House of Evidence (9 page)

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our older brother, Jacob Senior,” Halldór said, returning to the room where Matthías and Erlendur were waiting, “he was also murdered here in this house, in 1945.”

“Yes, clearly, you recall the tragedy,” Matthías replied.

“No, I don’t actually remember it. It’s come up in our investigations,” Halldór said.

“Well, there was not much talk about it at the time,” Matthías remarked by way of explanation. “People used their influence to prevent the press from making a big thing of it.”

This did not surprise Halldór; he could well believe that friends of the family that had lived in this house at that time would have had enough influence to control the newspapers. Would the same apply today? He doubted it. If nothing else of note happened in the next few days, this case would be news fodder for weeks to come. He dreaded the inevitable battle with reporters.

“Would you be so kind as to describe that incident for me, sir?” Halldór asked.

Matthías thought for a moment. “There is not much to say about it. Mrs. Kieler and the children were at the summerhouse, and the domestics had been given time off. It appeared as if someone had broken into the house and my brother Jacob had woken up
and gone downstairs. He probably surprised the intruder and was shot as a result.”

“Were there signs of a break-in?”

“Yes, a pane in the front door had been broken and it was possible to reach the lock through the broken pane. The police assumed that the burglar had watched the family set off on their trip and had not expected Jacob Senior to return to Reykjavik so soon.”

“Was nobody arrested?”

“There was actually a man in custody for some weeks, but I cannot recollect on what grounds. There were all manner of speculations flying around; my late sister-in-law was, for instance, always convinced that the murder was a communist conspiracy,” Matthías said, smiling sadly.

“Did she have any reason to believe that?”

“No, it was all in her imagination. She was a good person but very conservative, and saw communists in every corner. I expect that her upbringing is to blame for that; her father was an industrialist in England.”

“Did you have an opinion about who might have murdered your brother?”

“As I said, the police assumed it was a burglary that had gone wrong. There were a number of firearms in circulation in town after the wartime occupation, so I think it was a reasonable assumption.”

Halldór had been jotting all this down in his notebook, and now there was a short silence while he finished writing. “Why did the widow not move back to England?”

“That never seemed to be in the cards,” Matthías replied. “Birkihlíd was her home. My brother had taken out a life insurance policy with an English company, as her family had made that
a condition of their marriage. The policy proceeds she received after his death were considerable, and she was able to keep her home without any other financial help; but she had no pension, so there was not much left of the money when she died.”

“What was your brother’s profession when he was alive?” Halldór asked.

“He studied railway engineering, and his intention was to pursue that profession here in Iceland. That type of operation never took off here, but he carried out a number of different research projects in the field, both for the public sector and for his own company.”

“What company was this?”

“When my brother realized that political agreement to build a national railway would never be reached, he took things into his own hands and set up business with a group of Icelandic and foreign backers. It was called the Iceland Railroad Company.”

“Did it carry out any business operations?”

“No, but it invested a good deal in research and design. Jacob Senior did not manage to acquire sufficient capital stock to go into production until it was too late, due to the war.”

“So the investments were written off?”

“Yes. Jacob Senior had considerable income during the war years, when he worked for the British and American forces, and that went a long way to pay off the company’s debts. After he died, the widow used a part of the insurance proceeds to put the company into liquidation and close it down.”

Halldór got up and went over to the writing desk, which was small and neat, with a number of little drawers. There was nothing on it apart from a few papers, marked at the top with the name “Elizabeth Chatfield Kieler” in gold lettering.

“Was this where the lady of the house worked?” he asked.

“Yes.” Matthías got up. “She often sat here and wrote. She kept up a lively correspondence with her relatives and friends in England.”

Halldór examined the photographs on the wall.

“The family, I assume,” he said.

Matthías came closer and examined the photos in question. “Yes, she has arranged them so that the Icelandic half of the family is to the left on the wall and the English half to the right. The largest picture is of my brother.”

Halldór examined this photograph. It showed a good-looking man in middle age, with a high forehead and dark, wavy hair, combed back. His eyes were dark and intelligent, the nose straight and delicate, his well-shaped mouth lightly smiling.

“My brother was a handsome man. Here is a picture of him and his wife on their wedding day,” said Matthías, pointing to a picture of a young couple posing by a church door. Elizabeth was wearing a white wedding gown with a long train, artistically arranged at her feet, and Jacob was in a morning coat and striped trousers, holding a top hat under his arm.

“They were married in her hometown in England.” He pointed at another picture. “These are the children, Jacob Junior and Kirsten. This was taken at a photographic studio in England when they all went to visit her family, in 1934. Jacob Junior was nine years old at the time and Kirsten four.”

The photograph had been carefully posed. The boy wore short trousers and sat bolt upright on an upholstered chair, and the girl stood beside him wearing a long, full dress. His clothes were dark in color, hers were light; the background was tastefully draped with cloth, and there was a rocking horse and a leather ball in front of them. Brother and sister bore similar expressions—somewhat arrogant, thought Halldór.

Matthías pointed at a picture of an older man with white hair and a full beard. “This is old Jacob Kieler, my grandfather. He was born and brought up in the province of Schleswig, which at different times has belonged to both Denmark and Germany. He arrived in Iceland in 1857 to work as a shop assistant for a fellow countryman of his. This, on the other hand,” he said, pointing to a picture of a young man sporting a generous mustache, “is my father, Alfred. He ran a store, first in Hafnarfjördur and later here in Reykjavik. He built this house. And this is my mother, Kirsten.” Matthías pointed at a picture of a plump older woman wearing Danish ceremonial clothes and decked with jewelry. She reminded Halldór of Queen Victoria of England.

“My niece, Kirsten, was of course named for her. This is the old house in Hafnarfjördur, taken in 1901.” Matthías pointed at a picture of an old two-story wooden house. A young boy wearing shorts was standing in front of it. “This is my brother Jacob. He must have been eleven years old at the time. I think the photo was taken by a foreign friend of my father’s.”

Matthías pointed at another picture, this one of Birkihlíd under construction; the main walls of the house had been set up, and the builders were working on the roof. In front of the house was a small hayfield, where a cow and a few sheep were grazing.

“This picture was taken in 1910, when Birkihlíd was being built,” he said.

“Is this a picture of you?” Halldór asked, pointing at a photo of a slim young man with a dapper mustache, playing the cello.

“Yes, the picture was taken in Berlin in the spring of 1932, the day I gave my first solo concert.”

“I assume these are your niece and nephew with their mother,” Halldór said, referring to an enlarged color snapshot of an older woman with a young woman and a man. Though he had only
seen Jacob Junior after his death, he recognized him immediately. The decorations in the background indicated that the picture had been taken during Christmas celebrations.

“Yes,” Matthías replied, “Elizabeth and Jacob Junior went up north every other year to celebrate Christmas with the family there, and in alternate years Kirsten and her husband Árni came south. I understand that after Elizabeth’s death, Jacob Junior used to celebrate Christmas at the home of his friend Reverend Ingimar.”

“May I interrupt?” Jóhann said, appearing at the door of the sitting room carrying a cardboard box.

“Oh, yes, of course,” Halldór said, and turned to Matthías. “This young man needs to take your fingerprints, sir, to compare with the ones found here in the house. We’re assuming, of course, that you were a frequent visitor here, so that many of the prints found will be yours, and we can then exclude them from further investigation.”

“Yes, well, I suppose so,” Matthías said, wrinkling his nose.

Jóhann took a card out of the box and set it on the desk; it had a series of printed squares on it and some markings in English. He then produced an ink pad.

“This is just ordinary printing ink. It washes off easily,” Jóhann said. “It would be better if I might take your hand myself, sir. That’s the best way.”

Matthías held out his hand, and Jóhann carefully took one finger after another, pressing each onto the ink pad before rolling it across one of the squares on the card. Having done this with all the fingers of both hands individually, he then took each thumb, pressing it directly onto a square on the card, and finally, the other four fingers of each hand together, onto the largest squares.

“Thank you,” he said, making notes on the card.

Matthías glanced awkwardly at his blackened hands and then at Halldór. “Perhaps you wouldn’t mind escorting me to the bathroom. I can’t touch a thing.”

Holding his hands up in the air, he followed Halldór to the end of the corridor. The bathroom suite was clearly very old and worn after decades of use, but it was obvious from the quality fixtures that no expense had been spared when the bathroom had originally been installed.

“Thank you,” Matthías said, and then added, “Perhaps you would be so kind as to fill the sink with water?”

Diary III

January 12, 1914. Professor Schmidt talks about the variety of railroad gauges that have been employed. He firmly recommends the use of standard gauge, which is 4 feet 8½ inches, i.e. 1.435 meters. I asked him if it would not make sense to use a narrower gauge in Iceland in order to save on infrastructure. He said that would be reasonable, since Iceland would not be connecting directly with other railroad systems. Once a decision on gauge had been made, however, Icelanders would have to apply it throughout the country…

January 15, 1914. Today Herr Lautmann, an agent from the Association of Railroad Companies in the United States, paid a visit to the college. He is German by birth but has lived in North America
for 20 years. He urged us to seek employment in the United States after graduation; he says they offer great prospects and generous salaries. He received mixed reactions from my college friends, but I wrote down his name and address in Chicago…

January 24, 1914. Calculating curves between two straight sections. The radius of curvature may not be sharper than 300 meters. The professor shows me how to make use of books of tables…

May 2, 1914. My father sends me
Ísafold
magazine, with articles arguing about the cost of building a railroad in Iceland. There is much disagreement: those in favor put a figure of 27,000 krónur per kilometer for standard gauge track, while opponents say 49,000 krónur. Both sides quote experience from abroad, but I feel that it is impossible to price accurately the construction of a railroad until it has been designed and surveyed. On can invite bids for materials from many countries, and who can say in advance what that would bring. With careful planning and preparation it should be possible to build an inexpensive, fully budgeted railroad…

June 10, 1914. I shall not take a vacation this summer; instead I plan to devote myself to college studies in order to shorten the duration of my course.
If all goes well, I shall have finished by next spring, and then I can turn to real projects. I am writing to Elizabeth to tell her that I shall not be able to pay her a visit this summer. I don’t feel I can suggest that she comes here to Berlin, which would of course be my dearest wish…

June 28, 1914. News arrived from Sarajevo in Bosnia that Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife had been fatally shot as they drove through the city. People here in Berlin are dismayed: Franz Ferdinand was heir-presumptive to the Emperor of Austria and considered a good friend of Kaiser Wilhelm…

E
gill set himself up in one of the police cars, while officers in thick overcoats and fur hats fine-combed the snow with garden rakes, bringing him any objects they found. These he examined carefully, recorded, and wrapped in individual plastic bags.

Found in the garden of Birkihlíd, January 18,
1973, recorded by E.G.

One child’s mitten, frozen, red
An empty spirits bottle (Tindavodka)
Empty milk carton
Dead mouse (half-eaten, probably by a cat)
Burned-out firecracker

Other items he put in one bag and labeled them “Junk.” When his men had completed the search of the Birkihlíd grounds, he had them check the neighboring gardens, but nothing remarkable was found, apart from some rusty tree clippers, which he examined with particular care. After that the men searched all the neighborhood trash cans in case the weapon had been dumped in one of them; by now dusk was falling and the men had to use flashlights.

It remained for Egill to talk to the neighbors. He took along one of the older policemen whom he knew well from his own uniform days; he liked to demonstrate his authority when he spoke to people, and a small identity card was not as effective as a uniform.

The house just to the south of Birkihlíd had been built for a single family, but now contained three apartments. Its white exterior paint was flaking.

Egill knocked on the door of the basement apartment first. A young woman with a small child on her arm opened the door, but didn’t invite them in, so they had to ask their questions from the steps outside.

No, she hadn’t been aware of anything unusual until all the policemen appeared that morning. No, she had not heard a gunshot during the night.

On the floor above, an old, bent-backed woman with a cane invited them into the parlor, where an old man sat in a deep armchair, a blanket over his knees and knitted mittens on his hands. He was listening to
Children’s Hour
on the radio. The light was off so it was rather dark.

The old woman offered the visitors a seat on the couch, but she remained standing beside them, rocking to and fro.

“We are investigating a death in the house next door. Are you familiar with the people who live there?” Egill asked, raising his voice in order to be heard over the radio.

“What?” the old man said.

“Familiar and not familiar,” the woman said. “The Kielers don’t pretend to be familiar with just anybody. Who is dead?”

“His name is Jacob Kieler.”

“What?” the old man said.

“Well,” said the woman, “that’s good news.”

“Excuse me?” Egill said. “That’s good news?”

“Yes, he was a stuck-up so-and-so.”

“Had you any complaints about him?”

“What?” said the old man, turning to the woman. “What’s that man saying?”

“Might it be a good idea to turn down the radio?” Egill asked.

“Complaints about him!” the woman said, ignoring both the old man and the radio. “He’s done nothing but grouch, ever since he was a boy. He says that trash comes blowing over from our garden, but he burns scrap wood in the fireplace and doesn’t give a damn about the smoke drifting over our way. He was on the roof the day before yesterday, pretending to fix the chimney.”

“What, doing what?” asked the old man.

Egill tried to write but couldn’t see anything in the gloom.

“He also complains about our tenants. Says they park in the spot in front of his house,” the old woman continued. “It’s not as if he even owns a car himself.”

“Would it be possible to put the light on in here?” Egill asked.

The woman pretended not to hear, and continued, “That lot thought highly enough of themselves, and then the master himself ends up shot like a dog.”

“How do you know he was shot?” Egill asked suspiciously.

“Yes, well, they thought they could keep things under wraps, but there’s more to life than meets the eye.”

Egill wasn’t sure what to make of this reply; he found it difficult to think in this darkness and noise, so he just wrote
SUSPICIOUS
in large letters in his notebook.

“Did you see anyone out and about near Birkihlíd last night? At around midnight, say?” he asked.

“Around midnight? No, we go to bed at nine thirty on the dot. We won’t have any noise in the house after that,” the old woman said.

Egill gave up, but he underlined
SUSPICIOUS
twice, and he and the policeman took their leave.

“What did that man want?” he heard the old man say as the door closed behind them.

The top-floor apartment was accessed from inside the house. They were received by a man in his fifties who did not invite them in, but came out onto the landing and closed the door behind him. He wore a thick sweater with a jacket on top, and Egill noticed that he was not wearing shoes, just socks with a hole in one heel. He told the man who they were, and that they were investigating a death.

“Did you notice anything unusual last night?” he asked.

“Maybe, maybe not,” the man replied.

“Which means?” Egill asked, opening his notebook.

“What is unusual and what is not unusual?”

“Anything that’s not usual,” replied Egill impatiently.

“I see,” said the man.

“What happened yesterday that was unusual?” Egill said more firmly, moving to the side so that his uniformed colleague could be better seen.

“I went for a walk during the night, and the lights were on in the downstairs rooms in Birkihlíd.”

Egill brightened. “Is that unusual?”

“It is certainly not usual,” the man replied.

“Why were you going for a walk at that time?”

“I work as a night security guard at the docks. I sometimes find it difficult to get my sleep patterns back on my days off. So I go for walks.”

“How frequently does this happen?” Egill asked.

“It varies. Sometimes every night but then not for weeks. The landlady complains if I move about in the apartment at night.”

“So you noticed that the lights were on?”

“Yes, because it’s very rare that the lights are on in the reception rooms in that house. They seem to mainly live upstairs,” the man said.

“What time was this exactly?” Egill said.

“I walked round the neighborhood in a big loop, but returned home when it began snowing, just after one thirty. That’s when I saw the lights on.”

“Did you see anybody else during your walk?”

“Not here in the street, no.”

Very suspicious
, Egill wrote in his notebook.

Diary III

July 25, 1914. The newspapers report disputes between the Austrians and the Serbs. People seem to think it will end in armed conflict. I am designing a 20-meter-long railroad bridge with two parallel tracks…

July 27, 1914. It is being reported that hostilities have broken out between Austria and Serbia. Kaiser Wilhelm is hurrying back to Germany from Norway. People here in Berlin are very worried about an impending war…

August 2, 1914. Germany has declared war on Russia. Naval battle in the Baltic…

August 4, 1914. All-out war between Germany and Austria on the one hand, and England, Russia, and
France on the other. Prices of goods rising here in Berlin…

August 15, 1914. Fighting on the German-French border. Neither side prevailing. A war has begun that has no end in sight. I fear that the fighting will continue for many months…

September 4, 1914. College begins. Some of my classmates have registered for military service, while others want to complete their studies before joining the military. Our professors urge us to focus on our studies in spite of the hostilities…

November 1, 1914. Instruction in mechanics begins. We begin by studying basic steam engines, and the professor shows us calculations on energy efficiency for railway trains powered by steam. Apparently only 6% efficiency is achieved. I am looking forward to learning about locomotives powered by electricity. The professor says that such a train was first demonstrated here in the city in 1879, and the first extensive electric railroad, between Bitterfeld and Dessau, was opened in 1911 (15 kV, 16.7 Hz). An engine that Rudolf Diesel had completed before his death last year is also thought to be very promising. It is powered by oil…

November 15, 1914. I do not allow the war to interfere with my studies. The worst thing is not being able to write to Elizabeth. Only letters written in German or Danish are permitted, and they are read before they leave the country…

January 12, 1915. Structural engineering. Dr. Hagendorf showed us a photograph of the Firth of Forth railroad bridge in Scotland, which was opened in 1890. It is 2,530 meters in length overall and constructed mostly of steel. A true feat of engineering, says the doctor. Gerhard Grau asks about the best places to set explosives to destroy the bridge. He is very keen to complete his exams as soon as possible and begin military service. Dr. Hagendorf did not reply to his question…