.”
Thóra smiled to herself. She didn’t know the population of the southern coast of Snæfellsnes, but knew that the word “everyone” could not cover many people. “And what is it that everyone knows?”
Suddenly the girl became evasive. She thrust her hands into the pockets of her far-too-large jeans and looked down at her toes. “I’ve got to go. I shouldn’t be talking to you about this.” She spun around and walked out into the corridor. “Maybe later.” In the doorway she stopped and looked imploringly at Thóra. “Don’t tell Jónas I’ve been gossiping about this. He doesn’t like me talking to the guests too much.” She rubbed her left hand between the thumb and index finger. “If I want to be able to find work, I need a reference. I want to work at a hotel in Reykjavík.”
“Don’t worry. I’m not an ordinary guest. I’ll tell Jónas that you’ve been particularly helpful and ask his permission to talk to you properly when things are quieter. Jónas asked me to come here to investigate various matters. I think you can help me, and that would help hi
m too.” Thóra looked at the girl, who glared at her suspiciously. “What’s your name, anyway?”
“Sóldís,” the girl replied. She stood in the doorway for a moment, as if unsure what to do, then smiled weakly, said goodbye and left. Bergur Ketilsson walked at a leisurely pace, even though he knew that his wife was waiting for him at home with his nightly coffee. He preferred to spend the evening alone in the great outdoors rather than sitting at home with her in oppressive silence and fake marital bliss. He groaned at the thought. They had been married for twenty years, on reasonably good terms, but there had never been much passion between them, not even during their short courtship. They weren’t that way inclined, or at least she wasn’t. He had only recently discovered that side to his character—a little late to realize it, at forty. Life would doubtless have treated him differently had he found out before he married Rósa, the albatross around his neck. Perhaps he would have gone to Reykjavík to study instead. As a young man, he had taken delight in the Icelandic language, although he had never hinted at it to anyone. There was little to test the intellect of a lonely farmer. He scanned the eider nests mournfully. The recent cold snap had taken its toll on the ducklings. There would be fewer nests next year.
He walked on. In the distance he saw the hotel roof above the rocks on the beach. Silently he focused on it and tried to picture what went on inside, but he couldn’t imagine. He shrugged and continued on his way. As he was feeling depressed, he decided to take the longer route home, via the bay. This was not completely random, because he wanted to know how the hatching seabirds had fared during the cold spell. Quickening his pace, he trudged on, deep in thought. The hotel was behind the emotional crisis that had seized him. If it had not been built, he would have gone on with his life, reconciled to it, neither happy nor sad. He could never form a firm opinion about what went on there, as in its way it had brought him too much joy and too much confusion for him to be able to think logically about it. Spotting a nest, he approached it slowly. Two tiny ducklings were lying dead inside. The mother eider was nowhere to be seen, so perhaps the cold had killed her too.
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