“It looks as if you turned so the blow glanced off the side of your head instead of hitting you squarely, while the victim took a single blow to the centre of his forehead with something round.”
“A baseball bat, something like that?”
“Something narrower, maybe a length of pipe,” Miss Cruz said. “Difficult to say at this stage.”
“Did you see the attacker?” Ivar Laxdal asked.
“No. I was talking to Jonas Valur in the car park and he wasn’t very pleased to see me. I remember he saw something over my shoulder, so I started to turn to look, and, bang. Out like a light.”
“Not someone you’d be able to identify?”
“No chance. I take it the same attacker belted Jonas Valur a bit harder than he did me?”
“It looks that way. It must have been quick, because the man landed right on top of you. Any idea how long you were lying there?”
“Haven’t a clue,” Gunna said. “Jonas Valur had a suitcase, a small one on wheels. The kind you see pilots walking along with at airports. Any sign of that?”
“Nothing. His car was taken as well and left at the bus station.”
“What? At Hlemmur?”
“No. BSI.”
“So who the hell took it?”
“It’s being fingerprinted right now, so we should know soon enough. But I think we’d best leave you to get some rest,” Ivar Laxdal said, pointing to where Steini and Laufey could be seen waving from the reception desk.
“Fair enough,” Gunna said, struggling to her feet. “Helgi and Eirikur are getting on all right, aren’t they?”
“Gunnhildur, they’re doing fine, and they’re not taking the slightest notice of S?valdur Bogason’s frequent useful suggestions. I thought I’d tell you that to put your mind at rest.”
“Good. I’ll be back tomorrow and pick up where we left off.”
“You’ll be back in a week, if I have my way,” Ivar Laxdal said sternly. “Let’s be off,” he said to Miss Cruz in English.
“Gunnhildur has some more important visitors.”
GUNNA WATCHED TV with the sound turned low, determined not to think about work but unable not to. Her head ached dully and she said a quiet prayer of thanks for extrastrength painkillers. Steini lounged across an armchair, a book open in front of him.
“You’re not going to work tomorrow, are you, Mum?” Laufey asked.
Gunna yawned. “Tomorrow afternoon. I have to go to the hospital for a check-up at twelve, and I’ll go to the station for an hour or two after that.”
Laufey frowned, less than half satisfied, and went towards the kitchen. “Laufey, what are you wearing?” Gunna asked, her frown almost as deep as her daughter’s.
“New trousers. Got them in Reykjavik when I went there with Finnur last weekend.”
“They’re a bit, well, tight, aren’t they? Shouldn’t you wear a skirt or something with those?”
“They’re OK. Everyone wears these now, Mum.”
Steini shook his head as if to say that this was a discussion he would never be qualified to take part in.
“I know, sweetheart. But it’s just that they’re so, what shall I say? Revealing. You might as well walk around in nothing as wear those.”
“Mum!”
“It’s true. Is there even room for underwear under them?”
“Yes, of course there is. What’s the matter? Can’t I wear the same as everyone else?”
“I suppose so,” Gunna said, regretting that her question had elicited such a waspish reply. “It’s just that every man you encounter will be sizing you up. Right, Steini?”
“Don’t bring me into this,” Steini grunted, lifting his book higher.
“Oh, Mum, don’t be so old-fashioned,” Laufey scolded, nose in the air as she marched to her room and shut the door firmly behind her.
“?i, why did I say anything?” Gunna groaned. “I should know better by now.”
“She’s getting to be a big girl now, quite a grown-up young lady.”
“I know, that’s what worries me,” Gunna said, stretching to reach her mobile as it trilled. “Gunnhildur.”
“H?, chief. Hogni’s dabs are all over Jonas Valur’s car. How’s your head?” Eirikur asked.
GUNNA STUBBORNLY REFUSED to use the lift and tackled the stairs in two stages, taking a breather halfway up to ease the pounding in her temples. Sigvaldi on the desk had asked tenderly, albeit gruffly, after her health.
At her own desk she waited while Eirikur and Helgi marshalled chairs. Several other people looked curiously at her as they passed, and even S?valdur Bogason offered a few mumbled kind words.
“All right, boys. Tell me the worst,” Gunna instructed, looking up to see Ivar Laxdal appear in the doorway, his eyebrows knitted in disapproval.
“Come in, please. Just a quick chat and then I’m going back home,” she assured him.
“As long as that’s all,” Ivar Laxdal growled.
Gunna turned to Helgi. “Any sign of Hogni Sigurgeirsson?”
“Nothing, chief. No sign of his car anywhere yet, but Jonas Valur’s Merc was abandoned at the BSI bus station,” Helgi said, flipping through a sheet of notes. “You’ll be interested to know that during the house-to-house questions around Hallur Hallbjornsson’s place, there was a mention of a grey Opel, same model as Hogni’s, in the next street, and the timing fits.”
“Interesting. If it was Hogni, he must have gone pretty much straight from being questioned here to Hallur,” Gunna agreed. “No doubt on the vehicle identification?”
“None at all. The woman in question has the same model of car, so she was certain. No registration number, though.”
“Shame,” Gunna said.
“If this man is a suspect for the killing of Jonas Valur, you think he may have attempted to murder Hallur Hallbjornsson as well?” Ivar Laxdal asked.
“Certainly,” Helgi replied.
“So what next?” Gunna asked, wondering if the investigation was out of her hands and in Helgi’s charge.
“We’re looking for the weapon used to assault you and Jonas Valur. The door-to-door stuff is still going on and there’s a search in progress through all the bins and nooks and crannies for anything that might fit the bill. It could be a long process,” Helgi replied sadly.
“ALL RIGHT, ARE you?” Sigrun asked with concern.
“Ah, not so bad,” Gunna admitted. “And you? Heard anything from … ?”
Sigrun’s face brightened. “A little bird whispered to me that Jorundur’s all alone now.”
“Really?” Gunna said. “What happened?”
Sigrun sat down and opened a bag of home-made biscuits straight from the deep freeze. She dipped one in her coffee and skilfully lifted it out and into her mouth a moment before it was ready to disintegrate.
“Left over from Christmas,” she said, munching. “I baked too many and froze what was left over.”
“Never happens at my place. I swear my Gisli can sniff out cakes and biscuits a mile away. Come on, what’s happened with Jorundur? He’s not on the way home, is he?”
“No, it’s his lady friend, this Gigja who went out there with him. They’d been carrying on a good while. I can see it now, all the signs were there, but I refused to acknowledge it,” Sigrun said with a shake of her head. “I should have known better. Well, I was talking to M?ja Dis the other day.”
“The girl who works in the office at Hvalvikingur?”
“That’s her, the personnel manager I think she is. Well, M?ja Dis knows this Gigja a bit, because Gigja’s ex used to be a cook on one of the boats; Einar, his name is. So M?ja Dis ran into Einar at the petrol station in Keflavik and he said that she was back.”
