Frozen Assets

‘That’s right. Where are we bound, and what are you carrying?’

‘Fishmeal, going to Rotterdam, calling at Stornoway. Or so I’m told.’ He smiled. ‘Been to sea before?’

‘Yup, but it was a long time ago.’

‘In that case I take it you know your way around an engine room, so you’d better go below and sort yourself out. There’re only four of us on board. Follow the smell of food and you’ll find the galley. Trude’s the cook. Tell her I sent you and she’ll show you a cabin. But keep your hands off her. She’s married to the mate and we want to keep this a happy ship.’

Terje’s eyes twinkled with suppressed curiosity. ‘I’m not asking any questions,’ he added. ‘And if anyone asks, you’re the new grease monkey and I know nothing about you. OK?’

Harde grinned. The shipboard smells of salt, paint and the lingering aroma of burnt lube oil were already bringing his navy days back to him.

‘Absolutely fine by me, Terje. When are we sailing?’

‘As soon as the engineer tells me everything’s warmed up and ready to go. So you’d better be ready to chuck off the ropes in ten minutes. If that’s all right with you?’

The question was asked in a reserved tone, as if Terje were not entirely sure whether to treat Harde as a passenger or one of the crew.

The door at the back of the bridge opened and banged back against the bulkhead. A dark man in an overall that had once been white appeared.

‘OK?’ Terje asked.

The man just grunted and left the way he had come.

‘That’s Kalle, our chief engineer. Actually, our only engineer. On deck in half an hour. Trude’ll get you some wet weather gear as well. We’ve already eaten, but I expect she’ll find you a bite once we’ve sailed,’ Terje said with finality, indicating that Harde’s induction into the crew was over as far as he was concerned.

Apart from the buzz of conversation and ringing phones elsewhere in the building that permeated the thin plasterboard walls, the incident room was quiet. Snorri and Bara were at their computer terminals, trying not to disturb Gunna, who growled down every attempt at conversation. The evening before they and officers from the Reykjavik force had been to every hotel in and around Reykjavik and come away with nothing.

‘Come on then. Is there anything?’ she demanded, finally breaking her own silence as the other two almost sighed with relief.

‘Nothing, chief,’ Snorri admitted. ‘No sightings that can’t be accounted for.’

‘It seems the bloody man’s disappeared,’ Gunna grumbled. Her head was aching and she was certain she had the makings of a cold coming on. She wondered idly if Gisli and his girlfriend were still at the house in Hvalvik. This one seems a bit more serious than the others, she thought. Seems a pleasant enough girl, but a redhead? That means temper.

‘Any news?’

‘What?’ She spun her chair around to find Vilhjalmur standing by the door that he had opened silently. ‘Sorry, Vilhjalmur. Didn’t hear you come in.’

‘Just wondering if you have any news?’ he asked softly. ‘The Minister has asked to be kept informed.’

‘No, I’m afraid everything’s gone cold. The truck we’re sure our boy disappeared in has vanished. We haven’t had a sighting anywhere that can’t be explained in two minutes and frankly we have nothing to go on.’

‘That’s unfortunate.’ He cleared his throat softly.

‘Excuse me, sir,’ Snorri said, stepping up to where Vilhjalmur was standing in front of the large whiteboard on the wall. He set to work with a marker, reading information off a sheet of paper in his hand and filling in the gaps.

‘What do you have there?’

‘Shipping movements,’ Snorri replied without stopping.

‘Very good.’

‘That’s about all we have to go on,’ Gunna explained. ‘What is there, Snorri?’

‘There’s Starlight, a freighter sailing from Grundartangi at midnight,’ he read out, still writing. ‘There’s Beinta, a Faroese trawler leaving Hafnarfjordur at ten tonight and a couple of Russian trawlers, also in Hafnarfjordur, which haven’t decided when to leave yet,’ Snorri read off the screen. ‘Then there’s a freighter called Juno Provider docked at Skarfanes last night, no information on when they’re leaving, and a yacht that called at Hvalvik this morning and is still there. There’s a reefer called Wilhelmina due in Grindavik at six tomorrow morning, due out at six in the evening, and there are three cruise liners calling at and sailing from Reykjavik in the next forty-eight hours, the last ones of the year, I reckon. Want me to look any further afield?’

‘All foreign shipping?’ Vilhjalmur asked.

‘There isn’t any Icelandic shipping any more,’ Gunna said, yawning. ‘It’s all flagged out these days. Snorri, how about flights?’

‘Nothing out of the ordinary, as far as air traffic control is aware. They’ve been asked to alert us as soon as there’s anything other than routine commercial traffic.’

Vilhjalmur coughed again. ‘Without putting pressure on you and your team, Gunnhildur, we will have to scale back soon if there are no results.’

Normally Gunna would have wanted to argue from the sheer force of habit of wanting to hear the chief inspector’s voice go up an octave, but she thought better of it.

‘Probably right, Vilhjalmur. If he doesn’t show up soon, we can be sure he’s slipped past us. I’d like to keep this running to the middle of the week, if that’s OK with you and the accountant? But in the meantime, I really want a word with Sigurjona Huldudottir again. I’m convinced she knows how and where to find Harde.’

‘We’ll look at costs on Monday,’ he said frostily. ‘Are you certain that Sigurjona can tell you more?’

Gunna fumed inwardly at the man’s trepidation. ‘I’m bloody positive. She’s the kind of woman you’d know was lying even if she only said good morning. Look, if she’s going to put in a formal complaint about harassment, we may as well make it worth her while. She’s the only real link we have to Harde, apart from her sister, who’s sunning herself somewhere warm.’

‘If you absolutely have to,’ he snapped back, turning to make for the door. ‘But you don’t have my approval. It’s absolutely your responsibility,’ he added as a parting shot.

‘Snorri, can you check on that yacht in Hvalvik harbour?’ Gunna asked.

‘Yup. Will do.’

‘First get on to Akranes and ask them to get themselves out to Grundartangi and check on . . .’ She consulted the list of shipping movements on the wall. ‘Starlight. OK? And it wouldn’t do any harm if customs could give it an extra going over. The same goes for the reefer docking in Grindavik tomorrow.’

‘What about the other shipping?’ Bara asked.

‘I’m not too worried about fishing vessels, especially the Russian ones, unless our man wants to spend three months on Flemish Cap.’

‘Shall I check out the one at Skarfanes, Gunna?’ Snorri asked. ‘It looks interesting.’

‘Why?’

‘It’s just along the coast. There’s only the fishmeal plant there and nothing else. Nobody ever goes there except the staff. It’s pretty busy during the capelin season, but that was over months ago and it’s probably quiet now.’

‘How do you know all this?’

‘My dad worked there until he retired.’

‘Bara, I’d like you to come with me to grill Sigurjona and we’ll look in at Skarfanes on the way.’

‘Sure,’ Bara yawned.

‘Snorri, my boy. Man the barricades, will you? Won’t be long.’

Sigurjona was late. She normally made a point of keeping people waiting for a minute or two, as it reinforced the image she liked to project of being constantly busy. This time traffic had held her up and she was later than usual stepping from the lift and punching in the code to open the office door.

She could hear the hum of voices from her own office and frowned.