reason to keep you any longer, and you have been extremely helpful in keeping the investigation afloat as far as possible.’ They had all been questioned and made to recount again and again the order in which things had happened.
‘When can we leave?’ Fri?rikka had stopped crying now that several hours had passed since she had recognized the corpse in the snow. In the meantime they had been given food and drink, although Fri?rikka hadn’t been able to swallow a single morsel. The doctor had urged her to drink as much as she could since she was draining her body’s water supply with her floods of tears, and fortunately she had heeded him, since she would be shedding more tears by the end of the meal. ‘I can’t bear to be here any longer.’
‘I understand,’ said the police officer almost gently, before continuing in an entirely more commanding tone. ‘Unfortunately the helicopter can’t fly in the dark, so you can’t leave before dawn tomorrow. But the helicopter is here, and as soon as conditions are favourable you can leave.’
‘Do you have any idea what happened? I mean, to the woman you just found. Oddny Hildur.’ Eyjolfur was subdued and lethargic, and appeared distracted. It was as if this peculiar case had finally become too much for him. ‘It looked to us as if she’d been in an accident.’
‘I can’t tell for certain at the moment but it appears that the woman received a head injury, perhaps more than one. Hopefully we’ll figure it out.’
‘Where was she?’ asked Alvar. ‘I mean, it’s been several months since she disappeared and there’s no way she was behind the building the whole time.’ As usual, he blushed as he spoke. ‘I’m a rescuer and I know a bit about these things.’
At first the police officer refrained from speaking, as if he were trying to contain his desire to say something inappropriate. Then he said, with a hint of sarcasm, ‘I’ll tell you. At first glance it appeared the woman had been dead for quite some time. You can stop worrying about the search you conducted for her. It’s my understanding that although you did all you could to find her, things wouldn’t have turned out any differently even if you had searched for longer or in larger groups.’
‘So we could have saved her if we hadn’t given up?’ Fri?rikka appeared to be completely disconnected from everything that was happening around her. ‘I knew it. I always said that.’ Eyjolfur started to say something in reply, but then decided against it. Even he felt sorry for her in this puffy-eyed, broken-down state. He pressed his lips shut and closed his eyes.
‘You’ve misunderstood me, madam. You could not have done anything to save the life of your friend. I just wanted to point that out to you in the hope that maybe you would feel a little bit better. As difficult as it is.’
‘Where did she come from?’ Matthew acted as if he didn’t notice when Thora pinched him on the thigh. She had told him in private how the body had come to be behind the building and he had promised to keep quiet about it. ‘I’m wondering where her body has been all this time.’ Thora felt relieved – the plan was working.
‘We don’t know,’ replied the policeman. ‘Probably outdoors, but somewhere sheltered from animals. She wasn’t out on the island; we searched there today and it’s out of the question that we missed her.’
‘The most pressing question is obviously who you believe is responsible for the woman’s death, if we presume that it wasn’t an accident.’ Like all of them, Finnbogi was looking tired, with bags starting to show beneath his eyes.
‘It isn’t possible to presume any such thing. But for the body to suddenly appear like this does raise certain suspicions.’
‘It seems pretty unlikely that a person could receive a gash like that to their neck by falling, especially on level ground; and if she had stumbled on a mountainside or a steep slope you would think more injuries would be visible on her body, even in a snow-suit. It looked to me as if all her limbs were as they should be, at least.’ Thora found the doctor’s reasoning convincing.
‘As I said, all of this will be revealed, and it’s useless to be making guesses. If something unnatural occurred, we’ll get to the bottom of it, and there’s no need for you to spend time speculating about it.’
‘Changing the subject, I have a question.’ Thora had to honour her promise about Usinna’s remains. ‘Will the bones that were found in the office definitely be returned to the family? It would be so sad if the woman were not allowed a permanent resting place.’
The police officer seemed not to find the question all that odd. ‘Yes, that’s almost certain. We have to confirm that the body is that particular woman and once that’s done there’ll be no reason to hold on to the bones. It shouldn’t take very long to do, since I expect we’ll be able to find her dentist, and then the x-rays should be sufficient to identify her. Things will be different if it turns out not to be her, however.’
‘Let’s hope that’s not the case. We’ve had enough dead people.’ Thora leaned back in her chair.
‘I would examine the bones thoroughly. I’m certain that this woman was killed, just like Oddny Hildur. And that the villagers are the culprits. I’ve always said that and I’ve always known it.’ Fri?rikka spoke without looking the policeman in the eye – perhaps because of his race. The officer did not seem to take it personally.
‘We’ve already started questioning people from this area, especially those Arnar was in touch with, and we’ll see what comes out of that. We’ll find the guilty party; it will just take some time to clarify who he is and what he did. Maybe he was just guilty of moving bodies from one place to another.’
‘And of cutting them up,’ added Matthew. ‘Somebody took it upon himself to do that and I think it’s fairly clear that none of us was involved.’
The policeman shrugged. ‘It will all be explained. We have a lot of evidence, partly due to your initiative, and although much of it appears incomprehensible, these cases are usually solved when everything is put together and people start talking.’ He didn’t specify which people he meant. Instead, he clapped his hands and tried to smile good-naturedly, though the result looked more like a facial cramp. ‘I’ll have more mattresses brought over and you can decide whether you’ll all sleep here in the meeting room or in different places, but I have locked the offices. If you want something to eat or drink it would be good for me to know about that now, but otherwise one of my men will be posted here tonight and he can help you if anything comes up.’
‘What could come up?’ As ever, it didn’t take much to upset Fri?rikka. She would doubtless worry about this until she fell asleep and unfortunately everyone near her would hear all about it.
The police officer spoke soothingly. ‘Hopefully nothing, but in the unlikely event that it does, the officer will be on guard.’
‘Are you implying that the person who did this will return?’ Fri?rikka would not be persuaded. She clutched at her chest and stared, terrified, at the police officer.
‘Will you just shut up for once,’ hissed Eyjolfur. Whether it was down to his words or to the policeman’s obvious exhaustion, Fri?rikka fell silent and wiped away the tears that still streamed down her cheeks.
When Thora finally fell asleep Fri?rikka was still weeping and her soft sobs, which had bothered Thora for so long, had now started to have a soothing effect. It had been decided that Thora and Matthew would move from the meeting room along with Fri?rikka and sleep in the records storage room that was a bit further down the corridor. They thought it might be a bad idea to leave Fri?rikka and Eyjolfur in the same room overnight.
When the sound of cars driving into the camp and the glare of the floodlights filled the room a short time later, Matthew was the only one still awake. Only the sound of heavy breathing came from Fri?rikka’s mattress. Matthew did not have the heart to wake Thora and get her to come with him to see what was happening. Thus he was the only witness to the police dragging Naruana, the hunter’s son, out of the car and over to the cafeteria.
Chapter 32
‘My God – is daylight never going to come?’ Eyjolfur looked once more in the direction of the window. None of them had needed an alarm clock to wake up in the morning, since they were all desperate to go home. Thora, Matthew and Fri?rikka had moved back into the meeting room with the others and waited with them for the sun to rise. A policeman brought them bread, yoghurt and a pot of coffee, which was emptied surprisingly quickly. After all the food was finished the wait began again and they took turns asking what time it was.
‘Here it comes.’ Alvar looked happy, but it was probably the thought of beer at the airport in Kulusuk that cheered him so much. ‘You can see a big difference in the sky now from just a moment ago.’
