She put the shopping away and went into the long, high-ceilinged living room that had once been Mr José’s dining room, where he had received guests and where the tiger had also lived in its cage.

Everything was ready for Tómas’s arrival, even down to their favourite Shakira CD in the player, although they no longer danced on the sofa when they were together. The joy that had always been a feature of their reunions had gradually faded over the years, replaced by a certain mutual guardedness, which they both hid well, but which prevented them from being completely open with each other. All the same, it didn’t do any harm to have Shakira ready, just in case Tómas came home in a particularly good mood. All she would need to do was to press the play button and they would both abandon themselves to the delight of being together.

June 2017

56

The flash from the doorway was so bright, it was painful; María felt as if the light cut deep into her head. She rubbed her eyes and waited for them to acclimatise to the darkness again. This was the tenth or eleventh time this had happened – that the door to the dim corridor opened, the silent figure of a man appeared in the doorway and then there was a blinding flash as he took a photograph. After that she heard the sound of him pushing a tray of food across the floor with his foot.

Each time the man opened the door, she tried her hardest to read the sign on the wall in the passage behind him, but it disappeared when she was dazzled by the flash. It seemed to say Evacuation Route, and then there was some smaller lettering that she hadn’t been able to make out, although she was sure it was in English too. The sticker on the door was also in English, and when the bag had been removed from her head and she was thrown in here, she had seen something to the effect that these doors must always be kept locked.

She knew she had to be in Iceland. She had taken a flight home and it had landed at Keflavík airport, where two policemen were waiting to arrest her. They had spoken in Icelandic and apologised for the handcuffs when they saw the bruises on her wrists. Looking out of the car window, she had seen that they were driving out of the airport area, and were heading for Reykjanesbraut – the long, straight road leading into town, when the officer in the passenger seat had leaned back and pulled a cloth bag over her head.