A Place To Bury Strangers, page 7
‘But he must have been. There’s no other way he could have made it down to the road. There was no one else up there except for the shooter.’
The doctor looked from Ævar to Grímur and then back again.
‘Then the man who shot him must have carried him down off the hill,’ the doctor said.
‘No I don’t think so,’ said Ævar.
‘There is no other explanation. Unless he has a guardian angel who follows him around.’
‘There is always another explanation. We have the guy who shot him in custody and I’m telling you he did not carry Grímur down to the road after he shot him. The guy doesn’t have it in him. He would need to have a heart in order to do something like that.’
The doctor shrugged and started walking out of the ward. As he departed he called back over his shoulder.
‘I don’t care what you say, your friend did not make that journey on his own.’
The doctor stopped at the door and turned to face Ævar once again.
‘Either your cold-hearted killer helped him down to the street and saved his life or an angel carried him under its wings. With a wound like that Grímur would have been unconscious seconds after he was hit. Before he hit the ground even. Have a good day.’
Ævar turned back to Grímur and put his hand on the unconscious man’s arm.
‘If you can hear me in there I need you back. I want to nail this bastard and you’re the only one who can help me do it. Come back and help me make everything alright again. We owe it to each other to get this done. Let’s forget about everything else and just get this guy.’
There was no response from Grímur’s pale face. Ævar moved his hand onto Grímur’s forehead and held it there willing some form of communication to take place between the two of them but there was only silence and within that silence lay the key to all understanding.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Tuesday 3rd February
Svandís pulled the rear-view mirror towards her so she could get a better look at herself to put her lipstick on. Gylfi rolled his eyes but didn’t say a word, he knew better than that by now. She had just caught his slightly comical gesture though.
‘You don’t need it to see where you’re going. Stop being such a drama queen,’ she said as she looked at the colour of the first lipstick she picked before putting it back in her handbag and fishing another one out. Once she was convinced she had the right colour she started applying it while trying not to grin at Gylfi’s half-hearted attempt at indifference.
‘I don’t know why you even bother. It’s not like he’s going to care if you’re wearing lipstick or not,’ Gylfi said.
‘You’re just jealous because I don’t wear it for you.’
‘Why waste money on something he’s not even going to notice?’
‘It’s not like I paid for it. I pinched them from Hagkaup when you were getting those sweets yesterday so I may as well wear it. And anyway, it’s not for him it’s to make me feel better. I had a shitty day yesterday and I want to feel good about myself for a change.’
Gylfi chuckled to himself. He changed lanes to get past a motorist who was taking it easy even though they were the only two vehicles on the road at 3:00 a.m. He had long ago stopped wasting his time trying to talk her out of her peculiar ways. She was as stubborn as she was self-destructive. Enormously so. The more you tried to get her to take it easy the more of everything she drank, smoked, snorted and shot up just to prove that she could do whatever she wanted and that there wasn’t a thing you could do about it.
They had just passed through the suburb of Mosfellsbær and were heading north out of the city. They would soon be at the Hvalfjörður tunnel and Gylfi started fishing around for the 1,000 krónur they would need to pay when they reached the toll gate on the other side.
‘You can just shut up and drive anyway. If I wanted your advice I’d ask for it,’ Svandís said.
She put the lipstick away and moved the mirror back roughly to where it had been before but made sure it was still out of position just enough so that he couldn’t see out the back window. That wiped the smile off his face while he adjusted it again so it was just the way he liked it. When he was done he looked across at Svandís and groaned out loud which made her start giggling like a little girl.
‘Do you have to do that in the car?’ Gylfi asked.
Svandís was busy dividing a small pile of cocaine into two thin lines on top of a plastic takeaway food container that had held her dinner of leftover pasta only a few minutes earlier. Her diet consisted primarily of carbohydrate-rich foods that could be easily reheated whenever the urge to eat took her. And amphetamines. She also drank as much coffee as she could get down her throat and only slept a few hours at a time normally just after she’d finished her night’s work. As a result she looked at least ten years older than she really was and was tired almost all the time. Except when she was high on drugs. She ignored Gylfi and snorted the lines through a shortened drinking straw that she kept in her handbag especially for the job. When she was done she moved the rear-view mirror again to check her nose for detritus and laughed the contented laugh of the freshly high as a kite. She reached under the seat and found a half-empty bottle of white wine. She unscrewed the top and drank the remaining South American Chardonnay in one go. She wound down her window and threw the bottle out onto the road. Gylfi cringed as it disintegrated somewhere behind them in the dark.
‘Jesus Christ, what is wrong with you? Do you want us to get pulled over or what?’
‘So what if they do? There’s nothing left for the idiots to find now anyway,’ she yelled triumphantly. ‘Are we there yet?’
She giggled uncontrollably while Gylfi adjusted his mirror back to its rightful place yet again.
‘We’ll be another thirty minutes or so,’ Gylfi said. ‘I don’t know what your hurry is. Where did you get that stuff from anyway? I thought you were broke.’
‘I’ve been saving that for a rainy day.’
Gylfi shook his head as they descended into the Hvalfjörður tunnel. By the time they were halfway through he’d located the 1,000-krónur note he’d been hunting for and had it in his hand ready for the automatic toll booth.
‘I’m all revved up and good to go now is what my hurry is,’ she spouted.
‘Great,’ Gylfi said as sarcastically as he could.
Svandís ignored him and bounced about in her seat humming along to some tune that only she could hear. Once they had passed through the toll gate the rest of the trip to Borgarnes passed in silence. Gylfi was wary of starting any new conversations that might lead to an argument and the cocaine seemed to have something of a calming effect on Svandís and her drug-addled physiology.
Before too long they’d crossed the Borgarfjarðarbrú Bridge and were entering the small town of Borgarnes. They followed the main street for a short distance and then headed down a hill that wound its way back towards the sea. They were roughly sixty kilometres outside of Reykjavik now and Gylfi was starting to feel tired. He was ready for a break from her and was secretly hoping to get some sleep while she entertained Guðmundur. Hopefully there would be no repeat of the antics of their last visit.
That night he’d sworn he would never return to the guy’s house but apparently those decisions weren’t his to make any more. He still suspected that Svandís had made up a large proportion of her story about him attacking her. Guðmundur was a mildly creepy guy as were most of her customers but he hadn’t really seemed the type and she had been a real handful that particular night, even more so than usual. Even on her good days she could be a real pain in the arse. He had become accustomed to her fits and tantrums but they still irritated him. In the time they’d been seeing each other Gylfi had discovered that more often than not when some sort of crisis exploded around Svandís it was a really good idea to get all the facts from an impartial source before believing a single word that came out of her mouth.
He spotted the house he was looking for in its lonely position at the end of the winding road and as they pulled up outside it he breathed a sigh of relief unaware that he was even doing so out loud.
‘You’ll be pleased to be getting rid of me I expect,’ Svandís said without any hint that she’d taken it personally. ‘You should get some sleep while you can, this could take a while.’
‘I think I’ll do just that,’ he said and stretched his arms out realising that he was a lot more tired than he’d realised.
She reached over and grabbed his chin between her fingers and gave it a not so gentle shake.
‘Don’t sulk, you wouldn’t know what to do with yourself if you didn’t have me around to look after. I’ll be back out in a few hours but keep your phone on just in case.’
And with that she bounced out of the car and wiggled off up the driveway pulling her skirt down over her backside as she went. Gylfi waited until she had disappeared through the front door before turning the car around and driving off to an even more remote spot where he knew he wouldn’t be disturbed. It was entirely possible they wouldn’t be getting home until six or seven o’clock so it was a good idea to get some rest while he could.
Even though Svandís would be tired when she’d finished her night’s work she would only sleep for two or three hours before bouncing out of bed again and once she was up there would be no chance of him getting any more rest. It was like living with a five-year-old in many ways but it was just the way it worked with her. If she was up so were you. When Gylfi had found his parking spot he killed the engine and reached into the glove compartment. He lit the joint he’d stashed there for just such an occasion and reclined the driver’s seat as far as it would go. It wasn’t long before he was stoned and sound asleep in his little metal cocoon.
A while later he was woken from his marijuana-induced slumber by his phone ringing. He rubbed his eyes and fumbled around in the dark for it before conceding defeat and switching on the interior light. He shielded his eyes against the glare and picked the phone up off the floor. On the other end Svandís was talking so quietly that he could barely make out what she was saying.
‘They’re going to kill me,’ she whispered.
Even though her voice was quiet there was no mistaking the fear it contained.
‘What?’ he asked.
Gylfi tried turning the volume on the handset up but it was already as high as it would go.
‘What’s that again?’ he repeated.
‘I’m behind the sofa.’
‘Behind the sofa? What the hell for?’
‘He just called here. You’ve got to save me.’
‘What? Who called? What are you talking about?’
‘They’re in it together. I can see that now.’
‘Who’s in what together? Can you speak up? I can hardly hear you.’
‘If I’m still here when he gets here I’m dead. Do you understand what I’m saying?’
‘No, Svandís, I don’t understand what you’re saying.?’
‘Just get here as fast as you can and get me out of here. I’m serious. If you don’t you’ll never see me again. Gylfi?’
Gylfi cleared his throat and sneezed.
‘Okay, I’m coming.’
‘Hurry.’
The line went dead and he knew he now had no choice but to go and see what was wrong for himself. This is what he’d been expecting all along from a return visit to Guðmundur’s place. He started the engine and spun the wheels as he sped back to the house.
By the time he came to a stop at the end of the driveway Guðmundur was standing at his front door staring out into the night as if he’d lost something. Gylfi leapt out of the car and ran up to him.
‘Where is she?’ he demanded.
‘I couldn’t tell you.’
‘Why on earth not?’
‘Because,’ he said with a smug smile on his face. ‘I don’t know.’
‘Is she inside?’
‘No, she’s not inside. What do you think I’m doing out here. She’s run off.’
‘What do you mean she’s run off?’
‘Exactly what I just said. She’s run off like a fucking lunatic without so much as a word of explanation. I got my money back though. She didn’t even take that with her. Can you believe that?’
He looked at Gylfi as if he were responsible for the girl’s erratic behaviour.
‘She wouldn’t just run off for no reason. What the fuck did you do to her?’ Gylfi demanded.
‘I didn’t do anything to her and you can drop that tone of voice with me. I remember you from last time, don’t worry about that.’
Gylfi took a couple of very deliberate steps towards Guðmundur and grabbed him by his shirt collar.
‘Listen to me smart-arse. She called me a couple of minutes ago and said that someone was trying to kill her. Now I get here and you’re telling me that she’s just decided to run off in the freezing cold. You seriously expect me to believe that? Why don’t you drop the fucking attitude yourself and tell me what really happened?’
Guðmundur peeled Gylfi’s hand off his collar and pushed him back a couple of feet closer to where he’d been standing before.
‘Just calm down. I am telling you the truth. No one here is trying to kill her. I’m the only one in the house and I haven’t so much as touched her. We were having a bit of a drink and I went into the bathroom to take a piss. When I came out she wasn’t upstairs any more and when I came down here the front door’s wide open and she’s gone. That chick of yours has a few screws loose, pal. I’m sure she’s a lovely girl and everything but she’s a bit unstable if you know what I mean. One minute she’s all smiles and laughs and the next she’s ranting like a crazy bitch.’
Gylfi told himself that he needed to calm down and that it just might be possible that Guðmundur was telling the truth and that Svandís was acting like an idiot all over again. It was quite a coincidence though that these things always seemed to happen with the same customers. He ran his fingers through his hair and tried to decide what to do.
‘Okay. Let’s just say that you’re telling the truth.’
‘I am telling the truth,’ Guðmundur protested.
‘Let’s just say that you are then. Where would she have gone?’
‘I haven’t a clue,’ Guðmundur said. ‘Take a look around. You won’t see another place anywhere around here.’
Gylfi had to agree with him. There was nothing nearby where she could have gone to find shelter from the cold. If she had run away as he’d said, and wasn’t still hiding behind the sofa, the only place she could have gone was another house that stood about half a mile away along the coast. There were lights on outside it and even from where the two of them were standing he could see it clearly perched up above the ocean.
‘Who owns that place over there?’ Gylfi asked.
Guðmundur pretended to look in the direction Gylfi was pointing.
‘I don’t know. They’re too far away for me to care.’
‘I’m going to check it out then,’ Gylfi said.
‘Good luck. I’m going to bed. If you don’t find her don’t bother coming back here. I won’t be answering the door.’
Guðmundur went back inside and closed the door behind him. Gylfi looked towards the lights in the distance and cursed his girlfriend’s name.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Tuesday 3rd February
By the time Gylfi had found out how to get to the house with the eerie outdoor lights on it and parked the car he was starting to feel more nervous than angry. What if she wasn’t there? What then? How would he explain himself to the occupants without coming across as some kind of psychopath? But, if he sat around and thought about it long enough he would lose the courage needed to ring the doorbell so he was better off not thinking but just doing. Realistically the worst thing that could happen would be that they called the police but the way things were going he was going to need to do that sooner or later himself. This night was beginning to feel a lot like one that wasn’t going to go away in a big hurry.
As he walked up to the front door he noticed something. From a distance the house appeared to be asleep as any self-respecting house would be at this hour despite the security lights but when he got a little closer he could see that there were lights on behind the curtains as well. It was certainly an odd hour to be up watching television or reading. In fact it was an odd hour to be up doing much of anything for that matter. Surely they must have seen her then or maybe she was waiting inside for him. He took a deep breath, rubbed his hands together and rang the doorbell. Faint sounds of feet shuffling along the floor got louder and louder as they got nearer until a gentle-looking elderly man opened the door.
‘Thank God you’ve decided…’
He didn’t finish what he was saying but instead looked Gylfi up and down as if he was possibly a criminal or at the very least a nuisance of some sort.
‘I’m sorry, do I know you?’ he asked looking genuinely puzzled.
‘No, I’m looking for my friend. Maybe you’ve seen her?’
The man looked at him intently as if examining him for clues but didn’t say another word so Gylfi continued.
‘I’m sorry for disturbing you at this hour but it’s really important I find her. It seems she’s decided to run off from a house nearby and I thought she might have come past here as there don’t seem to be many other places around.’
The demeanour of the elderly man changed and he didn’t seem quite so pleasant any more.
‘Now, you listen to me young man. I haven’t the faintest idea what you’re talking about but if you don’t get off my doorstep right now I’m going to call the police.’
Gylfi could suddenly see the night stretching out into the next day and possibly beyond if he couldn’t find Svandís and get her home. His patience came to an abrupt end. He knew the old man was lying to him and he’d had enough.
‘Look, I know you’ve seen her. You’re the only house within miles and your lights just happen to be on so either you’ve talked to Svandís in the last ten minutes or so or you’ve been up playing cards until five in the morning. Whichever it is I’d like to come in and take a look around. If that’s a problem then you will need to call the police because I’ll kick your fucking door in if you don’t let me look for her.’
