Sun on Fire (8 page)

“Good idea,” Fischer said. “The Mövenpick restaurant in the Europa Center does an excellent schnitzel. The place is very easy to find. There’s a great view from the window tables over the square and the Kurfürstendamm.”

Gunnar escorted Fischer down to the embassy’s entrance lobby, where they parted.

“Let me know when you’ve found the killer,” Fischer said as they shook hands.

“Sure thing,” said Gunnar. He closed the door after Fischer and turned to Birkir, who was just coming down the stairs. It was time to compare notes on what they’d learned so far.

17:10

From Arngrímur, Birkir had gotten Anton’s traveling companion’s name and cell phone number, and after the briefing with Gunnar he called the number. The man answered instantly, and they set up a meeting. Birkir got the embassy driver to take him to the hotel where the guy was staying. It wasn’t far from the embassy, but in the heavy afternoon traffic the trip took ten minutes, with most of that time spent waiting at stoplights.

Entering the lobby, Birkir called the number again and said, “This is Birkir Li Hinriksson. I’m at the hotel.”

“I see you,” came the reply.

A stocky, muscular man in his thirties got up from a sofa in the hotel bar and walked over.

“You’re from the Icelandic detective division?” he asked, his deep voice betraying slight surprise. His head was clean-shaven, his features stern.

“Yes, I am,” Birkir replied and introduced himself again.

“Hi, I’m Búi Rútsson,” the other said, and looked searchingly at Birkir. “China?” he asked.

“Vietnam,” Birkir replied.

“But of Chinese origin?”

“Probably.”

“Aha.”

Birkir asked, “Do you have a key to Anton’s room?”

“Yeah, we got adjoining rooms. I’ve a key to the connecting door.”

“Let’s go up, then. When we’re done here, I’ll take Anton’s luggage with me.”

“OK.”

Búi led the way to an elevator and pressed the button. On arrival at the fourth floor, they walked along a long corridor and stopped at one of the doors, which Búi opened with his key card. They entered a luxurious hotel room, where Búi opened the connecting door and led them through to another.

“This is Anton’s room,” Búi said.

An open suitcase containing clothing lay on the made-up bed. Next to it was a briefcase, also open, full of papers.

Búi said, “I’ve already packed. I’m just about to leave, so I’m glad you’re going to deal with Anton’s belongings. That means I don’t have to take them with me.”

Birkir gestured toward two armchairs next to a low table, and they sat down. Birkir fished his voice recorder out of a pocket and switched it on. “What was your connection to Anton Eiríksson?” he asked, after dictating the usual preliminaries into the machine.

“I was an employee of his.”

“What was your job?”

“Bodyguard.”

“Nothing else?”

Búi hesitated before replying, “Taking responsibility for the security of a businessman who travels as widely as Anton is more than enough of a job for one person.”

Birkir frowned. “No other tasks?”

Búi shrugged. “Occasionally, if the hotel we were staying at had satisfactory security arrangements. Then, if Anton was busy, I would take his calls for him. Sometimes I booked flights and hotels. Dealt with hotel staff. Had clothes washed and dry-cleaned. Practical matters that need taking care of on long trips.
Other than that, I was on twenty-four hour duty when he was on business trips.”

“Did Anton consider himself to be in danger?”

“He traveled widely and visited places that were not safe.”

“Where is his home?”

“In England. He rents a furnished apartment in London.”

Búi took a business card from his pocket and handed it to Birkir. “Here. His company is registered at the same address.”

Birkir got up and went over to the bed. He examined the briefcase’s contents. On a chain fastened to the bottom of the case was a key ring containing a number of keys.

“Did he also have a home in Iceland?” Birkir asked.

“I don’t think so. I never accompanied him to Iceland. He always gave me time off when he went there. I think he probably stayed in a hotel when he was in Reykjavík.”

“Where do you live?”

“I have an apartment in Spain where I go when I’m not working. I have a flight booked to Barcelona tomorrow. I’m probably looking at a long vacation.”

“Do you have a key to Anton’s London apartment?”

“Yes.”

Birkir held out his hand. “I’m going to have to ask you to hand that key over to me.”

Búi reached into his jacket pocket for his key ring. “I have some clothes and other personal belongings there, but I can get them later,” he said, detaching a key and handing it to Birkir.

“When did you start working for Anton?” Birkir asked.

“Three years ago.”

“What did you do before that?”

“I was in the Reykjavík police force for two years, and then I went to a bodyguard-training school in America. After that I
worked for a firm that provides security personnel all over the world. Then Anton offered me a permanent position. It was an improvement over Iraq and Afghanistan.”

“Do you know of anyone who might have wanted to harm Anton?”

Búi shrugged. “He was a tricky devil and treated many people he had dealings with badly, but I didn’t think there was anyone who might tail him here to Berlin. Maybe that was a bad call.”

“You said you were with him twenty-four hours a day when he was traveling. Why weren’t you with him Sunday evening?”

Búi hesitated. He obviously found the question uncomfortable. “I sometimes get time off when Anton is visiting a secure house,” he said. “We assumed that the embassy was safe. That was obviously a mistake. Bad for my résumé.”

“So what did you do on Sunday?”

“I accompanied Anton to the embassy in a cab. I had the cab wait while I escorted him inside, and I left him at the front desk.”

“What did you do after that?”

“I visited a brothel.”

Búi’s frankness surprised Birkir. “Can anyone verify that?” he asked.

Búi grinned coldly. “I have no idea where I went. I just told the cab driver what I was looking for and he drove me someplace. When I had finished my business, I had the doorman call me a cab, and I went back to the hotel. Finding the place could be tough—I didn’t pay any attention to where we went.”

“Who knew that Anton was planning to go to the embassy?”

“Nobody knew. It was a spontaneous thing.”

“What do you mean?”

“We arrived in Berlin from Jakarta late Saturday night and planned to fly to Hamburg at two o’clock on Sunday. At eleven
o’clock on Sunday morning we got a message that the Hamburg meeting had been called off. Anton asked me to cancel the flight, and then spent the next few hours fielding phone calls. Then he had the idea of inviting the ambassador out to dinner that evening. Konrad usually does whatever Anton wants, but he happened to be busy at the embassy and suggested that Anton go there. That was when Anton decided to go to the embassy, and we booked the taxi.”

“So nobody knew that he was here in Berlin?”

“I don’t think so. Anton was in the habit of keeping his travel plans secret. Sometimes even I didn’t know where we were going until we booked the flight.”

“What did Anton plan to do on Monday?”

“Fly to the next meeting. Paris or London, I think. Either he hadn’t decided or he didn’t tell me.”

“Would Anton have gone with the ambassador to a restaurant alone?”

“No, he would have called me and I would have escorted them. I keep my cell phone switched on even when I’m not on call. Some of the better restaurants here in the city are used to their guests being escorted by their bodyguards. They have places that are easy to monitor. The headwaiters are paid well for taking care of that.”

“Do you pack a weapon on the job?”

“That’s a professional secret, but I do have certain licenses.”

“Does Anton have family in Iceland?”

“No. His parents are dead, he has no siblings, and he had nothing good to say about his other relatives. He has a will made out.”

“Will you inherit anything?”

Búi grinned. “No. Anton made it perfectly clear to me that I wouldn’t get as much as a cent if he got killed. He said that I might become less focused on the job if I was expecting an inheritance.”

“Was he right?”

“Who knows?”

“Do you know who benefits from Anton’s will?”

Búi shrugged. “He mentioned once or twice that his assets were to go to Indonesian orphans.”

“That was kind of him,” Birkir said warily.

Búi gave a dull smile and said, “You could say that Anton was fond of children.”

“We know Anton was a pedophile. Where did he buy access to juveniles?”

Birkir asked this as though it was a natural progression from what had been said before, and for a moment Búi seemed to be about to answer, but then he suddenly froze.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You can answer this. The guy is dead. You have no more confidentiality obligations toward him.”

Búi remained silent.

“Maybe you’re one, too?” Birkir asked. “Do we need to look into that?”

“I only buy adult women who know what they’re doing. That’s all I’m interested in. Prostitution is a legal profession here in Berlin.”

“That may well be true. But do you think it’s possible that Anton’s compulsion has anything to do with how he died?”

Búi shook his head. “I don’t have any idea what you’re talking about. This conversation is over.” He got up and went through to the other room, closing and locking the door.

17:15

Back in the Icelandic embassy, the focus was on the fourth floor—specifically the hallway, the washroom, and the ambassador’s office—and on the stairs down to the third floor, along with the elevator cab. The German CSI specialists went straight to work, dusting fingerprint powder on all surfaces that might have been touched—dark powder on light surfaces, light powder on dark surfaces. They photographed all the prints they found, and then lifted them with clear tape and stuck them to index cards. They checked all surfaces with a UV lamp to highlight any possible bloodstains. They methodically vacuumed all the floors and furniture to recover any loose material, using specialized filters they systematically filed away into labeled boxes.

The ambassador had confirmed that all the guests had visited the top floor at some point during the evening. Their fingerprints wouldn’t prove or disprove anything specific, but it might be possible to use their location and appearance to piece together a chain of events. Most prints would, however, probably belong to embassy staff or other visitors, making it difficult to create an overall picture. But they wouldn’t get a second chance, so it was vital to be painstaking in this forensic investigation. They would figure out later whether the evidence they’d collected was of any use.

Anna’s job was relatively cushy. She oversaw the Germans’ work, initialed all the sample labels, and regularly went out for a smoke.

The ambassador’s office was of primary interest. The large office chair had been displaced when the body was removed, but
there were white chalk marks on the floor indicating the chair’s position when the body was discovered. Chalk marks also showed where the victim’s feet had rested on the pale parquet. A brown crust indicated the outlines of a pool of blood; the people who’d removed the body had scraped up all the parts that had spilled out, but they had, correctly, not cleaned the floor. A labeled white paper bag lay on the desk. It contained a large cigar that had been lit but only partly smoked. Also on the desk was a telephone, its receiver dangling toward the floor.

The head of the forensic team checked the desk and chair meticulously. He found a variety of fingerprint sets, but finally concentrated on a very particular handprint on the edge of the desk, facing the chair. He demonstrated to Anna how someone might have stood at one end of the desk and supported himself on this edge while lunging at the guy in the chair with his right hand. His colleague photographed him in that position. The handprint they got off the table was very clear—good enough for comparison.

At the other end of the room there were a sofa and two chairs with a low table between them. On the table stood two large candlesticks, at least fifty centimeters tall, Anna estimated. The candle in one of them had burned down a long way before being extinguished. The other candle had been lit but snuffed out soon after—its wick was black but the wax was hardly melted.

Anna watched the forensic specialist dust powder onto the candlesticks with a soft brush. Some coins on the table attracted her attention, along with fragments of white material that looked more like plaster of paris than fired clay. The German pointed at them, and she nodded. He carefully picked the coins up with pliers and put them into a paper envelope. He wrote something
on the envelope with a marker, and Anna added her initials, “AT.” The plaster bits went into another envelope.

The glaze on the candlesticks was covered in a mass of handprints, but the technician had trouble finding anything recoverable. In the end he shrugged at Anna, and she nodded. This would be of no use and was of doubtful relevance.

With a gloved hand she grasped the candlestick with the burned-down candle and carefully lifted it up. Looking at its underside, she could see that the initials “HK” had been scratched, in large, crude letters, on its plaster-like filling.

“Hello,” she said, to attract the attention of the German, who’d turned to other things. When he looked toward her, she gestured with her free hand as if taking a photograph. The man nodded, and took a few pictures of the candlestick as Anna turned it this way and that. Finally she placed it back onto the table and picked up the other one. When she looked underneath it, she saw that the plaster filling had been broken and that there was a large internal cavity inside the candlestick.

“That’s interesting,” she said.

“Bitte?”

Anna smiled and shook her head. She pointed at a measuring tape in the technician’s bag, and put her finger into the hole in the bottom of the candlestick.