Voices (24 page)

She missed her mother. One of the last things her mother said to her in hospital was that now she would need to look after her father and brother. She must not let them down. 'Promise me that,' her mother said. 'It won't always be easy. It hasn't always been easy. Your father can be so stubborn and strict and I don't know whether Gudlaugur can take it. But if it ever comes to that you must stand with him, Gudlaugur, promise me that too,' her mother said, and she nodded and promised that too. And they held hands until her mother fell asleep, and then she stroked her hair and kissed her on the forehead.

Two days later she was dead.

'We'll let Gudlaugur sleep a little bit longer,' her father said when he came down into the kitchen. 'It's an important day for him.'

An important day for him.

She did not recall any day being important for her. Everything revolved around him. His singing. The recording sessions. The two records that had been released. The invitation to tour Scandinavia. The concerts in Hafnarfjördur. The concert tonight. His voice. His singing practice when she had to sneak around the house so as not to disturb them as he stood by the piano and his father played the accompaniment, instructing and encouraging him and showing him love and understanding if he felt he did well, but being strict and firm if he did not think he concentrated enough. Sometimes he lost his temper and scolded him. Sometimes he hugged him and said he was wonderful.

If only she had received a fraction of the attention lavished on him and the encouragement that he was given every day for having that beautiful voice. She felt unimportant, devoid of any talent that could attract her father's attention. He sometimes said it was a shame that she did not have a voice. He regarded teaching her to sing as a hopeless task, but she knew that wasn't the case. She knew that he could not be bothered to expend his energy on her, because she did not have a special voice. She lacked her brother's gift. She could sing in a choir and hammer out a tune on the piano, but both her father, and the piano teacher he sent her to because he did not have the time to attend to her himself, talked about her lack of musical talent

Her brother, on the other hand, had a wonderful voice and a profound feeling for music, but was still just a normal boy like she was a normal girl. She did not know what it was that distinguished them from each other. He was no different from her. To some extent she was in charge of his upbringing, especially after their mother fell ill. He obeyed her, did what she told him and respected her. Similarly, she loved him, but also felt jealous of the praise he earned. She was afraid of that feeling and mentioned it to no one.

She heard Gudlaugur coming down the stairs, and then he appeared in the kitchen and sat down beside their father.

'Just like Mum,' he said as he watched his sister pour coffee into their father's cup.

He often talked about their mother and she knew he missed her terribly. He had turned to her when something went wrong, when the boys bullied him or their father lost his temper, or simply when he needed someone to hold him without it being a special reward for a good performance.

Expectation and excitement reigned in the house all day and had reached an almost unbearable pitch when towards evening they put on their best clothes and set off for the cinema. The two of them accompanied Gudlaugur backstage, their father greeted the choirmaster, and then they crept out into the auditorium as it began to fill up. The lights in the auditorium dimmed. The curtain rose. Quite big for his age, handsome and peculiarly determined as he stood on stage, Gudlaugur finally began to sing in his melancholy boy soprano.

She held her breath and closed her eyes.

The next thing she knew was her father grabbing her by the arm so tightly that it hurt, and hearing him moan: 'Oh my God!'

She opened her eyes and saw her father's face, pale as death, and when she looked up at the stage she saw Gudlaugur trying to sing, but something had happened to his voice. It was like yodelling. She rose to her feet, looked all around the auditorium behind her and saw that people had started to smile and some were laughing. She ran up onto the stage to her brother and tried to lead him away. The choirmaster came to her assistance and eventually they managed to take him backstage. She saw her father standing rigid in the front row, staring up at her like the god of thunder.

When she lay in bed that evening and thought back to that terrible moment her heart missed a beat, not from fear or horror at what had happened or how her brother must have felt, but from a mysterious glee for which she had no explanation and which she repressed like an evil crime.

*

'Did you have a guilty conscience about those thoughts?' Erlendur asked.

'They were completely alien to me,' Stefanía said. 'I'd never thought anything like that before.'

'I don't suppose there's anything abnormal about gloating over other people's misfortunes,' Erlendur said. 'Even people close to us. It may be an instinct, a kind of defence mechanism for dealing with shock.'

'I shouldn't be telling you this in such detail,' Stefanía said. 'It doesn't paint a very appealing picture of me. And you may be right. We all suffered shock. An enormous shock, as you can imagine.'

'What was their relationship like after this happened?' Erlendur asked. 'Gudlaugur and his father.'

Stefanía ignored his question.

'Do you know what it's like not to be the favourite?' she asked instead. 'What it's like just being ordinary and never earning any particular attention. It's like you don't exist. You're taken for granted, not favoured or shown any special care. And all the time someone you consider your equal is championed like the chosen one, born to bring infinite joy to his parents and the whole world. You watch it day after day, week after week and year after year and it never ceases, if anything it increases over the years, almost ... almost worship.'

She looked up at Erlendur.

'It can only spawn jealousy,' she said. 'Anything else would not be human. And instead of suppressing it the next thing you know is that you're nourished by it, because in some odd way it makes you feel better.'

'Is that the explanation for gloating over your brother's misfortune?'

'I don't know,' Stefanía said. 'I couldn't control that feeling. It hit me like a slap in the face and I trembled and shivered and tried to get rid of it, but it wouldn't go. I didn't think that could happen.'

They fell silent.

'You envied your brother,' Erlendur said then.

'Maybe I did, for a while. Later I began to pity him.'

'And eventually hate him.'

She looked at Erlendur.

'What do you know about hate?' she said.

'Not much,' Erlendur said. 'But I do know that it can be dangerous. Why did you tell us that you hadn't been in contact with your brother for almost three decades?'

'Because it's true,' Stefanía said.

'It's not true,' Erlendur said. 'You're lying. Why are you lying about that?'

'Are you going to send me to prison for lying?'

'If I need to I will,' Erlendur said. 'We know that you came to this hotel five days before he was murdered. You told us you hadn't seen or been in contact with your brother for decades. Then we discover that you came to the hotel a few days before his death. On what business? And why did you lie to us?'

'I could have come to the hotel without meeting him. It's a big hotel. Did that ever occur to you?'

'I doubt that. I don't think it's a coincidence that you came to the hotel just before he died.'

He saw that she was prevaricating. Saw that she was mulling over whether to take the next step. She had patently prepared herself to give a more detailed account than at their first meeting, and now was the moment to decide whether to take the plunge.

'He had a key? she said in such a low voice that Erlendur could barely hear it. "The one you showed to me and my father.'

Erlendur remembered the key ring that was found in Gudlaugur's room and the little pink penknife with a picture of a pirate on it. There were two keys on the ring, one that he thought was a door key and the other that could well fit a chest, cupboard or box.

'What about that key?' Erlendur asked. 'Did you recognise it? Do you know what it fits?'

Stefanía smiled.

'I have an identical key,' she said.

'What key is it?'

'It's the key to our house in Hafnarfjördur.'

'You mean your home?'

'Yes,' Stefanía said. 'Where my father and I live. The key fits the basement door at the back of the house. Some narrow steps lead up from the basement to the hall and from there you can get into the living room and kitchen.'

'Do you mean ...?' Erlendur tried to work out the implications of what she was saying. 'Do you mean he went in the house?'

'Yes.'

'But I thought you weren't in contact. You said you and your father hadn't had anything to do with him for decades. That you didn't want to have any contact with him. Why were you lying?'

'Because Dad didn't know.'

'Didn't know what?'

"That he came. Gudlaugur must have missed us. I didn't ask him, but he must have done. For him to do that.'

'What was it precisely that your father didn't know?'

"That Gudlaugur sometimes came to our house at night without us being aware, sat in the living room without making a sound and left before we woke up. He did it for years and we never knew.'

She looked at the bloodstains on the bed.

'Until I woke up in the middle of the night once and saw him.'

24

Erlendur watched Stefanía, her words racing through his mind. She was not as haughty as at their first meeting when Erlendur had been outraged at her lack of feeling for her brother, and he thought he may have judged her too quickly. He knew neither her nor her story well enough to be able to sit on his high horse, and suddenly he regretted his remark on her lack of conscience. It was not up to him to judge others, though he was always falling into that trap. To all intents and purposes he knew nothing about this woman who had suddenly turned so pitiful and terribly lonely in front of him. He realised that her life had been no bed of roses, first as a child living in her brother's shadow, then a motherless teenager and finally a woman who never left her father's side and probably sacrificed her life for him.

A good while passed in this way, each of them engrossed in their respective thoughts. The door to the little room was open and Erlendur went out into the corridor. All of a sudden he wanted to reassure himself that no one was outside, no one was eavesdropping. He looked along the poorly lit corridor but saw nobody. Turning round, he looked down to the end, but it was pitch dark. He thought to himself that anyone who went down there would have had to walk past the door and that he would have noticed. The corridor was empty. All the same, he had a strong feeling that they were not alone in the basement when he went back into the room. The smell in the corridor was the same as the first time he went there: something burning that he could not place. He did not feel comfortable. His first sight of the body was etched in his mind and the more he found out about the man in the Santa suit, the more wretched was the mental image he preserved and knew he could never shake off.

'Is everything all right?' Stefanía asked, still sitting on the chair.

'Yes, fine,' Erlendur said. 'A silly idea of mine. I had a feeling someone was in the corridor. Shouldn't we go somewhere else? For coffee maybe?'

She looked across the room, nodded and stood up. They walked along the corridor in silence, up the stairs and across the lobby to the dining room where Erlendur ordered two coffees. They sat down to one side and tried not to let all the tourists disturb them.

'My father wouldn't be pleased with me now,' Stefanía said. 'He's always forbidden me to talk about the family. He can't stand any invasion of his privacy'

'Is he in good health?'

'He's in quite good health for his age. But I don't know ...' Her words trailed off.

'There's no such thing as privacy when the police are involved,' Erlendur said. 'Not to mention when murder has been committed.'

I'm starting to realise that. We were going to shake this off like it was none of our business, but I don't expect anyone can claim immunity in these dreadful circumstances. I don't suppose that's part of the deal.'

'If I understand you correctly? Erlendur said, 'you and your father had broken off all contact with Gudlaugur but he sneaked into the house at night without being noticed. What was his motive? What did he do? Why did he do this?'

'I never got a satisfactory answer out of him. He just sat still in the living room for an hour or two. Otherwise I'd have noticed him much earlier. He'd been doing it several times a year for years on end. Then one night about two years ago I couldn't sleep and was lying in bed in a drowsy state at about four in the morning, when I heard a creaking noise in the sitting room downstairs, which of course startled me. My father's room is downstairs and his door is always open at night, and I thought he was trying to get my attention. I heard another creak and wondered if it was a burglar, so I crept downstairs. I saw that the door to my father's room was just as I'd left it, but when I entered the hall I saw someone dart down the stairs, and I called out to him. To my horror he stopped on the stairs, turned round and came back up.'

Stefanía paused and stared ahead as if transported away from time and place.

'I thought he would attack me,' she began again. 'I stood in the kitchen doorway and turned on the light, and there he was in front of me. I hadn't seen him face to face for years, ever since he was a young man, and it took me a little while to realise that it was my brother.'

'How did you react to it?' Erlendur asked.

'It threw me completely. I was terrified too, because if it had been a burglar I should have rung the police instead of making all that fuss. I was trembling with fright and let out a scream when I switched on the light and saw his face. It must have been funny to see me so scared and nervous, because he started laughing.'

*

'Don't wake Dad,' he said, putting a finger to his lips to hush her.

She couldn't believe her eyes.

'Is that you?' she gasped.

He wasn't like the image she retained of him from his youth, and she saw how badly he had aged. He had bags under his eyes and his thin lips were pale; wisps of hair stood out in all directions and he regarded her with infinitely sad eyes. She automatically began working out how old he really was. He looked so much older.

'What are you doing here?' she whispered.

'Nothing,' he said. 'I'm not doing anything. Sometimes I just want to come home.'

*

'That was the only explanation he gave for why he sometimes sneaked into the living room at night without letting anyone know,' Stefanía said. 'Sometimes he wanted to go home. I don't know what he meant by that. Whether he associated it with childhood, when Mum was still alive, or whether he meant the years before he pushed Dad down the stairs. I don't know. Maybe the house itself held some meaning for him, because he never had another home. Just a dirty little room in the basement of this hotel.'

*

'You ought to leave,' she said. 'He might wake up.'

'Yes, I know,' he said. 'How is he? Is he all right?'

'He's doing fine. But he needs constant care. He has to be fed and washed and dressed and taken out and put down in front of the television. He likes films.'

'You don't know how bad I've felt about this,' he said. 'All these years. I didn't want it to turn out like this. It was all a huge mistake.'

'Yes, it was,' she said.

'I never wanted to be famous. That was his dream. My part was just to make it come true.'

They fell silent.

'Does he ever ask about me?'

'No,' she said. 'Never. I've tried to get him to talk about you but he won't even hear your name mentioned.'

'He still hates me.'

'I don't think he'll ever get that out of his system.'

'Because of the way I am. He can't stand me because Im...'

'That's something between the two of you that...'

'I would have done anything for him, you know that.'

'Yes.'

'Always.'

'Yes.'

'All those demands he made on me. Endless practising. Concerts. Recordings. It was all his dream, not mine. He was happy and then everything was fine.'

'I know.'

'So why can't he forgive me? Why can't he make up with me? I miss him. Will you tell him that? I miss when we were together. When I used to sing for him. You are my family.'

'I'll try to talk to him.'

'Will you? Will you tell him I miss him?'

'I'll do that.'

'He can't stand me because of the way I am.'

Stefanía said nothing.

'Maybe it was a rebellion against him. I don't know. I tried to hide it but I can't be anything else than what I am.'

'You ought to go now,' she said.

'Yes.'

He hesitated.

'What about you?'

'What about me?"

'Do you hate me too?'

'You ought to go. He might wake up.'

'Because it's all my fault. The situation you're in, having to look after him all the time. You must...'

'Go,' she said.

'Sorry:

*

'After he left home, after the accident, what happened then?' Erlendur asked. 'Was he just erased as if he'd never existed?'

'More or less. I know Dad listened to his records now and again. He didn't want me to know, but I saw it sometimes when I got home from work. He'd forget to put the sleeve away or take the record off. Occasionally we heard something about him and years ago we read an interview with him in a magazine. It was an article about former child stars. "Where are they now?" was the headline or something equally appalling. The magazine had dug him up and he seemed willing to talk about his old fame. I don't know why he opened up like that. He didn't say anything in the interview except that it was fun being the main attraction.'

'So someone remembered him. He wasn't completely forgotten.'

'There's always someone who remembers.'

'In the magazine he didn't mention being bullied at school or your father's demands, losing his mother and how his hopes, which I expect your father kindled, were dashed and he was forced to leave home?'

'What do you know about the bullying at school?'

'We know that he was bullied for being different. Isn't that right?'

'I don't think my father kindled any expectations. He's a very down-to-earth and realistic man. I don't know why you talk like that. For a while it looked as if my brother would go a long way as a singer, performing abroad and commanding attention on a scale unknown in our little community. My father explained that to him but I also think he told him that even though it would take a lot of work, dedication and talent, he still shouldn't set his hopes too high. My father isn't stupid. Don't you go thinking that.'

'I don't think anything of the sort.'

'Good.'

'Did Gudlaugur never try to contact you two? Or you him? All that time?'

'No. I think I've already answered your question. Apart from sneaking in sometimes without us noticing. He told me he'd been doing it for years.'

'You didn't try to track him down?'

'No, we didn't.'

'Were he and his mother close?' Erlendur asked.

'She meant the world to him,' Stefanía said.

'So her death was a tragedy to him.'

'Her death was a tragedy to us all.'

Stefanía heaved a deep sigh.

'I suppose something died inside us when she passed away. Something that made us a family. I don't think I realised until long afterwards that it was her who tied us together, created a balance. She and Dad never agreed about Gudlaugur, and they quarrelled about his upbringing, if you could call it quarrelling. She wanted to let him be the way he was, and even if he did sing beautifully not to make too much of it.'

She looked at Erlendur.

'I don't think our father ever regarded him as a child, more of a task. Something for him alone to shape and create.'

'And you? What was your standpoint?'