Where the Shadows Lie (Fire and Ice)

lowered marginally as she relaxed, as if this was one difficult question she could answer. ‘I went to a party for a friend who was launching an exhibition of her paintings. I was there from about eight until, maybe, eleven-thirty. There were dozens people there who know me. Her name is Frída Jósefsdóttir. I can give you her address and phone number if you want.’
    ‘Please,’ said Vigdís, passing her her notebook. Ingileif scribbled something on a blank page and handed it back.
    ‘And afterwards?’ asked Vigdís.
    ‘Afterwards?’
    ‘After you left the gallery.’
    Ingileif smiled shyly. ‘I went home. With someone.’
    ‘And who would that be?’
    ‘Lárus Thorvaldsson.’
    ‘Is he a regular boyfriend?’
    ‘Not really,’ said Ingileif. ‘He’s a painter: we’ve known each other for years. We just spend the night together sometimes. You know how it is. And no, he’s not married.’
    For once in the conversation, Ingileif seemed completely unembarrassed. So did Vigdís for that matter. She obviously knew how it was.
    Vigdís passed the notebook across again and Ingileif scribbled down Lárus’s details.
    ‘She’s not a very good liar,’ Magnus said when they were back out on the street.
    ‘I knew there was something going on between her and Agnar.’
    ‘But she was convincing that that was all in the past.’
    ‘Possibly,’ said Vigdís. ‘I’ll check her alibi, but I expect it will hold up.’
    ‘There must be some connection with Steve Jubb,’ Magnus said. ‘The name Isildur, or Ísildur is significant, I know it. Did you notice she didn’t seem surprised we were asking about her long-dead brother? And if she saw the Lord of the Rings movie the name Isildur would have jumped out at her. She didn’t mention that connection at all.’
    ‘You mean she was trying to downplay the Ísildur name?’
    ‘Exactly. There’s a connection there she’s not talking about.’
    ‘Shall we bring her in to the station for questioning?’ Vigdís suggested. ‘Perhaps Baldur should see her.’
    ‘Let’s leave it a while. Let her relax, drop her guard. We’ll come back and interview her again in a day or two. It’s easier to find the hole in a story second time around.’
    They checked with the woman who owned the boutique next door. She confirmed she had dropped into Ingileif’s gallery one afternoon earlier that week to borrow some tea bags, although she wasn’t absolutely sure whether it was the Monday or the Tuesday.
    Vigdís drove up the hill past the Hallgrímskirkja. Magnus peered up at a large bronze statue on a plinth in front of the church. The first vestur-íslenskur , Leifur Eiríksson, the Viking who had discovered America a thousand years before. He was staring out over the jumble of brightly coloured buildings in the middle of town to the bay to the west, and on towards the Atlantic.
    ‘Where are you from originally?’ Magnus asked. Although his Icelandic was already improving rapidly, he was finding it tiring, and there was something familiar about sitting in a car with a black partner that tempted him to slip back into English.
    ‘I don’t speak English,’ Vigdís replied, in Icelandic.
    ‘What do you mean you don’t speak English? Every Icelander under the age of forty can speak English.’
    ‘I said I don’t speak English, not I can’t speak it.’
    ‘OK. Then, where are you from?’ Magnus asked again, this time in Icelandic.
    ‘I’m an Icelander,’ Vigdís said. ‘I was born here, I live here, I have never lived anywhere else.’
    ‘Right,’ Magnus said. A touchy subject, clearly. But he had to admit that Vigdís was an incontrovertibly Icelandic name.
    Vigdís sighed. ‘My father was an American serviceman at the Keflavík airbase. I don’t know his name, I’ve never met him, according to my mother he doesn’t even know I exist. Does that satisfy you?’
    ‘I’m sorry,’ said Magnus. ‘I know how difficult it can be to figure out your identity. I still don’t know whether I am an Icelander or an American, and I just get more confused the older I get.’
    ‘Hey, I don’t have a problem with my identity,’ said Vigdís. ‘I know exactly who I am. It’s just other people never believe it.’
    ‘Ah,’ said Magnus. A couple of raindrops fell on the windscreen. ‘Do you think it will rain all day?’
    Vigdís laughed. ‘There you are, you are an Icelander. When in doubt discuss the weather. No, Magnús, I do not think it will rain for