Far North - Michael Ridpath [51]
‘Have you got kids?’ Ingileif asked.
‘A couple. My daughter’s at uni, and my son has just left school. No job – says he can’t get one with the recession, which might be true. But he’s been getting into all kinds of trouble recently. He expects me to get him out of it, but I’ve had enough. I don’t know what I did wrong. He was a good kid until three years ago.’
‘And your husband?’
‘Oh, he can’t control him. He just sits at home now, watching golf on tellie all day.’
‘Is he retired?’ Vigdís asked.
‘He used to work in a bank, in the back office. He never got paid very much, and they made him redundant in March. He’s tried to get another job, but he’s too old, they say. Fifty-one. So it’s all down…’ She blinked and swayed alarmingly. ‘It’s all down to me.’
‘Are the police losing their jobs?’ asked Vigdís, in English. ‘They are in Reykjavík.’
Árni translated into slurred Icelandic.
‘No,’ Sharon said. ‘But they are going to screw us on our pensions, I’m sure of that.’ She blinked. ‘Hang on. You do speak English.’
Vigdís glanced at Magnus and Árni. She giggled. ‘Only when I’m drunk.’
Árni translated into Icelandic faithfully. ‘Wait a minute,’ he said in English, looking perplexed.
‘Why don’t you speak English when you are sober?’ Sharon asked.
‘Because everyone expects me to speak English,’ Vigdís said in a strong Icelandic accent. ‘Because I am black nobody believes I am an Icelander.’
‘I had noticed you look a little different from all these others,’ said Sharon. ‘But I didn’t want to say anything.’
Vigdís smiled. ‘Foreigners are OK. It is the Icelanders that are a problem. Some of them think that it doesn’t matter where you were born, what language you speak, unless your ancestors, all your ancestors, arrived here in a longship a thousand years ago, then you are a foreigner.’
‘Let me guess,’ said Sharon. ‘One of yours didn’t.’
‘My father was an American soldier of some kind at Keflavík air base. I never met him. My mother never talks about him. But because of him people don’t believe that I am who I am.’
‘I believe you are an Icelander, Vigdís,’ Sharon said. ‘A very nice Icelander. And a good copper. That’s important, you know.’
‘Have you ever been to America?’ Ingileif asked. They were all speaking English now.
‘Not yet.’ Vigdís tried and failed to suppress a smile.
Ingileif noticed. ‘But?’
‘I’m going next week. Tuesday. To Nýja Jórvík. New York.’
‘What are you going to see?’ Árni asked.
‘Who are you going to see?’ Ingileif corrected him.
‘A guy,’ Vigdís admitted.
‘Not an American, surely?’ said Magnus.
‘No, an Icelander,’ said Vigdís. Her smile broadened. ‘He’s the brother of an old friend from Keflavík. He works for a TV company. I met him when he was visiting his family here over the summer.’
‘Sounds good,’ said Piper.
‘How are you going to deal with the language issues?’ Magnus asked.
‘She’ll be OK,’ said Árni. ‘As long as she stays drunk all the time, she can speak English.’
‘I’ll have to think about that,’ said Vigdís. ‘You’re right, it’s an important point of principle.’
A phone chirped from somewhere. Everyone glanced at each other, then Sharon reached into her bag. ‘Hello.’
She listened and straightened up. ‘This is DS Piper,’ she said, carefully. Magnus felt sorry for her. It was always tough getting a call from the station when you had had a few.
‘Yes, Charlie is my son… You are holding him for what?… Tooting police station?… He did what to an officer?… Did you call my husband?… The problem is I’m not in the country at the moment, I’m in Iceland… If I were you I would lock him up and throw away the key.’ She hung up.
‘Trouble at home?’ asked Ingileif.
‘Charlie is in trouble again. He thinks he can rely on me to bail him out, literally. But not this time. This time he’s going to get what’s coming to him.’ She leaned back into the bench and closed her eyes.
Her phone rang again. She ignored it. ‘Is she asleep?’ said Ingileif.
Magnus picked up the phone. ‘Hello?’
‘Can I speak to my mum?’ It was a young male voice.
‘She’s kinda busy right now,’ said Magnus, glancing at the woman