10 Great Rebus Novels (John Rebus) (260 page)

The little man shuffled away, footsteps receding into the distance.

‘Don’t worry,’ Holmes said. ‘I’ve laid a trail of breadcrumbs so we can find our way back.’ He looked around. ‘Isn’t this the creepiest place you’ve ever been?’

‘It’s straight into the top five. Listen, Brian, there’s a problem.’ He held up his right hand. ‘Fan.’ Then his left. ‘Shit.’ He clapped both hands together. The sound reverberated through the warehouse.

‘Tell me.’

‘The CC Rider’s opening an inquiry into the Spaven case, prior to reopening the case itself. And he’s managed to put in charge someone I recently rubbed up the wrong way.’

‘Silly you.’

‘Silly me. So no doubt they’ll be down here some day soon to lift the casenotes. And I don’t want them lifting
you
.’

Holmes looked at the bulging files, the faded black ink on each cover. ‘The files could get lost, couldn’t they?’

‘They could. Two problems. One, that would look highly suspicious. Two, I’m assuming Mr Clipboard knows which files you’ve been consulting.’

‘That’s true,’ Holmes conceded. ‘And it went down on his sheet.’

‘Along with your name.’

‘We could try slipping him some cash.’

‘He doesn’t look the type. He’s not in this for money, is he?’

Holmes looked thoughtful. He also looked terrible: unevenly shaven, his hair uncombed and needing a trim. The bags under his eyes could have carried half a hundredweight of coal.

‘Look,’ he said at last, ‘I’m halfway through . . . more than halfway. If I burn the candle tonight, maybe speed up my reading, I could have it finished by tomorrow.’

Rebus nodded slowly. ‘What do you think so far?’ He was almost scared to touch the files, to flip through them. It wasn’t history, it was archaeology.

‘I think your typing hasn’t improved. Straight answer: there’s something dodgy going on, that much I can read between the lines. I can see exactly where you’re covering up, rewriting the true story to fit your version. You weren’t quite so subtle in those days. Geddes’ version reads better, more confident. He glosses over stuff, he’s not afraid to understate. What I’d like to know is, what was the story with him and Spaven in the first place? I know you told me they served together in Burma or somewhere; how did they come to fall out? See, if we knew that, we’d know how valid the chip on Geddes’ shoulder was, and maybe how far it would take him.’

Rebus clapped his hands again, this time in muffled applause.

‘That’s good going.’

‘So give me another day, see what else I come up with. John, I
want
to do this for you.’

‘And if they catch you?’

‘I’ll talk my way out, don’t worry.’

Rebus’s pager sounded. He looked to Holmes.

‘Sooner you go,’ Holmes said, ‘sooner I can get back to it.’

Rebus patted him on the shoulder and headed back along the stacks. Brian Holmes: friend. Difficult to equate with the person who had roughed up Mental Minto. Schizophrenia, the policeman’s ally: a dual personality came in handy . . .

He asked the clerk if he could use a telephone. There was one on the wall. He called in.

‘DI Rebus.’

‘Yes, Inspector, apparently you’ve been trying to reach DCI Templer.’

‘Yes.’

‘Well, I have a location for her. She’s in Ratho, at some restaurant.’

Rebus slammed down the phone, cursing himself for not thinking of it sooner.

The wooden walkway where McLure’s body had lain had been blown dry by the wind, leaving nothing to indicate that a death had occurred so recently. The ducks were skimming the water; one of the boats had just left with half a dozen passengers; diners in the restaurant chewed on their food and stared out at the two figures on the canal bank.

‘I was in meetings half the day,’ Gill said. ‘I didn’t hear about it until an hour ago. What happened?’

She had her hands deep in coat pockets, the coat a cream Burberry. She looked sad.

‘Ask the pathologist. There was a cut on McLure’s head, but that doesn’t tell us a lot. He could have hit it when he slipped.’

‘Or he could have been whacked and pushed in.’

‘Or he could have jumped.’ Rebus shivered; the death reminded him of the Mitchison options. ‘My guess is, all the autopsy will tell us is whether he was alive when he hit the water. Right now I’ll tell you he was probably alive, which still doesn’t answer the question: accident, suicide, or a whack and a push?’ He watched Gill turn away, begin to walk the towpath. He caught up with her. It was starting to rain again, small drops, sparse. He watched them land on her coat, darkening it by degrees.

‘Bang goes my big collar,’ she said, an edge to her voice. Rebus turned up the collar of her coat, and she caught the joke, smiled.

‘There’ll be others,’ he told her. ‘Meantime, a man’s dead – don’t forget that.’ She nodded. ‘Listen,’ he said, ‘the ACC had me on the carpet this afternoon.’

‘The Spaven case?’

He nodded. ‘Plus he wanted to know what I was doing out here this morning.’

She glanced towards him. ‘What did you say?’

‘I didn’t say anything. But the thing is . . . McLure ties in to Spaven.’

‘What?’ He had her full attention now.

‘They palled around years back.’

‘Jesus, why didn’t you tell me?’

Rebus shrugged. ‘It didn’t seem an issue.’

Gill was thinking hard. ‘But if Carswell links McLure to Spaven . . .?’

‘Then my being out here on the very morning Feardie Fergie met the big cheerio is going to look just a tad suspicious.’

‘You have to tell him.’

‘I don’t think so.’

She turned to him, her hands gripping his lapels. ‘You’re protecting me from the fallout.’

The rain was growing heavier, drops sparkling in her hair.
‘Let’s just say I’m radiation-proof,’ he said, leading her by the hand into the bar.

They ate a snack, neither of them bringing an appetite with them. Rebus’s came with a whisky; Gill’s with Highland spring water. They sat facing one another at an alcove table. The place was a third full, nobody near enough to overhear.

‘Who else knew?’ Rebus said.

‘You’re the first person I’ve told.’

‘Well, they could find out anyway. Maybe Fergie’s nerve went, maybe he owned up. Maybe they just guessed.’

‘Plenty of maybes.’

‘What else have we got?’ He paused, chewing. ‘What about the other snitches you inherited?’

‘What about them?’

‘Snitches hear things, maybe Fergie wasn’t the only one who knew about this drugs thing.’

Gill was shaking her head. ‘I asked him at the time. He seemed confident it was being kept
very
quiet. You’re assuming he was killed. Remember, he has a history of bad nerves, mental problems. Maybe the fear just got too much for him.’

‘Do us both a favour, Gill, stick close to the investigation. See what the neighbours say: did he have any visitors this morning? Anyone out of the ordinary or suspicious? See if you can check his phone calls. My bet is it’ll go down as an accident, which means no one’s going to be working too hard on it.
Push them
, ask favours if you have to. Did he normally go for morning walks?’

She was nodding. ‘Anything else?’

‘Yes . . . who’s got the keys to his house?’

Gill made the calls, and they drank coffee until a DC turned up with the keys, fresh from the mortuary. Gill had asked about the Spaven case, Rebus giving only vague answers. Then they’d talked about Johnny Bible, Allan Mitchison . . . all shop-talk, steering a wide berth around anything personal.
But at one point they’d locked eyes, shared a smile, knowing the questions were there, whether they asked them or not.

‘So,’ Rebus said, ‘what do you do now?’

‘About the gen McLure gave me?’ she sighed. ‘There’s nowhere to go with it, it was all so vague – no names or details, no date for the meeting . . . it’s gone.’

‘Well, maybe.’ Rebus lifted the keys, shook them. ‘Depends whether you want to come snooping or not.’

The pavements in Ratho were narrow. To keep his distance from Gill, Rebus walked on the road. They didn’t say anything, didn’t need to. This was their second evening together; Rebus felt comfortable sharing everything but close proximity.

‘That’s his car.’

Gill walked around the Volvo, peered in through the windows. On the dashboard a small red light was blinking: the automatic alarm. ‘Leather upholstery. Looks straight out of the showroom.’

‘Typical Feardie Fergie car though: nice and safe.’

‘I don’t know,’ Gill mused. ‘It’s the turbo version.’

Rebus hadn’t noticed. He thought of his own aged Saab. ‘Wonder what’ll happen to it . . .’

‘Is this his house?’

They walked up to the door, used a mortise and a yale to open it. Rebus turned on the hall lights.

‘Do you know if any of our lot has been in here?’ Rebus asked.

‘As far as I know, we’re the first. Why?’

‘Just trying out a scenario or two. Say someone came to see him here, and they frightened him. Say they told him to take a walk . . .’

‘Yes?’

‘Well, he still had the presence of mind to double-lock the door. So either he wasn’t that scared . . .’

‘Or whoever was with him double-locked the door, assuming that’s what McLure would normally do.’

Rebus nodded. ‘One more thing. Alarm system.’ He pointed to a box on the wall, its light a steady green. ‘It hasn’t been switched on. If he was in a flap, he might forget. If he thought he wasn’t coming back alive, he wouldn’t bother.’

‘He might not bother for a short stroll either though.’

Rebus conceded the point. ‘Final scenario: whoever double-locked the door forgot or plain didn’t know the alarm was there. See, door double-locked but alarm system off – it’s not consistent. And someone like Fergie, Volvo driver, my guess is he’d
always
be consistent.’

‘Well, let’s see if he had anything worth nicking.’

They walked into the living room. It was crammed to bursting with furniture and nick-nacks, some modern, a lot looking like they’d been handed down the generations. But though overfilled, the room was neat, dust-free, with expensive-looking rugs on the floor – far from fire-damaged stock.

‘Supposing someone
did
come to see him,’ Gill said. ‘Maybe we should dust for prints.’

‘Definitely maybe. Get forensics on to it first thing.’

‘Yes, sir.’

Rebus smiled. ‘Sorry, ma’am.’

They kept their hands in their pockets as they walked through the room: the reflex to touch things was always strong.

‘No signs of a struggle, and nothing looks like it’s been put back in the wrong place.’

‘Agreed.’

Past the living room there was another, shorter hallway, leading to a guest bedroom and what had probably once been the lounge: only used when visitors called. Fergus McLure had turned it into an office. There was paperwork everywhere, and on a fold-out dining table sat a new-looking computer.

‘I suppose someone’s going to have to go through this lot,’ Gill said, not relishing the task.

‘I hate computers,’ Rebus said. He had noticed a fat notepad beside the keyboard. He slipped a hand from his
pocket and picked it up by its edges, angling it into the light. There were indents in the paper from the last written sheet. Gill came over to see.

‘Don’t tell me.’

‘Can’t make it out, and I don’t think the pencil trick would help.’

They looked at one another, spoke their thoughts together.

‘Howdenhall.’

‘Check the bins next?’ Gill said.

‘You do it, I’ll look upstairs.’

Rebus went back into the front hall, saw more doors, tried them: a small old-fashioned kitchen, family pictures on the walls; a toilet; a box room. He climbed the stairs, his feet sinking into deep-pile carpeting which muffled all sound. It was a quiet house; Rebus got the feeling it had been quiet even when McLure had been there. Another guest bedroom, large bathroom – unmodernised like the kitchen – and main bedroom. Rebus gave his attention to the usual places: beneath the bed, mattress and pillows; bedside cabinets, chest of drawers, wardrobe. Everything was obsessively arranged: cardigans folded just so and layered by colour; slippers and shoes in a row – all the browns together, then the blacks. There was a small bookcase boasting an uninspired collection: histories of carpets and Eastern art; a photographic tour of the vineyards of France.

A life without complications.

Either that or the dirt on Feardie Fergie was elsewhere.

‘Found anything?’ Gill called up the stairs. Rebus walked back along the corridor.

‘No, but you might want to have someone check his business premises.’

‘First thing tomorrow.’

Rebus came back down. ‘What about you?’

‘Nothing. Just what you’d expect to find in bins. Nothing saying, “Dope deal, two-thirty Friday at the carpet auction”.’

‘Pity,’ Rebus said with a smile. He checked his watch. ‘Fancy another drink?’

Gill shook her head, stretched. ‘I’d better get home. It’s been a long day.’

‘
Another
long day.’

‘Another long day.’ She angled her head and looked at him. ‘What about you? Are you heading off for another drink?’

‘Meaning?’

‘Meaning you drink more than you used to.’

‘Meaning?’

Her look was intent. ‘Meaning I wish you wouldn’t.’

‘So how much
should
I drink, doctor?’

‘Don’t take it like that.’

‘How do you know how much I drink? Who’s been squealing?’

‘We went out last night, remember?’

‘I only had two or three whiskies.’

‘And after I left?’

Rebus swallowed. ‘Straight home to bed.’

She smiled sadly. ‘You liar. And you were back at it first thing: a patrol car saw you leaving that pub behind Waverley.’

‘I’m under surveillance!’

‘There are people out there who’re worried about you, that’s all.’

‘I don’t believe this.’ Rebus threw open the door.

‘Where are you going?’

‘I need a fucking drink. You can come if you like.’

As he drove into Arden Street, he saw a group of people outside the main door to his tenement. They were shuffling their feet and cracking jokes, trying to keep morale up. One or two were eating chips from newspaper – a nice irony, since they had the look of reporters.