‘Bloody hell, no. I don’t know how you manage with all those yokels. Right, this should be it,’ he said, hammering on the door.
There was silence. Sævaldur hammered again.
‘Gústi! Open the bloody door, will you? It’s the law!’
An eye appeared at the peephole and after a moment the door inched open to reveal a stubbled face, puffy with sleep.
‘What do the coppers want with me?’ he growled.
‘So you do remember us? How nice. Open up, we need to talk.’
‘Got a warrant?’
‘Don’t talk crap. I said talk, not search.’
The little two-room flat was bare. A full-barrelled snore could be heard from the flat’s one bedroom. Sævaldur and Gunna took kitchen chairs while Gústi sat back on the sofa, flexing generous biceps and letting the towel he was wearing slip open, and leering at Gunna.
‘Who’s the bird, Sævaldur?’ he demanded. ‘I like big strong girls.’
Gunna ignored the question and held up Einar Eyjólfur’s picture. ‘Seen this guy?’
‘Dunno,’ Gústi replied without looking.
‘He’s dead.’
‘Poor bloke,’ Gústi said flatly.
‘He was in the Emperor on Monday evening, probably around or shortly after midnight.’
‘Shit, that was days ago. How should I know?’
Gunna pretended to consult her notes, looking down at the paperwork in front of her as Gústi spread his knees a little wider.
‘Ágúst Ásgeirsson,’ she muttered as if speaking to herself, and looked up sharply. ‘This could well be a murder investigation, and you’re one of the last people to see this person alive. I can see you’ve had convictions for assault in the past, according to your record. I’d like to be able to rule you out as a suspect, but with this in front of me, I could have doubts.’
Gunna was amused to see a brief look of fury in the man’s eyes, quickly replaced with irritation and finally with concern at the realization that not cooperating would do him little good.
‘Yeah, I seen him.’
‘When? On that night?’
‘Dunno. A few nights ago. Got into a ruck with some bloke in the bog. Must have trod on his toe or something.’
‘And what happened? Who was he arguing with?’
‘Don’t know. Don’t care,’ the surly mountain of a man replied, clearly not used to being overawed by the police. Gunna eyed him frostily, and scribbled notes in silence for long enough for Gústi to start fidgeting with the errant towel.
‘Tell me more.’
To Gunna’s relief, Gústi closed his knees and sat up as his confidence ebbed away.
‘I heard a racket from the Gents and went to check it out. Happens all the time, two drunks having an argument, and one of them was him,’ he said, suddenly cooperative and pointing at the dead man’s photo. ‘That’s all. Told ’em to pack it in or get out. End of story,’ he added lamely.
‘And the other man?’
‘Dunno. Big bloke. Foreign. That’s all.’
‘Time?’
‘Dunno. Early. One-ish.’
‘And what happened?’
‘Dunno. Wasn’t any more trouble, so they must have packed it in or fucked off out.’
‘As for this foreign bloke. Description?’
‘Tall. My height. Hell, it was dark, y’know?’
‘Thank you,’ Gunna said smoothly, rising to her feet as Sævaldur hauled himself upright. ‘You’ve been a great help.’
‘That’s all right. Always happy to help police ladies,’ he replied with a grin, before shooting a scowl towards Sævaldur.
‘Don’t push it, Gústi. We can always do you for indecent exposure, just like last time. Remember?’ Gunna asked sweetly.
‘How do you know? That was years ago . . .’ he protested as Gunna stepped out of the flat without waiting for Sævaldur to follow.
6
Monday, 1 September
Gunna took advantage of Snorri and Haddi being out of the station to shove open the long lower panel of the office window and light a furtive Prince, in defiance of state policy on smoking throughout government buildings. Without feeling even slightly guilty, she leaned back in her chair and read through her interim report on Einar Eyjólfur Einarsson’s miserable death.
Nobody appeared to have seen Einar Eyjólfur, 178cm tall, short fair hair, dressed in a pair of jeans and a black shirt, leaving the Emperor sometime in the early hours of 26 August.
With no more evidence to work on and nothing to indicate violence, the case would probably be shelved indefinitely, an unsolved case to haunt her on sleepless nights. Gústi the Gob was not a realistic suspect and the news that Sævaldur had brought him in for questioning was disturbing. She hoped it was for no good reason other than for Sævaldur to vent his spleen on someone.
‘But why Hvalvík?’ Gunna muttered to herself.
‘Chief?’
A door banged and Gunna dropped the butt of her cigarette out of the window before closing it. ‘In here, Haddi.’
She decided to end her interim report and hit Save before standing up. There were other matters that needed to be attended to as well as Einar Eyjólfur Einarsson’s case.
‘All right?’ Haddi asked, sniffing the air accusingly.
‘Yup. Fine. I’m going to lunch if you’ll be so good as to man the barricades.’
Outside Hafnarkaffi, Gunna debated whether to have lunch there or go home for a sandwich. She weighed the idea of a hot meal, heavy on the potatoes and swimming in thick sauce in a noisy cafeteria, against tuna and tomato sandwiches washed down with fruit juice while skimming yesterday’s papers.
Hot and noisy won. Inside, she picked up a tray and filled it with a dish of cauliflower soup and a plate of fried fish and boiled potatoes. Looking around for a seat, she noticed an arm waving to her.
‘Gunna. Here.’
‘Hey. Stefán, when did you get in?’
‘Just now. The missus is at work, so I thought I’d drop in here and catch up on the news.’
A cousin of Gunna’s husband, Stefán Jónsson had gone out of his way to take her son Gísli under his wing after Raggi’s death. There had long been an unspoken bond between her and Stefán built on deep respect, but which had never become an outright friendship. Gísli had followed Stefán to sea on one of the trawlers owned by the village’s only large fishing company after Stefán had gone out of his way to put a word in on his behalf.
‘Good trip?’ Gunna asked, starting with the soup, contrary to local custom.
‘Not bad. A hundred and twenty tonnes. Blowing a bastard all the way home, though.’
‘Where were you?’
‘Deep off the west.’
‘So, will my Gísli be going there this year as well?’
‘No. It’s the Barents Sea for them. We took their quota as well as ours last year. This year they can have ours. I’m getting too old for these long trips.’
‘Get away, Stefán. There’re years left in a young man like you.’
Stefán impatiently drummed his fingers on the table.
‘What’s on your mind?’ Gunna asked, recognizing the symptoms, in particular the heavy grey eyebrows swooping down over a frown as he tried to understand something he hadn’t fully got to grips with.
‘I was coming to see you later today anyway. About this chap.’
‘Which chap?’
‘The one you found out there down at the dock.’
Gunna looked up from her meal. ‘And? What about him?’
‘I’m damned sure I saw him, or his car, or something.’
‘Tell me more,’ she said softly, knowing that there would be little need to ask many questions.
‘It was the night we sailed, Monday—Tuesday. I was up very early and went up the valley to have a look at my stables and had a drive round the dock too. You know, like you do.’