The Wanderer, page 14
‘You certainly do.’
For half a minute it seemed as if Tom had run out of things to say, but then he spoke.
‘Ajay heard you talking to that professor. At lunch.’
‘Oh really?’ Ajay must have pretty good hearing, Eygló thought. He had been sitting a few metres away, but then the room had been empty. And he was a sound guy after all.
‘You need to be careful,’ Tom said.
‘What do you mean?’
‘About talking down this project. About scaring the professor. We are committed now, all of us. Even if the wampum is a fake, or the Columbus letter, it’s too late to do anything about it now.’
‘But if they are fakes, we have to be honest about it.’
‘Oh no we don’t,’ said Tom. His voice was firm.
‘But we have our reputations to think about. Our integrity.’
Tom stopped and looked straight at Eygló. ‘You are not listening to me. We don’t think about that. We make this film. And then we broadcast it.’
Suddenly his voice had an undertone of threat to it, which took Eygló aback. She had been expecting problems from Professor Beccari or Suzy, but not from Tom.
‘Are you worried about losing your job?’ she said. ‘Can’t you just get something else? Go back to nature programmes?’
‘It’s not me, it’s Suzy. She watches my back; I watch hers.’
‘She told me that she had overextended herself,’ said Eygló. ‘That she had to make this programme by the end of October.’
‘She might not have said that her house is in danger of being repossessed. And that her little jerk of a husband is threatening to leave her if that happens. And take the kids with him.’
‘No, she didn’t say that.’ In fact Eygló hadn’t appreciated what Suzy was telling her: that the failure of The Wanderer would be more than just a professional setback, it would be disaster. Under the circumstances, Suzy was behaving with admirable calmness. For a moment Eygló wondered whether a husband who ran off with the kids when the going got tough was a husband worth keeping, but she knew lots of women who did their best to hang on to bad men. Eygló, at least, had been able to cut them loose, whenever she lumbered herself with one.
‘I’ll be careful,’ she said. ‘But if I discover that the wampum was planted by that old lady, I will have to say something.’
‘No you won’t.’ Tom’s blue eyes were staring hard at Eygló. ‘That’s my point, you won’t.’
Eygló felt the anger rise up inside her. ‘Or what?’
‘Look what happened to Carlotta.’
‘What!’ The anger mixed with a sudden dash of fear. ‘Did I hear you right?’
‘I think so,’ said Tom.
‘Are you saying Carlotta was killed because she was about to expose the Columbus letter?’
‘Or the wampum.’
‘How do you know that?’ Eygló asked.
‘It’s obvious, isn’t it?’
Was it? Eygló thought. Not necessarily. How could Tom be so sure?
‘Was it you? Was it you who killed Carlotta?’
Tom turned on his heel and strode off rapidly towards Suzy and Beccari who were standing beside the car.
‘Tom!’ Eygló called after him.
But Tom didn’t answer.
CHAPTER 25
MAGNUS WAS QUITE correct: Vigdís was not happy about letting Einar and Eygló go to Greenland. Magnus was grateful it was only a short drive from police headquarters to Borgartún, where Einar’s wife Rósa was a partner in a small law firm, but it was long enough for Vigdís to give him her opinion.
Borgartún was Reykjavík’s answer to Wall Street, a long straight road that ran along the bay. It had flourished in the noughties, when glossy bank headquarters had bloomed, along with lesser but equally glossy buildings housing accountants, lawyers and the other services ancillary to the great credit boom that afflicted Iceland then. During Magnus’s last stint in Reykjavík after the crash of 2008, the heart had been ripped out of the area, as the banks were renamed and For Rent signs sprouted everywhere. But now it looked prosperous again.
Magnus and Vigdís pulled into a car park outside a small sleek building of soft brown stone and black glass. Rósa’s firm was on the first floor. One of those dark-haired Icelandic beauties with clear skin and clear blue eyes smiled from behind a desk and greeted them. Magnus introduced himself and Vigdís, and said they wanted to see Rósa on a personal matter. Unfazed, the receptionist showed them into a small conference room with a view across Borgartún to one of the banks that had risen from the ashes and was flexing its rediscovered financial muscles.
Magnus looked down at the Range Rovers and the BMWs cruising the street below. ‘Are we going to go through all this again, Vigdís? Surely we must have learned something?’
‘I’m not sure we have,’ said Vigdís. ‘I bet all those cars were paid for on credit. I still haven’t got over the last mess: my mortgage is just as big as it always was.’
Magnus didn’t have a mortgage. He didn’t even own a bed. He still hadn’t moved his stuff into Tryggvi Thór’s place. He had yet to find a property ladder, let alone step on its first rung. What had he done with his life? Ten years before he had been living in the Back Bay of Boston with a successful lawyer who worked in an office much like this. And now? Not a lot of progress had been made.
After ten minutes or so, the door opened and a woman with short blonde hair entered. She was big – at least six feet tall – with the broad shoulders and triangular body shape of a swimmer. Her jaw was square and her eyes blue. She wore a blue business suit and modern gold earrings of a design that Magnus recognized. They came from Ingileif’s gallery, and she had often worn a similar pair herself.
She shook Magnus and Vigdís’s hands. ‘I’m sorry you had to wait a little. It might have been better if you had made an appointment.’ She exuded competence and confidence.
‘It’s not that kind of visit,’ said Magnus.
Rósa sat opposite them at the table, pad of paper and slim fountain pen at the ready. ‘What kind of visit is it?’
‘We are investigating a murder.’
‘Oh, really. Whose?’
‘Don’t you know?’
Rósa hesitated, but only for a moment. ‘Carlotta Mondini?’
‘That’s correct.’
Rósa’s eyes held Magnus’s. They were sharp, ready to assess difficult questions.
‘Have you ever met Carlotta Mondini?’ Magnus began.
‘We were never introduced,’ Rósa said drily.
‘We have interviewed Einar a few times,’ Magnus said. ‘Has he mentioned it?’
‘I haven’t seen him since it happened,’ said Rósa.
‘But you must have spoken to him on the phone?’
‘Yes. Once. I saw the murder on the news and I called him. We agreed to discuss it tonight when he gets home from Snaefellsnes. Carlotta Mondini has always been a sore subject between us. But of course I am sorry the poor woman is dead. No one deserves that. Have you any idea who did it?’
‘So you knew about his affair with Carlotta?’ Magnus asked.
‘Yes. Or at least the original affair. I found out five years ago when Einar was at York and I had just started up the firm here.’
Rósa’s little blue suitcase rumbled over the cobbles of Swinegate. She was moving fast, anxious to get to Einar’s flat, which was only a hundred metres away. He wouldn’t be expecting her and she hadn’t warned him she was early. She had got through Heathrow in record time and managed to catch an earlier train from King’s Cross to York than she expected.
For three days the anxiety had been crushing her. Fortunately there was plenty of work to keep her occupied back in Reykjavík, but once she was on the plane to London her impatience had risen. She needed Einar. She grinned to herself.
She needed Einar now!
She rounded the corner into a narrow alley of half-timbered buildings and rang a bell next to a small boutique selling shoes that was always empty.
Her heart thudded as she waited for the door to be open. She smiled. She and Einar had been married nearly twelve years, and been together much longer than that, and her heart still thudded. She knew his did also.
She heard the sound of his feet clattering down the wooden stairs inside, running, and there was a thud as he took the final three in one leap. The door opened and there he was! Tall, those blue eyes dancing at the sight of her.
‘Rósa!’
His flat was tiny and on the first floor. He flipped her suitcase into the building and left it at the bottom of the stairs. He dragged her up the staircase, laughing, through the open door to his flat and kissed her hard and deep.
‘I wasn’t expecting you this early,’ he said.
‘Really?’ Rósa laughed. ‘It looks like you’re pleased to see me.’
‘I am so pleased to see you!’ he said. He lifted her up as if she were a feather. Einar was tall, but Rósa was almost as tall as him. She was also strong and a little heavy: Einar was the only man she had ever met who could carry her so effortlessly.
He took her through to the sitting room and threw her down on the kilim they had bought together from a man in the bazaar in Erzurum. They were good at this by now: within seconds her jeans were down to her thighs, as were her knickers, and he was inside her, moving up and down with a vigour that was both familiar and a revelation.
It only took a minute or two, yet already his back was sweaty.
He kissed her slowly, gently.
She smiled up at him. And then, unbidden, a tear leaked out of one eye. She sniffed and wiped it.
The glow in Einar’s smile switched to concern. ‘Rósa? Rósa? What’s wrong? I didn’t hurt you, did I?’
‘Oh, no, no, my darling, no.’ She leaned up to kiss him. ‘I have just been a bit emotional recently. It’s so good to see you.’
‘Come to bed.’
She stood up, and he gently removed first her clothes and then his. She led him into his bedroom, and within a couple of moments she was snuggled up under his arm, smelling the sweet sweat of sex.
The tears had stopped.
‘What is it?’ Einar said. ‘Tell me.’
She wanted to tell him, she knew she must, but not just then, not at that moment. She wanted to stay in his arms for ever; she wanted time to stop on that Friday afternoon in October 2012.
The future scared the hell out of her.
‘You almost missed me,’ Einar said, stroking Rósa’s hair. ‘I was just about to go out and get some champagne. I won’t be a minute.’
‘Oh, stay here a bit longer.’
‘Come on, Rósa. That’s what Friday afternoons are for, isn’t it? Screwing and drinking.’
Rósa could see Einar was determined. ‘OK,’ she nodded. The wine shop was only a few minutes’ walk away. She didn’t need the champagne, but she knew Einar liked the decadence of it. ‘Be quick.’
Hurriedly he pulled on some clothes and left the flat.
Rósa lay naked on the bed staring up at the ceiling. Trying not to think.
Einar’s phone chirped on the bedside table a few centimetres from Rósa’s head. She twisted to glance at it. What she saw made her gasp in horror.
I need to fuck you. Now!
She twisted rapidly away from the phone. No. No. NO!
Oh God. Could she unsee what she had just seen? She had to. Oh, Einar, why? Why? WHY?
She lay there, her chest heaving, trying through concentrating on her breathing to ignore what she had seen. She knew Einar used to do that kind of thing. She had hoped he had stopped, but of course he hadn’t.
Who was she? Don’t answer that question. Don’t ask that question.
Who was she?
She rolled over and grabbed Einar’s phone. The short text had disappeared. Before she had time to stop herself, Rósa’s fingers had flown over the screen and tapped in Einar’s code: 1104, the year Hekla erupted, a key date for Icelandic archaeologists, since Norse remains either lay below or above the layer of ash deposited all over the country by the volcano in that year. She knew Einar didn’t suspect she knew the code, but it had only taken her five tries a couple of years before to guess it.
There was a whole stream of texts back and forth going back months, all from a woman called Carlotta.
At first Rósa assumed she was an undergraduate at York, but as Rósa scrolled through the texts, she realized who Carlotta was.
She tossed the phone on the bedside table, hunched her knees up to her chest and wept.
‘Ta dah!’ Einar thrust open the door waving a bottle of cava in front of him. ‘Rósa? Rósa, what’s wrong?’
He sat next to her and put his arm around her naked shoulders. For a tiny moment Rósa wanted to lean into his familiar body, but then a rush of anger overcame her and she wriggled free.
Fear mixed with concern in Einar’s eyes. He knew he had been caught. ‘Rósa?’
‘Who is Carlotta?’
‘Carlotta?’
‘Yes, Carlotta.’
‘Er. There was a Carlotta on the dig in Greenland. An Italian girl. Actually, she was the one who found the wampum. Is that who you mean?’
‘Yes, it is.’
‘Oh.’
‘How long have you been sleeping with her?’
‘I haven’t been sleeping with her.’
‘Don’t lie to me, Einar. Not now.’
‘She and I did have a night together maybe. Just after she found the wampum. But that was over a year ago. And I’m really sorry.’
Rósa didn’t say anything. She couldn’t say anything.
‘It was a mistake. You know I’ve done that every now and then. But I’ve stopped now, I promise.’
The anger dried up Rósa’s tears.
Einar put his hand on Rósa’s shoulder. This time she didn’t brush it off.
‘Rósa? Have some champagne.’
‘How was Venice?’
‘Venice?’
‘Yes. You went to Venice last weekend. With Carlotta.’
‘Er . . .’
‘When I called you last weekend and you said you were marking essays, you were in Venice with another woman. A woman who you had been seeing for over a year.’
‘Actually, I was marking essays.’
‘Einar!’ Rósa screamed. She shook off his hand and walked over to the window, staring out at the couple of pedestrians in the street below.
She knew Einar slept with other women. He always had. At first she had hoped that he would stop once they were going out, and then once they were married, but he hadn’t. She pretended not to notice. She knew he loved her more than any of the others, she never doubted it for one minute. There had been one who had been serious – Eygló – and although Rósa hadn’t confronted Einar, she had confronted the other woman, who had backed off in shame.
But with that exception she was pretty certain none had ever lasted for more than a night or two.
Maybe she was wrong. Maybe Einar had a whole string of steady girlfriends all over the world; maybe she was just one of many.
‘Damn you, Einar! Not now. Why now?’
‘Hey, look, Rósa, I’m so sorry.’
‘I want you to get rid of her,’ Rósa said.
‘Yes of course,’ Einar said in his conciliatory voice. ‘Of course I will.’
‘No, I mean it!’
‘And I mean it,’ Einar said. But he didn’t. She knew that. He knew that.
She turned to face him. ‘Einar, the reason I was crying earlier. Before I found out about Carlotta . . .’
‘Yes?’
‘I have breast cancer.’
Einar’s jaw loosened. He looked at Rósa with a mixture of horror and compassion. And love. Deep love. She could see it.
‘When did you find out? Why didn’t you tell me?’
‘Three days ago. And I’m telling you now.’
Einar sat, his eyes never leaving Rósa, his face a battlefield of emotions.
‘Einar, I’m going to ask you again. I want you to stop sleeping with Carlotta. And any other woman after her. Will you promise me that?
He closed his eyes. He looked up to the ceiling, then back at Rósa. His lower jaw wobbled. Rósa realized he was on the verge of tears himself. Rósa had never seen Einar cry.
‘Yes,’ he said, his voice so quiet she could barely hear it. ‘Yes. I promise you, Rósa. I will not sleep with Carlotta again. Nor with any other woman.’ He swallowed. ‘Ever.’
Rósa looked at Magnus and Vigdís. ‘And I thought he kept that promise. Did he?’
Magnus didn’t answer.
‘Carlotta was here in Iceland, wasn’t she? She was found dead at Glaumbaer where Einar had been filming that day. It was on the TV news. I’m no fool.’
That was for sure. ‘So you think he had restarted the affair?’ Magnus asked.
‘Had he? You know; I don’t.’ She was still cool, but her blue eyes were piercing. There was anger there.
‘We don’t know for sure,’ said Magnus. He did know that Einar had a very awkward evening with his wife ahead of him.
‘Do you think my husband killed her?’ Rósa asked.
‘Why would he do that?’ said Magnus.
‘I have no idea,’ said Rósa. ‘And furthermore I find it impossible to think of my husband as a killer. An occasional scumbag, perhaps, but that’s different.’ Her eyes hardened. ‘Don’t play games with me, Inspector. I know you have a job to do, but I have a marriage to protect. Tell me what you need to know and I will endeavour to answer. But don’t try to trick me into incriminating my husband.’
‘I won’t play games,’ said Magnus. ‘But I do need to know how much you knew about Carlotta, and about your husband’s relationship with her. Has Einar told you anything about a letter that was discovered in the Vatican archives last year, written by Christopher Columbus to his brother? Does he discuss his work with you?’
‘Oh, yes, he does. I’ve always been very interested in what he’s doing. In fact that’s how we met; we were students together. I loved archaeology, and I would have liked to stick with it, but one of us had to earn some real money and so I went to law school. So I know about the letter and the wampum that Carlotta found in Greenland. But I thought the guy who discovered the letter was called Federico. Federico Trapanese, I think?’
