Dry weeks followed by a break in the weather had left the Icelandic air sparkling with clarity. The greens of fields and the brown and grey tones of the rocks and hillsides glittered with a new life. Hårde was even enjoying the drive through the jagged lava fields in the smooth Mercedes. It wasn’t his ideal choice of car, but he had to admit it was comfortable. He sped through enough puddles to plaster the number plates with a respectable layer of mud.
He approached following Horst’s instructions, leaving the main road along a wide but barely visible track that looked at first glance like little more than a flattened area of ground where the black lava had been pounded down.
The track widened and swung away from the main road down towards the coast where a long swathe of rock had been cleared, shovelled aside and flattened to make way for the long sheds of the factory squatting by the sea. Hårde frowned as an indefinable yet powerful aroma drifted even through the car’s closed windows.
Passing by the long building where there was no indication of any activity, nor any cars parked by the door at the end marked Office, he found a quiet spot between some containers and an expanse of ground strewn with the detritus of industrial fishing. Pumps, nets packaged into huge bales, coils of rusting wire and assortments of anonymous stainless steel equipment lay stacked on pallets against the day that something might possibly come in useful.
Hårde left the key in the car, reasoning that there was no need to put the unfortunate owner’s heirs to any additional inconvenience. Briefly he toyed with setting fire to it, figuring that it would cover his tracks more efficiently. He immediately dismissed the idea as impractical — a fire would attract attention and he admitted to himself that he just liked the idea of a bonfire.
He checked quickly that he had everything, shut the car door and walked past the buildings on the seaward side where a long quayside was deserted apart from a small freighter moored at the far end. A generator rattled and the belching mouthfuls of oily black smoke from the funnel told him that the main engine was being started up.
The ship was low in the water. Hårde swung his holdall on to his back and took the gangplank in a few long strides before looking about to see where any of the crew could be found. He heard a door slam above him and a bearded face under a peaked cap appeared at the bridge wing.
‘Gunnar?’ the man demanded fiercely.
‘That’s me.’
‘Good. Come up. Go through the door there and shut it behind you.’
The ship’s bridge was deceptively small. A single chair occupied the centre overlooking the radar screens, and there was a stool near one of the windows for a lookout.
‘I’m Terje,’ the man in the peaked cap said, shaking Hårde’s hand firmly. ‘You’re our new second engineer for this trip?’
‘That’s right. Where are we bound, and what are you carrying?’
‘Fishmeal, going to Rotterdam, calling at Stornoway. Or so I’m told.’ He smiled. ‘Been to sea before?’
‘Yup, but it was a long time ago.’
‘In that case I take it you know your way around an engine room, so you’d better go below and sort yourself out. There’re only four of us on board. Follow the smell of food and you’ll find the galley. Trude’s the cook. Tell her I sent you and she’ll show you a cabin. But keep your hands off her. She’s married to the mate and we want to keep this a happy ship.’
Terje’s eyes twinkled with suppressed curiosity. ‘I’m not asking any questions,’ he added. ‘And if anyone asks, you’re the new grease monkey and I know nothing about you. OK?’
Hårde grinned. The shipboard smells of salt, paint and the lingering aroma of burnt lube oil were already bringing his navy days back to him.
‘Absolutely fine by me, Terje. When are we sailing?’
‘As soon as the engineer tells me everything’s warmed up and ready to go. So you’d better be ready to chuck off the ropes in ten minutes. If that’s all right with you?’
The question was asked in a reserved tone, as if Terje were not entirely sure whether to treat Hårde as a passenger or one of the crew.
The door at the back of the bridge opened and banged back against the bulkhead. A dark man in an overall that had once been white appeared.
‘OK?’ Terje asked.
The man just grunted and left the way he had come.
‘That’s Kalle, our chief engineer. Actually, our only engineer. On deck in half an hour. Trude’ll get you some wet weather gear as well. We’ve already eaten, but I expect she’ll find you a bite once we’ve sailed,’ Terje said with finality, indicating that Hårde’s induction into the crew was over as far as he was concerned.
Apart from the buzz of conversation and ringing phones elsewhere in the building that permeated the thin plasterboard walls, the incident room was quiet. Snorri and Bára were at their computer terminals, trying not to disturb Gunna, who growled down every attempt at conversation. The evening before they and officers from the Reykjavík force had been to every hotel in and around Reykjavík and come away with nothing.
‘Come on then. Is there anything?’ she demanded, finally breaking her own silence as the other two almost sighed with relief.
‘Nothing, chief,’ Snorri admitted. ‘No sightings that can’t be accounted for.’
‘It seems the bloody man’s disappeared,’ Gunna grumbled. Her head was aching and she was certain she had the makings of a cold coming on. She wondered idly if Gísli and his girlfriend were still at the house in Hvalvík. This one seems a bit more serious than the others, she thought. Seems a pleasant enough girl, but a redhead? That means temper.
‘Any news?’
‘What?’ She spun her chair around to find Vilhjálmur standing by the door that he had opened silently. ‘Sorry, Vilhjálmur. Didn’t hear you come in.’
‘Just wondering if you have any news?’ he asked softly. ‘The Minister has asked to be kept informed.’
‘No, I’m afraid everything’s gone cold. The truck we’re sure our boy disappeared in has vanished. We haven’t had a sighting anywhere that can’t be explained in two minutes and frankly we have nothing to go on.’
‘That’s unfortunate.’ He cleared his throat softly.
‘Excuse me, sir,’ Snorri said, stepping up to where Vilhjálmur was standing in front of the large whiteboard on the wall. He set to work with a marker, reading information off a sheet of paper in his hand and filling in the gaps.
‘What do you have there?’
‘Shipping movements,’ Snorri replied without stopping.
‘Very good.’
‘That’s about all we have to go on,’ Gunna explained. ‘What is there, Snorri?’
‘There’s Starlight, a freighter sailing from Grundartangi at midnight,’ he read out, still writing. ‘There’s Beinta, a Faroese trawler leaving Hafnarfjördur at ten tonight and a couple of Russian trawlers, also in Hafnarfjördur, which haven’t decided when to leave yet,’ Snorri read off the screen. ‘Then there’s a freighter called Juno Provider docked at Skarfanes last night, no information on when they’re leaving, and a yacht that called at Hvalvík this morning and is still there. There’s a reefer called Wilhelmina due in Grindavík at six tomorrow morning, due out at six in the evening, and there are three cruise liners calling at and sailing from Reykjavík in the next forty-eight hours, the last ones of the year, I reckon. Want me to look any further afield?’
‘All foreign shipping?’ Vilhjálmur asked.
‘There isn’t any Icelandic shipping any more,’ Gunna said, yawning. ‘It’s all flagged out these days. Snorri, how about flights?’