Far North - Michael Ridpath [8]
Perhaps the berserkers were walking through the lava field again.
He hesitated as the fear almost overcame him, but Hallgrímur was brave. He swallowed and wriggled on.
There, on a cushion of moss in a hollow, he saw a man’s bare bottom pumping up and down over a woman, half dressed, her face, surrounded by a pillow of golden hair, tilted directly towards him. She didn’t see him; her eyes were shut and little mewling sounds came from her parted lips.
Mother.
Mother seemed to be in a good mood at dinner that evening. Father had returned from the fell having found the ewe stuck in a gully.
His mother was very fond of her children, or most of them. She was proud of Hallgrímur’s obedient little brother, and of his three sisters, whom she was raising to be hard working, honest and capable women about the farm.
But Hallgrímur. She just didn’t like Hallgrímur.
‘Halli! How did you scratch your knees?’ she demanded.
‘I didn’t scratch them,’ Hallgrímur said. He always denied everything stubbornly. It never worked.
‘Yes you did. That’s blood. And they are dirty.’
Hallgrímur looked down. It was true. ‘Er, I fell coming up the stairs.’
‘You were playing in the lava field, weren’t you? When I specifically told you to do your schoolwork.’
‘No, I swear I wasn’t. I was here all the time.’
‘Do you take me for an idiot?’ His mother raised her voice. ‘Gunnar, will you control your son? Stop him lying to his mother.’
His father didn’t seem to like Hallgrímur much either. But he liked his wife even less, despite her beauty.
‘Leave the boy alone,’ he said.
His mother’s good mood was long gone. ‘To your room, Halli! Right now! And don’t come down until you have finished your homework. Your brother can eat your skyr.’
Hallgrímur stood up and looked mournfully at the dish of skyr and berries he was abandoning. He sauntered towards the hallway and the stairs.
He paused at the door.
‘You are right, Mother. I did go to play in the lava field with Benni.’
He was pleased to see his mother’s cheeks flush.
‘I saw you and Benni’s father,’ he went on. ‘What were you doing?’
‘Out!’ his mother cried. ‘To your room!’
That night, after all the children were in bed with the lamps snuffed out, Hallgrímur heard his father shouting and his mother sobbing.
The little boy fell asleep with a smile on his face.
CHAPTER THREE
Wednesday, 16 September 2009
SERGEANT DETECTIVE MAGNUS Jonson of the Boston Police Department closed his eyes as he slipped into the deliciously warm water. His body tingled after the thirty lengths he had done and the shock of warm water after cold air. It was six degrees Celsius in the outside air, but forty degrees in the geothermally heated tub. Steam hovered a couple of feet above the Olympic sized pool, which was crowded with serious swimmers. It was six o’clock, rush hour in the open-air Laugardalur Baths, as Reykjavík’s men and women gathered after work for a swim and a chat. The fact that they were outside and nearly naked on a cold grey September evening didn’t bother any of them.
‘Ooh, that feels good,’ said the tall, skinny man who slid in beside Magnus. ‘You’re a fast swimmer.’
‘I’ve got to get rid of the energy somehow, Árni,’ Magnus said. ‘And the aggression.’
‘Aggression?’
‘Yeah. I’m not used to sitting around in a classroom all day.’
‘What you mean is you would rather be running around the streets of Boston blasting punks with your three fifty-seven Magnum?’
Magnus glanced at his companion. Despite living in Reykjavík for four months, Magnus was never entirely sure when Icelanders were being serious. It was a particular problem with Árni Holm. He was good at the deadpan irony. On the other hand he occasionally said the most spectacularly stupid things. ‘Something like that, Árni.’
‘I hear your course is pretty good. There’s a waiting list of people to sign up for it. Did you know that?’
‘You should come.’
‘I’m on the list.’
Magnus was teaching a course at the National Police College on urban crime in