strength and comfort from her after the accident. Leonora hardly dared take her eyes off the child in those first months and years. Of course, an event like that would have a profound impact and remain with you for the rest of your life.’
‘Yes,’ Erlendur said. ‘So they mourned him together.’
Ingvar was silent.
‘Do you know why the motor packed up?’ Erlendur asked.
‘No. They said the propeller came off. That’s all we knew.’
‘Had he been fiddling with it, then?’
‘Magnus? No. He didn’t have a clue about that sort of thing. Never touched an engine in his life as far as I’m aware. If you want to know more about Magnus you could talk to his sister, Kristin. She might be able to help you. Have a chat to her.’
Later that day Erlendur went to see an old schoolfriend of Maria’s. His name was Jonas and he was finance manager of a pharmaceuticals company. He sat in his spacious office, impeccably dressed in a tailor-made suit and wearing a loud yellow tie. He himself was tall and slim with a three-day beard shadow, not unlike Sigurdur Oli. When Erlendur called beforehand, Jonas expressed himself a little surprised by the inquiry into his schoolfriend’s suicide and puzzled as to how it concerned him, but he asked no awkward questions.
Erlendur waited for Jonas to finish a phone call that he explained he had to take; some urgent outside matter, from what Erlendur could gather. He noticed a photo of a woman and three children on a shelf and assumed they were the finance manager’s family.
‘Yes, about Maria – is it true what I’ve heard?’ Jonas asked when he finally put down the receiver. ‘Did she commit suicide?’
‘That’s correct,’ Erlendur said.
‘I could hardly believe it,’ Jonas said.
‘You met her at college, didn’t you?’
‘We went out for three years, two at sixth-form college and one at university. She read history, as you probably know. She was into that kind of research.’
‘Did you live together or…?’
‘For the last year. Until I’d had enough.’
Jonas broke off. Erlendur waited.
‘No, her mother was… to put it bluntly, she was extremely interfering,’ Jonas elaborated. ‘And the strange thing was that Maria never seemed to see anything odd about it. I moved into her place in Grafarvogur but quickly gave up on the whole thing. Leonora was all-important and I never felt I had Maria to myself. I discussed it with her but Maria didn’t get it; she wanted her mother to live with her and that was that. We quarrelled a bit and in the end I simply couldn’t be bothered any more and walked out. I don’t know if Maria ever missed me. I’ve barely seen her since.’
‘She got married later on,’ Erlendur said.
‘Yes – to some doctor, wasn’t it?’
‘So you didn’t lose touch completely?’
‘Well, I just happened to hear and can’t say I was surprised.’
‘Did you ever see her after you broke up?’
‘Maybe two or three times by chance, at parties and that sort of thing. It was all right. Maria was a great girl. It’s absolutely terrible that she should have chosen to end her life like that.’
The mobile phone in Erlendur’s pocket began to ring. He apologised and answered it.
‘She’s prepared to do it,’ he heard Eva Lind say at the other end.
‘What?’
‘Meet you.’
‘Who?’
‘Mum. She’s prepared to do it. She’s agreed to meet you.’
‘I’m in a meeting,’ Erlendur said, glancing at Jonas, who was patiently stroking his yellow tie.
‘Aren’t you up for it, then?’ Eva Lind asked.
‘Can I talk to you later?’ Erlendur asked. ‘I’m in a meeting.’
‘Just say yes or no.’
‘I’ll talk to you later,’ Erlendur said.
He ended the call.
‘Did death have any particular meaning for Maria?’ Erlendur asked. ‘Was it something she gave much thought to, from what you can remember?’
‘Not particularly, I don’t think. We didn’t discuss it – we were only kids, after all. But she was always very scared of the dark. That’s the main thing I remember about our relationship, her absolute terror of the dark. She could hardly be alone in the house after nightfall. That was another reason why she wanted to live with Leonora, I think. And yet…’
‘What?’
‘In spite of her fear of the dark, or perhaps because she of it, she was forever reading ghost stories, all that sort of stuff, Jon Arnason’s Icelandic folk tales and so on. Her favourite films were horror movies about ghosts and all that crap. She lapped it up, then would hardly dare go to sleep in the evenings. She was incapable of being alone. Always had to have somebody with her.’
‘What was she so afraid of?’
‘I never really knew because I couldn’t give a toss about that sort of thing. I’ve never been scared of the dark. I don’t suppose I listened to her properly.’
‘But she actively indulged her fear?’
‘It certainly seemed like that.’
‘Was she sensitive to her surroundings – did she see or hear things? Was her fear of the dark rooted in something she had experienced or knew?’
‘I don’t think so. Though I remember that she used to wake up sometimes and stare fixedly at the bedroom door as if she could see something. Then it would pass. I think it was something left over from her dreams. She couldn’t explain it. Sometimes she thought she saw human figures. Always when she was waking up. It was all in her mind.’
‘Did they speak to her?’
‘No, it was nothing – just dreams, like I say.’
‘Might it be relevant to ask about her father in this context?’
‘Yes, of course. He was one of them.’
‘One of those that she saw?’
‘Yes.’
‘Did she attend any seances when you were with her?’
‘No.’
‘You’d have known?’
‘Yes. She never did anything like that.’
‘Her fear of the dark – what form did it take?’
‘Oh, the usual, I expect. She didn’t dare go down to the washing machine in the basement on her own. She would hardly go into the kitchen alone. She always had to have all the lights on. She needed to be able to hear me if she was moving around the house in the evenings, especially if it was very late at night. She didn’t like it if I went out, if I couldn’t spend the night with her.’
‘Did she try to get any help for it?’
‘Help? No. Isn’t it just something that… Can you get help for fear of the dark?’
Erlendur didn’t know. ‘Maybe. From a psychologist or someone like that,’ he said.
‘No, nothing like that, at least not while I was with her. Maybe you should ask her husband.’
Erlendur nodded.
‘Thanks for your help,’ he said, standing up.
‘No problem,’ Jonas said, again running a small hand down his yellow tie.
