Thórdur’s tone changed and he became serious again.
“But Jacob’s problem was that he suffered from depression.” He paused, and then added, “It was, actually, both excitability and depression; he was a manic-depressive.”
“How did it manifest itself?”
“When he was overexcited, the railroad and other dreams took over all his thoughts, whereas during the fits of depression he would lie in bed, and we wouldn’t see him downstairs in the engineering studio for days on end. In between, he was completely normal and a hard worker.”
“Can you describe his manic fits a bit more?” Halldór asked.
“Endless chatter, almost limitless energy, and unrealistic ideas about himself and his abilities. When he was at his worst, he didn’t sleep for days on end and got all kinds of delusions; but when he was in that kind of mood, he could be really persuasive to those who didn’t know him, and I think, for instance, that he must have been on a real high when he got the Germans to invest money in Isländische Bahn. It must have taken a great deal of persuasiveness to get them to build the trains before even one meter of track had been laid here in Iceland.”
“What happened to the railroad company here?”
“By the time Jacob died, it had broken even. A great deal had been spent buying material for the railroad; material that never made it to Iceland and was lost in the war. But the engineering firm had gotten good jobs and received considerable income in the intervening years, so Jacob had been able to pay up all the shares he had underwritten in the company, which was a considerable sum. This money was used to pay outstanding debts. There were, naturally, many others who were fully paid-up shareholders in the company, but it was declared insolvent, even though it owned a nearly perfect railroad design.”
“So did the investors have to write off their shares?”
“Not totally. Jacob had a life insurance policy with an English company for a considerable sum of money, which went to Elizabeth. She was very keen for the railroad company to be honorably wound up, so she made an offer to all the investors to buy their shares at twenty percent of the nominal value. It was her wish that I should deal with these matters, and I went to see every shareholder about it; people were, on the whole, reasonably satisfied with the outcome.”
“Was the company then dissolved?”
“Yes. When I had got hold of all the shares, a formal company meeting was held and the company was dissolved, with the assets that remained passing to Elizabeth—nothing but valueless designs and documents, of course.”
“Why valueless?”
“It transpired during the prewar years that what Iceland needed was roads. A railroad would never have paid for itself at that time, but Jacob just wouldn’t face that fact, however many times I tried to make him realize it. But I am convinced that the railroad would have been of great value for the nation had we built it earlier, at the start of the century.”
“Did you own shares in the company?”
“Yes. We, the staff, got part of our salary paid in shares, so I was, of course, relieved to be paid this percentage. I made an agreement with the widow that I would deal with the dissolution of the business, and all that that entailed, in return for retaining the engineering firm’s goodwill. She refused to sell the furniture and equipment, but there were a few projects in progress, and I was allowed to take them with me. I have done very well since then, as you can see.”
“Were you aware of Jacob Senior being part of a group of people that wanted to make this country a monarchy instead of democracy?”
“No,” he said, shaking his head. “I heard the rumor long after Jacob Senior’s death, but I was never aware of anything like that at the time. I do remember, though, that he was quite worried about the establishment of the republic here, and that he wasn’t sure this was the right step to take, but then he got swept along like the rest of us when the day arrived.”
“Have you kept in contact with the family?”
“Yes, my wife and I often called in on the widow while she was alive. We bought a house not far from Birkihlíd, and we often popped in there when we went for walks.”
“Have you been there recently?”
“Yes, I visited Jacob Junior last Monday. I was tidying up our document store here and came across some papers of Jacob Senior’s that I had brought from the engineering firm at that time; they had been amongst the contracts in the safe and I hadn’t checked them properly. I delivered these papers to Jacob Junior and he was very grateful.”
“What papers were these?”