‘An apartment number? Weren’t the residents’ apartments numbered 01, 02 and so on?’
‘Yes, actually they were.’ Thóra exhaled. ‘If I remember correctly, 02 was the number of Natan’s apartment, but there was no hose there to my knowledge, long or short. Maybe the girl who’s still alive might know what it means.’
‘Isn’t that a good enough reason for you to find her? Maybe this text isn’t a threat at all, but a suggestion. She’s the only one still alive who knows what it was like to live there. Maybe she was even involved in the case.’
‘She’s paralysed and she can’t speak. I don’t know how she could possibly have been involved.’ Thóra shut her laptop. ‘But I obviously do need to meet her. First I’ve got to find out who she is, and where she is.’
‘That shouldn’t be hard.’ Matthew smiled. ‘As far as I can see, your real problem will be how to question her.’
Thóra closed her eyes. ‘Fantastic – this case just gets better and better.’
CHAPTER 19
Thursday, 14 January 2010
The Secure Psychiatric Unit at Sogn had obviously not changed since Thóra had been there last; abandoned wheelbarrows still stood in the driveway and the same wooden boxes were stacked against the wall, a few work gloves on top. It looked as though the place had lain dormant since the doors had shut behind her several days ago and had come back to life just a few minutes before she rang the bell again; everyone appeared to be dressed in the same clothes and as far as she could tell the same outdoor shoes were still lined up in the foyer. ‘It’s really cold out,’ Thóra remarked, handing her coat to the woman in reception. She couldn’t think of anything else to say and she could hardly ask the woman whether she’d been waiting for her there since last time, even if that was how it appeared.
‘Is it?’ The woman draped the garment over her arm. ‘Are you here to see Jósteinn? He was expecting a lawyer.’
‘Yes, that’s me.’ Thóra glanced down at her shoes, which were wet from the slush in the car park, and looked around for a mat to wipe them on. ‘I received a phone call from here this morning, saying he wanted to see me. That’s all I know about it.’ Although Thóra would have preferred to excuse herself from this meeting, pleading an enormous workload, that wasn’t really on; the man was footing the bill for the investigation into Jakob’s case, which meant that he had to be shown the minimum of courtesy.
‘Please have a seat in the waiting room and I’ll go and fetch him; do you remember the way?’ Thóra nodded and stopped trying to clean off the bottoms of her shoes, since it was a hopeless task. Instead she made a show of taking them off, while the woman said, ‘Hopefully we can get him to tear himself away from his workshop, since you’ve come specially.’
‘Is he in there a lot?’ Thóra had to pretend to take an interest in the man’s daily labours, and in fact she was happy to make conversation with the woman, since it meant delaying the meeting. She wasn’t exactly afraid of Jósteinn, but she wasn’t looking forward to seeing him.
‘Yes, he seems to feel at home around those broken computers; he achieves incredible results, in fact. We’ve lost count of the number of machines he’s managed to cobble together from other broken-down ones. They’ve been given new lives in developing countries.’
‘Do you think he gets something out of it, doing good deeds?’ Perhaps Thóra needed to revise her opinion of Jósteinn. He seemed genuinely concerned about Jakob, and now this. Maybe there was a good soul somewhere deep inside that broken and damaged man.
The woman smiled pityingly. ‘No, I wouldn’t say that. He couldn’t care less about those poor people in the Third World. He just likes the computers themselves; he says they’re perfect, that it’s impossible for them to make mistakes on their own. He enjoys giving them new life. He once told me that the great thing about computers was that they didn’t have eyes or brains, which meant they couldn’t tell how ugly he was, both outside and in. He’s a very sick man, and the computers seem to bring him some kind of satisfaction, which he needs. As do we all.’
Thóra didn’t know what more she could say, so she just nodded. She found her own way to the waiting room and when she opened the door to it she had the same feeling that she’d had when she walked into the building; the embroidered pillows appeared not to have moved a millimetre, and the puzzle on the dining room table looked equally untouched. Even the two puzzle pieces lying next to one of the table legs were still there, waiting to either end up in the vacuum cleaner or be spotted and picked up by someone eagle-eyed. Thóra considered gathering them up from the carpet herself, but decided not to. She wasn’t going to be anything other than a spectator in this place; she wouldn’t change anything. She didn’t understand why she felt like this, but she didn’t want to leave any trace on this sad little outpost of humanity, no matter how small.
Thóra turned her gaze to the window and looked at the empty, lonely greenhouse in the garden. The glass sparkled, but inside stood the empty spring pots, along with a bent watering can that may or may not have been full of water. Jakob was nowhere to be seen.
When Jósteinn appeared, accompanied by the woman from reception, Thóra felt her fists clench and she had an overwhelming desire to move all the way to the other end of the sofa. There was something about this small, skinny man that disgusted her. It didn’t just come from what she knew he’d done to others; his thin hair was greasy and his scalp showed through the comb tracks; even his glasses were so dirty that it was hard to believe he could actually see through the grime. He made a failed attempt to smile and Thóra nodded in return. She couldn’t bring herself to extend her hand, but it didn’t seem to bother him.
‘Can I just leave you two alone? I’ll be nearby if you need something.’ The woman from reception looked Thóra in the eye as she said this, and as before the subtext of her statement was clear.
‘Yes, that’s fine.’ Thóra affected a breezy tone, as if this was no problem at all. ‘We shouldn’t be long. Isn’t that right, Jósteinn?’
‘Yes.’ Jósteinn sat down in the chair opposite Thóra. He gazed in silence at his lap until the woman had disappeared. ‘How’s it going?’
‘Do you mean Jakob’s case?’ Thóra caught herself staring at the closed door.
‘Yes. Have you solved it?’ Jósteinn’s voice was hushed, as if he preferred not to be heard.
‘No, I can’t say I have, but it is progressing.’ Thóra shifted on the sofa, which was too soft and too low. ‘Why did you want to meet me? Just to find out how I was getting on?’
‘Yes. Exactly.’
‘Don’t you think it’s a bit unnecessary for me to come all this way to Sogn to tell you the little that I have to report? You could just as easily have called.’
Without looking up, Jósteinn smiled. His bottom lip split, leaving a bloody streak in the middle. He seemed neither to notice nor to be bothered by the pain that this must have caused him. Thóra couldn’t take her eyes off his thin-lipped mouth and his stained teeth, which, despite their colour, were straight and beautifully even. His smile disappeared as suddenly as it had appeared and a little drop of blood ran slowly down his chin. ‘I can’t call. I don’t have access to a telephone here, as you know.’
‘Surely you can speak on the phone if you ask the staff to call for you, and if the call is supervised.’
He shrugged. ‘I’ve never tried it. Haven’t ever needed to call anyone before.’