The door had not been forced, although scratches indicated that the lock had been picked, and it was clear enough from the bloodstains on the tape and the splintered remnants of the wooden chair that matched three remaining chairs in the kitchen upstairs that someone had been tied to it.
‘So who the hell are you and why were you there?’ Gunna muttered to herself, rattling her fingernails on the table.
The smashed chair indicated that the victim had broken it to escape, in which case, whoever it was had been left alone long enough to break the chair, bite through the tape and escape. Examination of the grey duct tape used to bind the victim to the chair had yielded some threads of a dark green material, and this had also been found on a corner of the shelves, as if the victim had snagged some clothing on it.
‘Interesting,’ Gunna decided. ‘But when? ‘When did this happen? How long ago?’ She picked up the phone and started dialling when the door swung open and a paper cup of coffee appeared, followed by Eiríkur, a folder of notes under one arm.
‘Hæ,’ Eiríkur said, dropping into his chair. ‘I had no idea that we lead such exciting lives.’
‘Oh, yes,’ Gunna agreed, her eyes skimming the rest of the report. ‘Non-stop thrills and spills at CID. That’s why you wanted to be a policeman, isn’t it?’
Eiríkur stretched and yawned. ‘Well, I certainly didn’t join up to be lectured on police procedure by an old boy who seems to have spent his retirement reading thrillers and knows more about police work than I do.’
‘No joy here, I’m afraid. Whoever was tied up in that basement appears to have been born without fingers as there isn’t a print to be found anywhere. No luck with your elderly crime fan, then?’
‘Maybe.’ Eiríkur grinned. ‘You know the Aunt Bertha guy, described as medium height and otherwise completely unremarkable, but wearing a green fleece with a yellow logo on it?’
‘Go on.’
‘Old Geir Einarsson has logged the appearance of a man in his late twenties or early thirties on ten occasions walking along Kópavogsbakki wearing a green fleece with a yellow logo on the front and two yellow stripes down one arm.’
‘That means there’s a possibility our mysterious victim could be whoever robbed the old lady’s house. Sævaldur’s phantom housebreaker, maybe?’
‘How do you figure that out?’
Gunna tapped the side of her nose and scrolled back through the report. ‘Traces of Polyethylene tera. .’ She stumbled. ‘Polyethylene teraphthalate found on the gaffer tape in the basement of Kópavogsbakki fifty, and also on a sharp edge of the shelves. That’s the stuff that fleece jackets and whatnot are made from. Colour: dark green.’
‘Wonderful. Will you tell Sævaldur or shall I?’
‘You know he’ll be furious if he doesn’t figure this one out for himself.’
‘I know. I can’t wait.’
‘I don’t suppose your elderly armchair sleuth saw what the logo was?’
‘Nope, sadly not. Too far away,’ Eiríkur said. ‘But he seems to have walked the same route, mostly in the afternoons, and he was seen at various times from soon after midday to just before dark.’
‘There you go, then. You’d better get back to Aunt Bertha and see if you can jog that woman’s memory, or find out what CCTV there is around there that he might have walked past. If you can figure out the logo, you might have him.’
‘She did give me the time, so I’ll see what I can find.’
‘Good man. Now get on with it before Sævaldur comes back and you have to tell him what you’ve found out,’ she said, reaching for her desk phone as it rang.
Orri saw Lísa’s car parked outside and muttered a curse that she had managed to park it across two spaces. He switched off the engine and sat in silence for a while, listening to the car ticking as he gathered his thoughts. He had been surprised at how nervous he had been sticking whatever it was to that car downtown that morning, scared of being noticed and questioned. Orri felt that under normal circumstances his nerves were strong, but being unable to choose the time and place was uncomfortable, and not being able do his usual research troubled him, removing the illusion of control.
Eventually he sighed, pulled the keys from the ignition with a click and made his way inside, his heavy work boots in one hand and his high-viz vest over his arm.
In the lobby he rattled his postbox and was surprised to see there was a bulky padded envelope there with no stamp, just his name on it in typed capitals. Puzzled, he ripped it open and found inside a folded wad of notes circled with a rubber band. Looking around quickly to see if he was being watched, Orri counted the notes and decided as he did so that the hour’s detour that morning had maybe been worthwhile after all. The wad of 5,000 krónur notes was equivalent to a good week’s wages.
He was on his way up the stairs with a spring in his step that had been lacking all day when his phone buzzed and he read the message as he pushed open the door of his flat and walked into the smell of something heavy on the spices.
Orri stopped dead, leaving the door half open.
Good evening, Orri Björnsson. You did well today. We have another task for you. Instructions for the job and on where to collect the equipment will be in your mailbox before morning. Reply with a blank message to acknowledge.
In a daze, and with the feeling deep inside that he was doing the wrong thing, Orri thumbed the reply button and sent a blank message back with the door of his apartment still open.
‘Hæ. Who was that?’ Lísa asked. ‘Anything important?’
Orri dropped his boots and his fluorescent jacket by the door, and shook his fleece from his shoulders.
‘Nah. Work stuff. What’s cooking?’
Chapter Eight
Bára sat in a café a few minutes’ walk from the Harbourside Hotel and waited for Gunna.
‘Working you hard are they?’
Bára’s smile was thin. ‘I’ll have them house-trained in a few days, I hope.’
‘So what are you doing here?’
‘Checking security. Back entrances and fire doors, that sort of thing,’ she said. ‘And getting a break from madam upstairs.’
‘How are they getting on?’
‘He’s all right. He’s in bed by eleven and working at his laptop by seven in the morning. She sleeps to midday and is up until three. He’s worried, Gunna,’ Bára said, looking around her. ‘It’s easy enough to tell. There are phone calls that are clearly not friendly ones and I’d love to have a really good look inside his laptop, but there’s no chance of that happening. He never leaves it open and I suspect there are a dozen passwords to go through to get to anything.’
Gunna looked over Bára’s shoulder at the morning activity unfolding. A ship was manoeuvring slowly in the still water of the harbour, assisted by a tug snapping at its heels to shove it into a berth. She shook her head irritably.
‘All right, are you?’ Bára asked with concern.
‘Yeah. I’m OK. Haven’t been sleeping well recently. Things have been awkward at home for a while.’
‘Are you and Steini not getting on?’
‘Steini’s lovely, as always,’ Gunna sighed. ‘He’s patient, always in a good mood and he cooks. So there’s nothing whatever to complain about. It’s my boy that’s causing me grief. You’re out of the loop if you haven’t heard.’
Bára looked blank. ‘In that case I’m out of the loop.’
Gunna took a deep breath. ‘Last year Gísli and his girlfriend-’