Gunnar nodded, turned and could feel Óðinn’s eyes were on him as he left the office, along with his suspicion. It was obvious that Óðinn thought Gunnar was the source of the leak.

Gunnar walked along the minister’s corridor to the lift. While he waited, he opened his phone and checked the news. It didn’t look good, and the comments were vicious. He scrolled through one thread back to the beginning.

Guðmundur Jónsson: Officials misusing their power, again and again.

Abbi Stabbi Ólason: Who the hell does this old bitch think she is? Medical records are confidential!!

Óli Gunnars: Hey, pal. This Pétur is the man who murdered her father, so maybe she just wants to make sure her kids are safe.

Ingigerður Adamsdóttir: Then she should be at home looking after her children instead of getting involved in politics that she obviously knows nothing about.

Hulda Ýr: Hey, 1950 called and it wants its opinions back. Seriously, you think women should just stay at home?

Emma Björk Eyfells: It doesn’t matter who this man is. She has no right to see medical records, and especially not psychiatric records. This is sensitive information!!

Grallaraspói: All this one needs is rock-hard dick :)

Hulda Ýr: Really? There’s something political you’re unhappy with and this is the best you can come up with? Good luck being revolting. 125

Einar Einarsson: This overprivileged scum think they can do what they like! And they don’t hesitate to walk all over the sick and break every rule of human rights! Úrsúla Aradóttir should resign immediately!

Guðmundur Jónsson: Hang on, Einar. Aren’t you ‘good guys’ happy with your bitch now?

Gunnar shook his head and got into the lift. He would get more satisfaction from vacuuming the car than from seeing any more comments.

52

‘Pleeease. Please come home,’ she had said in the most imploring voice she could manage. But her father merely leaned back against the plinth that supported the statue of Ingólfur Arnarson on the Arnarhóll hillock in the centre of the city, looked out over the harbour and lifted the bottle of spirit high in a toast.

‘A bourgeois lifestyle isn’t for me,’ he said, and Pétur voiced his agreement.

‘This man’s a bohemian!’ he said, slapping her father’s shoulder. ‘You can’t lock up a free spirit inside a terraced house.’

Then they went back to singing ‘Little Boxes’, as they always did whenever she came to ask her father to come home. By the time they finished, Úrsúla was in tears. She was gripped by an overwhelming helplessness and wished she had some way to force her father to come back home, to take a shower, sleep it off and have a decent meal, and then everything would be fine. After a few days he would go back to work and bring home money for her mother. That was the way it had been up to now. But that autumn he hadn’t come home with after his usual summer-long bender. 126