Why Did You Lie? (26 page)

She was inclined to think that Thröstur hadn’t initially recognised the property they were buying. When realisation eventually struck, it must have been difficult for him to overcome his revulsion and use the garage. She wondered whether he had always remembered the incident but forgotten where it took place, or buried the memory completely. She would probably never know.

What could have brought it all back to him? If the garage itself had been the trigger, why had it taken so many months? She hadn’t noticed him acting oddly around the building until November, when they had been living in the flat for several months. Something must have sparked the memory. But what? Perhaps it hadn’t been any single factor; the memory had simply re-emerged of its own accord.

Again Nína had to remind herself that there was nothing to be afraid of. These concrete walls were not to blame for what had happened to Thröstur, any more than they were for Stefán’s fate. Meeting Thorbjörg had opened her eyes. We make our own luck. Thorbjörg could have pulled herself together and taken responsibility for her life but she had lacked the guts or the will power. Of course, the woman’s alcoholism had played a part, but people overcame these things with less incentive than the welfare of their child. To be fair, perhaps it hadn’t been that easy for her to drag herself out of the pit back then. Nína had never been in her situation; never had to explain to a small child why Daddy wasn’t coming home. How were you supposed to do that?
Some people have a pain in their body, darling, others have an illness in their mind. Like Daddy. He was so ill that he thought it was better to die. To leave you and me behind. But it wasn’t his fault so we can’t be angry with him. He loved us very much, you must remember that. He loved you more than anything else in the world.
That sort of thing.

Of course there was every indication that Thröstur and Stefán had taken their own lives. The garage itself was innocent.

It was as if a curtain had been lifted. The story had taken shape and one of the main characters even had a face: one with sad, yellow eyes. But it wasn’t enough. She still needed to venture onto the stage to convince herself once and for all that there was nothing there that could explain Thröstur’s fate.

In the end, though, it was the sale of the flat that was forcing her to bite the bullet. How could she hand over the keys to some poor innocent couple if she believed the garage would bring them bad luck? No, better to go inside, inspect the place and reassure herself that there was nothing to fear.

‘Hello.’ Nína had meant to shout into the empty building but the word emerged as a whisper. There was no reply. Hastily she found the light switch. The bare bulb lit up the interior and Nína breathed easier when she saw she was alone. For a split second she thought of ringing Berglind and waiting out in the car for her and Dóri, then changed her mind. No, she could do this alone. She had to. There was nothing intrinsically malignant about the garage; it simply drew unhappy people to it. The sooner she faced up to that fact, the better.

Even so she almost ran straight out again when she spotted the ball on the windowsill. Taking a deep breath, she forced herself to examine it. The brightly coloured image on its surface, a rabbit, had been blurred in the printing process and the result was not as cute as intended; its teeth were too prominent, its eyes wonky and half crazed. Perhaps she was reading too much into it. She stepped further inside, averting her eyes from the steel tracks that supported the garage door. She didn’t want to risk catching sight of the mark left by the rope on the dusty metal. Here and there she could see evidence of the police examination but she didn’t dwell on that. They had found a whole host of fingerprints – the garage couldn’t have been given a proper clean for at least half a century – but only three sets had been traced to their owners. One belonged to Thröstur, one to her and the third to Dóri, who had helped them carry various bits and pieces when they’d first moved in. The other fingerprints had been left by unknown people some time in the past and the police saw no point in trying to identify them.

The floor was dirty, with drifts of dust lying along the walls and in the corners. There was little to see: a few boxes of junk and a battered desk and office chair that had accompanied Thröstur from his family home. Nína remembered that he had planned to potter around in here, repairing bits of engine. The police had emptied the desk in the hope of finding a suicide note but there was nothing. Although Nína knew people rarely wrote them, she had taken this as further proof that Thröstur had not tried to kill himself. He would have left a note, damn it.

At the back of the garage was the locked storeroom. Nína walked towards it, inadvertently taking bigger strides than usual. Once she had opened the storeroom and taken a peek inside, this belated initiation ceremony would be over. There would be nothing left to do and she could finally leave this place. Between her and Thröstur, and Thorbjörg and Stefán, there had been two other owners who had suffered no misfortune. If there was a curse on the garage, it only seemed to affect journalists.

Nína had to give the door of the storeroom a hard jerk and it shook on its rusty hinges as she released her hold. The bulb inside had blown, so she shone her phone inside to illuminate the contents.

She wasn’t prepared for how much crap had piled up in there. When they first moved in she had stuck her head inside and recoiled at how much the previous owners had left in there, but now the situation was much worse. Clutter lay strewn over the floor so there was hardly anywhere to put your feet. She couldn’t imagine who it was that had torn through it like a hurricane; Thröstur maybe, or the police? Rusty tools, torn magazines, skis, children’s clothes and a broken shovel, ancient drinks cans and bottles – some long-obsolete Icelandic brand she had never heard of. Three children’s bikes lay piled one on top of the other under all the rubbish, presumably relics of the bicycle repair shop that had once operated out of the premises. Nína assumed some of the old tools must date back to then too. Apparently the tenant hadn’t bothered to collect the rest of his gear. Perhaps Thorbjörg had refused to open the door for him and he had abandoned the attempt.

The presence of the bikes was more of a puzzle. Surely the children who owned them wouldn’t have been resigned to losing them just because some adult was having money trouble? Seeing a bike like the one she had owned as a girl, Nína remembered how attached she had been to it. She would have insisted on getting it back. Perhaps the young owners hadn’t been able to afford to pay for the repairs.

The only object that appeared to have been left undisturbed was a squalid-looking folding bed. The torn, stained mattress was covered in a thick layer of dust. There was no question that this place needed a thorough spring clean. But Nína decided not to break with tradition: the new owners would inherit the mess, assuming anyone wanted to buy the flat.

As she backed out she caught sight of a picture on the wall by the bed. It was the drawing of a face, apparently by a child – a girl, she guessed. It consisted of no more than a few lines, of which the pigtail had probably proved the greatest test of the artist’s talents. What made the strongest impression on Nína, however, was the large, downturned mouth.

She hurried out of the garage. The light dust of snow was still falling but this time she let the flakes settle on her eyelashes. The cold air and the drips running down her face were somehow cleansing. She felt in urgent need of a shower.

Next morning Nína arrived at work before anyone else. This was partly to escape the hospital before the doctors began their rounds, as she was reluctant to discuss when she wanted Thröstur’s life support switched off. She owed them an answer but couldn’t make up her mind. Ever since she’d made the decision she’d been preoccupied with other things. No, the main reason for turning up early today was to ambush Örvar. He hadn’t told her the truth and she wanted to confront him. She didn’t give a damn that she’d promised to leave the investigation to him; no one could be held to a deal based on lies.

He appeared at the end of the corridor, concentrating so hard on not spilling a brimming cup of coffee that he failed to notice Nína waiting by the door of his office until it was too late to pretend he was on his way somewhere else. Struggling to mask his consternation, he invited her to take a seat. He was very busy, he explained, and could only spare her a few minutes. Another lie, no doubt.

Nína sat down and came straight to the point while Örvar was swearing over the coffee he’d slopped onto his desk. Typical that he could carry it without accident all the way from the machine, then mess up just when he was home and dry. ‘Never take your eye off the ball,’ he muttered, mopping at the stained paperwork. No doubt the curses were directed at her too but she pretended not to notice. Finally he sat down, looking even more exhausted than usual. She knew he’d been finding these weekend shifts a trial, but there was no getting out of them. At least he was weary enough to buy Nína’s explanation that she’d come in early now to make up for her day off on Wednesday. She had been afraid he would send her straight home.

‘Nína, it’s not what you think. I wasn’t involved in the actual inquiry because I’d only recently joined the police. If Thorbjörg said that, she was mistaken. I went round a few times on call-out and felt sorry for her and her son. She must have remembered me because I was polite to her, and understanding about how hard she was finding it to accept what had happened.’ Örvar sighed. ‘I did a little checking for her in-house but there was no evidence – really, none at all – to suggest anything other than suicide.’

‘Then why not just tell me that? Why pretend not to know that another woman had experienced exactly the same thing in exactly the same place?’

‘Nína, I had no idea where you lived. I’ve never been round to your house and since we got an HR manager I haven’t kept up to speed with my team’s private lives. Except when they choose to confide in me.’

‘Which I
did
. But you didn’t say a word. You must have twigged when I said I’d found a statement taken from Thröstur. There can’t have been many suicides where a child was called in as a witness. Didn’t the penny drop when his name came up in that context?’

‘There were three kids. Boys, if memory serves, all around the same age. And since you ask, I never knew their names as I only heard about it secondhand – I never actually went near the investigation. I hadn’t a clue that your husband was one of them. It’s thirty years since I tried to help Thorbjörg and since then I’ve met countless women in the line of duty. Children, too.’ Örvar took a sip of coffee and made a face when he saw that he’d forgotten to wipe the bottom of his mug. There was a brown ring on the desk, shaped like a mouth shouting at him. Which was exactly what she felt like doing right now. It was intolerable to have to sit here and watch him squirm. She even suspected him of deliberately spilling the coffee to buy himself time.

‘It first began to come back to me when you told me about the video. Then the penny finally dropped – but not immediately.’

Nína didn’t believe this for a second but decided to let him continue.

‘Since then I haven’t had a chance to discuss it with you. I know we’ve crossed paths in the office but I hadn’t made up my mind what to say. It was partly out of concern for you – I didn’t want to raise your hopes. I still stand by what I said – no one but your husband was responsible for his actions. But I should have mentioned it to you earlier, I admit that.’

‘But you didn’t mention it at all – I had to ask you. That’s not the same thing.’ Nína paused to give Örvar a chance to apologise or protest but he said nothing, so she went on. ‘But now you’re going to tell me anything of importance you remember, aren’t you?’

‘Do I have any choice?’

‘No, not really. I won’t stop asking.’

‘What do you want to know? I can’t remember it in much detail.’

‘The two questions bugging me most are how did Thröstur get involved and what happened to the reports?’

‘I don’t know
exactly
where the reports are.’ Örvar sounded convincing but it was an odd choice of words.

‘What do you mean
exactly
?’

‘Just that. I can’t point you to their exact location, I’m afraid. But I’ll ask the old hands to check their shelves. And I’ll have a look around my office, though there’s no reason they’d be in here. As you’ll remember, it wasn’t my case, and I had a clear-out not long ago. Besides, I try to deal with everything as soon as a case is closed. Unlike some people, I don’t sit on the files for decades.’ He glanced round at the overflowing shelves. ‘Though, on second thoughts, maybe it’s longer since my last clear-out than I remembered. Maybe several years.’ Örvar stole a glance at the clock. ‘Look, I’m pressed for time, as I said. I’ve got to be at a meeting in five minutes. What was the other question?’

‘How was Thröstur mixed up in it? And the other two boys?’

‘Their testimony contradicted Thorbjörg’s claim that someone else had been involved in her husband’s death. The boys were able to confirm that nobody had entered the garage, so it was clear that no crime had been committed. Thorbjörg wasn’t told about them, only that all the indications were that her husband had acted alone.’

Now it was Nína’s turn to frown. ‘Then I find the way Thröstur was interviewed very odd. Wouldn’t a single statement, taken on the spot, have done? It sounded as if the man interviewing him thought he had something to hide. And how did they manage to trace the kids?’

‘By coincidence Stefán’s body was discovered almost immediately. The boys were still sitting on the wall when the police and ambulance arrived. So it wasn’t difficult.’ Örvar adjusted his shirt collar and picked up pen and notebook. ‘Statements were taken from them on the spot, then they were interviewed again in the presence of a legal guardian and after that the decision was made to question them further. Their statements weren’t entirely consistent with the evidence and the police hoped it would be possible to discover why. But they were unsuccessful.’