Standing in another's man grave

24

The M90 again, but only once they’d escaped the sluggish morning traffic in Edinburgh. Heading towards Perth and the A9. A quick pit stop to pick up beakers of tea and dry croissants. Kate Bush still singing about snowmen. As they crossed the Forth Road Bridge, Rebus asked Clarke if she noticed anything different. She studied him and shook her head.

‘No scaffolding on the rail bridge.’

She looked to her right and saw this was true.

‘Can’t remember the last time I saw it without,’ he added.

‘Yes,’ she agreed. Then: ‘Look, I’m sorry about last night.’

‘Me too. Hope you didn’t have words with James afterwards.’

She glanced towards him. ‘What makes you think that?’

‘Nothing.’ He paused for effect. ‘It’s just that I was in his bolt-hole when you phoned. .’

‘And?’

‘He was giving me a slap on the wrist about the Complaints.’

‘And?’ she repeated, growing a little more irritated.

‘And nothing,’ Rebus stressed. ‘I just got a feeling the two of you had. . you know. . maybe had words. . before he dropped you at your flat. And if that’s the case, I’m sorry I was the cause.’

‘You can be a real bastard sometimes, John.’ She shook her head slowly.

‘It has been said,’ he admitted. ‘And believe me, I’m not proud of the fact.’

‘Thing is, though, you are proud of the fact.’ She looked at him again. ‘You really are.’

They drove in silence after that, Rebus staring at the scenery — the elongated stretches of hillside near Kinross; the merest glimpse of Loch Leven; the way the view opened up as they rounded a curve in the road and entered Perthshire, snow visible along the topmost ridge of the distant Ochils. (He guessed they were the Ochils; didn’t feel like checking with Clarke.) When her phone rang, she pressed a button on the steering wheel and answered with a voice raised above the engine noise.

‘DI Clarke,’ she informed the caller.

‘It’s Lightheart.’ The inspector’s dull drone seemed to emanate from the same speaker as Kate Bush. Clarke pressed another button to mute the CD.

‘Give me an update,’ she said.

‘He seems to have got on the bus all right. It dropped him near the works. Some of the men gave him short shrift, though — didn’t like that their Portakabin had been searched. So he didn’t hang about, told them he was going into Pitlochry. That was the last they saw of him.’

‘He’s done a runner,’ Clarke confirmed.

‘Looks like.’

‘Anyone talked to his girlfriend?’

‘The barmaid, you mean? Not yet.’

‘Could he be shacked up with her?’

‘It would solve all our problems.’

‘And if someone had checked first thing, it would be saving me this bloody drive.’

‘Want me to do it then?’

‘No, I’ll talk to her when I get there.’

Rebus took note of that — I, not we. .

‘Are you in Pitlochry?’ she was now asking Lightheart.

‘Yes, but I need to head back to Perth — eleven o’clock meeting I can’t be late for.’

‘You do that then. We’ll talk again after.’

She ended the call and signalled to overtake the lorry in front.

‘Want the CD back on?’ Rebus eventually asked.

Clarke shook her head. A little later, she decided to put a question to him.

‘You don’t think it’s him, do you?’

‘No.’

‘Because he’s got a short fuse and that’s not the sort of person who goes years between victims?’

‘Right,’ Rebus agreed.

She nodded slowly. ‘So why did he run?’

‘It’s what people like him do — act on instinct; no forethought.’ Rebus decided it might be okay to throw in a question of his own. ‘Did the search turn up anything?’

‘They want to know if it’s worth putting a couple of frogmen in Loch Tummel.’

‘And is it?’

‘James’s call.’

‘What about Robertson’s stuff?’

‘Pretty much as you said. Half an ounce of cannabis, a few knock-off DVDs.’

‘Porn?’

‘Some.’

‘Hard core?’

‘No S and M, if that’s what you mean.’ She looked at him again. ‘This from the man who doesn’t rate profilers.’

‘Common sense comes cheaper.’

She managed a smile. The ice between them was melting. ‘That book in your flat — did Nina Hazlitt give it to you?’

‘How did you know?’

‘It’s on her Facebook bio that she edits books, including myths and legends.’

‘Did you know that “Ring-a-Roses” is about the plague?’

‘I thought everybody knew that.’

Rebus decided to try again: ‘Sawney Bean?’

Clarke thought for a moment. ‘Cannibal?’

‘Except he probably never existed. It was anti-Jacobite propaganda, according to one theory. Doesn’t take much to get a rumour started.’

‘Is the Burry Man in your book?’ Clarke asked.

‘He is — you ever seen him in the flesh?’

‘Last August. Took the car to Queensferry and watched him marching around, taking a drink from anyone that offered. Covered top to toe in burrs: no idea how he managed to pee. .’ She paused. ‘Could Nina Hazlitt be putting together a new bogeyman?’

‘I as good as asked her the same thing.’

‘And?’

‘She wasn’t happy about it.’

‘She’s an editor by trade.’

‘So?’

‘She creates order, John. If there’s one person responsible for all these disappearances, that gives some sense to what’s otherwise senseless.’

‘And we’re back to psychology again.’

‘Not got much else, have we?’

‘We’ve got a lot of people who don’t seem to be around any more.’

‘There is that.’

When she asked him if he wanted to choose a CD, he knew he’d been forgiven his latest transgressions.