‘I doubt many people wear woolly socks at the gym,’ said Thóra. ‘And what kind of exercise do you call that?’
‘God only knows,’ said Bragi. ‘From what I know, all sorts of things go on at those places. I have a divorce case that all started at a fitness centre. The husband became obsessed with his body and completely forgot about his wife and children. It wouldn’t surprise me if this loser put up with that treatment in the hope of increasing his muscle quantity.’
‘Muscle mass,’ corrected Thóra, without thinking.
‘That’s what I mean,’ said Bragi. He looked Thóra in the eye. ‘I’m getting mixed up with all these digressions. The main point of all this is that for us it opens a door to the banks. Up until now they’ve had their own lawyers, or looked to the big firms. This could be the start of some excellent business opportunities for us. Not to mention the changes that you’re longing for so much.’
Thóra nodded thoughtfully. Naturally, this could be of advantage to the firm and the bank could possibly become a great source of income for them in the future, but she thought it more probable that the bank had simply opted out of the Greenland trip and that this would be a one-off. When it came to other cases that could be handled at a normal pace, there would be no reason for the bank to seek their assistance. On the other hand, clouds had been gathering over the nation’s economy, and even though Thóra didn’t follow the financial sector that closely she hadn’t missed hearing about the attacks of foreign hedge funds on the Icelandic króna and the dubious position of various large Icelandic enterprises. Concepts no one had understood, much less used, a month ago were now on everyone’s lips, most noticeably terms like ‘short selling’ and ‘cross-ownership’. Thóra suspected that her eight-year-old daughter could explain these concepts now. This trend also suggested strongly that more hardship lay ahead, which often meant increased work for lawyers, particularly in debt collection. No matter how dismal she found collecting, it was more than likely that they would happily accept such cases if the economy froze. Chances were that this video was just some nonsense from the Internet, completely irrelevant to the employees of Berg Technology. ‘I’ll think about it,’ said Thóra. ‘It’s best if I look into this a little further, and if this video turns out to be showing what we both think it might, then this is definitely out of my sphere. We’d need to call the police.’
‘The Greenlandic police?’ said Bragi. ‘You might as well ask your neighbourhood sports’ association to undertake research on fundraising.’
‘What do you mean?’ Thóra exclaimed. ‘Is something wrong with them?’ She interrupted herself. ‘And anyway, what would you know about the police, or anything else in Greenland? You’ve never even been there.’
‘No, maybe not, but everyone knows the situation there is absolutely dreadful. The police aren’t immune to it, no more than anyone.’
‘Dreadful’ was a word Thóra’s mother used frequently when she was fretting over something, and Thóra couldn’t help but smile. ‘In any case the police here in Iceland need to be informed about this. Then they can put themselves in touch with their colleagues over in that dreadful Greenland.’
Suddenly Bragi’s eyes widened. ‘Listen,’ he said heartily, ‘you should take Bella with you! She’ll look after you, and besides, she’s completely expendable for that short amount of time. There are a lot of different traditions and customs in Greenland and I’m sure it will be good to have her along under those circumstances.’
Bella was more likely to trip Thóra up straight into the jaws of a polar bear than come to her rescue. ‘Matthew will be there, so I’m sure I’ll be safe. I don’t need her,’ said Thóra, grinning. Then she hurriedly added: ‘If in fact I go.’
‘Yes, my dear, you should go, and it won’t do you any harm to take Bella along,’ said Bragi, clearly enthralled with his own idea. ‘It would even help me out if she weren’t here for the next few days, since I have to take care of so many cases. It would be a great relief to be free of her.’
‘There’s no room for Bella on the plane,’ Thóra lied. ‘Just do what you were thinking the other day, and put up a partition so you don’t have to see or hear her.’ She stood up. ‘I’m going to go and talk to the head of the bank about this,’ she said, to put an end to the conversation about Bella. ‘I’ll make my final decision afterwards.’
‘And?’ asked Matthew curiously as he followed her out of the bank. ‘What are you going to do?’
‘I’m inclined to take the job. But still… oh, I don’t know,’ replied Thóra. The head of the bank had turned out to have several years, if not decades, to go before he could live up to his job title. He was in fact a slender young man who smelled so strongly of aftershave that it had taken all Thóra’s willpower not to pinch her nose shut as they spoke. She suspected the overapplication was deliberate; his palms were sweaty and he appeared nervous. It was easy to read between the lines and guess that his future at the bank hung on the same thread as the insurance. If the bank had to pay the insurance, he would be handed his marching orders. It seemed there was much more to this case than just the insurance money; there were great expectations for the mine in Greenland, even though there hadn’t been much public discussion about it. It was hoped that it would be serviced from Iceland, since the closest town with an airport was Ísafjörður. This could lead to more jobs that would both directly and indirectly serve the mine, but these teething troubles had not inspired the locals to put their trust in this big company. It could also be the case that political interests were threatening the young man’s position. However, he wasn’t all bad; Thóra was quite pleased with much of what she heard, especially the fact that he had informed the police about the situation and requested that they do what they could to persuade the Greenlandic authorities to intervene. The bank’s interests were not high on the police department’s list of priorities. The idea behind the group’s expedition was to survey the situation and try as hard as possible to minimize the damage if everything had gone completely awry, so that Berg Technology would be released from its contract. The equipment and tools belonging to the contractors needed to be inspected and the status of the research evaluated so that the bank could either get another contractor to take over, or persuade the employees to return to the site. According to the young man this was not out of the question; the group had been gripped by mass hysteria but, more often than not, these things passed when common sense returned. If, on the other hand, there really was something unusual about the situation at the site, information pertaining to it would have to be gathered. This would help the bank to demonstrate that conditions were extraordinary and therefore outside the company’s controclass="underline" in short, they could invoke force majeure.
This term kindled Thóra’s interest in the case. Force majeure meant that the parties to the contract could be freed from their obligations if they were unable to fulfil them due to circumstances beyond their control. This included war, workers’ strikes and earthquakes, or anything else that the parties to the contract could not influence. Thóra was well aware that no war was being fought in Greenland, and nor had she heard of any natural disasters or strikes there, either recently or in the past. This was what pricked her curiosity: there was a definite challenge involved in evaluating a situation in search of what could be considered uncontrollable. Crimes could be categorized under force majeure, and considering the video it was possible that might be the case here; however, that was not at all a given, making this an even more exciting legal issue. And there were other factors involved: whoever did not fulfil his obligations had to demonstrate that he had tried everything within his power to minimize the impact of external factors. In this case, determining such a thing could prove to be more challenging than pinpointing the actual phenomenon that had prevented the party from fulfilling its contract. Was this not precisely what she had craved so much – that very morning, in fact? A challenging case that wouldn’t make her yearn to throw her pen at her client’s head in fury?