She looked at him fondly and smiled, and he looked up and smiled back at her. Sometimes she felt that she was looking into a strange world behind his eyes. His ideas about how they could improve their lives seemed so odd here in Kópavogur, yet were undoubtedly perfectly normal where he had come from. Of course, if she lived in a detached house with enough space, then it would have been a great idea to have a few hens, and she would agree without a qualm. It would give him something to keep him busy while she was at work, and it would help with the food bills.

He stood up and washed his plate. She had also told him many times that he could just stack crockery in the dishwasher, but he seemed to forget every time.

‘When did you last see Ísafold from the flat opposite?’ she asked.

Standing by the sink, Omar seemed to freeze. He appeared to 82be thinking things over. One hand rested on the edge of the sink and the other held the brush. The water continued to flow, and for a long moment the only sound in the kitchen was its patter in the battered metal sink.

‘Where is Ísafold?’ he asked, without turning around.

‘I don’t know,’ Olga said. ‘She seems to have disappeared, and her sister is searching for her.’

‘They have taken her. The soldiers,’ Omar said in a low voice. ‘They take women and keep them chained up so they can rape them.’

Olga was startled. Occasionally he would say strange things that had to be rooted in his memories of war, but normally they only came to him as he lay between sleep and wakefulness, when he cried during the night. Never in bright daylight like this.

Olga stood up and went over to him, laying a hand on his shoulder.

He reacted with such suddenness, she was taken by surprise. He stood in the middle of the kitchen, howling and swinging the brush about him like a sword.

‘What?’ he shouted over the sound of the water running into the sink. ‘What about Ísafold? Why? It’s bad. She isn’t here. Why do you ask me?’

Olga reached for the tap and turned off the water. Then held out her hands to calm him, struggling to make out from his disjointed rush of words what he was asking for, as he continued to speak in twisted English scattered with Icelandic.

‘Shh. Shhh, Omar,’ she said in the tone she used to reassure him when he cried in the night. Her voice soothing, she stepped closer to him. ‘There. Shh. Shh. It’s all right, Omar. Calm down.’