“Is he up or down?” Erlendur asked.

“Up or down?” the fat manager puffed. “Do you mean whether he’s gone to heaven?”

“Yes,” Erlendur said. “That’s exactly what we need to know…”

“Shall we take the lift upstairs?” Sigurdur Oli asked.

“No,” the manager said, casting an irritated look at Erlendur. “He’s down here in the basement. He’s got a little room there. We didn’t want to chuck him out. And then you get this for your troubles.”

“Why would you have wanted to chuck him out?” Erlendur asked.

The hotel manager looked at him but did not reply.

They walked slowly down the stairs beside the lift. The manager went first. Going down the stairs was a strain for him and Erlendur wondered how he would get back up.

Apart from Erlendur, they had agreed to show a certain amount of consideration, to try to approach the hotel as discreetly as possible. Three police cars were parked at the back, with an ambulance. Police officers and paramedics had gone in through the back door. The district medical officer was on his way. He would certify the death and call out a van to transport the body.

They walked down a long corridor with the panting manager leading the way. Plain-clothes policemen greeted them. The corridor grew darker the further they walked, because the light bulbs on the ceiling had blown and no one had bothered to change them. Eventually, in the darkness, they reached the door, which opened onto a little room. It was more like a storage space than a dwelling, but there was a narrow bed inside, a small desk and a tattered mat on the dirty tiled floor. There was a little window up near the ceiling.

The man was sitting on the bed, leaning against the wall. He was wearing a bright red Santa suit and still had the Santa cap on his head, but it had slipped down over his eyes.