Tainted Blood (18 page)

At around 11.00 that same night, the policemen on duty in front of Katrín's house watched her husband leave, slam the door behind him, storm into his car and drive off. He seemed to be in a tearing rush and they noticed he was carrying the same suitcase as when he arrived home earlier that day. The policemen saw no further movement during the night and there was no sign of Katrín. A police patrol car was called to the neighbourhood and followed Albert to Hotel Esja where he checked in for the night.

Erlendur turned up outside Katrín's house at eight o'clock the following morning. Elínborg was with him. It was still raining. The sun hadn't come out for days. They rang the bell three times before they heard a rustling inside and the door opened. Katrín appeared in the doorway. Elínborg noticed she was wearing the same clothes as on the day before and she had clearly been crying. Her face was drawn and her eyes were red and swollen.

"Sorry," Katrín said as if in a daze, "I must have fallen asleep in the chair. What's the time?"

"May we come in?" Erlendur said.

"I never told Albert what happened," she said and went inside, without inviting them in. Erlendur and Elínborg exchanged glances and followed her.

"He walked out on me last night," Katrín said. "What's the time anyway? I think I must have fallen asleep in the chair. Albert was so angry. I've never seen him that angry."

"Can you contact some of your family?" Elínborg asked. "Someone who can come and stay with you? Your sons?"

"No, Albert will come back and everything will be all right. I don't want to disturb the boys. It'll be all right. Albert will come back."

"Why was he so angry?" Erlendur asked. Katrín had sat down on the sofa in the sitting room, Erlendur and Elínborg sat down opposite her just as before.

"He was furious, Albert was. And he's generally so calm. Albert's a good man, such a good man, and he's always been so good to me. It's a good marriage. We've always been happy."

"Maybe you want us to come back later," Elínborg said. Erlendur glared at her.

"No," Katrín said, "it's all right. It'll be all right. Albert will come back. He just needs to get over it. My God, how difficult this is. I should have told him straightaway, he said. He couldn't understand how I could keep quiet about it all that time. He shouted at me."

Katrín looked at them.

"He's never shouted at me before."

"Can I get you some help? Shall I call your doctor?" Elínborg said and stood up. Erlendur looked at her in bewilderment.

"No, it's all right," Katrín said. "That's not necessary. I'm just a bit sleepy-headed. It'll be all right. Sit down, dear. Everything will be all right."

"What was it you told your husband?" Erlendur asked. "Did you tell him about the rape?"

"I'd wanted to all these years, but I never had the guts to. I've never told anyone about that incident. I tried to forget it, pretend it had never happened. It's often been difficult, but I've managed, somehow. Then you came and I found myself telling you everything. Somehow I felt better. It was like you'd relieved me of a great burden. I knew I could finally talk openly and that was the only right thing to do. Even after all this time."

Katrín stopped talking.

"Did he get angry with you because you hadn't told him about the rape?" Erlendur asked.

"Yes."

"Didn't he understand your point of view?" Elínborg asked.

"He said I should have told him about it straightaway. That's understandable, of course. He said he'd always been honest with me and he didn't deserve this."

"But I don't quite understand," Erlendur said. "Albert sounds like a better person than that. I'd have thought he'd try to comfort you instead and stand by you, not storm out through the door."

"I know," Katrín said. "Maybe I didn't tell him about it in the right way."

"The right way," Elínborg said, not even trying to conceal her disbelief. "How can you tell anyone about that sort of thing in the right way?"

Katrín shook her head.

"I don't know. I swear, I don't know."

"Did you tell him the whole truth?" Erlendur asked.

"I told him what I told you."

"And nothing else?"

"No," Katrín said.

"Only about the rape?"

"Only," Katrín repeated. "Only! As if that's not enough. As if it's not enough for him to hear that I'd been raped and never told him about it. Isn't that enough?"

They all fell silent.

"Didn't you tell him about your youngest son?" Erlendur asked eventually.

Katrín suddenly looked daggers at him.

"What about our youngest son?" she said, spitting out the words.

"You named him Einar," said Erlendur, who had looked through the details Elínborg had collected about the family the day before.

"What about Einar?"

Erlendur looked at her.

"What about Einar?" she repeated.

"He's your son," Erlendur said. "But he's not his father's son."

"What are you talking about? Not his father's son? Of course he's his father's son! Who isn't his father's son?"

"Sorry, I'm not being precise enough. He isn't the son of the father he thought was his," Erlendur said calmly. "He's the son of the man who raped you. Holberg's son. Did you tell your husband that? Was that why he left as he did?"

Katrín stayed silent.

"Did you tell him the whole truth?"

Katrín looked at Erlendur. He sensed she was preparing to resist. A few moments passed and then he saw how her lips gave in. Her shoulders sank, she closed her eyes, she half collapsed in the chair and burst into tears. Elínborg glared at Erlendur but he just watched Katrín in the chair and gave her time to collect herself.

"Did you tell him about Einar?" he asked again when he thought she had managed to pull herself together.

"He didn't believe it," she said.

"That Einar wasn't his son?" Erlendur said.

"They're particularly close, Einar and Albert, they always have been. Ever since he was born. Albert loves his other two sons as well, of course, but especially Einar. Right from the start. He's the youngest child and Albert's pampered him."

Katrín paused.

"Maybe that's why I never said anything. I knew Albert wouldn't be able to stand it. The years went by and I pretended there was nothing amiss. Never said a thing. And it worked. Holberg had left a wound and why not let it heal in peace? Why should he be able to destroy our future together? To ignore it was my way of dealing with the horror."

"Did you know at once that Einar was Holberg's son?" Elínborg asked.

"He could well have been Albert's son."

Katrín fell silent again.

"But you saw it in his face," Erlendur said.

Katrín looked at him.

"How do you know all this?"

"He looks like Holberg, doesn't he?" Erlendur said. "Holberg as a young man. A woman saw him in Keflavík and thought it was Holberg himself."

"There's a certain resemblance between them."

"If you never told your son anything and your husband didn't know about Einar, why this big showdown now between you and Albert? What started it?"

"What woman in Keflavík?" Katrín said. "What woman who lives in Keflavík knows Holberg? Did he live with a woman there?"

"No," Erlendur said, wondering whether he ought to tell her about Kolbrún and Audur. She'd hear about them sooner or later and he couldn't see any valid reason for Katrín not to learn the truth now. He'd already told her about the rape in Keflavík, but now he named Holberg's victim and told her about Audur, who died young after a serious and difficult illness. He told her how they'd found the photograph of the gravestone in Holberg's desk and how it had led them to Keflavík and to Elín, and he told of the treatment Kolbrún had been given when she tried to press charges.

Katrín took in every word of the account. Tears welled up in her eyes when Erlendur told her about Audur's death. He also told her about Grétar, the man with the camera, whom she'd seen with Holberg, and how he vanished without trace, but had been found underneath the concrete floor of Holberg's basement flat.

"Is that all the fuss in Nordurmýri that's been in the news?" Katrín said.

Erlendur nodded.

"I didn't know Holberg raped any other women. I thought I was the only one."

"We know only about you two," Erlendur said. "There could be others. We can't be sure we will ever know."

"So Audur was Einar's half-sister," Katrín said, deep in thought. "The poor child."

"Are you sure you didn't know about this?" Erlendur asked.

"Of course I'm sure," she said. "I didn't have the faintest idea about it."

"Einar knows about her," Erlendur said. "He tracked down Elín in Keflavík."

Katrín didn't answer. He decided to try a different question.

"If your son didn't know anything and you never told your husband about the rape, how has Einar suddenly found out the truth now?"

"I don't know," Katrin said. "Tell me, how did the poor girl die?"

"You know your son is suspected of Holberg's murder," Erlendur said, not answering her. He tried to phrase what he had to say as carefully as he could. He thought Katrín was astonishingly calm, as if it didn't surprise her that her son was suspected of murder.

"My son's no murderer," she said softly. "He could never kill anyone."

"There's a strong probability that he hit Holberg over the head. Maybe he didn't intend to murder him. He probably did it in a fit of rage. He left a message for us. It said: I am him. Do you understand what that means?"

Katrín said nothing.

"Did he know Holberg was his father? Did he know what Holberg did to you? Did he know about Audur and Elín? How?"

Katrin stared into her lap.

"Where's your son now?" Elínborg asked.

"I don't know," Katrín said quietly. "I haven't heard from him for several days."

She looked at Erlendur.

"Suddenly he found out about Holberg. He knew something wasn't right. He found it out at work. He said we couldn't hide any secrets these days. He said it was all in the database."

Erlendur looked at Katrín.

"Is that how he got the information about his real father?" he asked.

"He discovered that he couldn't be Albert's son," Katrín said in a low voice.

"How?" Erlendur asked. "What was he looking for? Why was he looking himself up in the data-base? Was it a coincidence?"

"No," Katrín said. "It wasn't a coincidence."

Elínborg had had enough. She wanted to stop the questioning and give Katrín a break. She stood up saying she needed to fetch a glass of water and gestured to Erlendur to come with her. He followed her into the kitchen. Elínborg told him she thought the woman had been through enough for the time being and that they should leave her alone and tell her to consult a lawyer before she said anything else. They ought to save further questioning until later in the day, talk to her family and ask someone to stay with her and help her. Erlendur pointed out that Katrín hadn't been arrested, wasn't suspected of anything, that this wasn't a formal interrogation, just collecting information, and that Katrín was very cooperative at the moment. They ought to continue.

Elínborg shook her head.

"Strike while the iron's hot," Erlendur said.

"What a thing to say!" Elínborg hissed.

Katrín appeared at the kitchen door and asked if they should continue. She was ready to tell them the truth and not conceal anything this time.

"I want to get it over with," she said.

Elínborg asked whether she wanted to contact a lawyer, but Katrín said no. She said she didn't know any lawyers and had never had occasion to consult one. Didn't know how to go about it.

Elínborg looked accusingly at Erlendur. He asked Katrín to continue. When they had all sat down Katrín resumed her story. She wrung her hands and sadly began her story.

*

Albert was going abroad that morning. They got up very early. She made coffee for them both. They talked yet again about selling the house and buying somewhere smaller. They'd often talked about this, but had never got round to it. Maybe it seemed like too big a step, as if underlining how old they were. They didn't feel old, but it seemed an increasingly pressing matter for them to buy a smaller place. Albert said he would talk to an estate agent when he came back, and then he left in his Cherokee.

She went back to bed. She didn't have to go to work for two hours, but she couldn't get back to sleep. She lay there tossing and turning until eight o'clock. Then she got up. She was in the kitchen when she heard Einar come in. He had a key to the house.

She could tell at once that he was upset but she didn't know why. He said he'd been up all night. Paced the sitting room and went into the kitchen but refused to sit down.

"I knew there was something that didn't fit," he said, and gave his mother an angry look. "I knew it all the time!"

She couldn't understand what he was angry about.

"I knew something didn't bloody fit," he repeated almost shouting.

"What are you talking about, love," she said, unaware of why he was angry. "What doesn't fit?"

"I cracked the code," he said. "I broke the rules to crack the code. I wanted to see how the disease is passed on through families – and it
is
passed on through families, I can tell you that. It's in several families, but it's not in our family. Not in Dad's family and not in yours. That's why it doesn't fit. Do you understand? Do you understand what I'm saying?"

*

Erlendur's mobile phone rang in his coat pocket and he asked Katrín to excuse him. He went into the kitchen to answer it. It was Sigurdur Óli.

"The old girl from Keflavík's looking for you," he said, without introducing himself.

"The old girl? Do you mean Elín?"

"Yes, Elín."

"Did you talk to her?"

"Yes," Sigurdur Óli said. "She said she needed to talk to you straightaway."

"Do you know what she wants?"

"She flatly refused to tell me. How are you doing?"

"Did you give her my mobile number?"

"No."

"If she calls again give her my number," Erlendur said and hung up. Katrín and Elínborg were waiting for him in the sitting room.

"Sorry," he said to Katrín. She continued her story.

*

Einar paced the sitting room. Katrín tried to calm him down and work out what had made her son so upset. She sat down and asked him to sit beside her, but he wouldn't listen. Walked back and forth in front of her. She knew he'd been having problems for a long time and that the separation didn't help. His wife had left him. She wanted a fresh start. She didn't want to be overwhelmed by his sorrow.

"Tell me what's wrong," she said.

"So much, Mum, just so much."

And then came the question she'd been waiting for all these years.

"Who's my dad?" her son asked and stopped in front of her. "Who's my real father?"

She looked at him.

"We haven't got any secrets any more, Mum," he said.

"What have you found out?" she asked. "What have you been up to?"

"I know who isn't my father," he said, "and that's Dad." He roared with laughter. "Did you hear that? Dad isn't my dad! And if he isn't my dad, who am I then? Where did I come from? My brothers. Suddenly they're just half-brothers. Why haven't you ever told me anything? Why have you lied to me all this time? Why? Why?"

She stared at him and her eyes filled with tears.

"Did you cheat on Dad?" he asked. "You can tell me. I won't tell anyone. Did you cheat on him? No-one need know except the two of us but I have to hear it from you. You have to tell me the truth. Where do I come from? How was I made?"

He stopped talking.

"Am I adopted? An orphan? What am I? Who am I? Mum?"

Katrín burst into tears with heavy sobs. He stared at her, just beginning to calm down, while she wept on the sofa. It took him some time to register how much his words had upset her. Eventually he sat down and put his arm around her. They sat for a while in silence until she started to tell him about the night in Húsavík when his father was at sea. She was out with her girlfriends and met some men, including Holberg, who burst into her house. He listened to her story without interruption.

She told him how Holberg had raped her and threatened her and she'd decided for herself to have the baby and never tell anyone what had happened. Not his father and not him. And that had been fine. They'd lived a happy life. She hadn't allowed Holberg to rob her of her happiness. He hadn't managed to kill her family.

She told him that, though he was the son of the man who raped her, that didn't prevent her from loving him as much as her other two sons and she knew Albert was particularly fond of him. So Einar had never suffered for what Holberg did. Never.

It took him a few minutes to digest what she'd said.

"Sorry," he said at last. "I didn't mean to get angry with you. I thought you'd been cheating and that's where I came from. I had no idea about the rape."

"Of course not," she said. "How could you have known? I've never told anyone until now."

"I should have seen that possibility too," he said. "There was another possibility, but I didn't consider it. Sorry. You must have felt terrible all these years."

"You shouldn't think about that," she said. "You shouldn't suffer for what that man did."

"I've already suffered for it, Mum," he said. "Endless torment. And not just me. Why didn't you have an abortion? What stopped you?"

"Oh Lord, God, don't say that, Einar. Never talk like that."

*

Katrín stopped.

"Didn't you ever consider an abortion?" Elínborg asked.

"All the time. Always. Until it was too late. I thought about it every day after I found out I was pregnant. Anyway, the child could well have been Albert's. That probably made all the difference. And then I got depressed after the birth. Postnatal depression, isn't it? I was sent for psychiatric treatment. After three months I was well enough again to look after the boy and I've loved him ever since."

Erlendur waited a moment before he continued his questioning.

"Why did your son start looking up genetic diseases in the Research Centre's database?" he asked eventually.

Katrín looked at him.

"How did that girl from Keflavík die?" she asked.

"Of a brain tumour," Erlendur said. "The disease is called neurofibromatosis."

Katrín's eyes filled with tears and she heaved a deep sigh.

"Didn't you know?" she said.

"Didn't I know what?"

"Our little love died three years ago," Katrín said. "For no reason. Absolutely no reason."

"Your little love?" Erlendur said.

"Our little sweetheart," she said. "Einar's daughter. She died. The poor, sweet child."