Far North - Michael Ridpath [28]
‘But there were plenty of other bankers responsible for losing money last year. They haven’t committed suicide. Why was Gabríel Örn so sensitive?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘You knew him intimately. Did it surprise you that he drowned himself?’
Harpa sighed. ‘Yes. Yes, it did,’ she said quietly. ‘He was usually pretty confident about his talents. Maybe he finally realized what a bastard he was. Maybe he couldn’t look at himself in the mirror.’
‘He treated you badly?’
‘You could say that. He took all the credit for the good work I did, he was the one who got the big bonuses while I got diddly-squat. He blamed me for the bad deals he did. That infuriated me. I argued against doing all of the three big deals that eventually went wrong, but Gabríel overruled me, said I wasn’t smart enough to see the opportunity. I wasn’t smart enough to stop listening to him, that was the problem.
‘Then one day, as a special reward for my achievement at the bank, he told me I had become one of the golden circle of privileged employees who would be allowed to buy stock in the Ódinsbanki on special terms. The bank would lend me the money to do it, at low rates. I knew that it was how he had made tens of millions of krónur over the previous few years and I thought it was my big chance, so I went for it.’
She shook her head. ‘Six months later the shit hit the fan, the stock price fell to zero practically, and the bank was nationalized. But somehow the loan I had taken out was still there.’
‘Presumably everyone else suffered too?’
Harpa’s laugh had no humour and a tinge of hysteria. ‘A lot of us did. But not the true “golden circle”. While we were buying, they were selling. Gabríel sold three-quarters of his shares and had paid down all his loan.’
‘So you dumped him?’ Magnus asked.
‘I didn’t know anything about that at that stage.’ Harpa sighed. ‘He dumped me. There used to be a rule in all the banks that staff in a relationship couldn’t work together. After Gudmundur arrived, that rule was reinstated. Guess who had to go?’
‘Tough,’ Magnus said.
‘Yes. Though once I had left, my friends told me Gabríel was having an affair with a twenty-three-year-old trainee anyway. It was very convenient for him.’
Harpa’s bitterness had overwhelmed her initial confusion.
‘Can you tell me what happened the night he died?’
‘Killed himself, you mean?’
‘Died.’ Magnus repeated himself firmly.
‘But I told your colleague in January.’
‘Tell us again,’ said Magnus. He had pulled out his notebook. Árni’s notes from that first interview, which Magnus had skimmed on the way to Seltjarnarnes, were very sketchy.
Harpa hesitated, as if looking for a way out. There wasn’t one.
‘I went to the demonstration that afternoon in the Austurvöllur square outside the Parliament building. I met a man there, Björn Helgason. After the tear gas broke up the protest, I went back to his place.’
‘Where was that?’ Magnus asked.
‘Up the hill by the Catholic Cathedral. Actually it was his brother’s flat. Björn lives in Grundarfjördur; he was staying with his brother so he could attend the demo.’
‘Was Björn’s brother there?’
‘No, he was out somewhere or other.’
‘Then what happened?’
‘We had a drink. We talked. We got to the point where I thought something might happen. But then… then I guess I got cold feet. I felt bad about Gabríel. I needed to see him. So I called him and told him to meet me at B5 on Bankastraeti.’
‘What did Björn think about that?’
‘He seemed disappointed, but he was a gentleman about it. He insisted on giving me his number.’
‘So then what happened?’
‘So I walked over to Bankastraeti. Got into B5 and waited. Gabríel never came. By this stage I was a bit drunk. Some student began to annoy me. I slapped him. He slapped me. A couple of guys stepped in to protect me. The barman threw the student out.’
‘What was the student’s name?’ Magnus asked, knowing the answer from Árni’s notes.
‘Ísak, I think,’ Harpa said. ‘I can’t remember.’
‘And then?’
‘I got a text from Gabríel. It said something like “Gone swimming. Sorry.