Reykjavik Nights Read Online Free PDF Page B

possible that she had never intended to go in that day, that she had met up with some unknown person, with disastrous consequences, or had, alternatively, been bent on taking her own life in such a manner that her body was never found. She had not, as far as anyone was aware, had a boyfriend or gone out on dates or kept some relationship secret from her parents. And she had always been conscientious about her attendance. Could she have killed herself? There was no hint of any personal problems that could have pushed her to the brink of despair; on the contrary, she was popular and outgoing. But, then again, she had vanished during the blackest months of winter, and the darkness could take its toll on people’s mental health, so suicide could not be entirely ruled out. Indeed, the fact that her body never turned up suggested that it may have been swallowed without trace by the sea.
    Erlendur had traced the girl’s route to school on foot, though much had changed in the intervening years; the Nissen huts were long gone and new buildings had risen in their place. On another occasion he had caught the bus to Fríkirkjuvegur. He had also stood in front of her old home in the west of town. She had been an only child. He saw the garden where she had played, the door she had walked through. He lingered only briefly, no more than a minute or two, but it had been long enough for his eyes to drink in the sadness.
    The fate of the Thórskaffi woman was shrouded in the same mystery. Admittedly her friends had voiced suspicions of depression, though the woman had never confided in anyone, and unhappiness in her marriage. Her husband had flatly denied this, however, while conceding that he had been aware of mood swings and maybe low spirits. He had reported his wife missing early on Monday morning, by which point he had not heard from her since Saturday evening when she had gone out with friends from the estate agency where she worked. When she did not return home the following day, he had rung round her colleagues, but it was no use: some had only the haziest recollection of how the evening had ended.
    They had gone out for dinner at Naustid to celebrate the firm’s fifth anniversary. Spouses were not invited and in their absence everyone had let their hair down and consumed copious amounts of alcohol. They had stayed at the restaurant until late, then someone had suggested moving on to Thórskaffi, a busy nightclub where a popular band was playing. Once there, the group had gradually dispersed, either calling it a night or running into other friends. No one had noticed when or with whom the woman had left. The last person she was known to have talked to was the oldest employee of the firm, a receptionist in her fifties. The receptionist had offered to share a taxi but she had said no thanks; she was going to stay on a bit longer and would probably walk home as it would do her good to clear her head. She lived in the new neighbourhood at the western end of the Fossvogur valley but said she didn’t mind the distance.
    Later, when interviewed by the police, none of the other customers at Thórskaffi could recall much about the missing woman. Her colleagues had seen her chatting to a handful of other people, and two of these had come forward when the search was at its height. One was an old college friend who had been there with his wife. To them she had not appeared drunk, merely in high spirits, as they reminisced about their school days. The other witness was a woman she had known since her teens. A little later this friend had observed her talking to a man she did not recognise and could only describe in the vaguest terms since it had been dark in the club.
    The search had yielded no results. The woman had simply vanished into thin air and the subsequent investigation had uncovered little that might explain her fate, apart from the detail that three years previously she had cheated on her husband. The circumstances