Erlendur approached his father and stopped by his side. He could not understand why he was sitting on the bed instead of joining the search party up on the moor. His brother had still not been found. He might be alive, though it was unlikely. Erlendur read the hopelessness in the faces of the exhausted men returning home to rest and eat before setting out again. They came from the villages and farms all around, everyone who was up to the task, bringing dogs and long sticks that they plunged into the snow. That was how they had found Erlendur. That was how they were going to find his brother.

They went up to the moor in teams of eight to ten, stabbing their sticks into the snow and shouting his brother’s name. Two days had passed since they had found Erlendur and three days since the storm had split up the three travellers. The brothers had stayed together for a long time. They shouted into the blizzard and listened for their father’s voice. Two years the elder, Erlendur led his brother by the hand, but their hands were numbed by the frost and Erlendur did not feel when he lost his grip. He thought he was still holding his brothers hand when he turned round and could not see him any longer. Much later he thought he remembered the hand slipping away from his, but that was an invention. He never actually felt it happen.

He was convinced that he would die at the age of ten in a seemingly incessant blizzard. It attacked him from all directions, tore him and cut him and blinded his sight, cold and harsh and merciless. In the end he fell down into the snow and tried to bury himself. Lay there thinking about his brother who was also dying on the moor.

A sharp jab in his shoulder woke him and suddenly a face he did not recognise appeared. He could not hear what the man said. He wanted to go on sleeping. He was heaved out of the snow and the men took turns carrying him down from the moor, although he remembered little of the journey home. He heard voices. He heard his mother nursing him. A doctor examined him. Frostbite on his feet and legs, but not very severe. He saw inside his father’s room. Saw him sitting alone on the edge of the bed as if nothing that had happened had affected him.

Two days later, Erlendur was up and about again. He stood beside his father, helpless and afraid. Strange pangs of conscience had haunted him when he began to recover and regain his strength. Why him? Why him and not his brother? And if they had not found him, would they possibly have found his brother instead? He wanted to ask his father about this and wanted to ask why he was not taking part in the search. But he asked nothing. Just watched him, the deep lines etched into his face, his stubble, his eyes black with sorrow.

A long time elapsed and his father ignored him. Erlendur put his hand on his father’s and asked whether it was his fault. That his brother was missing. Because he had not held him tightly enough, should have taken better care of him, should have had him by his side when he himself was found. He asked in a soft and hesitant voice but lost control of himself and began whimpering. His father bowed his head. Tears welled up in his eyes, he hugged Erlendur and started to weep as well, until his huge body shook and trembled in his son’s arms.

All this passed through Erlendur’s mind until the record began crackling again. He had not allowed himself these contemplations for a long time, but suddenly the memories unfolded within him and he once again felt the heavy sorrow that he knew would never be completely buried or forgotten.

Such was the power of the choirboy.

The telephone on the bedside table rang. He sat up, lifted the needle from the record and switched off the player. Valgerdur was calling. She told him that Henry Wapshott was not in his room. When she had the hotel staff call his room and look for him, he was nowhere to be found.

“He was going to wait around for the sample,” Erlendur said. “Has he checked out of the hotel? I understand he had a flight booked for tonight.”

“I haven’t asked about that,” Valgerdur said. “I can’t wait here much longer and …”

“No, of course not, sorry” Erlendur said. “I’ll send him to you when I find him. Sorry about that”

“OK then, I’m off?

Erlendur hesitated. Although he didn’t know what to say, he didn’t want to let her go immediately. The silence became prolonged and suddenly there was a knock on his door. He thought Eva Lind had come to visit him.

“I’d so like to meet you again,” he said, “but I understand if you can’t be bothered.”

Again there was a knock on the door, harder this time.

“I wanted to tell you the truth about that deaths and ordeals business,” Erlendur said. “If you can be bothered to listen.”

“What do you mean?”

“Do you fancy that?”

He didn’t know himself exactly what he meant Why he wanted to tell this woman what he had never told anyone but his daughter before. Why he would not wind up the matter, get on with his life and let nothing disturb it, not now or ever.

Valgerdur did not answer immediately, and there was a third knock on the door. Erlendur put down the phone and opened the door without looking outside to see who was there; he assumed it could only be Eva. When he picked up the telephone again, Valgerdur had gone.

“Hello,” he said. “Hello?” There was no reply.

After putting down the receiver again, he turned around. In his room stood a man he had never seen before. He was short, wearing a thick, dark blue winter coat and a scarf, with a blue peaked cap on his head. Drops of water glittered on his cap and coat where the snow had melted. He was fairly fat-faced with thick lips, and enormous, dark bags beneath small, tired eyes. He reminded Erlendur of photographs of the poet W. H. Auden. A drip hung from the end of his nose.

“Are you Erlendur?” he said.

“Yes.”

“I was told to come to this hotel and talk to you,” the man said. He took off his cap, tapped it against his coat and wiped the drip from his nose.

“Who told you that?” Erlendur asked.

“Someone by the name of Marion Briem. I don’t know who that is. Something about the Gudlaugur Egilsson investigation and talking to everyone who knew him in the past. I used to know him and that Marion told me to talk to you about it.”

“Who are you?” Erlendur said, trying to recall where he had seen his face before.

“My name’s Gabriel Hermannsson and I used to conduct the Hafnarfjordur Children’s Choir once,” the man said. “May I sit down on the bed? Those long corridors…”

“Gabriel? Be my guest. Have a seat.” The man unbuttoned his coat and loosened his scarf. Erlendur picked up one of Gudlaugur’s record sleeves and looked at the photograph of the Hafnarfjordur Children’s Choir. The choirmaster stared cheerfully into the camera. “Is this you?” he asked, handing him the sleeve.

Gabriel looked at the sleeve and nodded.

“Where did you get that?” he asked. “Those records have been unavailable for decades. I stupidly lost mine somehow or other. Lent it to someone. You should never lend anything.”

“It belonged to Gudlaugur,” Erlendur said.

“I’m only, what, twenty-eight there,” Gabriel said. “When the photo was taken. Incredible how time flies”

“What did Marion say to you?”

“Not much. I said what I knew about Gudlaugur and was told to talk to you. I was coming to Reykjavik anyway so I thought it would be ideal to use the opportunity.”

Gabriel hesitated.

“I couldn’t quite tell from the voice,” he said, “but I was wondering whether it was a man or a woman. Marion. I thought it would be rude to ask but I couldn’t make up my mind. Normally you can tell from the voice. Funny name. Marion Briem.”

Erlendur discerned in his voice a note of interest, almost eagerness, as if it mattered to know.