society would eventually break down under the weight of the contradictions of capitalism. And when it did, Isak would be ready for it. He would spend the coming years building up an elite cadre of revolutionaries, a true vanguard of the proletariat who would be able to lead people like Bjorn to a better world.
It would come. He was young. He could be patient.
Everything would be fine as long as they all stayed quiet. He thought he could trust Bjorn and Sindri to do that. But not Harpa. Harpa would talk.
He would have to be careful. Killing Harpa would of course lead to its own inquiry and he would be a prime suspect. He would have to be sure not to leave any forensic evidence in the Honda. It would be important to dispose of the body miles away from Grundarfjordur, or anywhere he had been seen.
He wouldn’t be able to set up a perfect alibi, but he had spent the previous night in a small campsite just outside Reykjavik on the road to the south-east, taking care to give the owner his name. He had got up early that morning and doubled back, driving north. Once Harpa was out of the way, he planned to drive across Iceland, through the night if necessary. If he was seen camping in Thorsmork, well to the east of Reykjavik, the morning after Harpa’s death, the police might believe that he had spent the whole time in the area.
Isak trusted his own intelligence. He would be able to figure it out.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
VIGDIS LOOKED AT the nineteen-year-old boy opposite her. His eyes were rimmed with red and he looked miserable.
He hadn’t talked after his night in the cells, and Vigdis was surprised. She had done her best to coax something out of him, to make him feel good about confessing to whatever he wanted to confess to. She had mentioned Gabriel Orn, Sindri, Bjorn and Harpa. Nothing.
Ingolfur Arnarson. Nothing.
Then Arni had tried. His histrionics, including a bit of shouting at Frikki and banging on the table had been, quite frankly, embarrassing. For a moment Vigdis thought that she had exchanged a half-smile of amusement with Frikki, but then it was gone. She fervently hoped that they wouldn’t have to play back the videotape. There was no doubt about it: Arni watched too much TV.
There was a knock at the door and one of the duty constables from the front desk appeared. ‘Vigdis? There’s someone to see you.’
Vigdis left Arni to it and followed the constable into an adjoining interview room. There sat a dark-haired woman of about twenty.
‘I am Magda, Frikki’s girlfriend,’ she said in English.
Vigdis remembered that Arni had mentioned a girlfriend when he had picked Frikki up from his mother’s house. ‘Do you speak Icelandic?’ Vigdis asked.
‘A little. Can I talk to him?’
‘I’m afraid not. We are interviewing him in relation to a very serious incident.’
‘Please. Just for five minutes.’
Vigdis shook her head. ‘I’m sorry. But perhaps you can help. Do you know anything about the death of Gabriel Orn in January this year?’
Magda shook her head. ‘I was in Poland then.’
‘Has Frikki spoken to you about it?’
Magda hesitated. There was silence in the small interview room. Vigdis waited. She could almost see the wheels turning in Magda’s head as she tried to come to a decision.
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Yes, he has. But it is better if he talks to you directly about it.’
‘I agree,’ said Vigdis. ‘But he won’t.’
‘Let me talk to him, then,’ said Magda. ‘Alone.’
Vigdis considered it. As a rule, it was best to keep witnesses separate, pin down the differences in stories, prevent them from conferring. But this case was different. She nodded.
Ten minutes later Magda knocked on the door of the interview room. Vigdis opened it.
‘Frikki wants to talk,’ Magda said.
Vigdis was sitting at a table at the back of the coffee shop on Hverfisgata, just a few metres from the police station. At moments like this, outside the police station, Magnus had trouble remembering she was Icelandic and not American. An attractive black woman in jeans and a fleece, she could easily be one of the detectives from the Boston Police Department.
After seeing Ingileif he had walked the streets aimlessly. He had nowhere to go: he couldn’t face the classroom at the police college, and it was clear Baldur wouldn’t welcome him at the station. His thoughts bounced between Ingileif and the Oskar Gunnarsson case. Both depressed him. He came up with no great ideas about either problem.
There seemed an inevitability about Ingileif’s decision. The case involving her father’s death in the 1990s had been very painful for her. Although it had brought Magnus and her together, he could see how she associated him with it. He could understand how she might want to run away. Start again somewhere new. She was doing what she felt she had to do.
But the Oskar Gunnarsson case was different. Although he had been sidelined, he was confident that he was right.
And he could never let a case go.
So when Vigdis had called him on his cell phone, he had hurried to the cafe.
‘What have you got?’ he asked her.
‘Frikki talked.’
‘The night in the cells did its stuff?’
‘More his girlfriend. She persuaded him.’
‘And?’
‘And you were right. Gabriel Orn’s death wasn’t suicide.’
‘Who killed him? Bjorn?’
‘Possibly Frikki. Probably Harpa.’ Vigdis explained everything that Frikki had told her. About the night in January. The drinking at Sindri’s flat. Harpa calling Gabriel Orn, tempting him out. The scuffle, Harpa hitting him over the head. And the plan to cover everything up, a plan which Frikki had little directly to do with.
‘Got them!’ said Magnus in triumph. ‘What about Oskar? And Lister?’
‘Frikki didn’t know anything about them,’ Vigdis said. ‘He suspects something, much as we do, but he has no evidence.’
‘Any clue about the identity of Ingolfur Arnarson?’
‘He has never heard of him. We checked the phone directory, by the way. There are a dozen real Ingolfur Arnarsons listed. Robert is checking them out now.’ Robert was another detective in the Violent Crimes Unit.
‘Has Frikki seen any of the others since Gabriel Orn’s death?’
‘Only Harpa. He bumped into her in the bakery in Seltjarnarnes. He told her his theory that Sindri and Bjorn might have shot Oskar and the British Chancellor. She wasn’t impressed.’
‘Meaning she’s involved?’
‘Frikki didn’t think so. Neither did his girlfriend, for what it’s worth.’
‘So are you arresting them now?’
‘Baldur’s dithering. He’s in with Thorkell discussing it.’
‘But surely there’s a case for murder here? Or manslaughter at the very least. Baldur can’t hide from that.’
‘Yes, the Gabriel Orn case will definitely have to be reopened. But there’s also the question of whether you were right all along. Whether there is a link with the Oskar investigation.’
‘We can’t prove that until we get the ID on Isak from London,’ said Magnus. ‘But we should get these people in custody right away. Before anyone else gets killed.’
‘Maybe,’ said Vigdis. ‘Look, I’ve got to get back. If they do take a decision to make some arrests, they’ll be looking for me.’
