‘And you are suggesting that someone pushed him? Benedikt?’
‘Possibly. In the book the boy is taking revenge for the rape of his sister. In this case it would be for the murder of his father.’
Unnur mulled it over. ‘It is possible, I suppose. I can’t imagine Benedikt killing anyone. It’s all ancient history now, isn’t it?’
‘Perhaps not so ancient,’ Magnus said. ‘Remember Benedikt was murdered himself. In 1985.’
‘But that was a burglar,’ Unnur said.
The three of them sat in silence, thinking it all through.
Unnur shuddered. ‘This is creepy. Three deaths. Over, what, fifty years? From the nineteen thirties to the nineteen eighties.’
‘Is your aunt still alive?’ Ingileif asked.
‘Yes. But I doubt she would tell you anything.’
‘You never know with old people,’ Ingileif said. ‘Sometimes they are happy to talk when the people they are talking about are no longer with us.’
‘It’s important,’ said Magnus.
‘Yes, I suppose it is,’ said Unnur. ‘Well, let’s go and see her. She lives just around the corner.’
They left the restaurant and followed a small street that rose behind a fish factory. They came to a tiny house, that looked like an illustration out of a children’s book. It was clad in corrugated iron, painted a bright green with a red roof. A series of elfish knickknacks adorned the windows. Unnur rang the bell. Above the door was a white plaque upon which the year 1903 was carefully painted in black, with purple flowers winding around the numbers.
Unnur’s aunt Hildur was a tiny woman with a crooked back, bright blue eyes and a sharp mind. Her face lit up when she saw her niece. She led them through to an over-heated and over-furnished sitting room, with landscapes on the walls, and little Icelandic flags sprouting up among various elves, seals, trolls and birds on every surface. Unnur was sent to the kitchen to fetch some coffee, there was some brewed.
Hildur picked up some knitting. ‘It’s for my great-grandson,’ she said. ‘He’ll be two next week, and it’s for his birthday, so please don’t mind me if I keep working.’
She held up an almost completed tiny lopi sweater, with an intricate pattern of blue and white crossing chest and shoulders in concentric circles.
‘That’s beautiful,’ said Ingileif with enthusiasm.
The old lady grunted, but she was clearly pleased.
Unnur returned with the coffee. ‘This is Magnús Ragnarsson, aunt. Hallgrímur’s grandson.’
Immediately Hildur’s blue eyes fastened on Magnus, warmth replaced by suspicion.
‘I lived with my grandparents at Bjarnarhöfn for four years when I was a boy,’ Magnus said. ‘It wasn’t a happy time in my life.’
‘I imagine it wasn’t,’ said the old woman.
‘You know my grandfather, I take it?’
‘Of course,’ said Hildur. ‘We were neighbours until I was about twenty. We lived at Hraun. I have tried to avoid him since then.’
‘You don’t like him?’
‘No. I don’t. Benni and he used to be great friends when they were little, but I thought he bossed Benni around a bit. They grew apart as they got older.’
‘I don’t like him either,’ said Magnus. The old lady was shocked. Loyalty to grandparents was a given in Icelandic society.
‘Do you remember my great-grandfather?’ Magnus said. ‘Gunnar.’
‘Yes,’ said Hildur.
‘What was he like?’
Hildur didn’t answer straight away. ‘He was a bad man,’ she said eventually.
‘A very bad man,’ Magnus said. ‘He killed your father, didn’t he?’
There was silence in the room, apart from the ticking of a clock, which seemed suddenly very loud. ‘I believe he did,’ said Hildur eventually. ‘I had no idea when I was a child. He used to come over to our farm often after Father disappeared. He helped my mother out around the place, he was a good neighbour. But all the time he knew that he had killed her husband.’ She shuddered.
‘How did you find out? Did Benedikt tell you?’ Magnus fought to keep the excitement out of his voice. He didn’t want to spook her.
Hildur glanced at her audience. For a moment Magnus thought Ingileif might be right, that Hildur might decide that there was no point in keeping the secret any longer. But then she shook her head. ‘I can’t tell you. Some secrets go beyond the grave.’
‘Have you read your brother’s story “The Slip”?’ Magnus asked.
The old lady smiled knowingly. ‘Yes. Yes, I have.’
‘Do you think that your brother might have pushed Gunnar over the edge at Búland’s Head? In revenge for what Gunnar had done to your father?’
‘Let’s just say that on the day Gunnar fell into the sea, Benedikt was returning from Ólafsvík. He claimed he never saw Gunnar. Everyone believed him. Benedikt was an honest boy.’ Her eyes twinkled. ‘In fact he was an honest adult. He had to tell the truth somehow, in the end.’
‘I understand,’ said Magnus with a smile. ‘And thank you.’ He stood up to leave. ‘I know it happened a long time ago, but I am very sorry about your father.’
A tear suddenly appeared in the old lady’s eye. ‘So am I.’
Ingileif got her way. Despite Magnus’s reluctance, they stopped by the Berserkjahraun on the way back. They parked the Range Rover just below the farm of Hraun, on the eastern side of the lava field, the opposite side to Bjarnarhöfn.
Hraun was much as Magnus remembered it, with several large outbuildings, and a couple of small houses in addition to the main farmhouse. Circular bales of hay in white plastic lined the home meadow, on which round woollen balls of sheep grazed. Magnus and Ingileif headed into the lava field, and a few metres in they found the Berserkjagata, the ‘Berserkers’ Street’. It was a footpath cut into the rock, only a few inches wide.
‘I thought it would be bigger than this,’ said Ingileif.
‘If you think it was made by two men cutting into solid rock, it’s big enough,’ Magnus said. ‘And it made it much easier to walk to Bjarnarhöfn.’
‘Show me the cairn.’
The path wound through the twisted rock, down into hollows and up again. Autumn in Iceland has its own beauty. Not as striking, perhaps, as the change of leaves in Massachusetts, but the heather and grasses turn to gold and orange, and the bilberry leaves to a deep red. Peaceful.
They caught glimpses of the little Hraunsvík, the ‘Lava Bay’ between the two farms, where the lava flow had spilled into the sea. Two eider drakes in their black and white finery patrolled the cove. Magnus wondered whether the inhabitants of Bjarnarhöfn still collected their mates’ dun-coloured down every summer after the ducklings had left their nests. Beyond the bay, flat islands dotted Breidafjördur, familiar to Magnus from fishing trips in the farm’s skiff.
‘It’s quite hard to take in,’ said Magnus. ‘Jóhannes. Gunnar.’
‘Sounds like you’ve got yourself your very own family feud,’ Ingileif said. ‘It’s fascinating really. Just like the old days. Arnkell and Thórólfur and Snorri and – who was the other one – Björn of Breidavík?’
‘That’s him,’ said Magnus. ‘It does sound a bit like that.’
‘What do you think of Benedikt’s murder? Do you think it is connected?’
‘It must be a possibility,’ Magnus said. ‘Burglars don’t usually murder people in Iceland, although of course it can happen. I’ll pull out the police file next week and take a look.’
‘At least your grandfather wasn’t involved.’
‘I don’t know about that,’ Magnus said. ‘He would be right there for a family feud.’
‘You mean he could have killed Benedikt?’
‘Possibly. Once I take a look at the file it will be clearer.’
‘You really don’t like him, do you?’
Magnus didn’t answer.