The staff at the off-licence watched him as if he had committed a crime. Perhaps it was his appearance? He hoped so. What could they know, anyway? They knew nothing. Nor did they refuse to serve him; after all, his money was good, even if he didn’t exactly look like a banker. They avoided engaging with him, though; did not address a single word to him. Well, what did he care what they thought? They meant nothing to him. And anyway, what did he have to do with them? Not a thing. He was just there to buy a couple of bottles of spirits and that was all. He was causing no trouble; he was a customer, just like anyone else.
So why the hell were they gawping at him like that?
Was there a dress code for drinking brennivín?
He walked out of the off-licence, his mind churning, casting frequent glances behind him, as if he expected to be followed. Could they have called the cops? His pace quickened. The young man who had served him sat on his chair by the till, watching him through the glass frontage until he was out of sight.
He did not see any police officers but took the precaution of turning down a side street as soon as he could. From there he made his slow way back towards the centre of Reykjavík, heading for the old graveyard, instinctively picking the quietest back streets and alleyways. From time to time, when no one was looking, he stopped, removed one of the bottles from the bag and took a swig. When he finally reached the graveyard the bottle was nearly empty. He would have to go easy if the other one was to last.
The old cemetery on Sudurgata was a favourite refuge when he needed peace and quiet. He sat down now for a rest on a low stone wall that fenced in a large tomb, taking frequent sips from the second bottle, and although it was cold he did not feel it, protected as he was by the drink and his thick, padded jacket.
The alcohol had a restorative effect and he felt livelier, somewhat lighter of heart. A snatch of verse kept repeating itself in his head, as it often did when he was drinking: Brennivín is the best of friends / It never lets you down. In future he would avoid the town centre; you never knew when you might bump into some acquaintance, or even a cop, and that was the last thing he needed. More than once he had been picked up for the sole crime of showing his face in town. He had not been pestering anybody, merely sitting on a bench in Austurvöllur Square, minding his own business, when two policemen had approached him. He had told them to get lost — maybe adding a few obscenities, not that he could remember — and before he knew it he was in the cells. ‘You spoil the view for the tourists,’ they had told him.
He gazed across the graveyard at the mossy headstones and the trees that grew amid the tumbled graves, then raised his eyes heavenwards. The sky was gloomy and overcast; to him it seemed almost black, but then the clouds over the mountains parted for an instant, showing a gleam of sunlight and a pale strip of blue sky before it was obscured again by a dark bank of cloud.
He had not attended his mother’s funeral. Sometime, somewhere — probably when she was admitted to hospital, he did not know — she had given his name as next of kin, to be contacted in the event of her death. One day he had received a phone call that he still heard occasionally, as if from afar, from beyond the rim of sky over the mountains, telling him that his mother Sigurveig was dead.
‘Why are you telling me?’ he had asked.
He had felt neither gladness nor sorrow, neither surprise nor anger. Just numbness, but then he had been numb for a long time.
The woman had wanted to discuss arrangements about the body and the undertaker, and something else he did not catch.
He took a slug from the bottle and looked up at the clouds, checking to see if they had parted again but he could see no sunlight. He knew the graveyard well, often coming here in search of respite. No one bothered him here.
As he sat there among the old graves he was filled with a strange sense of tranquillity, and so he remained, uncertain, as sometimes happened, which side of the grave he was really on.
He had almost forgotten why he had come when he noticed a policeman approaching. The name escaped him at first. Sigur-something.
Sigurdur.
29
Sigurdur Óli was standing reading the printout when the phone on his desk rang. He answered testily and could hear nothing but breathing at first, the faint snuffling sounds of rapid breathing.
‘Who’s that?’ he asked.
‘I need to see you,’ said a voice which he immediately identified as belonging to Andrés.
‘Is that Andrés?’
‘I … can you meet me now?’
‘Where are you?’
‘In a call box. I’m … I’ll be in the graveyard.’
‘Which graveyard?’
‘On Sudurgata.’
‘All right,’ said Sigurdur Óli. ‘Where are you now?’
‘… about two hours.’
‘OK. In two hours. In the graveyard. Whereabouts in the graveyard?’
There was no answer. Andrés had hung up.
Nearly two hours later Sigurdur Óli parked his car and entered the old Reykjavík cemetery from the western end. He had no idea where to find Andrés but decided to try going left first. He walked some way down the hill past tombs and headstones, along narrow footpaths that wound between grey slabs, and had almost reached Sudurgata, the road at the bottom, when he caught sight of Andrés sitting on a low, mossy wall that had long ago been erected around a double tomb. Andrés watched as Sigurdur Óli approached. His hands, glimpsed beneath the long sleeves of his jacket, were black with dirt; he wore a woollen hat on his head and looked as dishevelled as he had when he last spoke to Sigurdur Óli behind the police station.
Andrés made to stand up but abandoned the idea. The stench he gave off was beyond belief; a reek of excrement combined with alcohol and urine. Apparently he had not changed his clothes for weeks.
‘You came then?’ he said.
‘I’ve been looking for you,’ Sigurdur Óli replied.
‘Well, here I am.’
He had a plastic bag from the state off-licence that looked to Sigurdur Óli as if it contained two bottles. He sat down on the wall beside Andrés, watching him take one bottle out of the bag, loosen the cork and swig from the neck. Noticing that he had almost finished it, Sigurdur Óli reflected that there was probably more to be gained from him drunk than sober.
‘What’s going on, Andrés?’ he asked. ‘Why do you keep contacting me? What do you want from us?’
Andrés looked around him, his eyes straying from one gravestone to the next, then took another gulp of alcohol.
‘And what are you doing here in the graveyard? I’ve been asking after you at your block of flats.’
‘There’s no peace anywhere. Except here.’
‘Yes, it’s a quiet spot,’ said Sigurdur Óli, remembering how the body of a young girl had once been found on the grave of Jón Sigurdsson, Iceland’s national hero. Bergthóra had been a witness on the case, which was how they had met. The occasional car drove past along Sudurgata and on the other side of the wall the pleasant houses of Kirkjugardsstígur slumbered in the quiet afternoon.