‘I’m not a complete slob, you know, Mum. I do like to go to smart places occasionally. I came here with Soffía once or twice,’ he said wistfully.
‘How is she?’ Gunna asked.
‘Soffía’s fine. For a skinny little thing she’s as tough as old boots.’
‘It’s something that hadn’t escaped my notice,’ Gunna said as the waitress returned with steaming dishes. Pasta with chicken for Gísli, grilled fish for her. ‘Looks good,’ she said as the girl vanished silently into the background.
They were silent for a few minutes as each made inroads on lunch. The restaurant was quiet, with only a few lunchtime customers holding quiet conversations over their meals beneath subtle lights and sprays of dried flowers on the walls between dark abstract oil paintings. The quiet suited her. Conversation at the table had never been encouraged when Gunna had been growing up in a large family where food had to be eaten before it disappeared into two hungry big brothers, and the same custom had been unconsciously carried on in her own household.
‘The pasta’s a bit overdone,’ Gísli said eventually and Gunna stared at him.
‘Overdone? You can overcook pasta?’
‘Sure, mum. Haven’t you seen Steini timing it every time he does pasta?’
‘I suppose so. I hadn’t noticed that.’
‘It should be al dente, so it still has a little texture to it, not boiled to death like. .’
‘Like I do?’
‘I wasn’t going to say that. I meant like a ship’s cook does it.’
‘In that case you can be forgiven.’
Gísli cleared his plate first and fidgeted again while Gunna finished her plaice.
‘Not bad,’ she said, downing her knife and fork. ‘Gísli, what’s bugging you? I know there has to be plenty, but what in particular? Soffía? Drífa? Any decisions? I know I’m only your old mum, so I’m the last one to get any information, but it would be nice to know what’s going on.’
‘I know Soffía would be your choice, wouldn’t she?’
‘I like the girl a lot. There’s bone in that nose.’
‘And Drífa?’
Gunna took a deep breath. ‘She’s lovely, but she’s a child.’
‘She’s growing up fast. I think she needs me more than Soffía does.’
‘You don’t have to tell me. I see more of her than you do.’ The words slipped out and Gísli flushed. ‘I’m sorry, Gísli. I didn’t mean it like that. You have to make your own choices and decisions.’
‘Like you did, you mean?’
Gunna frowned her eyebrows into a dark bar. ‘In what way?’
‘Like when you and my dad. .’
She sat back and looked him in the eye. ‘Your father was a mistake on my part.’
‘So I was a mistake?’
‘I didn’t say that.’
The waitress sensed the tension as she collected their plates. ‘Would you like to see a dessert menu?’ she asked shyly.
Gísli shook his head. ‘Just a coffee for me.’
‘I would, thanks,’ Gunna decided. ‘As I’m being treated.’
‘Sorry, Mum. I didn’t mean to snap at you,’ Gísli mumbled. He reached across the table and placed a hand on hers.
Gunna wanted to snatch her hand away but resisted the temptation.
‘Listen. Your father was five minutes of madness. I should have known better, but I wasn’t much older than your little sister is now. I was sixteen when you were born.’
‘You must have been. .?’ Gísli said and stopped, colouring.
‘You can work it out easily enough,’ Gunna said sharply. ‘A month or so short of my sixteenth birthday if you must know.’
‘You weren’t. . together at all?’
‘Are you joking? Your father was in the process of divorcing his first wife and the last thing he wanted was to be shackled to a wayward teenager. Why? You’ve seen him, haven’t you? What’s your impression?’ Gunna scanned the dessert menu the waitress handed her. ‘The fruit salad, please. And a coffee.’
‘Latte, expresso?’
‘Just ordinary coffee will do nicely.’
‘He’s a charming man,’ Gísli said. ‘In his own strange way.’
‘I wouldn’t say charming,’ Gunna said after a moment’s thought. ‘He’s a fascinating man, and when he was younger he was a remarkable character. But there’s a dark side to everyone and your father’s dark side is very close to the surface. So what did you make of him?’
‘Disappointed,’ Gísli mumbled.
‘Why’s that?’
‘Because he wasn’t interested, like I told you before.’
‘He must know when your birthday is but he never sent a present or a card, never tried to maintain any contact. But to his credit, I suppose, he never tried to claim you were nothing to do with him. You thought he’d have been waiting all these years for you to come and find him? Think again. He could have had access when you were a child but he didn’t want to know then. So why would he now? I’m afraid Thorvaldur Hauksson is a rather self-centred character.’
‘Have you seen him?’ Gísli asked.
Gunna let the fruit salad the waitress delivered sit untouched on the table in front of her as she wondered whether to tell Gísli the truth or not.
‘He left Vestureyri before you were a year old,’ she said finally. ‘It wasn’t exactly a healthy place for him to stay. He had an affair with a woman whose husband didn’t take kindly to it when he heard. So he left town and moved to Reykjavík, taking only what he could pack in the back of that old American gas guzzler he had at the time.’
‘That’s the last you saw of him?’
‘After I moved south to go to the police college I heard of him around town, but we didn’t run into each other, which was probably just as well. You were being looked after by your uncle Hafsteinn’s Anna Sigga at the time. They had three children of their own, so she said one more didn’t make much difference. It was very generous of Anna Sigga, I realize now.’
Gunna toyed with the fruit salad, but her appetite had deserted her, while Gísli sipped his coffee.
‘I saw him once,’ she said slowly. ‘You must have been about six or seven, I think. I was at the Hafnarfjördur station at the time. Two of the guys had been to a fight at a club and rounded up everyone who’d been involved, herded them into the back of a meat wagon and brought them down to the station to be charged.’
‘And my dad was one of them?’
‘He was the only one they had to handcuff,’ Gunna said sorrowfully. ‘It was a shock to see him sitting there having his details taken, sloppy drunk and with his hands behind his back. Someone had smacked him and given him a fat lip. He didn’t recognize me, I don’t think. At any rate, I didn’t say anything and just left the boys to it. I suppose he must have been turned out first thing the next morning because they were all gone when I came in for the next day’s shift.’ She forked up a slice of guava. ‘That was the last time I saw your father.’
‘You didn’t say anything?’
‘Not a word. I thought I’d leave the poor bastard a bit of dignity without having some young copper crowing over him,’ Gunna said and reached for her coffee. ‘So, how is he? He must be past fifty by now.’
‘Fifty-six,’ Gísli said. ‘He’s tired, I think. High blood pressure and he smokes like a chimney.’
‘Like a coal-fired sidewinder, as Steini would say,’ Gunna said and was relieved to see Gísli smile.
‘Something like that.’
‘You want some of this?’ she asked, pushing the fruit salad over to him and watched him spoon up what was left.
Outside the restaurant Gísli hugged her. ‘Thanks, Mum.’
‘For what?
‘You know,’ he mumbled. ‘Nothing. You’re going back to work?’
‘Oh, yes. I have to go and make some decisions before Ívar Laxdal makes them for me.’
‘Well, you’ve a track record of making tough decisions, I suppose. I’ll see you tomorrow.’
Gísli walked down the street and Gunna affectionately watched his broad back as he made his way downhill, car keys hanging from one finger, until he was no longer in sight. When he had gone, she shook herself, recalling their conversation and setting off towards the Hverfisgata station where Orri Björnsson was waiting in a cell for the hour-long ride in a police van to the prison at Litla Hraun.