Part 9 (1/2)

'AEi, Agnes, what's the matter with you tonight?' he snapped as his phone tinkled.

Agnes's face set like a rock and she sat bolt upright, straightening the cardigan that had begun to come adrift.

'There's nothing the matter with me,' she said harshly. 'I'm not the one who's grouchy and uptight. I'm not the one who's waiting for someone to call,' she spat and stood up. Joel Ingi heard her footsteps on the iron spiral staircase that led down to the flat from their cosy TV attic. Then the bathroom door slammed and he heard the sound of water running as his phone tinkled again. He scanned the message on the screen, frowned and sent a quick reply before sighing to himself and wondering how long it would be before Agnes deigned to speak to him again. Occasionally it was a relief to have her in a foul mood. At least that way Joel Ingi knew where he stood.

He could hear the m.u.f.fled roar of the shower running at full blast as he sprawled on the sofa, twisting his phone in his hands and wondering whether or not to call. He picked up the TV remote, flicked through a dozen channels and frowned at the lightweight satellite dross on offer everywhere, before scrolling through the list of numbers on his phone and selecting Hinrick. He pressed 'call', then immediately cancelled it, frowning to himself with one eye on the TV before deciding to call after all.

'Hae. It's me.'

'So I see.'

Joel Ingi could hear music in the background that practically drowned out the voice. 'Anything yet?' he asked.

'I told you yesterday,' Hinrik drawled, and from the self-satisfied sound of his voice, Joel Ingi imagined him lying on a leather sofa being administered to by gangster's molls of every description. 'I told you yesterday that my best guy is dealing with this. When there's something to tell, you'll be the first to hear it, my friend.'

'All right. Just wanted to be sure. After all . . .'

'After all, this is costing you a lot of money and you want results. That's what you were going to say, wasn't it?' Hinrik asked, his tone suddenly harsh.

'No. Not at all.' Joel Ingi said, fl.u.s.tered by the change of direction.

'That's all right then,' Hinrik said, softly this time. 'The job's being done. Now leave me alone to get on with it, will you?'

Joel Ingi found himself looking at his phone, the connection having been abruptly terminated. He tossed it onto the sofa and looked out of the small skylight that provided a view of city roofs, as long as you stood on tiptoe.

'I'm going to bed.' He turned and saw Agnes, her pale shoulders bare above the towel wrapped around her and her hair dripping as she looked into the TV attic from halfway up the stairs. 'You coming, or are you going to stay up there all night making secret phone calls?'

'Agnes, I'm just . . .' he fumbled, but she had already gone and this time the bedroom door slammed.

It had been too long, Baddo flexed his shoulders and surveyed the bar from a vantage point at one end that let him see the door and, more importantly, who came through it. The music throbbed and it irritated him, this poppy youngsters' music that was all computers and drum machines. There was no soul to it, no feeling. A bunch of sweaty guys with guitars in a smoky club, that's music, he thought, not this factory s.h.i.+t. But h.e.l.l, the place was busy enough and it was time for a man to iron out the creases after a long time away.

He sipped his beer, determined to make it last. The f.u.c.king price of it these days! Not that the price of beer alone had prompted him to leave the country when he did. Baddo reflected that it had been the right thing to do, even though it hadn't ended well. He could have stayed, he thought, faced them down, and all that unpleasantness would have been ancient history by now.

A couple of likely looking women were positioned here and there, one not too far away. Baddo returned to his thoughts, not that he made a habit of picking over the past, but seeing Maria again brought so much back.

He looked over at the woman nearest to him; she was a few feet away along the bar, trying to get the barman's attention. Decent figure, he reckoned, not too tall and no stick insect. Blonde a natural one as far as he could make out although maybe a little faded as middle age approached. Nicely dressed but not flashy. A few miles on the clock, but that doesn't have to be a bad thing. He sensed that she was about to look his way and averted his eyes, looking back in her direction just as she frowned in irritation as the barman again served someone else.

'Hey, Andri!' Baddo called in a tone that was gruff but carried in spite of the hum of noise. It was a voice that commanded attention and the barman looked up smartly at the hard-looking character he'd seen drinking with Hinrik a few times, a questioning look on his face.

'Lady here needs serving,' Baddo said sharply, and Andri was in front of her in a moment, his original customer angrily bewildered at being abandoned.

'Thanks for that. I feel I owe you a drink,' the woman said, appearing at his side ten minutes later, her group of friends at a table in the far corner forgotten.

Don't be too keen, he told himself. 'You're welcome. I don't like to see someone without a drink for too long.'

She smiled. Strong teeth, lines at the corners of her mouth, sharp blue eyes. She put out a hand. 'I'm Ebba. Pleased to meet you.'

'Baddo.'

'I'll get you that drink if you'll make sure the barman gets here.'

This time Baddo didn't even have to call. Andri was there as Baddo raised a finger. He was pleased to see her ask for two beers, as he had never held with fancy drinks for women. 'Cheers,' she said, clinking her gla.s.s against his and looking him in the eyes over its rim as she drank.

Sat.u.r.day Gunna had intended to make the most of a morning at home, but by the time she had washed and dried clothes and given the kitchen a birthday, she realized that there was precious little left of it.

'Laufey! Laufey Oddbjorg Ragnarsdottir! Rise and s.h.i.+ne, young lady,' she called in a thoroughly cheerful but convincing tone into the darkness of Laufey's bedroom, clicking the light on and off again.

'What? What time is it?' Laufey moaned.

'It's ten thirty on this delightful, cold, wet Sat.u.r.day morning, and as Steini's gone to Keflavik to drive a digger for the day and I have to go to work this afternoon, I took an executive decision that it's your turn to clean the bathroom.'

There was an incoherent moan from under the bedclothes and Gunna hoped that it signalled agreement with no further argument.

'I'm going to the shop,' she declared into the gloom. 'Be up by the time I get back, would you?'

The village of Hvalvik's only shop was spa.r.s.ely populated on a bl.u.s.tery morning and it was a windblown and red-cheeked Gunnhildur who returned home with two bags of shopping to find a black car parked diagonally across her drive.

Scowling to herself, she parked in the street instead, carried her bags through the widening puddles that had been ice the day before and let the front door bang as she let herself in.

'Laufey!'

'Yeah, Mum.' The reply didn't come from the bathroom, where she'd hoped her daughter would be toiling with a brush and mop.

'Is that one of your friends who doesn't know how to park a car straight?' Gunna demanded, dropping her boots by the door and carrying in three shopping bags, which she heaved onto the worktop before turning to see Laufey sitting at the kitchen table, patting the hand of a tearful young woman with a flood of ink-black hair straggling over the collar of her coat.

Gunna's face fell.

'Drifa? What brings you here? Are you all right, sweetheart?'

Pregnancy had not been kind to Drifa and when she stood up to hug Gunna, she could see the prominent bulge around the girl's midriff. It was only a few months since Gunna had last seen her brother's stepdaughter and the change was a shock. Her normally slim face with its lopsided smile had changed to a pale plumpness that looked distinctly out of place.

'I'm sorry, Gunna. I had to get away from Reykjavik for a few days. It's so lonely in the place I'm in and I wanted to get out of that miserable city for a while,' Drifa sniffed. 'I hope you don't mind?'

'Of course I don't mind. You're always welcome here,' Gunna said, shocked at the change in Drifa, not just in her spreading width but also in her transformation from a confident young woman to this tearful, lost child. 'Are you hungry, Drifa? Do you want something to eat? I'm going to work soon so I was going to have something anyway.'

'I don't want to put you to any trouble.'

'It's no trouble, sweetheart,' Gunna said. 'Laufey,' she added and needed to say no more as the girl opened the fridge and started piling food onto the table.

'I'm not sure I could eat anything,' Drifa said, b.u.t.tering a slice of bread and spreading it with cheese. 'I keep bringing everything up; I can't see why I'm getting so chubby when I'm hardly eating,' she wailed.

'It could be water retention, you know, Drifa. Once the baby's born . . .' she said and gulped. 'Once the baby's born you'll probably lose a lot of it straight away. That's what happened to me when Laufey was born.'

'Please, Mum. Not endless pregnancy stories,' Laufey said darkly. 'This isn't a sewing circle.'

In the end Drifa put away half a dozen slices of bread with cold meat, cheese or herring, an apple and a carton of juice, finally sitting back with more colour in her cheeks than there had been half an hour earlier.

'I'll have to leave you to it, I'm afraid, girls. I have to go to work,' Gunna said finally, after the table had been cleared and the usual family news had been exchanged. n.o.body had mentioned Gisli, and she hoped that it would stay that way for a while.

'On a Sat.u.r.day?' Drifa asked. 'Really?'