In the darkness, Gunna stretched out, feeling her toes tingle as the fatigue drained out of them and Steini settled beside her with a sigh. Exploring fingers gently stroked her thigh and she stretched a hand to cover and encourage them when the phone on the floor beside the bed began to buzz and chirp.
“Hell!” she swore, fumbling for it in the darkness. “What?” she barked into it.
“Tucked up with Steini already, are you, you randy old cow?”
“Bjössi, always a pleasure to hear from you. Yes, I’m in bed and I’ve been on my feet since six.”
“Well you’d better get out of bed, darling. We’ve got someone out at the airport you might want a word with.”
“So what made you want to leave so suddenly right now, with so much money?” Gunna asked.
“Just trouble,” Bjarki Steinsson replied in a voice laden with despair that echoed in the bare interview room at Keflavík international airport. “Always more trouble. The phone calls and the texts.”
“What calls and texts?”
“Demanding money, more and more money. Threatening to tell Kristrún.”
“Who was this?”
“I don’t know.” He waved a hand towards the jacket hanging on the back of a chair. “Look in the pocket. You’ll see.”
Gunna gestured for Bjössi to look as Bjarki continued, speaking faster, his voice rising from a whisper to a more normal tone.
“Yesterday there was a text as well. So I thought, why bother? I’d just go. I have enough to live on. I was just going to walk away and leave whoever it is to tell Kristrún whatever he wants. I don’t care any more. The house and the business are all in her and the children’s names. She can keep the lot, all those stupid crystal knick-knacks and pictures that give you a headache. I’ve had enough.”
Behind her, Bjössi carefully unfolded a sheet of paper, typed with a dozen lines. Gunna saw with relief that he had put on gloves to read it. “Have you any idea where these demands were coming from?”
“Some man. I have no idea who. Just a phone number, nothing else.”
“And the note? How did that get to you? Post?”
“It was pushed under the windshield wiper of my car yesterday morning. I heard about Hallur and then Jónas Valur, and I decided that was all the warning I needed after I went to see Hallur in hospital yesterday.”
“What do you know about what happened to him?”
“Only that he would never have taken his own life, never,” he said with conviction. “Hallur always comes out smiling. He’s one of nature’s survivors.”
Gunna turned to Bjössi. “What is it?”
“Demand for cash. Twenty thousand euros. ‘Have it ready. You will be told when and where to hand it over,’ it says here.”
“A classy sort of blackmailer, then, wanting foreign currency.”
“Understandable, I’d have thought, considering how valuable Icelandic cash is these days.”
“All right. We’d best get that to Technical as soon as we can and see what they make of it,” Gunna said, and turned back to Bjarki. “I’m sorry. I can’t allow you to leave the country.”
“Am I under arrest?”
“Not yet. But you tried to leave the country with a large amount of foreign currency, which I’m sure a man in your position is aware is illegal. Plus you’re a key witness in a serious case. If you attempt to leave the country, I’ll make sure you’re stopped and I’ll get an injunction to prevent you from travelling.”
“I can’t go back to Kristrún,” he said with certainty.
“In that case we’ll get you a hotel room for the night. I’ll be along to see you again in the morning, and then you can make other arrangements.”
Gunna banged with a fist on the door of Bjarki Steinsson’s room, with Eiríkur behind her.
“Don’t tell me the bloody man’s not here. Eiríkur, run down to reception again, will you, and find out if anyone’s seen him. Failing that, get somebody up here with a pass key,” she instructed. Eiríkur left at a jog along the corridor, his footfalls soundless in the deep beige carpet.
Beige and boring, Gunna thought. Just like Bjarki bloody Steinsson.
“Bjarki! Open the bloody door, will you! It’s the police!” She yelled, hammering on the door again.
She paced the corridor back and forth, banging the wall with her fist and feeling her knuckles sting. Eventually Eiríkur appeared at the far end of the corridor with the portly figure of the hotel’s manager puffing at his side.
“Open that, will you?” she instructed the manager.
“It’s extremely irregular,” the manager grumbled. “I can’t open a guest’s room just like that.”
“Yes you damn well can, and quickly. We’ve had enough bodies as it is,” Gunna told him grimly.
At the mention of bodies, the manager’s eyes bulged in immediate alarm and he swiped a card through a slot. The door swung open and he stood back to let Gunna and Eiríkur enter the room first. The clatter of running water was the first thing Gunna noticed, followed by the steam coming past the slightly ajar bathroom door, and the reek of sulphur.
“Bjarki!” Gunna called out. “Are you there?”