Ashes to Dust (38 page)

ever
persuade the woman to change her mind. Maybe it was
the desire to get as much for the money as possible, or the fear that the
breasts would get smaller with age; Dís couldn’t be sure, nor did
she think that the women would be able to answer the question if she put it to
them. Not that she was going to start questioning her patients.

Dís looked again at her watch. Why the
hell was she thinking about this now? It wasn’t her problem, since each
individual made the decision, took responsibility for it and had to live with
it. Besides, as far as she knew, all the women had been thrilled with their new
breasts. Dís looked once more at her watch in case time was passing
faster than she thought. But of course it wasn’t. Time was creeping by,
as it always did when she wanted it to pass quickly. The wait irritated
her for more than one reason: it served to remind her that Agúst was
more sought-after than her even though she was just as skilful, if not more so,
these days. He was older and more experienced, but he had started to stagnate.
She kept up to date with developments in the profession, but he showed less
interest. He tried feebly to disguise it, feigning interest when Dís
talked about articles she had read - most recently, one about an operation on
the ball of the foot that made it easier for women to walk in high-heeled
shoes. Yet he didn’t need to fake his enthusiasm when it came to conferences
abroad. She heard the door to Agúst’s office open and listened to
him exchanging pleasantries with the patient, who he clearly intended to escort
to the exit. She straightened up when she heard him lock the outer door.
Finally.

‘I thought that meeting would never
end,’ said Agúst as he came in to her office. ‘Sorry for the
wait.’ He plonked himself down, loosened his expensive tie and undid the
top button on his shirt. ‘She wants an apron removal. Just had a baby and
can’t wait to get into her bikini again.’

Dís said nothing. She wanted to go
swimming and then home, so she got straight to the point. ‘I feel awful
about the interrogation yesterday,’ she said. ‘The police know I
took it. I can feel it.’

‘Oh, come on,’ said Agúst,
massaging his own shoulders distractedly. ‘What time do you need to be
there tomorrow? I don’t have a patient until about ten, luckily.’

Dís seethed. He had no idea; there he
sat, footloose and fancy-free, while she was falling to pieces. And it was
all his
fault! ‘A man is in custody for Alda’s
murder,’ she said, as calmly as she could. ‘Doesn’t that
bother you even a little?’ Her anger felt pure and crystalline.

Agúst glared at her indignantly.
‘Why should it bother me?’ he snapped. ‘I’m thrilled
the police have caught the bastard.’ He looked away from her. ‘You
should be happy too - don’t get all worked up over something that’s
never going to happen.’

‘Agúst,’ said Dís,
gritting her teeth to keep herself from shouting. She exhaled through her nose
and composed herself before continuing. ‘I removed evidence from
Alda’s home, and the police suspect something. This evidence could either
prove the guilt of the man in custody, or, even worse, clear his name. Of
course I’m worried; only an idiot wouldn’t be.’ She hoped it
was clear she meant Agúst as well as herself.

He didn’t react to the taunt.
‘The police have talked to me too. There was nothing strange about their
questions, considering how she died. You can’t just grab Botox off
the shelf at the chemist’s.’

Dís rolled her eyes. ‘You
weren’t the first one at the murder scene. I was.’ She realized she
was almost lunging at him across the desk and pulled herself back a bit.
‘That’s why the questions they asked you weren’t as
loaded.’

Agúst seemed unsure what to say. He
obviously regretted not having taken the opportunity to slip out with the last
patient. ‘Which questions were you worried about?’

‘The questions about the Botox and
where Alda might have got it, the questions about exactly what I did while I
waited, how much time passed before I called for help, and so forth. How do I
know someone didn’t see me there, and that they won’t find out I
did more than I told them?’

Agúst frowned. ‘Dís, are
you crazy? How long did it take you to remove it from the bedside table? Thirty
seconds?
Twenty?
The police can’t possibly have
any information like that. Get a grip on yourself and calm down.’

Dís had to admit that he was probably
right, which she hated. ‘But where else could Alda have got the
Botox?’ she asked. ‘They’re not going to give up
investigating that. Say they get their hands on it in the end — the
bottle definitely has a serial number that can be traced back to the
dealer,
and from them to whoever originally supplied it.
What do you say to that, Einstein? Then you’ll be under the microscope
right next to me, I can promise you.’ She waited, willing him to panic.
He had bought the drug, not her. The drugs that she ordered were on their
inventory and didn’t ever leave the office. ‘And when they start
investigating you, other things are going to come out, you know.’ She
watched him, still waiting for his forehead to crease with worry.

Her hopes were dashed. Agúst just
shrugged, smiling cruelly. ‘Not a problem,’ he said.
‘I’ll never end up under that microscope. I’ve already come
up with a solution.’ He was obviously very pleased with his plan, because
he had puffed out his chest. ‘I told the police that we might not have
checked the inventory closely enough lately, because we’d been so
busy.’ Agúst smiled at Dís. And guess what? It turned out
some Botox was missing
.‘

Are you going to lie and say it came from
here
?‘
said Dís. It dawned on her that
this lie could get Agúst out of the frame, but she would still be under
suspicion. ’But they’ll think I took it
,‘
she said, surprised to note that there was no agitation in her voice.
’I told the lawyer of the man they arrested that we check our inventory
scrupulously. She’s going to suspect something when you tell a different
story
,‘
she added.

‘Bless you,’ laughed
Agúst. ‘That lawyer has no idea what I told the police.’ But
he looked discomfited. ‘You shouldn’t have told her that.’

Dís was unhappy about being put on the
defensive, but there was little she could do about it. ‘I thought I could
persuade her and the police to think that this was suicide after all, or at
least divert their attention to the A&E.’
As
she was saying this, she realized how bad this sounded.

Agúst rose and placed his hand on her
shoulder as she sat with her palms flat on the desk. ‘Everything will be
all right, Dís. Don’t trouble yourself unnecessarily or do
anything rash.’ He smiled genially at her, but Dís could feel an
edge behind his smile. He soon proved her right. ‘Where are you
keeping… the thing you took from the bedside table?’ asked
Agúst.

Dís tried to hide her distress.
‘I took it home,’ she said, and pressed her lips together firmly.
She wanted to make this difficult for him.

‘And what are you going to do with
it?’ he asked calmly. ‘Wouldn’t it be best to destroy
it?’

‘No,’ said Dís, looking
down. ‘I can’t. There might be important fingerprints on the
syringe.’ She stood up. ‘When I took it from the bedside table I
suspected that you’d let Alda have some Botox. I knew she wanted to give
herself and her friends injections, and I also knew that you wouldn’t say
no to her, even though I didn’t realize then what interests you were
protecting.’ She crossed her arms so he wouldn’t see how much her
hands were shaking. ‘I was afraid she’d made a terrible mistake, a
fatal one. Given
herself
a heart attack, or worse. I
was thinking about you, I wanted to protect you if it turned out you’d
been careless with drugs. But I never suspected this would turn out to be
murder.’ She looked directly at him. ‘I wanted to help you, but
that doesn’t mean I’m going to—’

Agúst interrupted her. ‘What?
Conceal evidence from the police? You’re already doing that.’ He
stared at her, and now she saw fear in his eyes for the first time. ‘Are
you taking this to the police?’

Dís thought for a moment. ‘I
don’t know, I haven’t decided yet,’ she lied.

Saturday 21 July
2007

The tour had ended with them sailing almost
aimlessly through a calm patch of sea around Heimaey and the nearby islands,
while the old captain spun his stories. It would have been interesting to see
their route on a map, since only fate seemed to determine the course Paddi the
Hook took. Now and again he described certain aspects of the landscape to them
and informed them of local customs and geography. But it was clear to everyone
that this was not the purpose of the trip. He didn’t make any particular
effort to describe what they were seeing, appearing to slip into tour guide
mode only occasionally, out of habit. Thóra would try to appear
interested, but with limited success. It wasn’t that it was difficult
- the scenery was fabulous, especially south of Heimaey - but she thought it
looked as though when the Almighty put the main island there, pieces had
crumbled off and formed the other islands that lay scattered about. When she
and Bella finally disembarked after the three-hour trip, Thóra was much
better informed about life in the Islands and the people she thought were tied
to the case. Paddi had seemed unwilling to admit that Alda’s name had
ever been linked with the blood on the pier, and hadn’t succumbed to
Thóra’s badgering. The smack with its foreign crew had sailed
away in the night.

Back on land Thóra had tried to show
the old sailor the copy of the photo from Alda’s desk, in the hope that
he could identify the young man. Paddi shook his head and said that he
wasn’t from the Westmann Islands, and looked more like a foreigner.
Thóra thanked him and put the picture back into her bag. What she had,
then, was the story about the blood on the pier, and the fact that Magnus had
been in the area around the time it appeared. She found it interesting that
Magnus’s wife was so adamant her husband hadn’t left the house
again after bringing their drunken son home. Of course it was possible that she
hadn’t been aware of him leaving, but Thóra suspected the woman had
been persuaded to make this statement against her better judgement.

Fresh in Thóra’s memory were the
descriptions of the violence that had caused the deaths of the men in the basement.
It required a particular type of man to attack others in such a way, and now
everything pointed towards that man being her client’s father. Dadi
Horseshoe - and possibly others - must have helped him. This made more sense
than the theory that an adolescent girl had been the perpetrator.

Back at the hotel Thóra realized that
her cheeks felt warm, and in the first mirror she passed she saw that her face
was the colour of a redfish. She cursed herself for not using the sunscreen she
had so conscientiously taken with her. Bella looked much the same. The
secretary yawned and Thóra noticed that she had no fillings in her
teeth, although she had had no desire to find this out. ‘Do you want to
take a nap?’ asked Thóra, who would certainly have liked to take
one herself. ‘I need to make several phone calls and try to speak to
Maria, Leifur’s wife. So you can just take it easy. Then we’ll have
a late dinner when I come back.’

Bella didn’t need to be asked twice.
Thóra went up to her room, but only to take a shower and put on
something a bit cleaner and more presentable than her jeans and sweatshirt.
Afterwards she felt much better, her fatigue washed away, along with the salt
in her hair. It was just as well, because she needed all her energy to make it
through the phone calls awaiting her. One of them was to Markus, to tell him
the new information about his father, and to let him know that she intended to
tell the police Paddi’s story about the blood. She also planned to inform
the police about the English smack, because she was pretty sure the bodies were
once its crew. She couldn’t imagine how the men had ended up in the
basement of Markus’s childhood home after leaving the Islands several
days before the eruption, but she had a strong feeling about it nevertheless.
Everyone agreed there had been few foreigners in the Islands at the time, so no
one else fitted. Right now she couldn’t waste time on these speculations,
though, because she had plenty of other things to do. She started by phoning
her children.

‘Have you got an apartment for the
festival?’ asked Gylfi. No hello Mum, how’s it going?

Thóra didn’t try to explain that
she’d been too busy saving an innocent man from prison to make any
preparations for The Bank Holiday weekend. It would mean nothing to Gylfi.
‘No, I haven’t heard anything yet,’ she said honestly. Indeed
she hadn’t heard anything about empty apartments, since she hadn’t
asked. ‘I need to call someone later who may be able to help me.’
Leifur was on Thóra’s list to call, and if he couldn’t get
them an apartment no one could. The fact that she was about to tell the police
his father could be connected to the bodies in the basement might throw a
spanner in the works. But her task was to make Leifur understand that it was
best for his brother, and that it was Markus’s legal right that the truth
be told.