Last Rituals (10 page)

 

 

They went out into the cold to the parking garage where they had left the rental car. Harald's flat was on Bergstadastraeti, not so far from Hverfisgata. Thóra had become very familiar with the central Thingholt district after she had started working on Skólavördustígur and could direct Matthew without any problems—although there were not many streets, it could be confusing for strangers to find their way along the narrow one-way lanes. They parked outside a dignified white concrete building on Bergstadastraeti where Matthew said Harald's flat was. It was one of the more desirable properties in the district, clearly well maintained, and Thóra could not begin to imagine the price. At least this explained the astronomical rent that she had noticed on Harald's tenancy agreement.

 

 

"Have you been here before?" asked Thóra as they walked up to the side entrance. The front door facing the street led to another apartment on the ground floor, where Matthew said the owners lived.

 

 

"Yes, a couple of times in fact," Matthew replied. "But this is only the second time I've been here on my own business, so to speak. The other times I came with the police. They needed a witness when they took away some papers and other items for the investigation, and again when they returned them. I'm sure we'll check the flat much more thoroughly than the police did. They were determined that Hugi was the murderer, so their investigation of the apartment was more of a formality."

 

 

"Is the flat as strange as the person who occupied it?"

 

 

"No, it's very ordinary," said Matthew, inserting one of the two keys into the lock on the outside door. The keys hung from a ring with an Icelandic flag on it and Thóra inferred that he had bought it specifically for these keys in one of the tourist shops. She couldn't really imagine Harald in such a store, surrounded by traditional woolen sweaters and stuffed puffins. "After you," said Matthew as he opened the door.

 

 

Before Thóra could get one foot inside a young woman came around the corner and called out to them in fairly good English. "Excuse me," she said, fastening her cardigan against the cold. "Are you acting for Harald's family?"

 

 

Judging from the way she was dressed, Thóra assumed she must have come out of the other flat. Matthew held out his hand to the woman and said in English: "Yes, we met when I got the keys from you. Matthew."

 

 

"Yes, I thought so," the woman said, shaking Matthew's hand with a smile. She was elegant, slender, with her hair and face well cared for, clearly well-off. When she smiled Thóra realized she may not have been as young as she looked at first, because deep wrinkles formed around her mouth and eyes. She held out her hand to Thóra. "Hello, my name's Gudrún," she said, adding: "My husband and I were Harald's landlords."

 

 

Thóra gave her name and returned the woman's smile. "We were just going to have a look around. I don't know how long we'll be."

 

 

"Oh, that's fine," the woman hurried to say. "I only came to ask if there was any news about when the flat will be vacated." She smiled again, this time apologetically. "We've had a few inquiries, you understand."

 

 

In fact Thóra didn't understand, because as far as she knew the Guntliebs were still paying the rent, and it must have been a good arrangement to rent out a flat in that part of town without any of the inconvenience that tenants cause. She turned to Matthew, hoping he might provide an answer.

 

 

"Unfortunately it won't be just yet," he answered curtly. "The agreement is still in effect, as I understood the last time we discussed this."

 

 

The woman was quick to apologize. "Oh, yes, please don't get me wrong—of course it is. We'd just like to know when the family plans to end it. This is an expensive property and it's always nice to find tenants who can pay the price we ask." She gave Thóra an awkward look. "You see, we've had an offer from an investment company which is difficult to refuse. They need the flat in two months, but it kind of depends on what your plans are. You know what I mean."

 

 

Matthew nodded. "I understand your predicament, but, unfortunately, I can't make any promises at the moment," he said. "It all depends on the progress we make going through Harald's belongings. I want to be certain that nothing that could be relevant gets boxed."

 

 

The woman, who was beginning to shudder from the cold, nodded fervently. "If I can do anything to speed it up, do let me know." She handed them a business card from an import agency that Thóra did not recognize. It carried the woman's name and telephone numbers, including her mobile.

 

 

Thóra produced her own card from her purse and handed it to her in exchange. "Take mine too, and do phone if you or your husband remember anything that could conceivably help us. We're trying to find out who murdered Harald."

 

 

The woman's eyes bulged. "What about the man they're detaining?"

 

 

"We have our doubts that he's the murderer," Thóra said simply. She noticed that the woman seemed shocked at the news. "I don't think you need have any worries," she hastened to add. "I doubt whoever it is will come around here." She smiled.

 

 

"No, that's not the point," the woman babbled. "I just thought it was over."

 

 

They exchanged farewells and Thóra and Matthew went into the warmth. In the hallway they found a white varnished staircase leading to the apartment on the upper floor. There was also a door that Matthew said led to the shared laundry room. After they had gone upstairs to the landing, Matthew opened the apartment with the other key on his ring.

 

 

The first thing that struck Thóra when she stepped inside was that Matthew had been rather liberal with the truth when he described the flat as "very ordinary." She gazed around her, astonished.

 

 

 

CHAPTER 8

Gunnar Gestvík, head of the department of history at the University of Iceland, strode along the corridor where the director of the Manuscript Institute had her office and absentmindedly nodded a greeting to a young historian on the way. The young man gave an embarrassed smile that again reminded Gunnar of his newly found fame within the university and its institutions. Nobody could seem to forget that it was into his arms that Harald Guntlieb's body fell, to say nothing of the nervous breakdown that he reaped in reward. Never before had he been so popular, if that was the right term, because hardly anyone who now made a detour to talk to him could rightly be classified as a friend.

 

 

Of course this business would eventually all blow over, but God alone knew how weary he was of having to answer stupid questions about the incident, which were prompted by nothing but sheer nosiness. He was beginning to feel revolted by the expression people invariably put on their faces while mustering the courage to ask their questions. The expression was supposed to show a combination of sadness at the young man's untimely death and compassion for Gunnar, but almost without exception the outcome was completely different. Their faces radiated only morbid fascination and relief that it had happened to someone else.

 

 

Should he perhaps have followed the vice chancellor's advice and taken two months' leave? He couldn't be sure. People might have lost all interest by then, but it would be rekindled when the case went to court. So he would only be postponing the inevitable by taking a rest. Besides, it would merely have spawned endless rumors about him—a nervous breakdown and self-imposed convalescence, binge drinking at home, or even worse. No, he thought it was the right decision to turn down leave and let the storm die down. People would eventually grow bored of the subject and start avoiding him again.

 

 

Gunnar tapped on the door where María Einarsdóttir, director of the institute, had her office—more for politeness' sake than anything else, because he immediately opened the door without waiting to be told to enter. She was on the telephone but gestured to Gunnar to take a seat, which he did. He impatiently waited for her to finish the call, which sounded as though it involved an order for printer toner that had not been delivered.

 

 

Gunnar tried to conceal how much this irritated him. When María had called him several minutes earlier she said it was a serious matter and demanded that he meet her at once. He had put aside the project he was working on at the moment, an application for an Erasmus program grant for the department of history in cooperation with the University of Bergen. The application was to be submitted in English and Gunnar had just been getting into his groove when María phoned. If this serious matter of hers was about toner, he would certainly give her a piece of his mind. He had begun to arrange a few well-chosen words when she put the telephone down and turned her attention to him.

 

 

Before she spoke she gave Gunnar a ruminating look, as if she too were choosing her words carefully. The fingers of her right hand drummed on the desk and she sighed. "Christ," she said in English, finally.

 

 

She had clearly not been using her time searching for a phrase from the classics, Gunnar thought, trying not to show how inappropriate he considered it for the director of the Manuscript Institute to use such a word. Times had certainly changed over the forty years since Gunnar was a young man. In those days people took pride in sounding classical—now it was thought cheesy and pretentious. Even a woman like María, well educated and not a youngster anymore, used slang and shoddy grammar. Gunnar cleared his throat. "What is it, María?"

 

 

"Christ," she repeated, running both hands through her cropped hair. It was just beginning to turn gray and a few silver strands glittered when she ruffled it. Then she shook her head and got to the point. "One of the old letters is missing." A short pause, and then: "It's been stolen."

 

 

Gunnar's head snapped back. He could not conceal his surprise and disapproval. "What do you mean, stolen? From the exhibition?"

 

 

María groaned. "No. Not from the exhibition. From here. In-house."

 

 

Gunnar sat openmouthed. In-house? "How could that happen?"

 

 

"That's a good question. To the best of my knowledge it's the first time something of this kind has happened here." In a sharper tone she added: "Who knows, maybe more than just this letter is missing. As you well know, six hundred manuscripts and fragments from Árni Magnússon's great collection are preserved here, along with all the old letters he amassed and a hundred and fifty manuscripts from the Royal Library in Denmark. Oh, yes, and seventy other manuscripts and letters from here and there." She paused and stared Gunnar in the eye. "You can bet we'll go through every scrap of paper here to find out whether anything else is missing. But I wanted to talk to you in person before I make it public. As soon as I order a count, it will be obvious what's going on."

 

 

"Why do you want to consult me about it?" asked Gunnar, surprised and slightly annoyed. As head of department he did not need to have much contact with the institute and had no particular function in it. "You're not accusing me of taking the letter?"

 

 

"For God's sake, Gunnar. I'd better explain the situation to you before you start asking if I suspect the vice chancellor." She handed him a letter that was lying on her table. "Do you remember the documents we had on loan from the Danish national archives?"

 

 

Gunnar nodded. The institute often received loans from foreign collections that were in some way connected with its own work. As a rule Gunnar got wind of them but did not commit them to memory unless the documents were related to his own areas of academic interest. The Danish collection was clearly not one. He skimmed the letter, which was written by Karsten Josephsen, a chief of department at the Danish national archive. Written in Danish, it was a reminder that the deadline for returning the documents was approaching. He handed the letter back to María. "I'm completely at a loss."

 

 

She took the letter and put it back in its place on the desk in front of her. "That may well be. It was a collection of letters written to the arch-deacons of Roskilde Cathedral. They were all from the period 1500 to 1550. I understand they did not arouse very much academic interest here, although the ones dated around the Danish Reformation in 1536 were interesting in their own right. But the missing letter was not one of those."

 

 

"What was the letter about?" asked Gunnar, still unsure how this concerned him.

 

 

"Naturally I don't know exactly what it said, because it's lost—but I do know that it was from 1510 and written by Stefán Jónsson, then bishop of Skálholt, to the archdeacon of Roskilde Cathedral. I have that information from the register that was sent here with the collection. In fact, that was how I discovered the letter was missing: I used the register as a checklist for packing the collection for its return to Denmark."

 

 

"Could it be that it never came here—it's simply always been missing?" asked Gunnar hopefully.

 

 

"Out of the question," came the answer. "I was present when the collection was unpacked last year and we took great care in checking it against the register they sent. It was all in perfect order and everything was in its place."

 

 

"So perhaps the letter has just been misplaced?" suggested Gunnar. "Couldn't it have accidentally ended up with other documents?"

 

 

"You know," María said, "if circumstances were different that might well be a possibility." She paused for a while to emphasize what would follow. "When I discovered the disappearance I went straight to our computer system to examine the letter—you presumably know that we scan every single document we receive, our own or borrowed?" Gunnar nodded and María went on. "Guess what? The file had been deleted—just this one letter."