My Soul to Take: A Novel of Iceland by Yrsa Sigurðardóttir Page B

She dressed hurriedly.
    Matthew reappeared just as she was putting on her second sock. "Damn," he said, disappointed. "I'd forgotten that you're the world champion in speed-dressing." He smirked at her. "Of course, the upside is that you're pretty quick at undressing too."
    "Very funny," said Thora. "What do you think of the hotel?"
    Matthew took a look around and shrugged. "Great. A bit off the beaten track. But what on earth are you doing here?" He added quickly, "Not that I'm complaining, not at all."
    "I'm working for the owner. He's thinking of suing the people who sold him the property."
    "Ah. Was he ripped off?" Matthew asked. He walked over to the window and pulled open the curtain to admire the view. "Lovely," he said, and turned back to Thora.
    "Oh, it's all quite silly, really. He claims this place is haunted and the previous owners must have known."
    "Haunted, yes." Matthew's expression was the one she expected to see on the judge's face, if the case ever went that far. "You don't say."
    "The business here is vulnerable to that kind of thing, so it's not quite as absurd as you might think." Thora smiled at him. "It's a New Age hotel. They focus on things such as healing, clairvoyance, organic food, crystals, magnetic fields, aura readings, and all that. Most of the staff are clairvoyant, or worse, so they're not very fond of ghosts."
    "Indeed," said Matthew, pulling a face. "So, all perfectly normal."
    "God, no," Thora hurried to say. "But in fact it's not that unusual in a place like this, which has long been considered a center for belief in the supernatural, so to speak. Legend has it that the glacier is inhabited by a man named Bardur who went inside it in a bout of depression after his daughter drifted away to Greenland on an iceberg. He's considered to be the guardian spirit of the area, and the glacier's supposed to have supernatural powers. I don't know whether the powers belong to this Bardur or the glacier itself."
    "Supernatural powers from a glacier?" Matthew's disbelief was written all over his face. "It's just a mountain with snow on it that never melts, correct me if I'm wrong."
    "Ha, ha," Thora said. "I'm just telling you the background, not my opinion. Faith in the power of the glacier goes way beyond Iceland— people flocked here from all over the world to welcome aliens from outer space just before the turn of the century."
    "And of course that wasn't a wild-goose chase, was it?"
    Thora shrugged. "Opinions differ. The spokesman for the group said they had come, but just in spirit. No spaceship or anything. Some kind of mental transportation."
    "'Mental' being the operative word, I suppose?" Matthew grinned.
    Thora returned his smile. "Could well be. But it is an incredibly powerful mountain."
    "And where does the body fit into the picture?"
    "Oh, that. The body's nothing to do with this spiritual stuff, actually. I don't think so, anyway. The owner doesn't agree entirely. He thinks the ghost's involved somehow. He's quite an unusual character."
    "You don't say," rejoined Matthew, frowning. "Was the body found here at the hotel?"
    Thora gave Matthew a brief account of where the body had been found, telling him that it was a woman who had been working for Jonas and she was thought to have been murdered.
    "And is there a suspect?"
    "Not to my knowledge," Thora replied. "I doubt whether the police have even formed an opinion yet. The case is still at the most preliminary stage."
    "I hope for your sake that it's not this Jonas," said Matthew.
    "No, it's definitely not him," Thora said airily, then added cautiously, "As it happens, I do have something that might shed light on the matter."
    "You've got something? What kind of something?" asked Matthew. His eyes were bright with curiosity.
    "Well, I have the diary of the woman who is very likely the murder victim. A sort of notebook, really," Thora replied, blushing but affecting nonchalance.
    "What?" Matthew exclaimed. "Did you know this