Free The Puffin of Death by Betty Webb Page A

day, you could stand inside the great hall and watch cod fishing boats steam into the harbor.
    As much as I enjoyed the tour through Harpa—in addition to hosting concerts and operas, the concert hall also provided a forum for post-modern painting and avant garde sculpture—it was nice to get back outside into the pollution-free Reykjavik air. And to tell the truth, I was starving, and looked forward to the trip across the street to Bæjarin’s Beztu Pylsur, which I now realized simply meant “the best hot dogs in town.”
    The joint wasn’t fancy. It wasn’t even indoors. A red and white shack fronting the harbor, it attracted enough customers that we had to stand in line for ten minutes before giving our order. Since the one picnic table was already occupied by a group of Japanese tourists taking snapshots of each other as they ate (what did that remind me of?) we milled around the sidewalk with other tourists and native Icelanders until we heard our number called.
    We ate while strolling down the harbor road. Gulls, gannets, and kittiwakes sailed over our heads, shrieking their sharp cries. Ahead of us, but miles distant, loomed Mount Esja, heralding the gateway to the Snaefellsnes Peninsula. Because the peninsula was reputed to be as mythic as it was picturesque, I felt a brief pang that I wouldn’t be traveling there. However, in less than two weeks, there was a limit to what I could see and do. As we rounded a curve in the harbor, the sight of Sólfar—Sun Voyager—a sculpture that resembled an old Viking longboat, took me out of my gloom. It had been positioned to face the setting summer sun, and golden late afternoon light gleamed along its steel surface.
    Very photogenic, as proved by the gaggle of tourists around it, all snapping pictures.
    I started to take out my own camera, then froze. Something had nudged my memory back at the hot dog stand, and now here. But what? Surely that was impossible, since I’d never been in Iceland before.
    Still…
    â€œTeddy, why do you frown?” Bryndis’ voice startled me.
    â€œI don’t know,” I confessed. “There seems to be something familiar about this.”
    â€œAn attack of déjà vu? Ah, reincarnation! Perhaps one of your ancestors was a Viking and his genes are urging you to hop on Sólfar and sail away to loot and pillage.”
    Although the image of a red-headed Icelandic ancestor made me laugh, it wasn’t impossible. The early Vikings had taken thousands of villagers as slaves during raids on the Irish coast, so who knew?
    But I didn’t think so. There was something about the scene before me that…
    â€œExcuse me, miss, but do you mind getting out of the way so I can take a picture of that thing?” An expensively dressed American, from his accent, a New Yorker, sub genus Brooklyn.
    â€œNo problem.” As soon as I moved, the man stepped forward, hefted a Nikon D4, and began to shoot.
    That’s when I remembered.
    Vik.
    Dead man.
    Nikon D4 lying on the moss.
    Could Simon Parr have taken a photograph of his killer?

Chapter Seven
    The next morning I returned to the Reykjavik City Zoo to help Bryndis with the animals we were readying for transport and learn the finer points of their daily routines. The temperature had climbed to sixty-five degrees, and a gentle breeze blew in from the North Atlantic, making the animals frisky. Cows lowed, chickens clucked, pigs squealed. Only occasional yelps from the seal pool reminded me this was no mere barnyard.
    After tossing a few fish to the seals, Bryndis led me to the Icelandic foxes’ temporary enclosure.
    The six-pound foxes were little different in habit and diet than the Gunn Zoo’s coyotes and wolves. Shy, as most wild animals are, they kept to the back of their enclosure while we worked around them. We checked on their automatic watering system, making certain it wasn’t clogged, and at eleven-thirty on the