"No, there's no sodding sign of any fucking Grétar," Sigurdur Òli said and rang off.
"There's one more thing, Inspector," Elín said, "I just realised it when you talked about him being related to Audur. I can see now that I was right. I didn't understand it then, but there was another look on his face that I thought I'd never see again. It was a face from the past that I've never forgotten."
"What was it?" Erlendur said.
"That was why I didn't feel scared of him. I didn't realise at first. He reminded me of Audur too. There was something about him that reminded me of Audur."
29
Sigurdur Òli returned his mobile phone to the holder on his belt and walked back to the house. He'd been inside with several other policemen when the pneumatic drill penetrated the base plate and the stench that came out was so overpowering that he retched. He rushed for the door like everyone else inside and thought he would vomit before he made it out into the fresh air. When they went back in they wore goggles and masks over their mouths, but the horrendous smell still penetrated them.
The drill operator widened the hole over the broken sewage pipe. It was easy going once he was through the floor. Sigurdur Òli dreaded to think how long ago the pipe had been broken. It looked as if waste had been collecting in a large area under the floor. There was a faintly discernable steam rising up from the hole. He shone a torch down at the patch of filth and from what he could see the ground had subsided by at least half a yard from the base plate.
The patch of filth was like a thick, swarming trunk of little black bugs. He jumped back when he saw some kind of creature dart past the beam of light.
"Watch out!" he shouted and strode out of the basement. "There are rats under that bloody thing. Close up the hole and call in pest control. Let's stop here. Stop everything this minute!"
No-one objected. One of the forensic team spread a plastic sheet over the hole in the floor and the basement was empty in a flash. Sigurdur Òli tore off his mask when he came out of the basement and voraciously gulped down the fresh air. They all did.
On his way home from Keflavík, Erlendur heard about the progress of the investigation in Nordurmýri. A pest-control officer had been called out, but the police would take no further action until the following morning when everything that was living in the foundations had been exterminated. Sigurdur Òli had gone home and was getting out of the shower when Erlendur called him for an update. Elínborg had gone home too. A guard was mounted outside Holberg's flat while the pest-control officer did his work. Two police cars stood outside the house all night.
Eva Lind met her father at the door when he got home. It was past 9 p.m. The bride had left. Before she went she had told Eva Lind she was going to talk to her husband and find out how he was feeling. She wasn't sure whether she would tell him the real reason for running out of their wedding. Eva Lind urged her to, said she shouldn't cover up for that bastard of a father of hers. The last thing she should do was cover up for him.
They sat down in the sitting room. Erlendur told Eva Lind all about the murder investigation, where it had led him and what was going through his mind. He did so not least to gain some kind of understanding of the case for his own benefit, a clearer picture of what had been happening over the past few days. He told her almost everything, from the moment they found Holberg's body in the basement, the smell in his flat, the note, the old photograph in the drawer, the pornography on his computer, the epitaph on the gravestone, Kolbrún and her sister, Elín, Audur and her unexplained death, the dreams that haunted him, Ellidi in prison and Grétar's disappearance, Marion Briem, the search for Holberg's other victim and the man in front of Elín's house, conceivably Holberg's son. He tried to give a systematic account and discussed with himself various theories and questions, until he reached a dead end and stopped talking.