Fleshmarket Close

6

Detective Constable Colin Tibbet arrived at work next morning to find that someone had placed a toy locomotive on his mouse pad. The mouse itself had been disconnected and placed in one of his desk drawers... a locked drawer at that — locked when he’d left work the previous evening, and needing to be unlocked this morning... yet somehow containing his mouse. He stared at Siobhan Clarke, and was about to speak when she silenced him with a shake of her head.

‘Whatever it is,’ she said, ‘it can wait. I’m out of here.’

And so she was. She’d been coming out of the DI’s office when Tibbet had arrived. Tibbet had heard Derek Starr’s closing words: ‘A day or two, Siobhan, no more than that...’ Tibbet presumed it had something to do with Fleshmarket Close, but he couldn’t guess what. One thing he did know: Siobhan knew that he’d been studying train timetables. This made her the chief suspect. But there were other possibilities: Phyllida Hawes herself was not above the odd practical joke. The same could be said of DC Paddy Connolly and DC Tommy Daniels. Might DCI Macrae have decided on a schoolboy prank? Or what about the man sipping coffee at the little foldaway table in the corner? Tibbet really only knew Rebus by reputation, but that reputation was formidable. Hawes had warned him not to be star-struck.

‘Rule number one with Rebus,’ she’d said: ‘you don’t lend him money and you don’t buy him drinks.’

‘Isn’t that two rules?’ he’d asked.

‘Not necessarily... both are likely to happen in pubs.’

This morning, Rebus looked innocent enough: sleepy eyes and a patch of grey bristle on his throat which the razor had missed. He wore a tie the way some schoolkids did — on sufferance. Each morning, he seemed to come into work whistling some irritating hook-line from an old pop song. By mid-morning, he’d have stopped doing it, but by then it was too late: Tibbet would be whistling it for him, unable to escape the pernicious chorus.

Rebus heard Tibbet hum the opening few bars of ‘Wichita Linesman’ and tried not to smile. His work here was done. He got up from the table, slipping his jacket back on.

‘Got to be somewhere,’ he said.

‘Oh?’

‘Nice train,’ Rebus commented, nodding towards the green locomotive. ‘Hobby of yours?’

‘Present from one of my nephews,’ Tibbet lied.

Rebus nodded, quietly impressed. Tibbet’s face gave nothing away. The lad was quick-thinking and plausible: both useful skills in a detective.

‘Well, I’ll see you later,’ Rebus said.

‘And if anyone wants you...?’ Angling for a bit more detail.

‘Trust me, they won’t.’ He gave Tibbet a wink and left the office.

DCI Macrae was in the hall, clutching paperwork and on his way to a meeting.

‘Where are you off to, John?’

‘Knoxland case, sir. For some reason, I seem to have become useful.’

‘Despite your best efforts, I’m sure.’

‘Absolutely.’

‘On you go then, but don’t forget: you’re ours, not theirs. Anything happens here, we can have you back in a minute.’

‘Try and keep me away, sir,’ Rebus said, searching in his pockets for his car keys and heading for the exit.

He was in the car park when his mobile sounded. It was Shug Davidson.

‘Seen the paper today, John?’

‘Anything I should know about?’

‘You might want to see what your friend Steve Holly has been saying about us.’

Rebus’s face tightened. ‘I’ll get back to you,’ he said. Five minutes later, he was pulling over kerbside, lunging into a newsagent’s. He pored over newsprint in the driver’s seat. Holly had printed the photo, but had surrounded it with an article on the sharper practices of bogus asylum-seekers. Mention was made of suspected terrorists who’d entered Britain as refugees. There was anecdotal evidence of spongers and charlatans, along with quotes from Knoxland residents. The message given was twofold: Britain is a soft target, and we can’t allow the situation to continue.

In the middle of which, the photo looked like nothing more than window-dressing.

Rebus called Holly on his mobile, but got an answering service. After a slew of judicious swear-words, he hung up.

He drove to the council housing department on Waterloo Place, where he’d arranged to meet with a Mrs Mackenzie. She was a small, bustling woman in her fifties. Shug Davidson had already faxed her his official request for information, but she still wasn’t happy.

‘It’s a matter of privacy,’ she told Rebus. ‘There are all sorts of rules and restrictions these days.’ She was leading him through an open-plan office.

‘I don’t suppose the deceased will complain, Mrs Mackenzie, especially if we catch his killer.’

‘Well, all the same...’ She had brought them into a tiny glass-walled compartment, which Rebus realised was her office.

‘And I thought the walls out at Knoxland were thin.’ He tapped the glass. She was shifting paperwork from a chair, gesturing for him to sit. Then she squeezed around the desk and sat in her own chair, putting on a pair of half-moon spectacles and sifting through paperwork.

Rebus didn’t think charm was going to work with this woman. Maybe just as well, since he’d never scored high marks in those tests. He decided to appeal to her professionalism.

‘Look, Mrs Mackenzie, we both like to see that whatever job we’re doing is done properly.’ She peered at him over her glasses. ‘My job today happens to be a murder inquiry. We can’t begin that inquiry properly until we know who the victim was. A fingerprint match came through first thing this morning: the victim was definitely your tenant...’

‘Well, you see, Inspector, that’s just my problem. The poor man who died was not one of my tenants.’

Rebus frowned. ‘I don’t understand.’ She handed him a sheet of paper.

‘Here are the tenant’s details. I believe your victim was Asian or similar. Is he likely to have been called Robert Baird?’

Rebus’s eyes were fixed to that name. The flat number was right... right tower block, too. Robert Baird was listed as the tenant.

‘He must have moved.’

Mackenzie was shaking her head. ‘These records are up-to-date. The last rent money we received was only last week. It was paid by Mr Baird.’

‘You’re thinking he sub-let?’

A broad smile lightened Mrs Mackenzie’s face. ‘Which is strictly forbidden by the tenancy agreement,’ she said.

‘But people do it?’

‘Of course they do. The thing is, I decided to do some sleuthing myself...’ She sounded pleased with herself. Rebus leaned forward in his chair, warming to her.

‘Do tell,’ he said.

‘I checked with the city’s other housing areas. There are several Robert Bairds on the list. Plus other forenames, all with the surname Baird.’

‘Some of them could be genuine,’ Rebus said, playing devil’s advocate.

‘And some of them not.’

‘You think this guy Baird’s been applying for council housing on a grand scale?’

She shrugged. ‘There’s only one way to be sure...’

The first address they tried was a tower block in Dumbiedykes, near Rebus’s old police station. The woman who answered the door looked African. There were little kids scurrying around behind her.

‘We’re looking for Mr Baird,’ Mackenzie said. The woman just shook her head. Mackenzie repeated the name.

‘The man you pay rent to,’ Rebus added. The woman kept shaking her head, closing the door slowly but purposefully on them.

‘I think we’re getting somewhere,’ Mackenzie said. ‘Come on.’

Out of the car, she was brisk and businesslike, but in the passenger seat she relaxed, asking Rebus about his job, where he lived, whether he was married.

‘Separated,’ he told her. ‘Long time back. How about you?’

She held up a hand to show him her wedding ring.

‘But sometimes women just wear one so they get less hassle,’ he said.

She snorted. ‘And I thought I had a suspicious mind.’

‘Goes with both our jobs, I suppose.’

She gave a sigh. ‘My job would be a hell of a lot easier without them.’

‘Immigrants, you mean?’

She nodded. ‘I look into their eyes sometimes, and I get a glimpse of what they’ve gone through to get here.’ She paused. ‘And all I can offer them are places like Knoxland...’

‘Better than nothing,’ Rebus said.

‘I hope so...’

Their next stop was a block of flats in Leith. The lifts were out of order, so they’d to climb four storeys, Mackenzie powering ahead in her noisy shoes. Rebus took a moment to catch his breath, then nodded to let her know she could knock on the door. A male answered. He was swarthy and unshaven, wearing a white vest and jogging bottoms. He was running fingers through thick dark hair.

‘Who the fuck are you?’ he said, in heavily accented English.

‘That’s some elocution teacher you’ve got,’ Rebus said, voice hardening to match the man’s. The man stared at him, not understanding.

Mackenzie turned to Rebus. ‘Slavic maybe? East European?’ She turned to the man. ‘Where are you from?’

‘Fuck you,’ the man replied. There seemed little malice in it; he was trying the words out either to note their effect or because they’d worked for him in the past.

‘Robert Baird,’ Rebus said. ‘You know him?’ The man’s eyes narrowed, and Rebus repeated the name. ‘You pay him money.’ He rubbed his thumb and fingers together, hoping the man might understand. Instead, he grew agitated.

‘Fuck off now!’

‘We’re not asking you for money,’ Rebus tried to explain. ‘We’re looking for Robert Baird. This is his flat.’ Rebus pointed to the interior.

‘Landlord,’ Mackenzie tried, but it was no good. The man’s face was twitching; sweat was beginning to break out on his forehead.

‘No problem,’ Rebus told him, holding his hands up, showing the man his palms — hoping maybe this sign would get through to him. Suddenly he noticed another figure in the shadows down the hallway. ‘You speak English?’ he called.

The man turned his head, barked something guttural. But the figure kept coming forward, until Rebus could see that it was a teenage boy.

‘Speak English?’ he repeated.

‘Little,’ the lad admitted. He was skinny and handsome, dressed in a short-sleeved blue shirt and denims.

‘You’re immigrants?’ Rebus asked.

‘Here our country,’ the boy stated defensively.

‘Don’t worry, son, we’re not from Immigration. You pay money to live here, don’t you?’

‘We pay, yes.’

‘The man you give the money to — he’s the one we’d like to talk to.’

The boy translated some of this for his father. The father stared at Rebus and shook his head.

‘Tell your dad,’ Rebus told the boy, ‘that a visit from the Immigration Service can be arranged, if he’d rather talk to them.’

The boy’s eyes widened in fear. The translation this time took longer. The man looked at Rebus again, this time with a kind of sad resignation, as if he were used to being kicked around by authority, but had been hoping for some respite. He muttered something, and the boy padded back down the hall. He returned with a folded piece of paper.

‘He comes for money. If we have problem, we this...’

Rebus unfolded the note. A mobile phone number and a name: Gareth. Rebus showed the note to Mackenzie.

‘Gareth Baird is one of the names on the list,’ she said.

‘Can’t be that many of them in Edinburgh. Chances are it’s the same one.’ Rebus took the note back, wondering what effect a phone call would have. He saw that the man was trying to offer him something: a handful of cash.

‘Is he trying to bribe us?’ Rebus asked the boy. The son shook his head.

‘He does not understand.’ He spoke to his father again. The man mumbled something, then stared at Rebus, and immediately Rebus thought of what Mackenzie had said in the car. It was true: the eyes were eloquent of pain.

‘This day,’ the boy told Rebus. ‘Money... this day.’

Rebus’s eyes narrowed. ‘Gareth is coming here today to collect the rent?’

The son checked with his father and then nodded.

‘What time?’ Rebus asked.

Another discussion. ‘Maybe now... soon,’ the boy translated. Rebus turned to Mackenzie. ‘I can call a car to take you back to your office.’

‘You’re going to wait for him?’

‘That’s the plan.’

‘If he’s abusing his tenancy, I should be here, too.’

‘Could be a long wait... I’ll keep you in the picture. The alternative is hanging around with me all day.’ He shrugged, telling her it was her choice.

‘You’ll phone me?’ she asked.

He nodded. ‘Meantime, you could be following up some of those other addresses.’

She saw the sense in this. ‘All right,’ she said.

Rebus took out his mobile. ‘I’ll send for a patrol car.’

‘What if that scares him off?’

‘Good point... a taxi then.’ He made the call, and she headed back downstairs, leaving Rebus facing father and son.

‘I’m going to wait for Gareth,’ he told them. Then he peered down their hall. ‘Mind if I come in?’

‘You are welcome,’ the boy said. Rebus walked inside.

The flat needed decorating. Towels and strips of material had been pressed to the gaps in the window frames to minimise draughts. But there was furniture, and the place was tidy. One narrow element of the living room’s gas fire was lit.

‘Coffee?’ the boy asked.

‘Please,’ Rebus answered. He gestured towards the sofa, requesting permission to sit. The father nodded, and Rebus sat down. Then he got up again to study the photographs on the mantelpiece. Three or four generations of the same family. Rebus turned to the father, smiling and nodding. The man’s face softened a little. There wasn’t much else in the room to attract Rebus’s attention: no ornaments or books, no TV or stereo. There was a small portable radio on the floor by the father’s chair. It was shrouded in sellotape, presumably to stop it falling apart. Rebus couldn’t see an ashtray, so kept his cigarettes in his pocket. When the boy returned from the kitchen, Rebus accepted the tiny cup from him. There was no offer of milk. The drink was thick and black, and when Rebus took his first sip, he couldn’t decide whether the jolt it gave him was caffeine or sugar. He nodded to let his hosts know it was good. They were staring at him as if he were an exhibit. He decided he would ask for the boy’s name, and some of the family’s history. But then his mobile rang. He muttered something resembling an apology as he answered it.

It was Siobhan.

‘Anything earth-shattering to report?’ she asked into her phone. She was sitting in some sort of waiting room. She hadn’t expected to be able to see the doctors right away, but had anticipated an office or anteroom. Here, she was in with outpatients and visitors, noisy toddlers, and staff who ignored all outsiders as they purchased snacks from the two vending machines. Siobhan had spent a lot of time examining the contents of those machines. One boasted a limited range of sandwiches — triangles of thin white bread with mixtures of lettuce, tomato, tuna, ham and cheese. The other was more popular: crisps and chocolate. There was a drinks machine, too, but it bore the legend ‘Out of Order’.

Once the lure of the machines had worn off, she’d perused the reading material on the coffee table — out-of-date women’s mags with the pages just about hanging together, except where photos and offers had been torn out. There were a couple of kids’ comics, too, but she was saving those for later. Instead, she’d started tidying up her phone, deleting unwanted text messages and call records. Then she’d texted a couple of friends. And finally she’d crumbled altogether and called Rebus.

‘Mustn’t grumble,’ was all he said. ‘What are you up to?’

‘Hanging around the Infirmary. You?’

‘Hanging about in Leith.’

‘Anyone would think we didn’t like Gayfield.’

‘But we know they’re wrong, don’t we?’

She smiled at this. Another kid had come in, barely old enough to push open the door. He stood on tiptoe to feed coins into the chocolate machine, but then couldn’t decide. He pressed nose and hands to the glass display, mesmerised.

‘We still meeting up later on?’ Siobhan asked.

‘If not, I’ll let you know.’

‘Don’t tell me you’re expecting a better offer.’

‘You never can tell. Did you see Steve Holly’s rag this morning?’

‘I only read grown-up newspapers. Did he print the photograph?’

‘He did... and then he went to town on asylum-seekers.’

‘Oh, hell.’

‘So if any other poor sod ends up in the deep-freeze, we’ll know who to blame.’

The waiting-room door was opening again. Siobhan thought it might be the child’s mum, but instead it was the woman from the reception desk. She motioned for Siobhan to follow her.

‘John, we’re going to have to talk later.’

‘You were the one who phoned me, remember?’

‘Sorry, but it looks like I’m wanted.’

‘And suddenly I’m not? Cheers, Siobhan.’

‘I’ll see you this afternoon...’

But Rebus had already hung up. Siobhan followed the receptionist down first one corridor and then another, the woman walking briskly, so that there was no possibility of conversation between them. Finally she pointed to a door. Siobhan nodded her thanks, knocked and entered.

It was some sort of office: rows of shelves, a desk and computer. One white-coated doctor sat swivelling on the only chair. The other rested against the desk, arms stretched above his head. Both were good-looking and knew it.

‘I’m Detective Sergeant Clarke,’ Siobhan said, shaking the first one’s hand.

‘Alf McAteer,’ he told her, his fingers brushing over hers. He turned to his colleague, who was rising from the chair. ‘Isn’t it a sign that you’re getting old?’ he asked.

‘What?’

‘When the police officers start getting more ravishing.’

The other one was grinning. He squeezed Siobhan’s hand. ‘I’m Alexis Cater. Don’t worry about him, the Viagra’s almost run its course.’

‘Has it?’ McAteer sounded horrified. ‘Time for another prescription then.’

‘Look,’ Cater was telling Siobhan, ‘if it’s about that child porn on Alf’s computer...’

Siobhan looked stern-faced. He angled his face into hers.

‘Joking,’ he said.

‘Well,’ she replied, ‘we could take the pair of you down to the station... impound all your computers and software... might take a few days, of course.’ She paused. ‘And by the way, the police may be getting better-looking, but we’re also given a sense-of-humour bypass on the first day at work...’

They stared at her, standing shoulder to shoulder, both leaning back against the edge of the desk.

‘That’s us told,’ Cater told his friend.

‘Well and truly,’ McAteer agreed.

They were tall and slim, widening at the shoulders. Private schools and rugby, Siobhan guessed. Winter sports, too, judging by their tans. McAteer was the swarthier of the two: thick eyebrows, almost meeting in the middle, unruly black hair, face needing a shave. Cater was fair-haired like his father, though it looked to her as if he maybe dyed it. Already a touch of male-pattern baldness was showing. Same green eyes as his father, too, but otherwise there was little resemblance. Gordon Cater’s easy charm had been replaced by something much less winning: an absolute confidence that Alexis was always going to be one of life’s winners, not because of what he was, any qualities he might possess, but due to that lineage.

McAteer had turned to his friend. ‘Must be those tapes of our Filipino maids...’

Cater slapped McAteer’s shoulder, kept his eyes on Siobhan.

‘We are curious,’ he told her.

‘Speak for yourself, sweetie,’ McAteer said, affecting campness. In that instant, Siobhan saw the way their relationship worked: McAteer working constantly at it, almost like a king’s fool of old, needy for Cater’s patronage. Because Cater had the power: everyone would want to be his friend. He was a magnet for all the things McAteer craved, the invites and the girls. As if to reinforce this, Cater gave his friend a look, and McAteer made a show of zipping his mouth shut.

‘What is it we can do for you?’ Cater asked with almost exaggerated politeness. ‘We’ve really only got a few minutes between patients...’

It was another shrewd move: reinforcing his credentials — I’m the son of a star, but in here, my job is helping people, saving lives. I am a necessity, and there’s nothing you can do to change that...

‘Mag Lennox,’ Siobhan said.

‘We’re in the dark,’ Cater said. He broke eye contact to cross one foot over the other.

‘No you’re not,’ Siobhan told him. ‘You stole her skeleton from the medical school.’

‘Did we?’

‘And now she’s turned up again... buried in Fleshmarket Close.’

‘I saw that story,’ Cater said with the slightest of nods. ‘Grisly sort of find, isn’t it? I thought the article said it had something to do with raising the devil?’

Siobhan shook her head.

‘Plenty of devils in this town, eh, Lex?’ McAteer said.

Cater ignored him. ‘So you think we took a skeleton from the medical school and buried it in a cellar?’ He paused. ‘Was it reported to police at the time...? Only, I don’t recall seeing that particular story. Surely the university would have alerted the proper authorities.’ McAteer was nodding his assent.

‘You know that didn’t happen,’ Siobhan said quietly. ‘They were still in the mire for letting you walk out of the pathology lab with a selection of body parts.’

‘These are serious allegations.’ Cater offered a smile. ‘Should my solicitor be present?’

‘All I need to know is what you did with the skeletons.’

He stared at her, probably the same look which had discomfited many a young woman. Siobhan didn’t even blink. He sniffed and took a deep breath.

‘Just how major a crime is it to bury a museum piece beneath a pub?’ He tried her with another smile, head sliding over to one side. ‘Aren’t there any drug-pushers or rapists you should be pursuing instead?’

The memory of Donny Cruikshank came to her, his scarred face no kind of recompense for his crime...

‘You’re not in trouble,’ she said at last. ‘Anything you tell me will be kept between us.’

‘Like pillow talk?’ McAteer couldn’t help saying. His chuckle died at another look from Cater.

‘That means we’d be doing you a favour, Detective Clarke. A favour that might need repaying.’

McAteer grinned at his friend’s comment, but kept quiet.

‘That would depend,’ Siobhan said.

Cater leaned towards her a little. ‘Come out for a drink with me tonight, I’ll tell you then.’

‘Tell me now.’

He shook his head, not taking his eyes off her. ‘Tonight.’

McAteer looked disappointed: presumably some prior arrangement was about to be ditched.

‘I don’t think so,’ Siobhan said.

Cater glanced at his wristwatch. ‘We need to get back to the ward...’ He held out his hand again. ‘It was interesting meeting you. I bet we’d have had a lot to talk about...’ When she stood her ground, refusing to take his hand, he raised an eyebrow. It was a favourite move of his father’s, she’d seen it in half a dozen films. Slightly puzzled and let down...

‘Just one drink,’ she said.

‘And two straws,’ Cater added. His sense of his own powers was returning: she hadn’t managed to turn him down. Another victory to chalk up.

‘Opal Lounge at eight?’ he suggested.

She shook her head. ‘Oxford Bar at seven thirty.’

‘I don’t... Is it new?’

‘Quite the opposite. Look it up in the phone book.’ She opened the door to leave, but paused as if she’d just thought of something. ‘And leave your jester in his box.’ Nodding towards Alf McAteer.

Alexis Cater was laughing as she made her exit.

7

The man called Gareth was laughing into his mobile phone as the door opened. There were gold rings on each of his fingers, chains dangling from his neck and wrists. He wasn’t tall but he was wide. Rebus got the impression much of it was fat. A gut hung over his waistband. He was balding badly, and had allowed what hair he had to grow uncut, so that it hung down to the back of his collar and beyond. He wore a black leather trenchcoat and black T-shirt, with baggy denims and scuffed trainers. He already had his free hand out for the cash, wasn’t expecting another hand to grab it and haul him inside the flat. He dropped the phone, swearing and finally taking note of Rebus.

‘Who the hell are you?’

‘Afternoon, Gareth. Sorry if I was a bit brusque there... three cups of coffee gets me that way sometimes.’

Gareth was composing himself, deciding that he wasn’t about to be done over. He bent down for his phone, but Rebus stepped on it, shaking his head.

‘Later,’ he said, kicking the phone out of the door and slamming it shut behind them.

‘Fuck’s going on here?’

‘We’re having a chat, that’s what.’

‘You look like the filth to me.’

‘You’re a good judge of character.’ Rebus gestured down the hall and encouraged Gareth into the living room with his hand pressed to the young man’s back. Passing father and son in the kitchen doorway, Rebus looked towards the son and got a nod, meaning he had the right man. ‘Sit down,’ Rebus ordered. Gareth lowered himself on to the arm of the sofa. Rebus stood in front of him. ‘This your flat?’

‘What’s it to you?’

‘Only it’s not your name on the tenancy.’

‘Isn’t it?’ Gareth played with the chains around his left wrist. Rebus leaned over him, got right into his face.

‘Is Baird your real surname?’

‘Yeah.’ His tone challenged Rebus to call him a liar. Then: ‘What’s so funny?’

‘Just a wee trick, Gareth. See, I didn’t actually know your surname.’ Rebus paused and straightened up again. ‘But I do now. Robert’s what — your brother? Dad?’

‘Who are we talking about?’

Rebus smiled again. ‘Bit late for all that, Gareth.’

Gareth seemed to agree. He jabbed a finger in the direction of the kitchen. ‘Did they grass us up? Did they?’

Rebus shook his head, waited till he had Gareth’s full attention. ‘No, Gareth,’ he said. ‘A dead man did that...’

After which he let the young man simmer gently for five minutes, like so much reheated cock-a-leekie. Rebus made a show of checking text messages on his mobile. Opened a new packet of cigarettes and slid one unlit between his lips.

‘Can I have one of those?’ Gareth asked.

‘Absolutely... just as soon as you tell me: is Robert your brother or your dad? I’m guessing dad but I could be wrong. By the way, I can’t begin to count how many criminal charges are hanging over you right now. Sub-letting’s just the start of it. Does Robert declare all this illegal income? See, once the taxman gets his claws into your baws, he’s worse than a Bengal tiger. Trust me on that — I’ve seen the results.’ He paused. ‘Then there’s demanding money with menaces... that’s where you come in specifically.’

‘I’ve never done nothing!’

‘No?’

‘Nothing like that... I just collect, that’s all.’ A pleading tone entering his voice. Rebus guessed Gareth had been the slow, lumbering kid at school — no real friends, just people who tolerated him because of his bulk, using that bulk when occasion demanded.

‘It’s not you I’m interested in,’ Rebus reassured him. ‘Not once I’ve got an address for your dad — an address I’m going to get anyway. I’m just trying to save the pair of us all that hassle...’

Gareth looked up, wondering about that ‘pair of us’. Rebus shrugged an apology.

‘See, you’ll be coming with me back to the station. Hold you in custody till I get the address... then we pay a visit...’

‘He lives in Porty,’ Gareth blurted out. Meaning Portobello: on the sea-front to the south-east of the city.

‘And he’s your dad?’

Gareth nodded.

‘There,’ said Rebus, ‘that wasn’t so bad. Now up you get...’

‘What for?’

‘Because you and me are going to pay him a visit.’

Gareth didn’t like the sound of this, Rebus could tell, but he didn’t offer any resistance either, not once Rebus had cajoled him to his feet. Rebus shook hands with his hosts, thanked them for the coffee. The father started offering banknotes to Gareth, but Rebus shook his head.

‘No more rent to pay,’ he told the son. ‘Isn’t that right, Gareth?’

Gareth gave a flick of his head, said nothing. Outside, his mobile phone had already been taken. Rebus was reminded of the torch...

‘Somebody’s pocketed it,’ Gareth complained.

‘You’ll have to report that,’ Rebus advised. ‘Make sure the insurance takes care of it.’ He saw the look on Gareth’s face. ‘Always supposing it wasn’t nicked in the first place.’

At ground level, Gareth’s Japanese sports car was ringed by half a dozen kids whose parents had given up on sending them to school.

‘How much did he give you?’ Rebus asked them.

‘Two bar.’ Meaning two quid.

‘And how long does that get him?’

They just stared at Rebus. ‘It’s not a parking meter,’ one of them said. ‘We don’t give tickets.’ His pals joined in the laughter.

Rebus nodded and turned to Gareth. ‘We’re taking my car,’ he told him. ‘Just have to hope yours is still here when you get back...’

‘And if it isn’t?’

‘Back to the cop-shop for a reference to help with the insurance claim... Always supposing you’re insured.’

‘Always supposing,’ Gareth said resignedly.

It wasn’t a long drive to Portobello. They headed out on Seafield Road, no sign of a prostitutes’ day-shift. Gareth directed Rebus to a side road near the promenade. ‘We need to park here and walk,’ he explained. So that was what they did. The sea was the colour of slate. Dogs chased sticks across the beach. Rebus felt like he’d stepped back in time: chip shops and amusement arcades. For years when he was a kid, his parents had taken him and his brother to a caravan in St Andrews for the summer, or to a cheap bed and breakfast in Blackpool. Ever since, any seaside town could pull him back to those days.

‘Did you grow up here?’ he asked Gareth.

‘Tenement in Gorgie, that’s where I grew up.’

‘You’ve gone up in the world,’ Rebus told him.

Gareth just shrugged, pushed open a gate. ‘This is it.’

A garden path led to the front door of a four-storey double-fronted terraced house. Rebus stared for a moment. Every window had uninterrupted views across the beach.

‘Moved on a bit from Gorgie,’ he muttered, following Gareth up the path. The young man unlocked the door and yelled that he was home. The entrance hallway was short and narrow, with doors and a staircase off. Gareth didn’t bother looking in any of the rooms. He headed for the first floor instead, Rebus still close behind.

They entered the drawing room. Twenty-six feet long, with a floor-to-ceiling bay window. The place had been tastefully decorated and furnished, but too modernly: chrome and leather and abstract art. The room’s shape and dimensions didn’t suit any of it. The original chandelier and cornices remained, offering glimpses of what might have been. A brass telescope sat by the window, supported by a wooden tripod.

‘What the hell’s this you’ve dragged in?’

A man was sitting at the table by the telescope. He wore a pair of glasses on a string around his neck. His hair was silvery-grey, neatly barbered, the face lined by weathering rather than age.

‘Mr Baird, I’m Detective Inspector Rebus...’

‘What’s he done this time?’ Baird closed the newspaper he’d been reading and glared at his son. There was resignation rather than anger in his voice. Rebus guessed things weren’t working out as hoped for Gareth in the family’s little enterprise.

‘It’s not Gareth, Mr Baird... it’s you.’

‘Me?’

Rebus did a circuit of the room. ‘Council’s certainly doing a better class of let these days.’

‘What are you on about?’ The question was for Rebus, but Baird’s eyes were asking his son for an explanation, too.

‘He was waiting for me, Dad,’ Gareth burst out. ‘Made me leave my car there and everything.’

‘Fraud’s a serious business, Mr Baird,’ Rebus was saying. ‘Always mystifies me, but the courts seem to hate it more than housebreaking or mugging. I mean, who are you cheating, after all? Not a person, not exactly... just this big anonymous blob called “the council”.’ Rebus shook his head. ‘But they’ll still come down on you like shit from the sky.’

Baird had leaned back in his chair, arms folded across his chest.

‘Mind you,’ Rebus added, ‘you weren’t content with the small stuff... how many flats are you sub-letting — ten? Twenty? Got the whole family roped in, I’d say... maybe a few dead aunties and uncles on the paperwork, too.’

‘You here to arrest me?’

Rebus shook his head. ‘I’m ready to tiptoe out of your life the minute I get what I’ve come for.’

Baird suddenly looked interested, seeing a man he could do business with. But he wasn’t altogether convinced.

‘Gareth, he have anybody else with him?’

Gareth shook his head. ‘Waiting for me in the flat...’

‘Nobody outside? No driver or anything?’

Still shaking his head. ‘We came here in his car... just me and him.’

Baird considered this. ‘So, how much is this going to cost me?’

‘The answers to a few questions. One of your tenants got himself killed the other day.’

‘I tell them to keep themselves to themselves,’ Baird started to argue, ready to defend himself against any implication that he was an uncaring landlord. Rebus was standing by the window, staring down at the beach and promenade. An old couple walked past, hand in hand. It annoyed him that they might be subsidising the schemes of a shark like Baird. Or maybe their grandkids were languishing on a waiting list for a council flat.

‘Very public-spirited of you, I’m sure,’ Rebus said. ‘What I need to know is his name and where he came from.’

Baird snorted. ‘I don’t ask where they come from — made that mistake once and got my ear bent for my sins. Thing that concerns me is, they all need roofs over their heads. And if the council won’t or can’t help... well, I will.’

‘For a price.’

‘A fair price.’

‘Yes, you’re all heart. So you never knew his name?’

‘Used the first name Jim.’

‘Jim? Was that his idea or yours?’

‘Mine.’

‘How did you find him?’

‘Customers have a way of finding me. Word of mouth, you could call it. Wouldn’t happen if they didn’t like what they were getting.’

‘They’re getting council flats... and paying you over the odds for the privilege.’ Rebus waited in vain for Baird to say something; knew what the man’s eyes were telling him — Got that off your chest? ‘And you’ve no idea of his nationality? Where he was from? How he got here...?’ Baird was shaking his head.

‘Gareth, go fetch us a beer out the fridge.’ Gareth was quick to comply. Rebus wasn’t fooled by the plural ‘us’ — he knew there’d be no drink forthcoming for him.

‘So how can you communicate with all these people if you don’t know their language?’

‘There are ways. A few signs and bits of miming...’ Gareth came back with a single can, which he handed to his father. ‘Gareth did French at school, I reckoned that might be useful to us.’ His voice dropped at the end of the sentence, and Rebus assumed that once again Gareth had fallen short of expectations.

‘Jim didn’t need to mime though,’ the boy added, keen to contribute something to the conversation. ‘He spoke a bit of English. Not as good as his pal, mind...’ His father glared at him, but Rebus stepped between them.

‘What pal?’ he asked Gareth.

‘Just some woman... about my age.’

‘They were living together?’

‘Jim lived on his own. I got the feeling she was just someone he knew.’

‘From the estate?’

‘I suppose...’

But now Baird was on his feet. ‘Look, you’ve got what you came for.’

‘Have I?’

‘Okay, I’ll put it another way — you’ve got all you’re getting.’

‘That’s for me to decide, Mr Baird.’ Then to the son: ‘What did she look like, Gareth?’

But Gareth had taken the hint. ‘Can’t remember.’

‘What? Not even her skin colour? You seemed to remember how old she was.’

‘Lot darker-skinned than Jim... that’s all I know.’

‘She spoke English though?’

Gareth tried looking to his father for guidance, but Rebus was doing his best to block his eye-line.

‘She spoke English and she was a friend of Jim’s,’ Rebus persisted. ‘And she lived on the estate... Just give me a bit more.’

‘That’s everything.’

Baird stepped past Rebus and wrapped an arm around his son’s shoulders. ‘You’ve got the boy all confused,’ he complained. ‘If he remembers anything else, he’ll let you know.’

‘I’m sure he will,’ Rebus said.

‘And you meant what you said about leaving us be?’

‘Every word of it, Mr Baird... Of course, the Housing Department may have their own feelings on the matter.’

Baird’s face twisted into a sneer.

‘I’ll let myself out,’ Rebus said.

On the promenade, there was a stiff breeze blowing. It took him four attempts to get his cigarette lit. He stood there for a while, staring up at the drawing-room window, then remembered that he’d missed lunch. There were plenty of pubs on the High Street, so he left his car where it was and took a short stroll to the nearest one. Called Mrs Mackenzie and told her about Baird, ending the call as he pushed open the pub door. Ordered a half of IPA to wash down the chicken salad roll. Earlier, they’d been serving soup and stovies, and the aroma lingered. One of the regulars asked the barman to find the horse-racing channel. Flipping the TV remote through a dozen stations, he passed on one that made Rebus stop chewing.

‘Go back,’ he ordered, debris flying from his mouth.

‘Which one?’

‘Whoah, right there.’ It was a local news programme, an outside broadcast of a demo in what was recognisably Knoxland. Hastily contrived banners and placards:

NEGLECTED

WE CANNOT LIVE LIKE THIS

LOCALS NEED HELP TOO...

The reporter was interviewing the couple from the flat next to the victim. Rebus caught the odd word and phrase: council has a responsibility... feelings ignored... dumping ground... no consultation... It was almost as if they’d been briefed on which buzz-words to use. The reporter turned to a well-dressed Asian-looking man wearing silver-rimmed spectacles. His name appeared onscreen as Mohammad Dirwan. He was from something called the Glasgow New Citizens Collective.

‘Load of nutters over there,’ the barman commented.

‘They can shove as many into Knoxland as they like,’ a regular agreed. Rebus turned to him.

‘As many what?’

The man shrugged. ‘Call them what you like — refugees or con artists. Whatever they are, I know damned fine who ends up paying for them.’

‘Right enough, Matty,’ the barman said. Then, to Rebus: ‘Seen enough?’

‘More than enough,’ Rebus said, leaving the rest of his drink untouched as he headed for the door.

8

Knoxland hadn’t calmed much by the time Rebus arrived. Press photographers were busy comparing shots, huddled around the screens of their digital cameras. A radio reporter was interviewing Ellen Wylie. Rat-Arse Reynolds was shaking his head as he walked across waste ground to his car.

‘What’s up, Charlie?’ Rebus asked.

‘Might clear the air a bit if we left them to get on with it,’ Reynolds growled, slamming his car door shut on the world and picking up an already open packet of crisps.

There was a scrum beside the Portakabin. Rebus recognised faces from the TV pictures: the placards were already showing signs of wear and tear. Fingers were being pointed as an argument continued between the locals and Mohammad Dirwan. Close up, Dirwan looked to Rebus like a lawyer: new-looking black woollen coat, polished shoes, silver moustache. He was gesturing with his hands, voice rising to compete against the noise. Rebus peered through the mesh grille covering the Portakabin’s window. As suspected, there was no one home. He looked around, eventually took the walkway to the other side of the tower block. He remembered the little bunch of flowers at the murder scene. They’d been scattered now, trampled on. Maybe Jim’s friend had left them...

A transit van sat on its own in a cordoned zone which normally would have provided parking for residents. There was no one in the front, but Rebus banged on the back doors. The windows were blackened, but he knew he could be seen from within. The door opened and he climbed in.

‘Welcome to the toy box,’ Shug Davidson said, sitting down again next to the camera operator. The back of the van had been filled with recording and monitoring equipment. Any civil disorder in the city, police liked to keep a record. Useful for identifying the troublemakers, and for compiling a case if necessary. From the video screen, it looked to Rebus as though someone had been filming from a second- or third-floor landing. Shots zoomed in and out, blurred close-ups suddenly coming into focus.

‘Not that there’s been any violence yet,’ Davidson muttered. Then, to the operator: ‘Go back a bit... just there... freeze that, will you, Chris?’

There was some flicker to the stilled image which Chris tried to rectify.

‘Who is it worries you, Shug?’ Rebus asked.

‘Shrewd as ever, John...’ Davidson pointed to one of the figures at the back of the demo. The man wore an olive-green parka, hood pulled over his head, so that only his chin and lips were visible. ‘I think he was here a few months ago... We had this gang from Belfast, trying to hoover up the drugs action.’

‘You put them away, didn’t you?’

‘Most of them are on remand. A few headed back home.’

‘So why is he back?’

‘Not sure.’

‘Have you tried asking him?’

‘Scarpered when he saw our cameras.’

‘Name?’

Davidson shook his head. ‘I’ll have to do a bit of digging...’ He rubbed at his forehead. ‘And how’s your day been so far, John?’

Rebus filled him in on Robert Baird.

Davidson nodded. ‘Good stuff,’ he said, not quite managing any level of enthusiasm.

‘I know it doesn’t get us any further...’

‘Sorry, John, I’m just...’ Davidson shook his head slowly. ‘We need someone to come forward. The weapon’s got to be out there, blood on the killer’s clothes. Someone knows.’

‘Jim’s girlfriend might have some ideas. We could bring Gareth in, see if he can spot her.’

‘It’s an idea,’ Davidson mused. ‘And meantime, we watch Knoxland explode...’

Film was running on four different screens. On one, a crowd of youths was seen standing way to the back of the crowd. They wore scarves across their mouths, hoods up. Spotting the cameraman, they turned and gave him a view of their backsides. One of them picked up a stone and hurled it, but it fell well short.

‘See,’ Davidson said, ‘something like that could light the fuse...’

‘Have there been any actual attacks?’

‘Just verbal stuff.’ He leaned back and stretched. ‘We finished the door-to-door... Well, we finished all the ones that would talk to us.’ He paused. ‘Make that could talk to us. This place is like the Tower of Babel... a posse of interpreters would be a start.’ His stomach growled, and he tried to disguise it by twisting in his creaking chair.

‘Time for a break?’ Rebus suggested. Davidson shook his head. ‘What about this guy Dirwan?’

‘He’s a Glasgow solicitor, been working with some of the refugees on the estates over there.’

‘So what brings him here?’

‘Apart from the publicity, maybe he thinks he can rake up a whole new bunch of clients. He wants the Lord Provost to come see Knoxland for herself, wants a meeting between politicians and the immigrant community. There are a lot of things he wants.’

‘Right now, he’s in a minority of one.’

‘I know.’

‘You’re happy to feed him to the lions?’

Davidson stared at him. ‘We’ve got men out there, John.’

‘It was getting pretty heated.’

‘You offering yourself as bodyguard?’

Rebus shrugged. ‘I do whatever you tell me to, Shug. This is your show...’

Davidson rubbed at his forehead again. ‘Sorry, John, sorry...’

‘Take that break, Shug. A breath of air if nothing else...’ Rebus opened the back door.

‘Oh, John, message for you. The Drugs guys want their torch back. I was told to tell you it’s urgent.’

Rebus nodded, got out and closed the door again. He headed up to Jim’s flat. The door was flapping open. No sign of the torch in the kitchen, or anywhere else. The forensic team had been in, but he doubted they’d taken it. As he exited, Steve Holly was coming out of the flat next door, holding his tape-recorder to his ear to check it had worked.

Soft touch, that’s the problem with this country...

‘I take it you’d agree with that,’ Rebus said, startling the reporter. Holly stopped the tape and pocketed the recorder.

‘Objective journalism, Rebus — giving both sides of the argument.’

‘You’ve talked to some of the poor bastards who’ve been thrown into this lion’s den then?’

Holly nodded. He was peering over the wall, wondering if anything he should know about was happening at ground level. ‘I’ve even managed to find Knoxers who don’t mind all these new arrivals — bet you’re surprised by that... I certainly was.’ He lit a cigarette, offered one to Rebus.

‘Just this minute finished one,’ Rebus lied with a shake of his head.

‘Any result yet from the photo we printed?’

‘Maybe no one noticed it tucked away there... too busy reading about tax-dodgers, pay-outs and preferential housing.’

‘All of it true,’ Holly protested. ‘I never said it applied here, but it does some places.’

‘If you were any lower, I could tee a golf ball off your head.’

‘Not a bad line,’ Holly grinned. ‘Maybe I’ll use it...’ His mobile sounded and he took the call, turning from Rebus, walking away as if the detective no longer existed.

Which, Rebus assumed, was the way someone like Holly worked. Living for the moment, attention span stretching only as far as that particular story. Once it was written out, it was yesterday’s news, and something else had to fill the vacuum it left. It was hard not to compare the process with the way some of his own colleagues worked: cases erased from the mind, new ones awaited, hoping for something a bit unusual or interesting. He knew there were good journalists out there, too: they weren’t all like Steve Holly. Some of them couldn’t stand the man.

Rebus followed Holly downstairs and out into the lessening storm. Fewer than a dozen diehards were left to argue their grievances with the solicitor, who had been joined by a few of the immigrants themselves. This was making for a fresh photo op, and the cameras were busy again, some of the immigrants shielding their faces with their hands. Rebus heard a noise behind him, someone calling out, ‘Go on, Howie!’ He turned and saw a youth walking purposefully towards the crowd, his friends offering encouragement from a safe distance. The youth paid no attention to Rebus. He had his face covered, hands tucked into the pouch on the front of his jacket. His pace was increasing as he made to pass Rebus. Rebus could hear his hoarse breath, almost smell the adrenalin coming off him.

He snatched at an arm and yanked it backwards. The youth spun, hands emerging from their pouch. Something tumbled across the ground: a small rock. The youth cried out in pain as Rebus wrenched his arm higher behind his back, forcing him down on to his knees. The crowd had turned at the sound, cameras clicking, but Rebus’s eyes were on the gang, checking they weren’t about to attack en masse. They weren’t: instead, they were walking away, no intention of rescuing their fallen comrade. A man was getting into a battered red BMW. A man in an olive-coloured parka.

The captured youth was now swearing between agonised complaints. Rebus was aware of uniformed officers standing over him, one of them handcuffing the youth. As Rebus straightened up, he came eye to eye with Ellen Wylie.

‘What happened?’ she asked.

‘He had a rock in his pocket... going to attack Dirwan.’

‘That’s a lie,’ the youth spat. ‘I’m being fitted up here!’ The hood had been pulled from his head, the scarf from his mouth. Rebus saw a shaved skull, a face blighted by acne. One central tooth missing, the mouth open in disbelief at the way events had turned. Rebus stooped and picked up the rock.

‘Still warm,’ he said.

‘Take him down the station,’ Wylie was telling the uniforms. Then, to the youth: ‘Anything sharp on you before we search your pockets?’

‘Telling you nothing.’

‘Get him into a car, lads.’

The youth was led away, cameras following him as he returned to his complaints. Rebus realised that the lawyer was standing in front of him.

‘You saved my life, sir!’ He clasped Rebus’s hands in his own.

‘I wouldn’t go that far...’

But Dirwan had turned to the crowd. ‘You see? You see the way that hate drips down from father to son? It is like a slow poison, polluting the very ground that should nourish us!’ He tried to embrace Rebus, but met with resistance. This didn’t seem to bother him. ‘You are a police officer, yes?’

‘A detective inspector,’ Rebus acknowledged.

‘Name’s Rebus!’ a voice called. Rebus stared at a smirking Steve Holly.

‘Mr Rebus, I am in your debt until we perish on this earth. We are all in your debt.’ Dirwan meant the immigrant group who stood nearby, apparently unaware of what had just happened. And now Shug Davidson was coming into view, bemused by the spectacle before him and accompanied by a grinning Rat-Arse Reynolds.

‘Centre of attention as usual, John,’ Reynolds said.

‘What’s the story?’ Davidson asked.

‘A kid was about to clout Mr Dirwan here,’ Rebus muttered. ‘So I stopped him.’ He offered a shrug, as if to indicate that he now wished he hadn’t. A uniform, one of the ones who’d taken the youth away, was returning.

‘Better take a look at this, sir,’ he told Davidson. He was holding a polythene evidence bag. There was something small and angular within.

A six-inch kitchen knife.

Rebus found himself playing babysitter to his new best friend.

They were in the CID office in Torphichen Place. The youth was being questioned in one of the interview rooms by Shug Davidson and Ellen Wylie. The knife had been whisked away to the forensic lab at Howdenhall. Rebus was trying to send a text message to Siobhan, letting her know they’d have to reschedule their meeting. He suggested six o’clock.

Having given his statement, Mohammad Dirwan was sipping sugary black tea at one of the desks, his eyes fixed on Rebus.

‘I never mastered the intricacies of these new technologies,’ he stated.

‘Me neither,’ Rebus admitted.

‘And yet somehow they have become imperative to our way of life.’

‘I suppose so.’

‘You are a man of few words, Inspector. Either that or I’m making you nervous.’

‘I’m just having to re-jig a meeting, Mr Dirwan.’

‘Please...’ The lawyer held up a hand. ‘I told you to call me Mo.’ He grinned, showing a row of immaculate teeth. ‘People tell me it’s a woman’s name — they associate it with the character in EastEnders. You know the one?’ Rebus shook his head. ‘I say to them, do you not remember the footballer Mo Johnston? He played for both Rangers and Celtic, becoming hero and villain twice over — a trick not even the best lawyer could hope to accomplish.’

Rebus managed a smile. Rangers and Celtic: the Protestant team and the Catholic. He thought of something. ‘Tell me, Mr...’ A glare from Dirwan. ‘Mo... tell me, you’ve had dealings with asylum-seekers in Glasgow, right?’

‘Correct.’

‘One of the demonstrators today... we think he might be from Belfast.’

‘That wouldn’t surprise me. The same thing happens on the Glasgow estates. It’s a spill-over from the troubles in Northern Ireland.’

‘How so?’

‘Immigrants have begun to move to places like Belfast — they see opportunities there. Those people involved in the religious conflict are not so keen on this. They see everything in terms of Catholic and Protestant... maybe these new incoming religions scare them. There have been physical attacks. I would call it a basic instinct, this need to alienate what we cannot understand.’ He raised a finger. ‘Which does not mean I condone it.’

‘But what would bring these men from Belfast to Scotland?’

‘Maybe they wish to recruit the unhappy locals to their own cause.’ He shrugged. ‘Unrest can seem an end in itself to some people.’

‘I suppose that’s true.’ Rebus had seen it for himself: the need to foment trouble, to stir things up; for no other reason than a feeling of power.

The lawyer finished his drink. ‘Do you think this boy is the killer?’

‘Could be.’

‘Everyone seems to carry a knife in this country. You know Glasgow is the most dangerous city in Europe?’

‘So I hear.’

‘Stabbings... always stabbings.’ Dirwan shook his head. ‘And yet people still struggle to come to Scotland.’

‘Immigrants, you mean?’

‘Your First Minister says he is worried about the decline in the population. He is correct in this. We need young people to fill the jobs, otherwise how can we hope to support the ageing population? We also need people with skills. Yet at the same time, the government makes immigration so difficult... and as for asylum-seekers...’ He shook his head again, slowly this time, as if in disbelief. ‘You know Whitemire?’

‘The detention centre?’

‘Such a godforsaken place, Inspector. I’m not made welcome there. You can perhaps appreciate why.’

‘You’ve got clients in Whitemire?’

‘Several, all of them appealing their cases. It used to be a prison, you know, and now it houses families, individuals scared out of their wits... people who know that to be sent back to their native land is a death sentence.’

‘And they’re kept in Whitemire because otherwise they’d ignore the judgement and do a runner.’

Dirwan looked at Rebus and gave a wry smile. ‘Of course, you are part of the same apparatus of state.’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ Rebus bristled.

‘Forgive my cynicism... but you do believe, don’t you, that we should just send all these black bastards home? That Scotland would be a Utopia if only it weren’t for the Pakis and gypsies and sambos?’

‘Christ almighty...’

‘Maybe you have Arab or African friends, Inspector? Any Asians you go drinking with? Or are they just faces behind the till of your local newsagent’s...?’

‘I’m not getting into this,’ Rebus stated, tossing an empty coffee beaker into the bin.

‘It’s an emotive subject, to be sure... and yet one I have to deal with every single day. I think Scotland was complacent for many years: we don’t have room for racism, we’re too busy with bigotry! But this is not the case, alas.’

‘I’m not racist.’

‘I was making a point merely. Don’t upset yourself.’

‘I’m not upset.’

‘I’m sorry... I find it hard to switch off.’ Dirwan shrugged. ‘It comes with the job.’ His eyes darted around the room, as if seeking a change of subject. ‘You think the killer will be found?’

‘We’ll do our damnedest.’

‘That’s good. I’m sure you are all dedicated and professional people.’

Rebus thought of Reynolds, but said nothing.

‘And you know that if there’s anything I personally can do to assist you...’

Rebus nodded, then thought for a moment. ‘Actually...’

‘Yes?’

‘Well, it looks like the victim had a girlfriend... or at any rate a young woman he knew. We could do with tracing her.’

‘She lives in Knoxland?’

‘Possibly. She’s darker-skinned than the victim; probably speaks better English than him.’

‘That’s all you know?’

‘It’s all I know,’ Rebus confirmed.

‘I can ask around... the incomers may not be as fearful of talking to me.’ He paused. ‘And thank you for requesting my help.’ There was a warmth to his eyes. ‘You can be assured I will do what I can.’

Both men turned as Reynolds came lumbering into the room, chewing on a shortbread biscuit which had left a trail of crumbs down his shirt and tie.

‘We’re charging him,’ he said, pausing for effect. ‘But not with murder. Lab says it wasn’t the same knife.’

‘That was quick,’ Rebus commented.

‘Post-mortem says a serrated blade, this one’s got a smooth edge. They’re still going to test for blood, but it’s not promising.’ Reynolds glanced in Dirwan’s direction. ‘We can maybe get him for attempted assault and carrying a concealed weapon.’

‘Such is justice,’ the lawyer said with a sigh.

‘What do you want us to do? Chop his hands off?’

‘Was that remark addressed to me?’ The lawyer had risen to his feet. ‘It is hard to tell when you refuse to look at me.’

‘I’m looking at you now,’ Reynolds retorted.

‘And what do you see?’

Rebus stepped in. ‘What DC Reynolds sees or doesn’t see is neither here nor there.’

‘I’ll tell him if he likes,’ Reynolds said, bits of biscuit flying from his mouth. Rebus, however, was steering him to the door. ‘Thank you, DC Reynolds.’ Doing everything but giving him a push into the corridor. Reynolds gave one final glower towards the lawyer, then turned and left.

‘Tell me,’ Rebus asked Dirwan, ‘do you ever make friends, or just enemies?’

‘I judge people by my standards.’

‘And a two-second hearing is enough for you to make up your mind?’

Dirwan thought about this. ‘Actually, yes, sometimes it is.’

‘Then you’ve made up your mind about me?’ Rebus folded his arms.

‘Not so, Inspector... you are proving difficult to pin down.’

‘But all cops are racist?’

‘We are all racist, Inspector... even me. It is how we deal with that ugly fact that is important.’

The phone started ringing on Wylie’s desk. Rebus answered it.

‘CID, DI Rebus speaking.’

‘Oh, hello...’ A tentative female voice. ‘Are you looking into that murder? The asylum-seeker on the housing estate?’

‘That’s right.’

‘In the paper this morning...’

‘The photograph?’ Rebus sat down hurriedly, reached for pen and paper.

‘I think I know who they are... I mean, I do know who they are.’ Her voice was so brittle, Rebus feared she might take fright and hang up.

‘Well, we’d be very interested in any help you can give, Miss...?’

‘What?’

‘I need your name.’

‘Why?’

‘Because callers who won’t give their name tend not to be taken so seriously.’

‘But I’m...’

‘It’ll just be between us, I assure you.’

There was silence for a moment. Then: ‘Eylot, Janet Eylot.’

Rebus wrote the name down in scrawled capitals.

‘And can I ask how you know the people in the photo, Miss Eylot?’

‘Well... they’re here.’

Rebus was staring at the lawyer without really seeing him. ‘Where’s here?’

‘Look... maybe I should have asked permission first.’

Rebus knew he was close to losing her. ‘You’ve done absolutely the right thing, Miss Eylot. I just need a few more details. We’re keen to catch whoever did this, but right now we’re pretty much in the dark, and you seem to be holding the only candle.’ He was trying for a light-hearted tone; couldn’t risk frightening her off.

‘Their names are...’ It took Rebus an effort of will not to shout out encouragement. ‘Yurgii.’ He asked her to spell it, wrote it down as she did so.

‘Sounds East European.’

‘They’re Turkish Kurds.’

‘You work with refugees, do you, Miss Eylot?’

‘In a manner of speaking.’ She sounded a little more confident, now she’d given him the name. ‘I’m calling from Whitemire — do you know it?’

Rebus’s eyes focused on Dirwan. ‘Funnily enough, I was just talking about it. I’m assuming you mean the detention centre?’

‘We’re actually an Immigration Removal Centre.’

‘And the family in the photograph... they’re there with you?’

‘The mother and two children, yes.’

‘And the husband?’

‘He fled just before the family were picked up and brought here. It happens sometimes.’

‘I’m sure it does...’ Rebus tapped pen against notepad. ‘Look, can I take a contact number for you?’

‘Well...’

‘Work or home, whichever suits.’

‘I don’t...’

‘What is it, Miss Eylot? What are you scared of?’

‘I should have spoken to my boss first.’ She paused. ‘You’ll be coming here now, won’t you?’

‘Why didn’t you talk to your boss?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Would your job be threatened if your boss knew?’

She seemed to consider this. ‘Do they have to know it was me that called you?’

‘No, not at all,’ Rebus said. ‘But I’d still like to be able to contact you.’

She relented and gave him her mobile number. Rebus thanked her and warned that he might need to talk to her again.

‘In confidence,’ he reassured her, not at all sure that this would actually be the case. Call finished, he tore the sheet from the pad.

‘He has family in Whitemire,’ Dirwan stated.

‘I’d ask you to keep that to yourself for the time being.’

The lawyer shrugged. ‘You saved my life — it’s the least I can do. But would you like me to come with you?’

Rebus shook his head. Last thing he needed was Dirwan sparring with the guards. He went in search of Shug Davidson, found him in conversation with Ellen Wylie, in the corridor next to the interview room.

‘Reynolds told you?’ Davidson asked.

Rebus nodded. ‘Not the same knife.’

‘We’ll sweat the little sod a while longer anyway; might be he knows something we can use. He’s got a fresh tattoo on his arm — red hand and the letters UVF.’ Meaning the Ulster Volunteer Force.

‘Never mind that, Shug.’ Rebus held up the note. ‘Our victim was on the run from Whitemire. His family are still there.’

Davidson stared at him. ‘Someone saw the photo?’

‘Bingo. Time to pay a visit, wouldn’t you say? Your car or mine?’

But Davidson was rubbing his jaw. ‘John...’

‘What?’

‘The wife... the kids... they don’t know he’s dead, do they? You really think you’re right for the job?’

‘I can do tea and sympathy.’

‘I’m sure you can, but Ellen’s going with you. You okay with that, Ellen?’

Wylie nodded, then turned to Rebus. ‘My car,’ she said.

9

Her car was a Volvo S40 with only a couple of thousand miles on the clock. There were CDs on the passenger seat, which Rebus had flicked through.

‘Put something on if you like,’ she’d said.

‘I’ve got to text Siobhan first,’ he countered: his excuse for not having to choose between Norah Jones, the Beastie Boys and Mariah Carey. It took him several minutes to send the message sorry cant do six might manage eight. Afterwards, he wondered why he hadn’t just called her instead, guessing it would have taken half the time. Almost immediately, she rang back.

‘Are you taking the piss?’

‘I’m on my way to Whitemire.’

‘The detention centre?’

‘Actually, I have it on good authority that it’s an Immigration Removal Centre. It also happens to be home to the victim’s wife and kids.’

She was silent for a moment. ‘Well, I can’t do eight o’clock. I’m meeting someone for a drink. I was hoping you might’ve been there too.’

‘There’s a fair chance I will be, if that’s what you want. We can hit the pubic triangle afterwards.’

‘When it’s getting lively, you mean?’

‘An accident of timing, Siobhan, that’s all.’

‘Well... go easy on them, eh?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I’m assuming you’re going to be the bearer of bad news at Whitemire.’

‘Why is it nobody thinks I can do the sympathy thing?’ Wylie glanced at him and smiled. ‘I can be the caring new-age cop when I want to.’

‘Sure you can, John. I’ll see you in the Ox around eight.’

Rebus put his phone away and concentrated on the road ahead. They were driving west out of Edinburgh. Whitemire was situated between Banehall and Bo’ness, sixteen or so miles from the city centre. It had been a prison up until the late 1970s, Rebus visiting on just the one occasion, shortly after he’d joined the force. This much he told Ellen Wylie.

‘Before my time,’ she commented.

‘They shut it down soon after. Only thing I remember is someone showing me where they used to do the hangings.’

‘Lovely.’ Wylie hit the brakes. They were in the middle of the rush hour, commuters crawling home to their towns and villages. No clever route or short-cut available, every set of traffic lights seemingly against them.

‘I couldn’t do this every day,’ Rebus said.

‘Be nice to live in the country though.’

He looked at her. ‘Why?’

‘More space, less dog-shit.’

‘Have they banned dogs from the countryside then?’

She smiled again. ‘Plus, for the price of a two-bed flat in the New Town, you could have a dozen acres and a billiard room.’

‘I don’t play billiards.’

‘Me neither, but I could learn.’ She paused. ‘So what’s the plan for when we get there?’

Rebus had been considering this. ‘We might need a translator.’

‘I hadn’t thought of that.’

‘Maybe they’ve got one on the staff... they could break the news...’

‘She’ll have to ID her husband.’

Rebus nodded. ‘The translator can tell her that too.’

‘After we’ve gone?’

Rebus shrugged. ‘We ask our questions, get out of there quick.’

She looked at him. ‘And people say you can’t do sympathy...’

They drove in silence after that, Rebus finding a news channel on the radio. There was nothing about the scuffle at Knoxland. He hoped nobody would pick up on it. Eventually, a sign pointed to the turn-off for Whitemire.

‘I just thought of something,’ Wylie said. ‘Shouldn’t we have warned them we were coming?’

‘Bit late for that.’ The road became a pot-holed single track. Signs warned trespassers that they would be prosecuted. The twelve-foot perimeter fence had been augmented by runs of pale green corrugated iron.

‘Means no one can see in,’ Wylie commented.

‘Or out,’ Rebus added. He knew that there had been demonstrations against the holding centre, and guessed that these were the reason for the recently installed cladding.

‘And what on earth is this?’ Wylie asked. A lone figure was standing by the side of the road. It was a woman, wrapped heavily against the cold. Behind her was a tent just big enough for one person, and next to it a smouldering camp-fire with a kettle hanging over it. The woman held a candle, cupping her free hand around the spluttering flame. Rebus stared at her as they passed. She kept her eyes on the ground in front, her mouth moving slightly. Fifty yards on stood the gatehouse. Wylie stopped the car and sounded her horn, but no one appeared. Rebus got out and approached the booth. A guard sat behind the window, chewing a sandwich.

‘Evening,’ Rebus said. The man pressed a button, his voice issuing from a speaker.

‘You got an appointment?’

‘I don’t need one.’ Rebus showed his ID. ‘Police officer.’

The man appeared unimpressed. ‘Slide it through.’

Rebus placed the card in a metal drawer and watched as the guard picked it up and studied it. A phone call was made, Rebus unable to hear any of it. Afterwards, the guard jotted down Rebus’s details and pressed the button again.

‘Car registration.’

Rebus obliged, noting that the last three letters were WYL. Wylie had bought herself a vanity plate.

‘Anyone else with you?’ the guard asked.

‘Detective Sergeant Ellen Wylie.’

The guard asked him to spell Wylie, then noted these details down, too. Rebus looked back towards the woman at the side of the road.

‘Is she always here?’ he asked.

The guard shook his head.

‘She got family inside or something?’

‘Just a nutter,’ the guard said, sliding Rebus’s ID back through. ‘Park in one of the visitor bays in the car park. Someone will come to meet you.’

Rebus nodded his thanks and walked back to the Volvo. The barrier opened automatically, but the guard had to venture outside to unlock the gates. He waved them through, Rebus pointing Wylie in the direction of their parking space.

‘I see you’ve got a vanity plate,’ he commented.

‘So?’

‘I thought they were boys’ toys.’

‘Present from my boyfriend,’ she admitted. ‘What else was I going to do with it?’

‘So who’s the boyfriend?’

‘None of your business,’ she said, giving him a glare which told him the subject was closed.

The car park was separated from the main compound by another fence. There was building work going on, foundations being laid.

‘Nice to see at least one growth industry in West Lothian,’ Rebus muttered.

A guard had emerged from the main building. He opened a gate in the fence and asked if Wylie had locked her doors.

‘And set the alarm,’ she confirmed. ‘Lot of car crime around here?’

He failed to see the joke. ‘We’ve some fairly desperate people in here.’ Then he led them to the main entrance. A man was standing there, dressed in a suit rather than the grey uniform of a guard. The man nodded to the guard to let him know he’d take over. Rebus was studying the unadorned stone-clad building, its small windows set high into its walls. There were much newer whitewashed annexes to left and right.

‘My name’s Alan Traynor,’ the man was saying. He shook first Rebus’s hand and then Wylie’s. ‘How can I be of service?’

Rebus drew a copy of the morning paper from his pocket. It was folded open at the photograph.

‘We think these people are being held here.’

‘Really? And how did you come to that conclusion?’

Rebus didn’t answer. ‘The family’s name is Yurgii.’

Traynor studied the photo again, then nodded slowly. ‘You’d better come with me,’ he said.

He led them into the prison. To Rebus’s eye, that was exactly what it was, notwithstanding the tweaked job description. Traynor was explaining the security measures. they’d been ordinary visitors they’d have been fingerprinted and photographed then frisked with metal-detectors. The staff they passed wore blue uniforms, chains of keys jangling by their sides. Just like a prison. Traynor was in his early thirties. The dark blue suit could have been tailored to fit his slim frame. His dark hair was parted from the left, long enough so that he had to push it out of his eyes occasionally. He told them he was the deputy, his boss having taken some sick leave.

‘Nothing serious?’

‘Stress.’ Traynor shrugged to show that it was only to be expected. They followed him up some stairs and through a small open-plan office. A young woman sat hunched over a computer.

‘Working late again, Janet?’ Traynor asked with a smile. She didn’t respond, but watched and waited. Rebus, unseen by Traynor, rewarded Janet Eylot with a wink.

Traynor’s office was small and functional. Through the glass sat a bank of CCTV screens, flicking between a dozen on-site locations. ‘Only one chair, I’m afraid,’ he said, retreating behind his desk.

‘I’m fine standing, sir,’ Rebus told him, nodding for Wylie to take the seat. But she decided to stand too. Traynor, having lowered himself on to his own chair, now found himself having to look up at the detectives.

‘The Yurgiis are here?’ Rebus asked, feigning interest in the CCTV screens.

‘They are, yes.’

‘But not the husband?’

‘Slipped away...’ He shrugged. ‘Not our problem. It was the Immigration Service that screwed up.’

‘And you’re not part of the Immigration Service?’

Traynor snorted. ‘Whitemire is run by Cencrast Security, which in turn is a subsidiary of ForeTrust.’

‘The private sector, in other words?’

‘Exactly.’

‘ForeTrust’s American, isn’t it?’ Wylie added.

‘That’s right. They own private prisons in the United States.’

‘And here in Britain?’

Traynor admitted as much with a bow of the head. ‘Now, about the Yurgiis...’ He played with his watch-strap, hinting that he had better things to do with his time.

‘Well, sir,’ Rebus began, ‘I showed you that piece in the newspaper, and you didn’t bat an eye... didn’t seem interested in the headline or the story.’ He paused. ‘Which gives me the feeling you already know what happened.’ Rebus pressed his knuckles to the desktop and leaned down. ‘And that makes me wonder why you didn’t get in touch.’

Traynor met Rebus’s eyes for a second, then turned his attention to the CCTV screens. ‘Know how much bad press we get, Inspector? More than we deserve — a hell of a lot more. Ask the inspection teams — we’re audited quarterly. They’ll tell you this place is humane and efficient and we don’t cut corners.’ He pointed to a screen showing a group of men playing cards around a table. ‘We know these are people, and we treat them as such.’

‘Mr Traynor, if I’d wanted the brochure I could have sent away for one.’ Rebus leaned down further so the young man could not escape his gaze. ‘Reading between the corporate lines, I’d say you were afraid Whitemire would become part of the story. That’s why you did nothing... and that, Mr Traynor, counts as obstruction. How long do you think Cencrast would keep you on with a criminal record?’

Traynor’s face began to flush from the neck up. ‘You can’t prove I knew anything,’ he blustered.

‘But I can try, can’t I?’ Rebus’s smile was perhaps the least pleasant the young man had ever been treated to. Rebus stood up straight and turned towards Wylie, giving her a completely different kind of smile before returning his attention to Traynor.

‘Now, let’s get back to the Yurgiis, shall we?’

‘What do you want to know?’

‘Everything.’

‘I don’t know everyone’s life story,’ Traynor said defensively.

‘Then you might want to refer to their file.’

Traynor nodded and got up, heading out to ask Janet Eylot for the relevant documents.

‘Nice going,’ Wylie said under her breath.

‘And lots of fun, to boot.’

Rebus’s face hardened again as Traynor returned. The young man sat down and riffled through the sheets of paper. The story he told was simple enough on the surface. The Yurgii family were Turkish Kurds. They had arrived first in Germany, claiming to have been under threat in their own country. Family members had disappeared. The father gave his name as Stef... Traynor looked up at this.

‘They’d no papers on them, nothing to prove he was telling the truth. Doesn’t sound a very Kurdish name, does it? Then again... says here he was a journalist...’

Yes, a journalist, writing stories critical of the government. Working under various aliases in an attempt to keep his family safe. When an uncle and cousin had gone missing, it was assumed they’d been arrested and would be tortured for details about Stef.

‘Gives his age as twenty-nine... could be lying there too, of course.’

Wife, twenty-five, children, six and four. They’d told the authorities in Germany that they wanted to live in the UK, and the Germans had obliged — four fewer refugees for them to worry about. However, upon hearing the family’s case, it had been decided by Immigration in Glasgow that they should be deported: back to Germany at first, and from there probably to Turkey.

‘Any reason given?’ Rebus asked.

‘They hadn’t proved they weren’t economic migrants.’

‘Tough one,’ Wylie said, folding her arms. ‘Like proving you’re not a witch...’

‘These matters are gone into with great thoroughness,’ Traynor said defensively.

‘So how long have they been here?’ Rebus asked.

‘Seven months.’

‘That’s a long time.’

‘Mrs Yurgii refuses to leave.’

‘Can she do that?’

‘She has a lawyer working for her.’

‘Not Mo Dirwan?’

‘How did you guess?’

Rebus cursed silently: if he’d taken up Dirwan’s offer, he could have been the one to break the news to the widow. ‘Does Mrs Yurgii speak English?’

‘A little.’

‘She needs to come to Edinburgh to identify the body. Will she understand that?’

‘I’ve no idea.’

‘Is there anyone who could translate?’

Traynor shook his head.

‘Her kids stay with her?’ Wylie asked.

‘Yes.’

‘All day?’ She watched him nod. ‘They don’t go to school or anything?’

‘There’s a teacher comes here.’

‘How many children exactly?’

‘Anything from five to twenty, depending on who’s being kept here.’

‘All different ages, different nationalities?’

‘Nigerians, Russians, Somalis...’

‘And just the one teacher?’

Traynor smiled. ‘Don’t swallow the media line, Detective Sergeant. I know we’ve been called “Scotland’s Camp X-Ray”... protestors ringing the perimeter, hands joined...’ He paused, suddenly looking tired. ‘We’re just processing them, that’s all. We’re not monsters and this isn’t a prison camp. Those new buildings you saw as you came in — specially constructed family units. TVs and a cafeteria, table-tennis and snack machines...’

‘And which of those don’t you get in a prison?’ Rebus asked.

‘If they’d left the country when told, they wouldn’t be here.’ Traynor patted the file. ‘The officials have made their decision.’ He took a deep breath. ‘Now, I’m assuming you’d like to see Mrs Yurgii...’

‘In a minute,’ Rebus said. ‘First, what do your notes tell you about Stef doing a runner?’

‘Just that when officers went to the Yurgiis’ flat...’

‘Which was where?’

‘Sighthill in Glasgow.’

‘A cheery spot.’

‘Better than some, Inspector... Anyway, when they arrived, Mr Yurgii wasn’t home. According to his wife, he had left the previous night.’

‘He got wind you were coming?’

‘It wasn’t a secret. The judgement had been delivered; their lawyer had informed them of it.’

‘Would he have had any means of supporting himself?’

Traynor shrugged. ‘Not unless Dirwan helped him out.’

Well, that was something for Rebus to ask the lawyer. ‘He didn’t try to contact his family?’

‘Not that I’m aware of.’

Rebus thought for a moment, turning towards Wylie to see if she had any questions. When she just twitched her mouth, Rebus nodded. ‘Okay, we’ll go see Mrs Yurgii now...’

Dinner had just finished, and the cafeteria was emptying.

‘Everybody eats at the same time,’ Wylie commented.

A uniformed guard was arguing with a woman whose head was covered with a shawl. She carried an infant on her shoulder. The guard was holding up a piece of fruit.

‘Sometimes they smuggle food back to their rooms,’ Traynor explained.

‘And that’s not allowed?’

He shook his head. ‘I don’t see them here... must have finished already. This way...’ He led them down a corridor fitted with a CCTV camera. The building might have been clean and new, but to Rebus’s mind it was a compound within a compound.

‘Had any suicides yet?’ he asked.

Traynor glared at him. ‘One or two attempts. A hunger-striker, too. Comes with the territory...’ He had stopped at an open door, gesturing with his hand. Rebus looked in. The room was fifteen feet by twelve — not small in itself, but containing a bunk-bed, a single bed, wardrobe and desk. Two small children were working at the desk, crayonning pictures and whispering to one another. Their mother sat on her bed, staring into space, hands on her lap.

‘Mrs Yurgii?’ Rebus said, moving a little further into the room. The drawings were of trees and balls of yellow sunshine. The room was windowless, ventilated from a grille in the ceiling. The woman looked up at him with hollow eyes.

‘Mrs Yurgii, I’m a police officer.’ He had the children’s interest now. ‘This is my colleague. Could we maybe talk away from the children?’

Unblinking, her eyes never left his. Tears began to drip down her face, lips pursed to hold back the sobs. The children went to her, offering comfort with their arms. It had the look of something they did regularly. The boy would be six or seven. He looked up at the intruding adults with a face hardened beyond its years.

‘You go now, not do this for us.’

‘I need to talk to your mother,’ Rebus said quietly.

‘It is not allowed. Bugger off now.’ He enunciated these words precisely, and with a trace of the local accent — picked up from the guards, Rebus guessed.

‘I really need to talk to...’

‘I know all,’ Mrs Yurgii said suddenly. ‘He... not...’ Her eyes beseeched Rebus, but all he could do was nod. She hugged her children to her. ‘He not,’ she repeated. The girl had started crying, too, but not the boy. It was as if he knew that his world had shifted yet again, bringing another challenge.

‘What is this?’ The woman from the cafeteria was standing just outside the door.

‘Do you know Mrs Yurgii?’ Rebus asked.

‘She is my friend.’ The infant had gone from the woman’s shoulder, leaving a patch of drying milk or saliva there. She squeezed into the room and crouched in front of the widow.

‘What has happened?’ she asked. Her voice was deep, imperative.

‘We’ve brought some bad news,’ Rebus told her.

‘What news?’

‘It’s about Mrs Yurgii’s husband,’ Wylie interrupted.

‘What has happened?’ There was fear in the eyes now, realisation dawning.

‘It’s not good,’ Rebus confirmed. ‘Her husband is dead.’

‘Dead?’

‘He was killed. Someone needs to identify the body. Did you know the family before you came here?’

She looked at him as if he were stupid. ‘None of us knew the others before this place.’ She spat out the final word as though it were gristle.

‘Can you tell her that she needs to identify her husband? We can send a car for her tomorrow morning...’

Traynor held up a hand. ‘No need for that. We have transport...’

‘Oh, yes?’ Wylie said sceptically. ‘With bars on the windows?’

‘Mrs Yurgii has been marked down as a potential absconder. She remains my responsibility.’

‘You’ll take her to the mortuary in the back of a paddy-wagon?’

He glowered at Wylie. ‘Guards will escort her.’

‘I’m sure society’s reassured by that.’

Rebus placed his hand on Wylie’s elbow. She seemed about to add something, but turned away instead, heading off down the corridor. Rebus gave a little shrug.

‘Ten in the morning?’ he asked. Traynor nodded. Rebus gave him the address of the mortuary. ‘Any chance Mrs Yurgii’s friend here could go with her?’

‘I don’t see why not,’ Traynor conceded.

‘Thanks,’ Rebus said. Then he followed Wylie out to the car park. She was pacing the ground, kicking imaginary stones, watched by a guard who was patrolling the perimeter with a torch, despite the floodlit glare. Rebus lit a cigarette.

‘Feeling better now, Ellen?’

‘What’s there to feel better about?’

Rebus held up both hands in surrender. ‘I’m not the one you’re pissed off with.’

The sound which issued from her mouth started as a snarl but ended in a sigh. ‘That’s the problem though: who is it I am pissed off with?’

‘The people in charge?’ Rebus guessed. ‘The ones we never see.’ He waited to see if she’d agree. ‘I’ve got this theory,’ he went on. ‘We spend most of our time chasing something called “the underworld”, but it’s the overworld we should really be keeping an eye on.’

She thought about this, nodding almost imperceptibly. The guard was walking towards them.

‘No smoking,’ he barked. Rebus just stared at him. ‘It’s not allowed.’

Rebus took another inhalation, narrowing his eyes. Wylie pointed to a faint yellow line on the ground.

‘What’s that for?’ Trying to steer his attention away from Rebus.

‘The zone of containment,’ the guard answered. ‘Detainees aren’t allowed to cross it.’

‘Why the hell not?’

He shifted his gaze to her. ‘They might try to escape.’

‘Have you taken a look at those gates lately? Height of the fence tell you anything? Barbed wire and corrugated iron...?’ She was inching towards him. He started backing away. Rebus reached out to touch her arm again.

‘I think we should leave now,’ he said, flicking his cigarette so that it bounced off the guard’s polished toecap, sending a few momentary sparks into the night. As they drove out of the compound, the lone woman was watching them from her camp-fire.

10

‘Well, this is... rustic.’ Alexis Cater gazed at the nicotine-coloured walls of the Oxford Bar’s back room.

‘I’m glad you condescend to approve.’

He wagged a finger. ‘There’s a fire in you — I like that. I’ve quenched a few fires in my time, but only after inflaming them first.’ He smirked as he raised his glass to his lips, sloshing the beer around in his mouth before swallowing. ‘Not a bad pint, mind, and bloody cheap. I might have to remember this place. Is it your local?’

She shook her head, just as Harry the barman appeared to clear away any empty glasses. ‘All right, Shiv?’ he called. She nodded back.

Cater grinned. ‘Your cover’s blown, Shiv.’

‘Siobhan,’ she corrected him.

‘Tell you what: I’ll call you Siobhan if you’ll call me Lex.’

‘You’re trying to cut a deal with a police officer?’

His eyes twinkled above the rim of the glass. ‘Hard to picture you in uniform... but well worth the effort, all the same.’

She’d chosen to sit on one of the benches, reasoning that he would take the chair opposite, but he’d slid on to the bench beside her, and was creeping closer by degrees.

‘Tell me,’ she said, ‘does this charm offensive of yours ever work?’

‘Can’t complain. Mind you...’ he checked his watch, ‘we’ve been here the best part of ten minutes and you’ve yet to ask me about my father — that’s probably a record.’

‘So what you’re saying is, women humour you because of who you are?’

He winced. ‘A palpable hit.’

‘You remember why we’re having this meeting?’

‘God, you make it sound so formal.’

‘If you want to see “formal”, we can keep talking at Gayfield Square.’

He raised an eyebrow. ‘Your flat?’

‘My police station,’ she corrected him.

‘Bloody hell, this is hard work.’

‘I was just thinking the same thing.’

‘I need a ciggie,’ Cater was saying. ‘Do you smoke?’ Siobhan shook her head, and he looked elsewhere. Another drinker had arrived, taking the table opposite them, spreading out his evening paper. Cater stared at the pack of cigarettes lying beside the newspaper. ‘Excuse me,’ he called. ‘Have you a spare ciggie by any chance?’

‘Not spare, no,’ the man said. ‘I need every single one I can get my hands on.’ He went back to his reading. Cater turned to Siobhan.

‘Nice clientele.’

Siobhan shrugged. She wasn’t about to let him know there was a machine around the corner next to the toilets.

‘The skeleton,’ she reminded him.

‘What about it?’ He leaned back, as though wishing he were elsewhere.

‘You took it from outside Professor Gates’s office.’

‘So what?’

‘I’d like to know how it ended up in a concrete floor in Fleshmarket Close.’

‘Me too,’ he snorted. ‘Maybe I could sell the idea to Dad for a mini-series.’

‘After you took it...’ Siobhan prompted.

He swirled his glass, producing a fresh head on the top of the pint. ‘You mistake me for a cheap date — one drink and you think I’ll spill the beans?’

‘Right you are then...’ Siobhan started to get to her feet.

‘At least finish your drink,’ he protested.

‘No thanks.’

He rolled his head to left and right. ‘All right, point made...’ Gestured with his arm. ‘Sit down again and I’ll tell you.’ She hesitated, then pulled out the chair opposite him. He pushed her glass towards her. ‘Christ,’ he said, ‘you’re a real drama queen when you get going.’

‘I’m sure you are, too.’ She lifted her tonic water. On entering the bar, Cater had ordered her a gin and tonic, but she’d managed to signal to Harry that she didn’t want the gin. Straight tonic was what she’d been given — the reason the round had been so cheap...

‘If I tell you, can we get a bite to eat after?’ She glared at him. ‘I’m ravenous,’ he persisted.

‘There’s a good chippie on Broughton Street.’

‘Is that anywhere near your flat? We could take the fish suppers back there...’

This time she had to smile. ‘You never give up, do you?’

‘Not unless I’m really, really sure.’

‘Sure of what?’

‘That the woman isn’t interested.’ He beamed a smile at her. Meantime, behind her, the man at the next table cleared his throat as he turned to a fresh page.

‘We’ll see,’ was her response. And then: ‘So tell me about the bones of Mag Lennox...’

He stared up at the ceiling, reminiscing. ‘Dear old Mags...’ Then he broke off. ‘This is off the record, naturally?’

‘Don’t worry.’

‘Well, you’re right, of course... we did decide to “borrow” Mags. We were hosting a party, and decided it would be fun if Mags presided over us. Got the idea from a veterinary student’s party: he’d sneaked a dead dog out of the lab, sat it in his bath, so that every time someone needed to...’

‘I get the picture.’

He shrugged. ‘Same thing with Mags. Plonked her on a chair at the head of the table during dinner. Later on, I think we even danced with her. It was just a bit of high spirits, m’lady. We planned to take her back afterwards...’

‘But you didn’t?’

‘Well, when we woke up next morning, she’d left of her own volition.’

‘I hardly think that likely.’

‘Okay then, somebody’d walked off with her.’

‘And with the baby, too — you got that when the department were chucking it out?’ He nodded. ‘Did you ever find out who took them?’

He shook his head. ‘There were seven of us for dinner, but after that the party proper started and there must have been twenty or thirty people there. Could’ve been any one of them.’

‘Any prime suspects?’

He considered this. ‘Pippa Greenlaw brought a bit of rough with her. Turned out to be a one-nighter and he was never heard of again.’

‘Did he have a name?’

‘I should think so.’ He stared at her. ‘Probably not as sexy as yours, though.’

‘What about Pippa? Is she a medic too?’

‘Christ, no. Works in PR. Come to think of it, that’s how she met her beau. He was a footballer.’ He paused. ‘Well, wanted to be a footballer.’

‘Have you got a number for Pippa?’

‘Somewhere... might not be up-to-date...’ He leaned forward. ‘Of course, I don’t have it with me. I suppose that means we’ll need another rendezvous.’

‘What it means is that you’ll call me and tell me it.’ She handed over her card. ‘You can leave a message at the station if I’m not there.’

His smile softened as he studied her, angling his face one way and then another.

‘What?’ she asked.

‘I’m just wondering how much of this Ice Maiden routine is just that — a routine. Do you ever step out of character?’ He reached across the table and snatched her wrist, placing it to his lips. She wrenched free. He sat back again, looking satisfied.

‘Fire and ice,’ he mused. ‘It’s a good combination.’

‘Want to see another good combination?’ the man at the next table asked, folding shut his paper. ‘How about a punch in the face and a boot up the arse?’

‘Bloody hell, it’s Sir Galahad!’ Cater laughed. ‘Sorry, chum, no damsels round these parts requiring your services.’

The man was on his feet, stepping into the middle of the cramped room. Siobhan stood up, blocking his view of Cater.

‘It’s fine, John,’ she said. Then, to Cater: ‘I think you better skedaddle.’

‘You know this primate?’

‘One of my colleagues,’ Siobhan confirmed.

Rebus was craning his neck, the better to glare at Cater. ‘You better get her that phone number, pal. And no more of your fannying around.’

Cater was on his feet. He made a show of pausing long enough to finish his drink. ‘It’s been a delightful evening, Siobhan... we must do it again some time, with or without the performing monkey.’

Harry the barman was in the doorway. ‘That your Aston outside, pal?’

Cater’s face softened. ‘Nice car, isn’t it?’

‘I wouldn’t know about that, but some punter’s just mistaken it for a urinal...’

Cater gasped and scrambled down the steps towards the exit. Harry gave a wink and returned to the bar. Siobhan and Rebus shared a look, then a smile.

‘Smarmy little bastard,’ Rebus commented.

‘Maybe you’d be, too, given who his father is.’

‘Silver spoon up the nose at birth, I dare say.’ Rebus sat back down at his table, Siobhan turning her chair round to face him.

‘Maybe it’s just his routine.’

‘Like your “Ice Maiden”?’

‘And your Mr Angry.’

Rebus winked and tipped his glass to his mouth. She’d noticed before how he opened his mouth when he drank — as if attacking the liquid, showing it his teeth. ‘Want another?’ she asked.

‘Trying to postpone the evil moment?’ he teased. ‘Well, why not? Got to be cheaper here than there.’

She brought the drinks through. ‘How did it go at Whitemire?’

‘As well as could be expected. Ellen Wylie went off on one.’ He described the visit, ending with Wylie and the guard. ‘Why do you think she did that?’

‘Innate sense of injustice?’ Siobhan suggested. ‘Maybe she comes from immigrant stock.’

‘Like me, you mean?’

‘I seem to remember you telling me you came from Poland.’

‘Not me: my grandad.’

‘You probably still have family there.’

‘Christ knows.’

‘Well, don’t forget I’m an immigrant, too. Parents both English... brought up south of the border.’

‘You were born here, though.’

‘And whisked away again before I was out of nappies.’

‘Still makes you Scottish — stop trying to wriggle out of it.’

‘I’m just saying...’

‘We’re a mongrel nation, always have been. Settled by the Irish, raped and pillaged by the Vikings. When I was a kid, all the chip shops seemed to be run by Italians. Classmates with Polish and Russian surnames...’ He stared into his glass. ‘I don’t remember anyone getting stabbed because of it.’

‘You grew up in a village, though.’

‘So?’

‘So maybe Knoxland’s different, that’s all I’m saying.’

He nodded agreement with this, finished his drink. ‘Let’s go,’ he said.

‘I’ve still got half a glass.’

‘You losing your bottle, DS Clarke?’

A complaint sounded in her throat, but she got to her feet anyway.

‘You been to one of these places before?’

‘Couple of times,’ he admitted. ‘Stag nights.’

They’d parked the car on Bread Street, outside one of the city’s more chic hotels. Rebus wondered what visitors thought, stepping out of their suite and into the pubic triangle. The area spread from the showbars of Tollcross and Lothian Road to Lady Lawson Street. Bars advertised the ‘biggest jugs’ in town, ‘VIP table-dancing’, and ‘non-stop action’. There was just the one discreet sex shop as yet, and no sign that any of Leith’s street-walkers had taken up residence.

‘Takes me back a bit,’ Rebus admitted. ‘You weren’t here in the seventies, were you? Go-go dancers in the pubs at lunchtime... a blue cinema near the university...’

‘Glad to hear you so nostalgic,’ Siobhan said coolly.

Their destination was a refurbished pub just across the road from a disused shop. Rebus could recall several of its previous names: The Laurie Tavern, The Wheaten Inn, The Snakepit. But now it was The Nook. A sign on its large blacked-out window proclaimed it ‘Your First Nookie Stop In The City’, and offered ‘immediate gold-status membership’. There were two bouncers guarding the door from drunks and undesirables. Both were overweight and shaven-headed. They wore identical charcoal suits and black open-necked shirts, and sported earpieces to alert them to any trouble inside.

‘Tweedledum and Tweedledumber,’ Siobhan said under her breath. They were staring at her rather than Rebus, women not being the Nook’s target demographic.

‘Sorry, no couples,’ one of them said.

‘Hiya, Bob,’ Rebus replied. ‘How long you been out?’

The bouncer took a moment to place him. ‘You’re looking well, Mr Rebus.’

‘So are you: must’ve been using the gym at Saughton.’ Rebus turned to Siobhan. ‘Let me introduce Bob Dodds. Bob was doing six for a fairly major assault.’

‘Reduced on appeal,’ Dodds added. ‘And the bastard deserved it.’

‘He’d dumped your sister... that was it, wasn’t it? You went for him with a baseball bat and a Stanley knife. And here you are, large as life.’ Rebus smiled broadly. ‘And performing a useful function in society.’

‘You’re a cop?’ the other bouncer finally twigged.

‘Me too,’ Siobhan told him. ‘And that means, couples or no couples, we’re going in.’

‘You want to see the manager?’ Dodds asked.

‘That’s the general idea.’

Dodds reached into his jacket and produced a walkie-talkie. ‘Door to office.’

There was some static, then a crackled reply. ‘What the fuck is it now?’

‘Two police officers to see you.’

‘They after a bung or what?’

Rebus took the walkie-talkie from Dodds. ‘We just want a quiet word, sir. If you’re offering to bribe us, however, that’s something we’ll have to discuss down the station...’

‘It was a joke, for Christ’s sake. Get Bob to bring you in.’

Rebus handed back the walkie-talkie. ‘I guess that makes us gold-status members,’ he said.

Through the door, there was a thin partition wall, built to stop anyone from outside being able to scope the place out before parting with the admission price. The reception desk consisted of a middle-aged woman with an old-fashioned cash register. The carpeting was crimson and purple, the walls black, with tiny lighting filaments whose purpose was either to resemble the night sky or deter drinkers from a detailed study of the bar prices and measures. The bar itself was much as Rebus remembered it from Laurie Tavern days. There was no draught beer, however, just the more profitable bottled variety. A small stage had been constructed in the centre of the room, two shiny silver poles stretching from it to the ceiling. A young, dark-skinned woman was dancing to an over-amplified instrumental, watched by maybe half a dozen men. Siobhan noticed that she kept her eyes shut throughout, concentrating on the music. Two more men were seated on a nearby sofa, while another woman danced topless between them. An arrow pointed the way to a ‘Private VIP Booth’, shielded by black drapes from the rest of the room. Three suited businessmen sat on stools at the bar, sharing a bottle of champagne.

‘It livens up later on,’ Dodds told Rebus. ‘Place is mental at the weekend...’ He led them across the floor, stopping at a door marked ‘Private’ and punching numbers into the keypad alongside. He pushed the door open and nodded them through.

They were in a short, narrow hallway with a door at its end. Dodds knocked and waited.

‘If you must!’ the voice called from the other side. Rebus motioned with his head to tell Dodds they could manage without him from here on. Then he turned the handle.

The office was not much bigger than a boxroom, and what space there was had been filled almost to capacity. Shelves groaned under paperwork and bits and pieces of discarded equipment — everything from a disconnected beer pump to a golfball typewriter. Magazines were stacked on the linoleum floor: trade mags mostly. The bottom half of a water cooler had become a support for shrink-wrapped collections of beer mats. A venerable-looking green safe stood open, to reveal boxes of drinking straws and packs of paper napkins. There was a tiny barred window behind the desk, which Rebus guessed would give a minimum of natural light in daytime. The available wall space was filled with framed cuttings from newspapers: paparazzi-style pics of men exiting the Nook. Rebus recognised a couple of footballers whose careers had stalled.

The man seated at the desk was in his thirties. He wore a tight white T-shirt, giving definition to his muscular torso and arms. The face was tanned, the cropped hair jet black. No jewellery, other than a gold watch with more dials than necessary. His blue eyes shone, even in this room’s dim wattage. ‘Stuart Bullen,’ he said, reaching out a hand without bothering to stand.

Rebus introduced himself, then Siobhan. Handshakes completed, Bullen apologised for the lack of chairs.

‘No room for them,’ he shrugged.

‘We’re fine standing, Mr Bullen,’ Rebus assured him.

‘As you can see, the Nook has nothing to hide... which makes your visit all the more intriguing.’

‘That’s not a local accent, Mr Bullen,’ Rebus commented.

‘I’m from the west coast originally.’

Rebus nodded. ‘I seem to know the name...’

Bullen’s mouth twitched. ‘To put your mind at rest, yes, my dad was Rab Bullen.’

‘Glasgow gangster,’ Rebus explained to Siobhan.

‘A respected businessman,’ Bullen corrected.

‘Who died when someone fired at him from point-blank range on his own doorstep,’ Rebus added. ‘What was that — five, six years ago?’

‘If I’d known it was my dad you wanted to talk about...’ Bullen was staring hard at Rebus.

‘It isn’t,’ Rebus interrupted.

‘We’re looking for a girl, Mr Bullen,’ Siobhan said. ‘A runaway called Ishbel Jardine.’ She handed him the photograph. ‘Maybe you’ve seen her?’

‘And why would I have seen her?’

Siobhan shrugged. ‘She might need money. We hear you’ve been hiring dancers.’

‘Every club in town’s hiring dancers.’ It was his turn to shrug. ‘They come and they go... All my dancers are legit, mind, and dancing’s as far as it goes.’

‘Even in the VIP booth?’ Rebus asked.

‘We’re talking about housewives and students... women who need a bit of easy cash.’

‘If you could just look at the photo, please,’ Siobhan said. ‘She’s eighteen and her name’s Ishbel.’

‘Never seen her before in my life.’ He made to hand the photo back. ‘Who told you I was hiring?’

‘Information received,’ Rebus informed him.

‘I saw you looking at my little collection.’ Bullen nodded towards the photos on the wall. ‘This is a classy place, we like to think we’re a bit above the other clubs in the area. That means we’re choosy about the girls we employ. We tend not to take the junkies.’

‘Nobody said she was a junkie. And I doubt very much whether this dive could ever be described as “classy”.’

Bullen sat back, the better to study him. ‘You can’t be too far off retiring, Inspector. I look forward to the day when I can deal with cops like your colleague.’ He smiled in Siobhan’s direction. ‘A much pleasanter prospect.’

‘How long have you had this place?’ Rebus asked. He’d brought out his cigarettes.

‘Don’t smoke in here,’ Bullen told him. ‘It’s a fire risk.’ Rebus hesitated, then put the packet away again. Bullen gave a little nod of thanks. ‘To answer your question: four years.’

‘What took you away from Glasgow?’

‘Well, my dad’s murder might give you a clue.’

‘Never caught the killer, did they?’

‘Shouldn’t that “they” be a “we”?’

‘Glasgow and Edinburgh police — chalk and cheese.’

‘You mean you’d have had more luck?’

‘Luck’s got nothing to do with it.’

‘Well, Inspector, if that’s all you came for... I’m sure you’ve got other premises to visit?’

‘Mind if we talk to the girls?’ Siobhan asked suddenly.

‘What for?’

‘Just to show them the photo. Is there a dressing room they use?’

He nodded. ‘Through the black curtain. But they only go there between shifts.’

‘Then we’ll talk to them where we find them.’

‘If you must,’ Bullen snapped.

She turned to leave, but pulled up short. There was a black leather jacket hanging behind the door. She rubbed the collar between her fingers. ‘What car do you drive?’ she asked abruptly.

‘What’s it to do with you?’

‘It’s a simple enough question, but if you want to do it the hard way...’ She glared at him.

Bullen let out a sigh. ‘BMW X5.’

‘Sounds sporty.’

Bullen snorted. ‘It’s an off-roader, a four-by-four. Huge big tank of a thing.’

She nodded understanding. ‘Those are the cars men buy when there’s something they feel the need to compensate for...’ On which line she made her exit. Rebus offered Bullen a smile.

‘How’s she rating now as that “pleasanter prospect” you were talking about?’

‘I know you,’ Bullen replied, wagging a finger. ‘You’re the cop Ger Cafferty keeps in his pocket.’

‘Is that right?’

‘It’s what everybody says.’

‘I can’t argue with that then, can I?’

Rebus turned to follow Siobhan out. He reckoned he’d done well not to rise to the young prick’s goading. Big Ger Cafferty had for many years been king of Edinburgh’s underworld. These days, he lived a quieter life: at least on the surface. But with Cafferty, you never could tell. It was true that Rebus knew him. In fact, Bullen had just given Rebus an idea, because if there was one man who might know what the hell a Glasgow low-life like Stuart Bullen was doing on the other side of the country from his natural lair, that man was Morris Gerald Cafferty.

Siobhan had taken a stool at the bar, the businessmen having moved to a table. Rebus joined her, putting the barman’s mind at ease: he’d probably never had to serve a single woman before.

‘Bottle of your best beer,’ Rebus said. ‘And whatever the lady’s having.’

‘Diet Coke,’ she told the barman. He brought their drinks.

‘Six pounds,’ he said.

‘Mr Bullen says they’re on the house,’ Rebus informed him with a wink. ‘He wants to keep us sweet.’

‘Ever see this girl in here?’ Siobhan asked, holding up the photograph.

‘Looks familiar... but then a lot of girls look like that.’

‘What’s your name, son?’ Rebus asked.

The barman bristled at that use of ‘son’. He was in his early twenties, short and wiry. White T-shirt, maybe trying to copy his boss’s style. Hair spiked with gel. He wore the same earpiece as the bouncers. There were two stud earrings in his other ear.

‘Barney Grant.’

‘Worked here long, Barney?’

‘Couple of years.’

‘Place like this, that probably qualifies you as a lifer.’

‘Nobody’s been here as long as me,’ Grant agreed.

‘Bet you’ve seen a few things.’

Grant nodded. ‘But one thing I haven’t seen in all that time is Stuart offering free drinks.’ He held his hand out. ‘Six pounds, please.’

‘I admire your persistence, son.’ Rebus handed over the money. ‘What’s your accent?’

‘Aussie. And I’ll tell you something else — I’ve got a memory for faces, and I seem to know yours.’

‘I was in here a few months back... stag party. Didn’t stay long.’

‘So to get back to Ishbel Jardine,’ Siobhan cajoled, ‘you think maybe you’ve seen her?’

Grant took another look at the photo. ‘Might not have been here, though. Plenty of clubs and pubs... could’ve been anywhere.’ He took the money to the till. Siobhan turned round to study the room and almost wished she hadn’t. One of the dancers was leading a suit towards the VIP booth. Another, the one she’d seen earlier, concentrating on the music, was now sliding up and down the silver pole, minus her thong.

‘Christ, this is sleazy,’ she commented to Rebus. ‘What the hell do you get out of it?’

‘A lightening of the wallet,’ he replied.

Siobhan turned to Grant again. ‘How much do they charge?’

‘Tenner a dance. Lasts a couple of minutes, no touching allowed.’

‘And in the VIP booth?’

‘Couldn’t tell you.’

‘Why not?’

‘Never been in. Want another drink?’ He motioned to her glass, which was as full of ice as when it had arrived, but otherwise empty.

‘Trick of the trade,’ Rebus told her. ‘More ice you put in, less room there is for the actual drink.’

‘I’m fine, thanks,’ she told Grant. ‘Do you think any of the girls would talk to us?’

‘Why should they?’

‘What if I leave the photo with you... would you show it around?’

‘Could do.’

‘And my card.’ She handed it over with the photograph. ‘You can phone me if there’s any news.’

‘Okay.’ He placed both items under the bar. Then, to Rebus: ‘What about you? Fancy another?’

‘Not at those prices, Barney, thanks all the same.’

‘Remember,’ Siobhan said, ‘call me.’ She slid from the stool and headed for the exit. Rebus had stopped to study another row of framed photos — copies of the newspaper cuttings in Bullen’s office. He tapped one of them. Siobhan looked closer: Lex Cater and his film-star father, their faces turned ghostly white by the photographer’s flash gun. Gordon Cater had raised his hand to his face, but too late. His eyes looked haunted, but his son was grinning, happy to be captured for posterity.

‘Look at the by-line,’ Rebus told her. Each story was accompanied by an ‘exclusive’ tag, and beneath the headlines sat the same bold-print name: Steve Holly.

‘Funny how he’s always in the right place at the right time,’ Siobhan said.

‘Yes, isn’t it?’ Rebus agreed.

Outside, he paused to light a cigarette. Siobhan kept walking, unlocking the car and getting in, sitting there with hands gripped around the steering wheel. Rebus walked slowly, inhaling deeply. There was still half a cigarette left by the time he reached the Peugeot, but he flicked it on to the road and climbed into the passenger side.

‘I know what you’re thinking,’ he said.

‘Do you?’ She signalled to move away from the kerb.

He turned to her. ‘More than one kind of flesh market,’ he stated. ‘Why did you ask about his car?’

Siobhan considered her reply. ‘Because he looked like a pimp,’ she said, Rebus’s words turning over in her mind:

More than one kind of flesh market...