‘I’ll see you at breakfast.’
‘If Dempsey’s not sent me packing by then.’ He gestured towards Clarke’s phone.
‘I might not be far behind. James says he’s struggling to find “a viable role” for me.’
‘He’s a real charmer.’
Clarke checked the clock on her phone. ‘Better get some sleep. Night, John.’
‘Everything’s going to work out,’ he was telling her as he pushed the door shut. He listened as she crossed the landing and headed to her own eaves bedroom a further flight up. Another door opened and Rebus heard Page’s voice asking her if she was all right.
‘Fine,’ was all she said, the stairs creaking as she climbed them.
52
Dempsey didn’t wait for them to arrive at HQ. Her chauffeured car drew up as, post-breakfast, Rebus, Page and Clarke emerged from the guest house. Rebus, already in the process of lighting a cigarette, asked Dempsey if he needed a blindfold to go with it.
‘What in God’s name did you think you were doing?’ she asked him.
‘I was in a pub, having a quiet drink.’ He’d had time to prepare this version of the story. ‘Hammell and Hazlitt were across the road. After they’d posed for the cameras, they found themselves next to me at the bar. We know each other, so we said hello. That’s when Raymond burst in and took his little paparazzi shot.’
‘What’s this about?’ Page asked, frowning.
‘Your officer,’ Dempsey told him, ‘is all over the internet.’
‘Thanks to your nephew,’ Rebus reminded her.
She ignored the jibe. ‘So what did you tell them about the investigation?’
‘What’s to tell? I’m not exactly in the loop.’
Dempsey pointed at him, but her eyes were on Page. ‘I want him gone, do you hear me?’
‘Loud and clear,’ Page responded. Dempsey was already getting back into the car. Her driver started pulling away.
‘Thanks for backing me up there, boss,’ Rebus commented.
‘Go back inside,’ Page said, ‘get your stuff together and check out of your room – Gayfield Square will pick up the tab. We’ll see you in Edinburgh.’
Rebus thought of things he could say, things like: ‘I was solving murders when you were in your pram.’ He didn’t, though. He just gave a little bow of the head in Clarke’s direction, as if to wish her the best of British, then flicked the cigarette to the ground and did as he was told.
When he re-emerged, Mrs Scanlon – make-up immaculate as usual – came with him and wished him well on the journey south. Page and Clarke were gone. Rebus watched as Mrs Scanlon closed the door, then decided on another cigarette before the off. When his phone rang, he considered not answering, but it was Gayfield Square.
‘Who is it?’ he asked.
‘Christine Esson.’
‘Hiya, Christine. If you’ve not already heard, I’ll be joining you shortly.’
‘Any news to report?’
‘Way this thing’s going, the internet’ll know before I do.’
‘I did see that photo of you with Hammell and Hazlitt . . .’
‘And you thought you’d call me to gloat?’
‘What is there to gloat about?’
‘Nothing.’ He crushed the butt of his cigarette underfoot and got into the Saab. Would this be the day it refused to start?
The engine growled into life; none of the dashboard’s warning lights came on.
‘So, anyway,’ Esson was saying, ‘I said I’d pass on her number.’
‘Sorry, Christine, I missed the start of that. Whose number?’
‘The woman who phoned wanting to speak to you about Sally Hazlitt.’
Rebus rolled his eyes. Another sighting. ‘How much of a crank did she sound?’
‘She seemed perfectly sane. Told me to give you her name and get you to call her.’
Rebus sighed, but reached into his pocket for his notebook and pen. When Esson read the woman’s name out, he stiffened. Then he asked her to repeat it.
‘Susie Mercer,’ she obliged, keeping her intonation nice and clear.
‘That’s what I thought you said first time,’ Rebus told her.
53
Glasgow.
Rebus had told the woman who called herself Susie Mercer: ‘This has to be in person.’
She’d asked him why.
‘I need to be sure.’
She was in Glasgow. A9 south, then M80 west. It was lunchtime before Rebus arrived, parking in a multi-storey near the bus station and walking the short distance to Buchanan Street. As arranged, he called her again.
‘I’m here,’ he said.
‘Where?’
‘Heading down Buchanan Street.’
‘Turn left at Royal Exchange. You’ll see a café there called Thompson’s. Sit at the counter by the window.’
‘I’m hardly James Bond material.’
‘Just do it or I walk.’
So Rebus did it – ordered a coffee and an orange juice and sat with them, staring out at the passing parade of shoppers. Glasgow wasn’t his patch. It was a sprawl compared to Edinburgh. As long as he stuck to a half-dozen streets, he could navigate his way around; outside that tight circumference, he’d be lost.
It was a good five minutes before she came in. She eased herself on to the stool next to him.
‘Had to be sure you weren’t bringing her,’ she announced.
Rebus studied her. She’d cropped her hair and bleached it, then plucked her eyebrows till they almost ceased to exist. But the eyes and cheekbones were still those of her mother.
‘You’ve gotten good at this down the years,’ Rebus said, staring into the eyes of Sally Hazlitt.
‘Not good enough,’ she snapped back.
‘That e-fit was a fair likeness, though – no wonder you panicked.’ He paused. ‘So do I call you Sally, or Susie, or have you already fixed on a new name?’
She stared at him. ‘Nina keeps mentioning you on the news. Then I saw that photo of the two of you . . .’
‘And?’
‘And she needs to be told to stop.’
‘Stop looking for you or stop thinking you’re a murder victim?’
Her eyes remained fixed on his. ‘Both.’
‘Why not tell her yourself?’
She shook her head. ‘No way,’ she said.
‘Then tell me why you did it.’ Rebus lifted the coffee to his mouth.
‘First I need you to tell me something – why do you think she’s doing it?’
‘She’s your mother. What other reason does she need?’
But Sally Hazlitt was shaking her head again. ‘Has she told you anything about what our lives were like?’
Rebus thought for a moment. ‘Your mum and dad were teachers. Lived in London . . .’
‘That’s as much as you know?’
‘Crouch End, she told me – a nicer area than they should have been able to afford. A relative left some sort of legacy.’ He paused. ‘She’s still in the same house, by the way, sharing with your Uncle Alfie at the moment. Your dad liked reading you stories when you were a kid.’ He paused again, maintaining eye contact. ‘You know he’s dead?’
She nodded. ‘Good riddance.’ And at last Rebus thought he began to see. ‘There’s lots he liked teaching me,’ she went on, meaningfully. ‘Lots and lots.’
The silence lay between them until he broke it, his voice softening.
‘Did you say anything to your mum at the time?’
‘I didn’t need to – she knew. That’s the whole reason she wants to know if I’m still around. Because if I am, I might spill the beans.’ She was looking down at the floor, eyes glistening.
‘Why wait till Aviemore to make your move?’
It took her a moment to gather herself again. ‘I knew I didn’t want to study English at university – that had always been his idea. And the more we all sat around the chalet in Aviemore talking about the future, the more I knew I couldn’t tell him
to his face.’
Rebus nodded his understanding.
‘He’d . . . stopped by that time. Stopped when I was fourteen.’ She cleared her throat. ‘Sounds crazy, but I thought back then it must be my fault, and that made it worse somehow. I’d spent the years since thinking how to punish him, and that night, December 31st, I had just enough Dutch courage in me – or gin at any rate. The whole thing felt so much easier, being in a strange place, hundreds of miles away from them.’
‘But once you found out he was dead . . .?’
‘Too late by then. I knew I wasn’t going back.’
‘It can’t be much fun, always living in fear of being recognised.’
‘That’s why you need to tell her to stop. I’m alive and I’m fine and I never want to see her or talk to her again.’
‘It’d be a lot easier if you told her yourself.’
‘Not for me it wouldn’t.’ She slid from the stool and stood in front of him. ‘So will you do it?’
Rebus puffed out his cheeks. ‘You’re sure this is the life you want?’
‘It’s what I’ve got.’ She gave a shrug. ‘Plenty of others out there worse off than me. You should know that.’
Rebus thought for a moment, then nodded his agreement.
‘Thanks,’ she said, managing a sliver of a smile. Rebus tried to think what else to say, but she was already at the door. Once outside, however, she hesitated, then came back in.
‘Something else you’ve got wrong – I don’t have an Uncle Alfie. Or an Uncle Anything, come to that.’ She pulled open the door and left the café again, striding away with her bag slung over her shoulder, head held high, until the ranks of pedestrians swallowed her up and she was gone. Rebus took out his phone, adding her mobile number to his contacts list. She would probably change it, just as she would slip into a new identity, gifting herself a different past. He couldn’t help but see it as a waste of a life – but then the life was hers to waste. With her number safely stowed, he slipped the phone back into his pocket and ran his hands down his cheeks as he replayed the meeting.
There’s lots he liked teaching me. . .
I might still spill the beans. . .
I don’t have an Uncle Alfie. Or an Uncle Anything, come to that . . .
‘So who the hell is Alfie?’ Rebus asked himself, staring at his reflection in the window.
Part Five
Smell of blood is everywhere –
Even in stone . . .
54
Rebus walked into the SCRU office at Fettes HQ and saw that the packing crates had arrived. Peter Bliss and Elaine Robison were busy with labels and inventories.
‘Come to give us a hand?’ Robison pleaded.
‘This lot going to the Crown Office?’ he asked, prodding one of the boxes with his toe.
‘That’s right,’ Bliss said. ‘And it’ll all be in a damned sight better order than when it first arrived.’
‘Don’t worry,’ Robison added, ‘we’ve left one or two for you. Didn’t want you to feel you were missing out.’
‘Where’s Danny Boy?’
‘Another meeting with the bigwigs.’
‘He’s going to get the job, isn’t he?’
‘Looks like,’ Bliss conceded.
‘He’ll be insufferable,’ Rebus commented.
‘Won’t be our problem, though, will it? We’ll be reduced to daytime TV and cold callers.’
‘In place of cold cases,’ Robison added with a smile. ‘Though I might manage a wee holiday back to Australia first.’ She picked up the photo of the Sydney Harbour Bridge from her desk and kissed it. Then, to Rebus: ‘We were thinking next Friday for a meal and a drink.’
Rebus moved one of the empty crates from his chair and sat down at his desk. ‘I’ll have to check my diary,’ he said.
‘How was Inverness? TV made it look like a bit of a circus.’
‘Nothing the media likes more than a new Sawney Bean to scare us with.’
‘Who?’
‘Cannibal – probably mythical.’
‘Did you call in on Gregor Magrath?’ Bliss asked.
Rebus nodded. ‘And I passed along the news.’
‘How did he take it?’
‘Philosophically.’
‘Picked a nice spot for himself up there, hasn’t he?’
‘Might be all right on a calm day . . .’
Bliss chuckled. ‘Aye, before he retired, Gregor was always chasing the sun. Him and Margaret used to come back from Tenerife brown as berries.’
‘Margaret was his wife?’ Rebus guessed, remembering the photos on the bookcase. ‘When did she die?’
‘Couple of years before he took retirement. Bloody shame – he used to bring cruise brochures in, tell everyone where he and Margaret were going to go when he got the gold watch. How’s he keeping?’
‘Seems fine. You didn’t work here when Nina Hazlitt met him, did you?’
‘Don’t think so. He’d have mentioned her.’
‘It would have been 2004.’
‘Just before my time, then.’
‘He never discussed her with you?’
Bliss shook his head.
Someone rapped their knuckles against the open door. Rebus looked up and saw Malcolm Fox standing there.
‘Can we have a word?’ Fox asked.
‘If you must,’ Rebus responded.
‘Maybe along the corridor . . .’
Rebus followed him to the Complaints’ lair. Fox punched in the code for the lock, making sure to shield the combination from the visitor. The room was much the same size as SCRU, with an almost identical layout: desks and laptops and a window with a view on to Fettes Avenue. There was another suit waiting for them. He was Fox’s age, but wirier, with ancient acne scars on one cheek. Rebus got the feeling this man would happily play bad cop to Fox’s good – or vice versa. Fox introduced him as Tony Kaye, then asked Rebus to take a seat.
‘I’m fine standing.’
Fox gave a shrug, then eased his backside on to the corner of Tony Kaye’s desk.
‘Thought you might still have been up north,’ Fox said. ‘That’s why I phoned Inverness first, only to be told you’d been given the heave-ho.’ His eyes drilled into Rebus’s. ‘Mind telling me why?’
‘I was showing them up as amateurs. You know how prickly other forces get when that happens.’
‘So it had nothing to do with Frank Hammell, then?’
‘Why should it?’
‘That photo of you and him enjoying a friendly drink,’ Tony Kaye suggested.
‘Just a coincidence.’
‘Don’t take us for mugs.’
Rebus switched his attention to Fox, waiting for the man to speak.
‘Morris Gerald Cafferty,’ Fox obliged, ‘and now Francis Hammell. You don’t half pick your friends, Rebus.’
‘They’re as much my friends as you are.’
‘Funny, that,’ said Kaye, ‘because we’ve not been to any pubs with you, while you’ve been spotted drinking with both of them.’
Rebus kept his eyes on Fox. ‘We’re wasting each other’s time here.’
‘SCRU’s being wound up, I hear. That’s you off the force again.’ Fox paused. ‘Unless you’re serious about reapplying.’
‘Being a civilian suddenly has its merits,’ Rebus said, turning and heading for the door. ‘Means I don’t have to listen to you and your shit.’
‘Enjoy the rest of your life, Rebus,’ Kaye called out to him. ‘What’s left of it, that is . . .’
When he got home that evening, a note had been pushed under his door. He unfolded it. It was from MGC – Morris Gerald Cafferty – and it was just to let Rebus know how disappointed Cafferty was in him for ‘consorting with scum like Frank Hammell’, the word ‘scum’ underlined three times for emphasis. Rebus scooped up the rest of the mail and went into the living room. It felt stuffy, so he prised open one of the sash windows, then turned up the radiator to compensate. The hi-fi’s turntable had been lef
t switched on, rotating lazily. Rebus added a Bert Jansch album and lowered the stylus on to the vinyl. Then he started charging his phone before heading to the bedroom and emptying his overnight bag, filling a couple of polythene carriers with laundry. It would be another hour before the nearest launderette closed, so he decided to drop the stuff off – and collect some food on the way home. Leaving his phone behind and lifting the tone-arm from the record, he locked the flat and walked down the two flights of stairs.
‘Yes, I know,’ he apologised to the Saab as he approached it. He’d just tossed the laundry on to the back seat when he heard someone call his name. Tensing, he turned and saw Darryl Christie getting out of a black Mercedes M-Class. The driver stayed behind the steering wheel, but lowered his window the better to keep a close eye on proceedings. Rebus recognised him as the lippy doorman from Jo-Jo Binkie’s – Marcus or something like that.
‘Hello, Darryl,’ Rebus said, resting his back against the Saab. ‘Is it worth me asking how you come to know where I live?’
‘This is the information age, if you hadn’t noticed.’
‘How’s your mum doing? And the rest of the family?’
‘There’s a funeral needs planning.’
‘There’s also a friend of your mother’s who needs calming down.’
‘You think I’m bothered about him?’
‘I think you’ve got a head on your shoulders. In a lot of ways, you’re smarter than Frank Hammell. Someone needs to bring him back from Inverness.’
‘Tomorrow,’ Christie stated. He was dressed in the same dark suit, with a fresh white shirt but no tie. He slipped his hands into his trouser pockets and studied Rebus. ‘Frank says you might be okay.’
‘I’m flattered.’
‘Despite being Cafferty’s man.’
‘I’m not.’
‘Doesn’t matter. Frank’s wondering if you might keep your ears open, on behalf of the family.’
‘Oh?’
‘Any names that come into the frame – all we’d need is a head start.’
‘Frank wants his hands on them before they can be brought into custody?’
Christie nodded slowly. ‘But I don’t want that to happen.’
‘No?’