Frozen Assets

Matti goggled. ‘But . . . ?’

‘But what?’

‘You don’t speak English or Romanian or whatever it is she speaks.’

‘Well, Matti, it may have escaped your notice, but Marika speaks quite passable Icelandic.’

‘Bloody hell.’

‘Language, please.’

‘Sorry. I never noticed. We just speak English together.’

‘And now you can speak Icelandic as well. At least she doesn’t use all those awful slang expressions you use all the time.’

‘Bloody hell.’

‘Language, Matti.’

‘Sorry.’

Loa stood up and banged the kettle on to the stove. ‘Matti, you always come up west when you’re in the soup, and I’m not going to ask again what it is this time. I’d like to know if it’s serious, though, and if the police are looking for you.’

‘Well, yes.’

‘Serious, or police?’

‘Both.’

‘Silly boy. You can’t stay here long without being found, you know. Hallgrimur’s wife saw you in the shop in Holmavik yesterday. If she knows you’re here, then sooner or later everyone else will.’

‘I know,’ he admitted.

Loa’s voice dropped to a murmur. ‘Your young lady, Marika. Seems like a nice girl. Got her head screwed on. You ought to hang on to her.’

‘Ach. She’s all right.’

‘Not your type, I’d have thought. Skinny little thing. Does she work?’

‘Yeah, in a club.’

‘So I assume that’s where you met, is it? Some dive?’

‘Sort of.’

‘What sort of work does she do?’

Matti sighed and knew that the truth wouldn’t do, although not telling the truth to Loa could be a dangerous business.

‘She dances,’ he said finally.

‘Oh, I see. What kind of dance?’

‘The sort where you take your clothes off and people watch.’

Loa’s brow furrowed in a way that reminded Matti uncomfortably of their cousin Gunna.

‘Bloody hell,’ she said finally.

It was late in the afternoon and they had a meeting room to themselves. Skuli thought Gunna would be impressed as they sat in their glass cage at Dagurinn’s offices, but she didn’t seem to have realized what a feat he had achieved. He could see Jonni and Dagga looking curiously at them, and turned back to the computer screen.

‘Is this all the pictures?’ Gunna demanded.

‘It’s all the ones I have, but I suppose Lara might have more.’

‘And this is the highest quality you can get?’

‘I think so. Lara didn’t compress the files, so this is as they were taken.’

Gunna peered at the picture of herself on the screen, jaw set firm, sky and mountains reflected in the mirrors of her sunglasses. ‘Zoom in, will you?’

‘On what?’

‘There.’ She pointed to the man in the middle distance looking directly at the lens from behind her.

The man’s face filled the screen, impassive blue eyes and a day’s worth of stubble on his cheeks. A very ordinary face, Gunna thought, nothing special about the combination of features, but unmistakably the face of a strong-willed character used to getting his own way.

‘Skuli, my boy, I’d very much like to get more pictures of this man if it’s possible. Can you get hold of the photographer?’

Skuli opened his mobile and thumbed buttons before holding it to his ear.

‘Hi, Lara? Skuli at Dagurinn. Yeah, fine, thanks. And you? Cool.’

Gunna sat and listened to Skuli’s half of the conversation, fascinated at the way his entire manner changed when speaking to someone of his own age.

‘Yeah, er, Lara. I need a favour if that’s OK? I have someone here who wants to see any pictures you have of the march at Hvalvik. Yeah, it was a great day, wasn’t it? Just wondering if you’re on the way over here at all?’

Gunna frowned and motioned to Skuli for him to pass the phone to her. He frowned back.

‘Er, Lara, just a moment,’ he said, and held the phone in the palm of his hand. ‘She says she has more pics, but wants to know who wants to see them?’

‘Let me speak to her.’

‘Er, OK.’

He handed the phone across with a second’s reluctance.

‘Good morning. Lara? This is Gunnhildur Gisladottir, Hvalvik police. I’m working on an investigation and need to identify someone in one of your pictures of the march. Could you help out?’ Gunna asked in a tone that clearly expected a positive reply.

Lara’s voice crackled through a poor line. ‘Yeah, that’s OK. I can bring my laptop and you can go through all the pictures I took if you want.’

‘Excellent. When?’

‘Depends where you are? Are you in town or out at Hvalvik right now?’

‘I’m in Skuli’s office at the moment.’

‘No problem. I’ll be right with you. Five minutes.’

‘Good. Thank you,’ Gunna finished, snapping Skuli’s phone shut. ‘She’ll be here in a few minutes.’

‘She’s here already,’ Skuli said, looking over Gunna’s shoulder. She swung her head round to see Lara’s gangly form approaching, lopsided with a camera bag slung over one shoulder. She stopped at Dagga’s desk, where some exaggerated air kisses took place as Jonni scowled.

‘You know,’ Skuli said, looking at the image on his computer screen, ‘I spoke to this man at the march.’

‘What? Why didn’t you say so before?’

‘Should I have?’

‘Ach, I’m sorry, Skuli. Now, tell me more.’

‘Well, not much really. He came and chatted for a minute, and then he was gone. Didn’t think much of it.’

‘What did he say?’

‘Not much. Asked if I was a journo and I said yes. He said he was working for a German magazine called Eco Zeit, but I googled it afterwards and it doesn’t seem to exist.’

‘Did he say his name?’

‘No, don’t think so.’

‘And is he German or what?’

Skuli thought. ‘Sorry, I don’t know. He spoke English very well, better than I do, but I couldn’t tell you if he had an accent or not.’

There was a tap at the door and Lara appeared, grinning.

‘Hi,’ Skuli responded with a warmth that told Gunna he was more than a little pleased to see her. ‘That was quick.’

‘Wasn’t it just? I was upstairs. Been doing some pictures for Home and Garden magazine on the next floor,’ she said, unfolding a laptop and tapping it into life. She quickly located a folder of image files, swiped across them and opened the whole series.