Ashes to Dust (43 page)

‘Don’t be an idiot,’ said
Thóra. ‘The sheet was put up in an emergency to prevent ash from
coming into the house. The house itself is secure, and it isn’t going
anywhere.’ Thóra didn’t want to go in again, not at all, and
wanted Bella there as back-up. She didn’t feel comfortable going down
into the dark basement alone; if she had someone with her to talk to she could
pretend everything was fine. ‘Let’s go, it’ll be fun once
we’re in.’ Thóra pushed the door with her foot, and it
opened with a faint creak. Dust and soot whirled in the beam from her torch.

‘It must be really dangerous to breathe
in this dust,’ said Bella.

‘Since when did you start worrying
about that?’ asked Thóra. ‘If you wait outside you’ll
have several cigarettes, so it’ll probably be a nice rest for your
lungs in here.’ She took a few steps into the house, then turned and
looked at Bella through the murky air. It was as if she’d jumped inside
an old-fashioned coal stove and shut the door. ‘Come on,’ she said,
beckoning.

The sturdy secretary frowned, but finally let
herself be persuaded, turning on her torch and walking in to join Thóra.
She put her free hand over her mouth and nose and mumbled something
indecipherable into her palm, shooting Thóra a look that displayed
neither warmth nor admiration. Thóra tried to smile
appeasingly
,
which didn’t really work as she didn’t want to open her mouth. She
walked carefully in the direction of the basement door, happy to hear Bella
following close on her heels. The only light came from their torches, since all
the windows were still boarded up tightly. They fumbled their way along the
filthy floor, though there wasn’t really anything they could trip over.
It appeared that whatever loose items had remained in the house when the
police took it over had been pushed to the edges of the room. Thóra
tried not to dwell on why they had needed to clear space, but it was obvious.
They had to get the three bodies out somehow. She was also trying to forget
about the hard hat the archaeologist had insisted she put on the first time
she’d come here. She quickened her step.

‘Is this the basement door?’
asked Bella when Thóra stopped. ‘Isn’t it better if I wait
here?’ She looked around and coughed. The air hadn’t got any
cleaner and Thóra knew it would get even worse as they went deeper down,
but didn’t dare tell Bella in case that was the last straw that sent her
straight for the exit. ‘Then I’d be ready if anything needed to be
done up here. For example, I could get help if the floor were to crash down
into the basement.’

‘Enough of that talk,’ said
Thóra, refraining from saying that the floor was more likely to collapse
with Bella standing on it. ‘You’re coming with me.’ She
opened the door and shone her torch down the stairs. ‘This won’t
take us any time at all.’ She stepped onto the landing and set off
cautiously down the wooden steps. When she waved the torch around the basement
she could see that the police had removed more than just the bodies. Everything
from the shelves and the floor was gone. Thóra sighed.

‘What?’ asked Bella, who had
thankfully followed Thóra
down.
‘Is
something wrong?’ Bella followed Thóra’s example and shone
her light around the dark cellar.

‘They’ve taken everything,’
said Thóra. ‘Damn.’

‘Wasn’t that to be
expected?’ said Bella. ‘What if the body that belonged to the head
was cut up into little pieces and scattered everywhere? The police would want
to make sure they had all the evidence.’

‘I doubt that,’ said Thóra
irritably, walking farther into the basement. ‘The objects were removed
because this was an atypical crime scene. No one had been down here for thirty-
four years, so there was no way of knowing what belonged to the home and what
to the possible murderer.’ She looked around again. ‘They had to
take everything with them, if only to be able to examine it under better
conditions.’

‘Are we finished, then?’ asked
Bella impatiently. ‘You said this would take no time.’

‘No, not at all,’ said
Thóra. ‘I think there’s a storeroom here somewhere, and the
police probably haven’t cleared it out.’ She shone her light on the
walls, one after another.
‘Especially not if it’s
sealed.’
She walked over to two doors that stood side by side in
one corner. ‘If they’d wanted to remove everything from the house
there wouldn’t be anything left on the ground floor. There could just as
easily be something relevant up there.’

‘I’m not opening those
doors,’ said Bella, and coughed again. The dust in the air had become
extremely thick and every breath was accompanied by a foul taste like musty old
books. ‘The body hasn’t been found.’ Despite this, Bella
followed Thóra and took her place at her side.

‘Of course the police have already
looked here,’ said Thóra. ‘It’s out of the question
that the body is anywhere in this house, let alone in the basement.’
Nevertheless she felt her stomach muscles tighten. She grabbed the handle of
one of the doors and opened it with her eyes closed. She stood for a moment in
front of Bella, knowing that the secretary could not see her face. After a few
seconds, when Bella still hadn’t kicked up the ashes and fled,
Thóra knew it was safe to open her eyes. ‘It’s amazing the
junk people put in their storerooms,’ she exclaimed, looking at the
jumble of tyres, batteries, tools and unidentifiable spare parts. ‘The
police have clearly moved things around,’ she added, pointing at white
rings on the floor from where the tyres must previously have lain.

‘Do you think they’re
here?’ asked Bella, poking her head through the doorway.
‘Those books and things?’

‘No,’ said Thóra, shaking
her head.
‘Hardly.
The stuff in this storeroom
belongs more in a garage than a basement. I don’t imagine Magnus would
have stored old books along with nuts and bolts.’ She used her torch to
make sure there weren’t any hidden boxes or shelves where the items might
possibly be found. ‘Let’s try the other door,’ she said,
closing the first one. She couldn’t figure out whether she’d rather
see boxes and other items hidden there, or nothing, which would mean they could
get out of the basement. She opened the second door in the same way as the
first. When she opened her eyes she knew they wouldn’t be leaving here
any time soon. It was a full-sized storeroom with shelves on all the walls,
each of them full of boxes and other things that weren’t fit for around
the house but were important enough not to go in the bin.

‘Holy moly,’ said Bella.
‘Are you going to go through all of this?’ She followed
Thóra into the storeroom and pointed at the imprint of a box in the dust
on one of the shelves. ‘The police have obviously looked through this
stuff, so I doubt there’s anything important hidden here.’

Thóra opened the first box.
‘This’ll be quick,’ she said distractedly, pointing her torch
into the box. ‘We’re looking for books, a compass and money. Coins,
I think.’

Bella sighed and walked to the shelf farthest
from Thóra. ‘That’s easy for you to say,’ she said,
picking up a child’s school cap. ‘It looks like everything’s
all mixed up here.’ She reached for a frying pan. ‘What’s
wrong with people?’ she asked. ‘Why don’t they throw away
their rubbish?’

‘Times were different when these things
were packed up,’ said Thóra, still examining the box in front of
her. She found herself thinking about what was hidden in her own storeroom. She
hoped her house would never be buried by ash, so that others would never
rummage through her belongings later and make critical remarks. ‘People
had to make do and mend, and most things were more expensive than they are
now.’

‘What, even hair?’ said
Bella.
‘Ugh.’

Thóra couldn’t stop to look at
what Bella was grumbling about, since she thought she’d seen something
that could be loose change glinting at the bottom of her box. ‘People
still keep locks of their babies’ hair. It’s very common, although
I don’t understand what one’s actually supposed to do with
it,’ she said, as she reached a hand into the box. She pulled out two
teaspoons,
then
let them fall back in. She closed the
carton and turned to the next one.

‘This isn’t from a baby, I can
tell you that,’ said Bella. ‘It can’t be.’

‘My mother has hair from her
grandmother,’ said Thóra, adjusting her torch beam. ‘She
could never bring herself to throw it away, and I believe she may take it with
her to the grave.’ She was glad she’d brought Bella with her. If
she’d been down here alone she wouldn’t have lasted long. Although
the conversation wasn’t all that gripping, it helped her forget the foul
air and the fear that the house might crash down on their heads. She aimed her
torch into another box. At the top lay something lacy in a plastic bag that had
once been clear but had started to yellow. Thóra pulled it out and saw
that it was a christening gown. She set it aside and continued digging through
all sorts of children’s clothing, for the most part homemade, either
knitted or crocheted. At the bottom of the box were two books marked with gold
letters: Baby’s First Year.

Thóra had been given a book like this
as a gift when her son Gylfi was born and she had managed to write things in it
during the first three months of his life. The book had then been forgotten and
never used again. The box also contained various items such as plates for
children, silverware and a large old-fashioned baby’s bottle.
‘I just have baby stuff,’ she told Bella. ‘Did you find
anything besides locks of hair?’

‘An old bathing suit,’ said
Bella. ‘I think it’s mouldy. It smells bad.’

Thóra was removing the last few things
from the box, when she noticed the baby’s bottle was unusually heavy. She
pointed the torch at it and saw there was something inside.

‘What’s this?’ she asked
herself, unscrewing the top.

‘What?’ asked Bella, looking up
from the bathing
suit.

A small mallet dropped out of the bottle with
a heavy thud. ‘Who would keep a salmon priest in a baby bottle?’
asked Thóra, grimacing.

‘A priest?’ said Bella.

‘Yes, a salmon priest. It’s the
hammer a fisherman uses to stun the fish, after he’s caught it.’

‘What fucked-up religion do you belong
to?’ said Bella, coming and looking over Thóra’s shoulder.
‘And what are those marks on it?’ The light was stronger now that
there were two torches. It was a keen observation on Bella’s part: the
copper mallet was covered with black spots.

‘It could very well be blood,’
mused
Thóra. Was this the weapon the unidentified men
in the basement had got to know first-hand? She put it to one side and picked
up a little shoebox that contained several tiny pairs of
shoes,
and underneath them an ornate knife. ‘Look at this,’ she said.

Bella moved closer to her to get a better
look, and when Thóra’s phone rang she gave a screech that cut
through the oppressive silence. Thóra was equally startled, though she
managed to suppress the scream that nearly burst out of her. She fumbled for
the phone and answered it. ‘Thóra speaking,’ she said,
affecting nonchalance. She hoped this wasn’t someone from the Islands,
asking what she was up to.

‘Hi, this is Dís at the plastic
surgery clinic,’ said the voice on the other end. ‘I have a small
problem related to your investigation into Alda’s death.’

‘Really?’ asked
Thóra,
surprised and a little relieved not to have to
make up an excuse for where she was.

‘Yes. I was hoping you could help
me. I need a lawyer.’

Sunday 22 July
2007

Thóra stared at the paper in front of
her. It was not yet eight o’clock. She wasn’t usually up and about
this early, but tourists eager for a full day’s adventures had woken her
with their clatter in the corridor at around seven, and she hadn’t been
able to get back to sleep. She had jumped into the shower and sat down at the
little desk in her room in the hope of working out the facts of the case. This
was easier said than done, and Dís’s phone call the night before
hadn’t done anything to make it easier. Dís hadn’t wanted to
say anything except that she had information that needed to be shared with the
police. However, her own interests compelled her to speak to a lawyer first;
she’d had only Thóra’s number, so had called her. Thóra
explained to Dís that she couldn’t help her since she was
Markus’s lawyer and he was the only suspect in the case. She asked if
Dís would like to speak to Bragi and Dís had taken Bragi’s
number. When Thóra spoke to him later in the evening, Bragi had told her
to prepare herself for new information to appear in Markus’s case very
soon. He did not say what this information was, and Thóra knew better
than to interrogate him about it. He was obligated to protect his
client’s confidentiality. Thóra had to ask him one thing, though -
whether the information in question was likely to be positive or negative for
Markus. Bragi had thought it over for a long time but replied that he
hadn’t actually worked that out yet. If forced to choose, he would say
more positive than negative.

Thóra turned back to the paper in
front of her and pushed Dís and her mysterious information from her
mind. There was no point wondering about that now; all would become clear after
the weekend. She lifted her pen. Of everything that she had dug up, how much of
it was connected to the case? She lined up the events chronologically in the
hope of being able to piece it all together, and then ran down the scribbles on
the page one more time.