“It makes me puke,” Sigurdur Oli said.
Elinborg looked at Erlendur.
“What did forensics say about the equipment?” he asked.
“They’re still looking at it,” Elinborg said. “They’re trying to get in touch with experts from Iceland Telecom.”
“I was thinking about all that equipment they found in Kleifarvatn years ago,” Sigurdur Oli said, “and this one tied to the skeleton. Shouldn’t we talk to some old codger from the diplomatic service?”
“Yes, find out who we can speak to,” Erlendur said. “Someone who remembers the Cold War.”
“Are we talking about spying in Iceland?” Elinborg asked.
“I don’t know,” Erlendur said.
“Isn’t that pretty absurd?” Elinborg said.
“No more than “where the family gathers every day to relax and enjoy happy times together”,” Sigurdur Oli parroted her.
“Oh, shut up,” Elinborg said, and deleted what she had written.
Wrecked cars were kept behind a large fence, stacked six high in some places. Some had been written off, others were just old and worn out. The spare-parts dealer looked the same, a weary man approaching sixty, in a filthy, ripped pair of overalls that had once been light blue. He was tearing the front bumper off a new Japanese car that had been hit from behind and had concertinaed right up to the front seats.
Erlendur stood sizing up the debris until the man looked up.
“A lorry went into the back of it,” he said. “Lucky there was no one in the back seat.”
“A brand new car too,” Erlendur said.
“What are you looking for?”
“I’m after a black Ford Falcon,” Erlendur said. “It was sold or given away to this yard around 1980.”
“A Ford Falcon?”
“It’s hopeless, of course — I know,” Erlendur said.
“It would have been old when it came here,” the man said, pulling out a rag to wipe his hands. “They stopped making Falcons around 1970, maybe earlier.”
“You mean you didn’t have any use for it?”
“Most Falcons were off the streets long before 1980. Why are you looking for it? Do you need spares? Are you doing it up?”
Erlendur told him that he was from the police and that the car was connected with an old case of a missing person. The man’s interest was aroused. He said he had bought the business from a man called Haukur in the mid-1980s but did not recall any Ford Falcon in the stock. The previous owner, who had died years ago, had kept a record of all the wrecks he’d bought, said the dealer, and showed Erlendur into a little room filled to the ceiling with files and boxes of papers.
“These are our books,” the man said with an apologetic smile. “We, er, never throw anything away. You’re welcome to take a look. I couldn’t be bothered to keep records of the cars, never saw the point, but he did it conscientiously.”
Erlendur thanked him and began examining the files, which were all marked on the spine with a year. Spotting a stack from the 1970s, he started there. He did not know why he was looking for this car. Even if it did exist, he had no idea how it could help him. Sigurdur Oli had asked why he was interested in this particular missing person over the others he had heard about in the past few days. Erlendur had no proper answer. Sigurdur Oli would never have understood what he meant if he had told him that he was preoccupied by a lonely woman who believed she had found happiness at last, fidgeting outside a dairy shop, looking at her watch and waiting for the man she loved.
Three hours later, when Erlendur was on the verge of giving up and the owner had asked him repeatedly whether he had turned up anything, he found what he was looking for: an invoice for the car. The dealer had sold a black Ford Falcon on 21 October 1979, engine defunct, interior in reasonable condition, good lacquering. No licence plates. Stapled to the sheet of paper describing the sale was a pencilled invoice: Falcon 1967. 35,000 kronur. Buyer: Hermann Albertsson.
11
The First Secretary at the Russian embassy in Reykjavik was the same age as Erlendur but thinner and considerably healthier-looking. When he received them he seemed to make a special effort to be casual. He was wearing khaki trousers and said, with a smile, that he was on his way to the golf course. He showed Erlendur and Elinborg to their seats in his office, then sat down behind a large desk and smiled broadly. He knew the reason for their visit. The meeting had been arranged well in advance so Erlendur was surprised to hear the golfing excuse. He had the impression that they were supposed to rush through the meeting and then disappear. They spoke English and, although the First Secretary was aware of the reason for the enquiry, Elinborg briefly repeated the need for the meeting. A Russian listening device had been found tied to the skeleton of a man probably murdered and thrown into Lake Kleifarvatn some time after 1961. The discovery of the Russian equipment had still not leaked to the press.
“There have been a number of Soviet and Russian ambassadors in Iceland since 1960,” the Secretary said, smiling self-confidently as if none of what they had related was any of his business. “Those who were here in the 1960s and early 1970s are long since dead. I doubt that they knew anything about Russian equipment in that lake. Any more than I do.”
He smiled. Erlendur smiled back.
“But you spied here in Iceland during the Cold War? Or at least tried to.”
“That was before my time,” the Secretary said. “I couldn’t say.”
“Do you mean you don’t spy any more?”
“Why would we spy? We just go on the Internet like everyone else. Besides, your military base isn’t so important any more. If it matters at all. The conflict zones have shifted. America doesn’t need an aircraft carrier like Iceland any more. No one can understand what they’re doing here with that expensive base. If this were Turkey I could understand.”
“It’s not
“We know that some embassy staff were expelled from Iceland on suspicion of spying,” Erlendur said. “When things were very tense in the Cold War.”
“Then you know more than I do,” the Secretary said. “And of course it is your military base,” he added, looking at Elinborg. “If we did have spies in this embassy then there were certainly twice as many CIA agents at the US embassy. Have you asked them? The description of the skeleton you found suggests to me — how should one put it — a mafia killing. Had that occurred to you? Concrete boots and deep water. It’s almost like an American gangster movie.”
“It was Russian equipment,” Erlendur said. “Tied to the body. The skeleton…”
“That tells us nothing,” the Secretary said. “There were embassies or offices from other Warsaw Pact countries that used Soviet equipment. It need not be connected with
“We have a detailed description of the device with us, and photographs,” Elinborg said, handing them to him. “Can you tell us anything about how it was used? Who used it?”
“I am not familiar with this equipment,” the Secretary said as he looked at the photographs. “Sorry. I will enquire, though. But even if we did recognise it, we can’t help you very much.”
“Couldn’t you give it a try?” Erlendur asked.
The Secretary smiled.
“You’ll just have to believe me. The skeleton in the lake has nothing to do with this embassy or its staff. Neither in the present, nor in the past.”
“We believe it’s a listening device,” Elinborg said. “It is tuned to the old wavelength of the American troops in Keflavik.”
