Frozen Assets

‘Mercedes,’ Haddi replied instantly. ‘Green, station wagon. Dent in the passenger side front wing. Why do you ask?’

‘Just wondering. What about the driver? Big guy?’

‘Big, well, a fat bloke anyway.’

‘Big tache? One of those seventies ones like the Smokey and the Bandit guy?’

‘That’s it. Didn’t like the look of him at all.’

‘Not to worry, Haddi. Not to worry,’ Gunna said, reaching for the phone and stabbing at numbers.

‘Skúli Snædal, please,’ she said crisply to the receptionist who answered. ‘Yes, it is important. This is Gunnhildur Gísladóttir at Hvalvík police and I don’t care in the least if he’s in a meeting.’

Matti opened his eyes and looked at the lumps on the ceiling that took him back to being a small boy again when he had been dispatched to Álfasteinn every summer, until he was precocious enough a teenager to spend the summer baiting lines and watching the slate-grey halibut flop over the gunwale instead.

He reached out, expecting Marika to be curled in a ball beside him, but his hand found only a cold depression in the mattress.

‘Marika!’

‘What?’

Matti hauled on his trousers and made his way blearily to the bathroom where he peed loudly and with great relief. ‘What are you doing?’

‘Nothing,’ she replied from the next room.

In Álfasteinn’s long kitchen, she sat in a ragged armchair with a large black and white cat perched on its arm. Both of them looked at Matti as he appeared, face puffed and the hair on one side of his head standing on end. Marika put the book she was reading on the other arm of the chair.

‘Where’s Lóa?’

‘Gone out.’

‘Going to be long, d’you know?’

‘She say she be quick. An hour, maybe. She is nice lady, your cousin.’

‘Ach, she’s all right, is Lóa. A bit of a monster sometimes. Any coffee?’ he asked through a yawn.

‘On cooker.’ Marika picked up the book and returned to it.

‘What are you doing?’

‘Reading.’

‘Reading what?’

‘English book. Grapes of Wrath.’

‘Good?’

‘Yes.’

Matti shuffled over to the stove and poured coffee from the pot. He yawned again, scratched and drank. Marika looked up for a moment and shook her head briefly. Matti switched on the radio over the sink and listened for a minute to an announcer reading out a list of forthcoming funerals before he switched off again and wandered to the window to look out over the sea. Marika turned a page and carried on reading.

Suddenly the cat jumped down to the floor and went to sit expectantly by the door. Matti watched it drowsily and wondered if it had seen a mouse, but the door creaked open and a large collie loped in, greeting the cat before lying down on a square of carpet under the window. Behind the collie came the stocky figure of Lóa, kicking off rubber boots at the door and padding in thick socks into the kitchen.

‘Ah, Matti my boy, so you’ve finally managed to drag your fat arse out of bed, have you? The whole bloody house was shaking, you were snoring so loud.’

‘Yes, Lóa, dear cousin.’

She heaved a bag on to the worktop and a chunk of meat oozing blood could be seen inside.

‘What’s for dinner, then?’

‘Hallgrímur over at Einarsnes shot a seal yesterday and this is my share of it. Good of him, I think.’

She lowered herself with a groan into a chair.

‘Bad back still?’ Matti asked.

Lóa nodded. ‘Now and again. Well, what brings you up here this time?’

‘Ach. You know. Needed to get away for a while.’

‘In trouble again?’

‘Sort of.’

‘What sort of?’

‘Nothing much. Just need to let the dust settle.’

‘That’s not what I gathered from your young lady.’

Matti goggled. ‘But. .?’

‘But what?’

‘You don’t speak English or Romanian or whatever it is she speaks.’

‘Well, Matti, it may have escaped your notice, but Marika speaks quite passable Icelandic.’

‘Bloody hell.’

‘Language, please.’

‘Sorry. I never noticed. We just speak English together.’

‘And now you can speak Icelandic as well. At least she doesn’t use all those awful slang expressions you use all the time.’

‘Bloody hell.’

‘Language, Matti.’

‘Sorry.’

Lóa stood up and banged the kettle on to the stove. ‘Matti, you always come up west when you’re in the soup, and I’m not going to ask again what it is this time. I’d like to know if it’s serious, though, and if the police are looking for you.’

‘Well, yes.’

‘Serious, or police?’

‘Both.’

‘Silly boy. You can’t stay here long without being found, you know. Hallgrímur’s wife saw you in the shop in Hólmavík yesterday. If she knows you’re here, then sooner or later everyone else will.’

‘I know,’ he admitted.

Lóa’s voice dropped to a murmur. ‘Your young lady, Marika. Seems like a nice girl. Got her head screwed on. You ought to hang on to her.’

‘Ach. She’s all right.’

‘Not your type, I’d have thought. Skinny little thing. Does she work?’

‘Yeah, in a club.’

‘So I assume that’s where you met, is it? Some dive?’

‘Sort of.’

‘What sort of work does she do?’

Matti sighed and knew that the truth wouldn’t do, although not telling the truth to Lóa could be a dangerous business.

‘She dances,’ he said finally.

‘Oh, I see. What kind of dance?’

‘The sort where you take your clothes off and people watch.’