They stood on opposite sides of the road.
‘Don’t you remember me?’ Elínborg called out.
The girl stared at her.
‘I was just asking after you,’ said Elínborg, and stepped into the road.
The girl backed away, then strode on. Elínborg started to cross the road towards her but the girl broke into a run. Elínborg ran after her, calling out to her to stop, but she just ran even faster.
Elínborg, who was wearing flat shoes, did her best to keep up, but she was not as fit as the young woman and soon fell behind. Finally Elínborg slowed to her normal walking speed and watched her quarry disappear between two houses.
Elínborg turned around and walked back towards the guest house. This was incomprehensible. Why wouldn’t the girl speak to her now? She had wanted to help before. What was she running away from? And Elínborg was convinced that Lauga had known exactly who Elínborg had meant when she’d described her. There must be a reason why Lauga was unwilling to help. What were they concealing? Or was Elínborg being led astray by an over-active imagination? Perhaps the village itself was affecting her, dark and silent and isolated as it was.
She had her own keys to the front door of the guest house and to her room, so there was no need to disturb anyone there. She rang Teddi, who told her that all was quiet on the home front and asked, as usual, when she would be back. She told him she didn’t know. They said goodnight, and Elínborg settled down with a book about oriental cuisine and its connections with eastern philosophy.
She was dozing off over her book when she heard a quiet tap at the window. When the knocking was repeated more insistently, she jumped out of bed and went over to the window, cautiously pulled back the curtains, and peered out into the dark. Her room was on the ground floor at the rear of the building. Initially she could see nothing, but then she discerned someone standing out in the darkness. She was looking into the eyes of the girl in the blue parka.
The girl beckoned, then vanished into the night. Elínborg stepped away from the window, dressed hurriedly, and went out, closing the door quietly behind her so as not to disturb her hosts who were asleep on the upper floor. She could see very little. She walked around to the back of the house where her bedroom window was but saw no sign of the blue parka. She dared not call out. The girl’s behaviour seemed to indicate that she wanted to avoid being seen, at all costs. She was clearly nervous about having anything to do with Elínborg, the detective from the city.
Elínborg was about to abandon her search and return to her room when she noticed a movement on the road. The street lighting was sparse. She went closer and saw that the girl was waiting for her. Elínborg hurried towards her, only for her to take to her heels. The girl ran a short distance, then stopped again and looked back. Elínborg halted. She was not going to play chase a second time. The girl edged closer and Elínborg approached her, but the girl once again backed away and moved farther off. Finally Elínborg realised that she wanted her to follow, but at a discreet distance. She did as the girl wished, trailing her at a leisurely pace.
It was cold. A biting northerly wind cut sharply through her clothes, with ever-increasing force. The woman and the girl walked on with the wind in their faces. Elínborg grimaced and clutched her coat more tightly around her. They walked along by the sea, past the cluster of houses above the harbour which formed the centre of the village, and on northwards. Elínborg wondered how far they were going and where the girl was leading her.
They had moved away from the seashore now. Elínborg strode along the road which ran out of the village, past a large building which she assumed must be the community centre. A single light bulb was burning over the entrance. She heard the roar of a nearby river in the dark and then they crossed a bridge. She kept losing sight of the girl. It was a moonlit night. Elínborg was so cold that she started to shiver: the wind had risen still more and it was now blowing a gale.
All at once she spotted a ray of light on the road ahead. The girl had stopped at the side of the road and switched on a torch.
‘Is this really necessary?’ said Elínborg breathlessly. ‘Can’t you just say what you want to say? It’s the middle of the night, and I’m freezing.’
Without so much as looking at Elínborg, the girl hurried down off the road towards the sea. Elínborg followed. In the dark she reached a waist-high stone wall and followed it around to a gate, which the girl opened. It squeaked a little.
‘Where are we?’ asked Elínborg. ‘Where are you taking me?’
She soon found out. They followed a narrow path past a large tree. In the glow of the torch Elínborg made out concrete steps leading up to a building — she could not tell what it was. The girl turned to the right and up a shallow slope. In the torchlight Elínborg saw a white cross, and in the next flash of light a slab of cut stone that had subsided into the ground. She could see an inscription.
‘Is this a churchyard?’ whispered Elínborg.
The girl made no answer but walked on until she came to a simple white wooden cross. In the centre was a plaque with an inscription in small letters, and on the grave itself lay a bunch of fresh-looking flowers.
‘Whose grave is this?’ asked Elínborg, trying to decipher the inscription in the wavering beam of the torch.
‘It was her birthday the other day,’ the girl murmured.
Elínborg gazed at the grave marker. The torch went out. She heard footsteps fading into the distance, and realised that she had been left alone in the churchyard.
30
It took Elínborg a long time to get to sleep, and after a few hours’ rest she got up early. Overnight the wind had dropped, and a light snow was falling. She did not know whether she would see the girl again, nor why she had taken her down to the churchyard. Elínborg had managed to read the inscription on the grave marker: it was a woman’s name. She thought about the woman who lay in the grave, the flowers someone had recently placed there, the story buried in the earth, an enigma.
She stayed in her room all morning, making phone calls to Reykjavík and preparing herself for the day. It was early afternoon when she strolled down to the restaurant. Although the lunchtime rush was over, some customers still lingered. Lauga had someone helping her in the kitchen. Elínborg ordered bacon and egg and a coffee. She felt that the other diners were looking at her askance, as if she were an intruder, but she pretended not to notice. She took her time, lingered over her lunch, and had a second cup of coffee while she observed her surroundings.
Lauga took Elínborg’s empty plate, and wiped the table top. ‘When do you think you’ll be going back to the city?’ she asked.
‘That depends,’ said Elínborg. ‘The village does have certain things to offer, even though nothing ever happens here.’
‘No, I suppose not,’ said Lauga. ‘I hear you were out all night.’
‘Really?’
‘Rumour around the village,’ explained Lauga. ‘There are plenty of rumours here. You shouldn’t believe everything you’re told in a place like this. I hope you’re not going to put your faith in rumour.’
‘No, I have no intention of doing so,’ said Elínborg. ‘Is it likely to snow today, do you know?’ she asked, glancing out of the window. She did not like the look of the overcast sky.