‘What do you mean?’ asked Thóra, startled. It was unlike Matthew to be so vague.
‘One of the employees of Berg Technology here in Iceland made repeated attempts to gain remote access to the system and seems to have got in, although attempts by others since then haven’t produced any result. So there was a computer connection for a time, even though it was patchy, but now it appears to have been lost for good. In any case, the man managed to look up the latest files and among them he found a particularly interesting one that was created after the rest of the group left the site. The man saved it and then sent it to others in the group, and it seems the e-mail is the main reason why the staff refuse to return.’
‘What did this file contain, then?’ asked Thóra.
‘Everything in it suggests that one of the men is alive, or at least that someone is still at the work site. It’s what caused the matter to be put on highest priority.’
‘What was in the file?’ insisted Thóra.
‘I’ll just send it to you. Some of it is actually impossible to put into words,’ he said. ‘Are you sure you want to see it? I’m warning you, the contents are not for the faint-hearted.’
Naturally Thóra had to see the file, and as quickly as possible. They said goodbye and hung up, and she waited impatiently for the e-mail and clicked on it immediately when it appeared. The attachment was a wmp. file, its name made up of an indecipherable sequence of numbers. The numbers could not refer to the date, and must have been made up by the video camera itself. Thóra right-clicked on the file and saw that it had been created four days ago, just before midnight on 13 March. She couldn’t determine whether this information had been added by the camera, or the computer onto which the file had been transferred. A wrongly set clock or different time zone could of course have confused this information. She shut the window and opened the attachment itself.
Chapter 2
The video was short but powerful. It took Thóra a few moments to figure out what was being filmed; the quality was poor and the image appeared in an impractically small window on the screen. When Thóra tried to enlarge it the image became grainy and even less distinguishable as a result. The sound was also of rather poor quality, characterized by a continual low buzz. It would have been little problem for the characters in an episode of CSI to clean it up, but since the legal firm had no research lab at its disposal Thóra had to make do with the unclear sound. That was unfortunate, because it was what could be heard through the buzzing that affected her most. The clip was shot indoors, but it was difficult to determine in what sort of building the camera’s operator was located, since his or her hands were extremely unsteady. Thóra caught a glimpse of a bookshelf and chair at the start of the clip, but then the camera was pointed almost immediately down towards the speckled linoleum. That was pretty much the perspective until the end of the clip. Apart from the linoleum, nothing else could be seen but two feet and legs up to the knees. The owner of the legs was lying or sitting on the floor, which in itself was peculiar. Whoever it was also appeared to be completely immobile, which made the scene even stranger. Thóra hadn’t seen anyone lying so still since her days of going out on the town when she was younger. Sometimes a guest or two at a late-night post-club party would be lying in the same position, but judging by the footwear this hadn’t been any sort of party. The feet were in thick, probably woollen, socks and open slippers that had never been and would never be in style; hardly appropriate for a social get-together. The person in the video sat or lay flat on the floor in jeans, his or her legs splayed in either direction. Thóra had the feeling that it was a man, without being able to explain why, since it was impossible to determine the size of the feet or shoes.
In the three minutes and twenty-two seconds that the video played, the legs jerked weirdly four times. Just before each time a whistling sound momentarily rose above the buzzing, ending with a muffled thud. Then the legs would jerk, and a dark liquid sprayed across the middle of the frame. Over the years Thóra had found herself forced to watch numerous horror films with her son Gylfi, which is probably why she imagined the worst possible scenario. To her it seemed as if a body were being dismembered, or someone was being killed with an axe or a heavy club. But it couldn’t be the latter, since there was no screaming or any other sound of anguish. There was only the whistling, a thump – and what sounded like the strange crooning of a child. Thóra could distinguish a melody, but could make nothing of the words. Either the child was babbling nonsense or its language was totally alien to her. She reached for her phone and rang Bragi’s extension. ‘Come here for a second,’ she said, squinting as she watched the video for the third time. ‘I need to get your opinion on something.’ She stopped the video and leaned back in her chair, thinking it over. It had clearly been a mistake to say that she would go along, even though she could always change her mind. She looked askance at the paperwork on her desk and glanced at the documents for the name-change case at the top of a thick stack of other papers. She looked back at the computer screen. Judging from the video, this Greenlandic case would certainly be different.
‘What’s going on?’ asked Bragi curiously as he appeared in the doorway. He was a large man with a teddy bear-ish manner who wore his age well. He was wearing a dark suit with a tie, since he was one of the generation of lawyers who thought it brought shame to the profession to dress in comfortable clothes. His orthodoxy, however, was not strong enough to prevent him from loosening the knot of his tie and leaving the top button of his shirt undone, which slightly diminished his respectability.
‘Take a look at this,’ said Thóra, pointing to the screen. ‘And tell me what you think is going on there.’ She started the video and pushed the desk chair aside to allow him to come closer for a better view. Bragi enjoyed anything strange, so this should be right up his alley. She waited until it was over and the peculiar chanting had stopped. ‘Well,’ she said, ‘let’s hear it.’
Bragi’s eyes flashed. ‘If this is related to a divorce, then I have dibs on the case, as the kids say.’ He fumbled for the mouse to replay the video. ‘This is great.’
Thóra interrupted him and told him the basics about Matthew’s offer and the origin of the video. She watched his smile fade as he realized this probably had nothing to do with a marriage at death’s door. ‘But what do you think this is?’ she asked.
‘Best case scenario, assault. Worst, murder,’ replied Bragi, making no attempt to hide his disappointment that this wasn’t a divorce case.
‘That’s what I thought,’ said Thóra, exhaling. ‘I don’t know, maybe I should pull out of this one. It’s more than a little bit strange, and much more serious than a loss of insurance money.’
‘Well, that depends on how high the insurance is,’ said Bragi. ‘There are tables showing individuals’ monetary worth, so if the poor fellow has been called from this life, we could certainly set the nominal value placed on loss of life against the amount of insurance lost, and measure which is considered more severe.’ He thought for a moment and then added: ‘We would certainly need additional information, like gender, age and education, to make more precise calculations.’
Thóra grimaced. ‘I know that,’ she said, irritated at Bragi’s bad taste. ‘I’m mainly wondering now whether it would be safe for me to make this trip. What if the video was shot at the camp?’
‘I wouldn’t read too much into it,’ said Bragi, patting her shoulder. ‘This could have been anything, and shot anywhere. Even at a fitness centre.’