Thin Ice: An Inspector Gunna Mystery (Gunnhildur Mystery Book 5) (17 page)

Magni turned and followed his gaze to see Erna with an expression somewhere between confusion and irritation standing in the doorway, while the man in the blue overall stared at her.

‘There’s something a bit damn spooky about all this,’ he said with a sudden burst of anger and pointed at Erna. ‘I know who you are. Your picture’s been in the papers and on the TV; they said you’d gone missing somewhere. So what’s all this about?’

He made for the door and Magni tried to head him off. ‘Hey, listen, man. It’s not what it looks like, all right?’

The man shook Magni’s hand from his shoulder. ‘I don’t care what it looks like. There’s something proper fishy happening here and the sooner I’m out of this place, the better.’

Fat flakes of snow drifted lazily down through still air as the man set off across the yard.

‘You fucking stop.’ This time it was Össur who was yelling. ‘I’m warning you.’

‘Össi, no . . .’ Magni said.

The man in the blue overalls stopped and turned, staring at Össur who strode towards him, hands in his pockets, snowflakes collecting on his thin grey hair.

‘And what?’ the man said with a truculent look at Össur, who was shorter than him by half a head and certainly seemed less of a threat than the beefy Magni might have been. ‘What you going to do? You can fuck off, pal. I’m out of here.’

‘You stay right where you are,’ Össur snarled, his voice hoarse.

‘And if I don’t?’ the big man demanded, squaring up to Össur. ‘I’m out of here and you’re not stopping me.’

‘Össi, no . . .’ Magni called, hurrying across the yard to where the two of them were almost nose to nose.

‘If you know what’s good for you, shitbag,’ Össur drawled.

‘Well, fuck you!’ The man in the blue overalls yelled in his face and placed both hands on Össur’s chest, sending him staggering backwards.

‘Össi, don’t . . .’

The pistol appeared from Össur’s pocket and Magni could see the blood drain from the man’s face.

‘Hey, this ain’t right . . .’ the man said in disbelief, the words barely out of his mouth before Össur’s first slug caught him in the chest. Magni had expected the man to be thrown backwards, like he’d seen in the movies, but instead he stopped still for a moment and a second shot hit him only an inch or so away from the first. The two shots were rapid, dry cracks that echoed off the surrounding hills, dulled by the damp in the air; and before the second shot’s echo had faded it was joined by Erna’s piercing scream bouncing off the rocks as the man sagged gradually to his knees before falling forward into the snow.

Helgi was tight-lipped and pale when he made his appearance. He went to the coffee room, poured himself a mugful and sat staring into space.

‘All right?’ Gunna asked. The faint smell of the autopsy room lingered around him.

‘Yeah. I’ll be all right in a minute.’

‘So? Árni Sigurvinsson?’

Helgi sipped his coffee, grimaced, squirted some long-life milk into it from a carton on the table and sipped again.

‘Smoke inhalation, as we expected. Absolutely no doubt that was the cause of death, according to Miss Cruz. But there’s more.’

‘Explain, young man.’

‘It’ll all be in Miss Cruz’s report. He’d been beaten up quite efficiently probably only a couple of hours at most before he died. There’s a good bit of internal bruising, but not many outward signs of it. There’s a decent amount of alcohol in his blood, and Miss Cruz reckons they’ll probably identify a few other goodies as well once the tests have been done. Plus he’s missing a toe on his left foot.’

‘Eiríkur said. A recent injury?’

‘His toe was chopped off with something sharp, a chisel maybe, and very recently.’

‘Miss Cruz knows this is a priority?’

‘I didn’t have to tell her. This one goes to the front of the queue, along with everything else she was supposed to have done by last week,’ Helgi said bitterly. ‘She’s trying to identify what kind of tool was used.’

‘The Laxdal’s threatening to put Sævaldur on to this with you.’

Helgi groaned. ‘No, please. Sæsi’s fine harassing hoodlums, but we don’t need bull-in-a-china-shop tactics here. Not yet, anyway.’

‘I’d agree with you on that. What’s Eiríkur up to?’

‘He was questioning anyone and everyone he could find yesterday who might have known the victim, and I think the landlord came across as suspicious. Eiríkur’s in at twelve today, I think.’

‘And where are you taking this?’

‘You know, I’m damned if I know. Doing the same as Eiríkur and hoping that somebody saw something or someone that morning. Here, Gunna?’

‘Hmm?’

‘You have a contact who’s a taxi driver, don’t you?’

‘Do I? Oh, yes. I know who you mean.’

‘Can you put me on to him, find out if there’s any gossip about Árni?’

Gunna thought. ‘I’m not sure he’d talk to anyone else.’ She checked her watch. ‘I’ll tell you what. I know where this character goes for his lunch break. I’ll go and surprise him and let you know what I find out.’

Erna stood with her hands to her mouth and screeched.

‘What the hell happened?’

Tinna Lind appeared behind her and looked from her mother to Magni and Össur to the corpse of the man in the blue overalls on the ground between them. The pistol in Össur’s hand told the story by itself and Tinna Lind took her mother’s arm to lead her inside the hotel.

Össur’s teeth chattered. ‘What the fuck do we do now?’

‘You’re asking me? Christ on a bike, Össi,’ Magni spluttered in fury. ‘You’re the gangster here. You’re the man with the experience. How about you come up with an idea of your own?’

In the face of Magni’s outburst, Össur’s face reverted to its usual impassive look. ‘Sort it out, will you? I’m cold. I’m going inside.’

Magni stood speechless and helpless in the yard as snow continued to fall around him and settle on the lifeless man in the blue overalls. He knelt by the man, rolled him onto one side and felt with two forefingers in a fold of his neck for a hint of a pulse, hoping that somehow Össur’s shots had missed anything vital and that the man had merely been stunned. Flakes of snow fluttered slowly downwards, melting as they landed on the man’s face and collecting in his thick dark hair. The resolute refusal of his fingers to find a pulse, the man’s open eyes and the face that was surprisingly peaceful in death were enough to convince him he was wasting his time.

He laid the man in as dignified a position as he could, closed his eyes and stood for a moment before going inside. Erna sat huddled on the sofa, her legs folded beneath her, rocking in Tinna Lind’s arms. Magni looked questioningly at her, wanting to ask a dozen questions. Tinna Lind looked back at him, lifted a finger to her lips and shook her head briefly without stopping her gentle rocking motion.

In the office he went to the filing cabinet, took out one of the bottles and poured himself a finger of whisky that he threw back in one, thought about another and decided against it.

He put on a coat and a pair of gloves that he had found in the shed at the back, pulled a wool hat down to his eyebrows and went back outside. The man in the blue overalls had driven from where? He wondered if the man had come from Reykjavík or Selfoss, or maybe even from Akranes? It was impossible to say and it wasn’t as if he could ask him now, he reflected bitterly.

The man’s car had been parked at the side of the road, further down the curving road that put the hotel out of sight, and as Magni approached it, he could see why it hadn’t been driven all the way into the yard. A drift of snow snaked across the road, a little more than knee high but still enough to warrant caution. The man’s car was a small van, but Magni saw it had been fitted with robust tyres with heavy treads and studded with nails, and he guessed the van was made for the terrain with four-wheel drive.

He had no idea what to do. For the first time, Magni was struck by indecision. The van was bright red and would be easily spotted. He had no idea where he could safely dispose of it, or even if he could hide it effectively. The keys had been left in the ignition. The engine fired first time and the radio blared into life at the same moment, making him fumble for a button to switch it off. Unable to find one, he settled for turning the volume down low and manoeuvred the van in an awkward series of turns to spin it around and drive down the track.

He was surprised at how quickly he found a place to leave the van, thankful that there would be no overly long walk back. He realized that there were narrow tracks forking off at long intervals, each one leading to a summer house hidden among rocks and trees. Choosing one at random, he bumped the van down a track to a summer house that had conifers planted around it, their branches heavy with snow, and tucked the van underneath the largest of the trees, where he knew it would be out of sight of the road, and hoped it would be out of sight from the air as well.

He left the keys in the van, as if the owner had just got out of it, trudged back along the track to the road and towards the hotel. He found the going harder than he’d expected. The unmade road under a thick coating of hard snow was unpredictable. Several times he lost his footing, and with the thickening snow falling through still air, he could see no more than a few dozen yards ahead. He trusted that the road he was following would lead him back to the hotel.

‘Looking good, Matti.’ Gunna leaned over to kiss his cheek. ‘Good to see you’re looking after yourself.’

‘Thanks. I’m trying. It’s Marika’s doing really.’

The lunchtime trade at Grandakaffi was brisk. Gunna and Matti sat in the glass-sided extension with a view over the dock and the handful of taxis parked opposite while their owners addressed themselves to the day’s meat soup.

‘Not eating, Matti?’ Gunna asked, nodding at the counter.

‘If you’re buying, then why not?’

‘Fair enough. You go and get them and I’ll pay.’

The soup with its heavy chunks of mutton was one of those traditional staples that she and Matti had grown up with, something that their mothers both served at least once a week.

‘Not bad, is it?’ Matti said appreciatively once he was halfway through his dish.

‘As good as your mum’s?’

‘Don’t talk stupid. Nothing’s as good as Mum makes.’

‘How’s Marika? Keeping you under control?’

Matti grunted. ‘Yeah. She’s doing well. Assistant manager at that place now.’

‘Where’s she working? Remind me?’

‘Travel firm that runs coach trips. It’s quiet this time of year, but she was rushed off her feet last summer. How’s your brood keeping? I understand congratulations are in order?’

Gunna sighed. ‘Gísli has two boys now, with two different women, six weeks apart.’

‘Yeah. I heard that. Tough position,’ Matti commiserated. ‘So is he settled down with one of them? Your brother’s girl, wasn’t it?’

‘Svanur’s stepdaughter. That’s the situation at the moment, but I guess it could all change in five minutes. He’s living with Drífa, which doesn’t do a lot for family harmony. But there was an episode last year with a girl from New Zealand.’

‘Wow! He gets about, my cousin does.’

Gunna scowled. ‘That’s as maybe, but he has two children to support now. Anyway, the girl from New Zealand didn’t last long. I think she figured out pretty quickly that a guy with two small children to support was never going to be much of a prospect. A shame, a very smart young woman. It’s Laufey I’m more concerned about these days.’

‘In what way?’

‘Ach, probably worrying about nothing. She just doesn’t seem able to settle. Dumped the boy she’d been knocking about with and hasn’t found new friends.’

‘She’ll be all right,’ Matti said unconvincingly. ‘You want a coffee?’

Gunna leaned forward, arms crossed. ‘Listen. You have your ear to the ground.’

‘Not as much as I used to.’

‘Árni Sigurvinsson,’ she said, and knew as she saw Matti blanch that she’d hit the target.

‘Árni’s dead.’

‘He’s not just dead. He was murdered.’

‘Yeah. I heard that.’

‘And? Any thoughts? What was Árni up to?’

‘I suppose I should have come and seen you, but I didn’t know what to say.’

‘Matti, are you involved in this?’ Gunna asked in alarm.

‘No, not as such.’ Matti looked out of the window at the rain pattering into the puddles in the street outside, grey water on a greyer street. ‘There was a whisper going round. No names, no comebacks. Understood?’

‘Understood,’ Gunna assured him over her mug of coffee.

‘Look, there was someone looking for a driver for a job last week. Cash payout. That’s all I know. I turned it down. Didn’t have to think twice.’

‘Why? How come you turned it down?’

Matti scratched his neck and fiddled with a corner of his moustache. ‘It was just too . . . woolly. You know what I mean? I don’t know who had the job, but the message came through someone I’d be wary of trusting. Anyway, too many unanswered questions and I guess too many things to go wrong. Anyway, I’m straight these days, keeping my nose clean, and Marika wouldn’t be impressed if I were to get a year in Litla Hraun. Done that, don’t want to do it again.’

‘Very commendable, and not before time, cousin Matti.’

‘Thank you, cousin Gunna.’

‘A changed man, I’m pleased to see. I’m sure your mother is delighted.’

‘You know what our mothers are like. It’s not as if either of them is easily pleased.’

‘True enough. Any idea what this job was supposed to be? If it was last week, has it been done, and is that why Árni came out of it so badly?’

Matti shifted uncomfortably in his chair and glanced around to reassure himself that nobody was listening.

‘Thursday afternoon last week. Somebody stitched up Alli the Cornershop good and proper.’

‘That old bastard? Good for whoever did it.’

‘I don’t suppose Alli’s been along to report a robbery to the police, but the word is that a couple of hundred thousand euros disappeared and Alli’s on the warpath.’

‘Ah. Definitely not small potatoes.’

‘Far from it. I’ve no idea if Árni had anything to do with it, but to my way of thinking it’s a bit too much of a coincidence. Not that I’m selling the tale any dearer than I bought it, if you get my drift.’