by Ian Rankin
That evening, he visited one of only two drop-in centres available to ex-cons in Edinburgh. It reminded him most of Fraser Leitch’s establishment, except that here there was a colour TV rather than black and white.
Nobody could help him. Hugh McAnally hadn’t been near the place, not as far as anyone knew. He wasn’t about to press the point or outstay his lukewarm welcome, but he took a quick look round before he left.
In a corner of the main room, a woman with a huge canvas bag slung over her shoulder was crouching down in conversation with a man who sat slumped in a chair. The man stared past her, not interested. Eventually the woman gave up, wrote something on a pad, closed it, and returned it to the canvas bag. The man leaned forward then and whispered something into her ear. She listened, her cheeks reddened, and she got to her feet, turning to walk away.
Rebus was right behind her. She brought herself up short to avoid a collision.
‘You wouldn’t be Jennifer Benn, would you?’
‘That’s me.’
‘My lucky night.’ Rebus looked past her, to where the seated man was rubbing his forehead, trying not to let Rebus see his face. ‘Hiya, Pete.’
The man looked up and seemed to place Rebus. ‘Evening, Mr Rebus.’
‘How long have you been out?’
‘Three weeks two days.’
‘And you fancy another trip back already? Give the lady back her purse.’
The social worker stared in surprise as Pete slipped the bulging black leather purse out of his denim jacket. She snatched it back and checked the contents.
‘Do you want to press charges?’ Rebus asked. She shook her head. ‘Fine, then let’s have a little chat.’
By the time they reached the front door, Jennifer Benn had regained her composure.
‘Where are we going?’
‘Somewhere I’m a bit more welcome. There’s a pub across the road.’
‘I don’t like pubs.’
‘My car then?’
She turned to him. ‘Can I see some ID?’
‘I thought that scene back there would have been ID enough.’ But she wasn’t budging, so he dug out his warrant card, which she inspected slowly.
‘All right,’ she said, handing it back, ‘we can talk here.’
‘Here?’ They were on the pavement. She wrapped a woollen scarf around her neck and pulled on sheepskin mitts. She was in her late-twenties and had frizzy blonde hair and outsized glasses. ‘It’s freezing here,’ Rebus complained.
‘Then best hurry up.’
He sighed. ‘You were Shug McAnally’s social worker?’
‘That’s right.’
‘I’m investigating his suicide.’
She was shaking her head. ‘I’m afraid I can’t help. He never kept an appointment, we never met.’
‘Did you report him?’
She nodded. ‘But I didn’t think anything would come of it. What punishment do you mete out to someone with terminal cancer?’
And with that she turned and walked quickly to her car. Rebus thought that she’d asked a very good question indeed.
16
Next morning, he found himself summoned to Chief Superintendent Watson’s office.
Gill Templer was already there when he arrived. She was standing with her back to the filing cabinet, arms folded. There wasn’t much room: three large cardboard boxes marked ‘PanoTech’ sat on the floor by the desk.
‘My new computer,’ the Farmer explained. ‘Sit down, John.’ The Farmer looked like a man with bad news: Rebus had been here before; same look, same tone of voice.
‘I’d rather stand, sir.’
‘Been up to anything we should know about, John?’
‘No, sir.’
‘Nothing at all?’
‘Not that I know of, sir. Why?’
Watson glanced towards Gill Templer. ‘I had a phone call yesterday evening from Allan Gunner.’ Gunner: the deputy chief constable. ‘He doesn’t often call me at home.’
‘Do I take it he had bad news?’ Rebus decided to sit down after all.
‘HM Inspectorate of Constabulary are thinking of investigating us.’
‘Us?’
‘B Division.’
‘That’s us all right.’
‘It’s no joking matter.’
Nor was it. HMIC was independent of the police service; it reported directly to the Secretary of State for Scotland. HMIC’s public remit encompassed examining police standards and indicating areas for improvement. It inspected all eight regional forces each year, but only four of these were full ‘primary’ inspections. They looked at rises in crime stats, falls in detection rates, and complaints from the public. No problem there: the recorded crime rate was steady when it wasn’t falling, and recent clear-up rates were marginally improved. But HMIC could really screw up a station’s working practices, just by being on the premises. There were long lists of questions to answer, an initial pre-inspection followed by the full inspection … and, as everyone in the room knew, HMIC could sometimes stumble upon something better left unqueried. Or, as the Farmer put it,
‘You know those buggers, John. If they want to find dirt on us, there’s dirt to be found. We don’t exactly work in an antiseptic environment.’
‘That’s because we don’t deal with people who wash behind their ears every morning. What are you getting at, sir? So what if we’ve been picked out? It’s the luck of the draw.’
‘Ah,’ Watson said, holding up a prodigious forefinger. ‘I only said they were thinking of picking us out.’
‘I don’t get it.’
The Farmer shifted – so far as he was able – in his chair. He was not a small man; it was not a large chair. ‘To be honest, neither do I, the DCC was being bloody cagey. I think the gist was, we’re doing something naughty, and if we stop doing it, another division might find itself under scrutiny instead of us.’
‘Did he actually say that?’ Gill Templer asked.
The Farmer shrugged. ‘I’m giving my interpretation, that’s all. Now, after his phone call, I did some thinking. I asked myself: who would be getting up people’s noses? Well, I know one copper who’s like cocaine in that respect.’
‘Nobody sniffs coke these days, sir.’ Watson just sat there, unblinking. ‘OK,’ Rebus said, standing again. ‘I went to see Big Jim Flett yesterday, probably a couple of hours before Gunner called you.’
‘Why?’ Gill Templer asked. She looked furious that he hadn’t told her beforehand.
‘McAnally.’
‘The suicide?’ The Farmer frowned as Rebus nodded.
‘The thing is, sir, there’s something … I don’t know, I just think there’s something there. Why go all the way to Warrender School to blow your brains out in front of a councillor, a man who says he never even knew the deceased? And how come the widow’s suddenly got money to spend? Those are two questions; I’ve got a wheen more.’
‘Well,’ the Farmer said, ‘that might explain the second phone call. Also last night, and also at my home. It was from Derek Mantoni.’
‘I don’t know him.’
‘Councillor Mantoni is chair of Lothian and Borders Joint Police Board.’
Rebus saw now: Gillespie had been complaining to his friend.
‘He was asking about you, John.’
‘Nice of him.’
‘Apparently you’ve rubbed Councillor Gillespie up the wrong way. I should remind you that the councillor is a victim here, and one who’s been through a terrible experience.’ The Farmer sounded as if he was quoting Derek Mantoni.
‘Inspector Rebus,’ Gill Templer said, ‘is there any reason to believe it wasn’t a suicide?’
‘No,’ Rebus admitted. ‘I’m sure it was suicide.’
‘Then I don’t see the problem.’
Rebus turned to her. ‘Well, I do!’ He jabbed his thumb into his chest to reinforce the point. ‘And now everyone suddenly wants it covered up!’ She turned her head away from him.
‘John,�
�� the Farmer warned, ‘that’s out of order. I’ve been looking at the hours you’ve been putting in. You’re due some time off … a lot of time actually. It’s a quiet time of year.’
Rebus held the Farmer’s stare. ‘You’ve got to back me up on this, sir.’
‘I’m telling you to take some time off, that’s all.’
‘Who is it you’re scared of: the DCC? Mantoni? HMIC?’
The Farmer ignored him. ‘Take a week, ten days … clear your head, Inspector.’
Rebus slammed both hands down on the desktop. A framed photo of the Farmer’s family fell off and landed on a cardboard box. Gill Templer stooped to pick it up.
‘You’ve got to back me up,’ Rebus repeated. He knew Gill was a lost cause; he had eyes only for the Farmer, but the Farmer wasn’t looking.
‘I’ve given you an order, Inspector.’
Rebus gave one of the boxes a kick on his way out of the room.
When he thought it over later, Rebus didn’t blame the Farmer. He was covering his arse; so was Gill, if it came down to it. Now Rebus was a free agent, or at least a loose one. He couldn’t get anyone into trouble but himself, and that was fine with him. He’d cleared his desk, pushing everything into drawers and, when he ran out of space, the wastepaper-bin. He’d left St Leonard’s without a word to anyone.
There were just the two problems – neither of them insignificant – and he pondered them as he sat in the back room of the Oxford Bar with a half of Caledonian Eighty and a double malt.
The first problem was, police routine gave his daily life its only shape and substance; it gave him a schedule to work to, a reason to get up in the morning. He loathed his free time, dreaded Sundays off. He lived to work, and in a very real sense he worked to live, too: the much-maligned Protestant work-ethic. Subtract work from the equation, and the day became flabby, like releasing jelly from its mould. Besides, without work, what reason had he not to drink?
It worried him, because now there was nothing to stop him raising two fingers to the shade of Wee Shug McAnally, a man not exactly universally mourned, and get on with some serious bevvying instead. He could spend a seven-to-ten stretch in the Ox no problem, augmented by betting-shop gossip and nourished by pies and bridies. It would be wonderfully easy.
Then there was the second problem, not unconnected to the first.
For, now that he had so much time on his hands, what was to stop him booking a dentist’s appointment?
The only thing to do was to keep working. Besides, there were some things he needed to do in a hurry, before word got around that he was on leave. The first of these involved another visit to C Division in Torphichen Place.
DI Davidson was again on duty, to Rebus’s relief.
‘I can smell it off you,’ Davidson said, leading him to the CID room.
‘What?’
‘The drink. How can you torture me like that? There’s another two hours before I finish my shift.’
Rebus saw that they were alone in the CID room. ‘I need the casenotes on McAnally, the ones from the rape charge.’
‘What for?’
Rebus shrugged. ‘I just need to see them.’
Davidson went to a desk drawer and brought out a bunch of keys. ‘You know, John, there’s enough to be getting on with in the here-and-now.’ He went to a walk-in cupboard and opened it. ‘I don’t suppose there’ll be a copy still here. Everything’ll have been archived by now.’
There were reports packed tight along each shelf. On every spine, in fat felt-marker, was an officer’s name, depending on whose copy the report was. The spines faced upwards, the base of each report facing out. On the base was the name of the accused. There was no McAnally.
So then they’d to traipse to another part of the building, locate another set of keys, and unlock a storeroom, inside which stood a dozen tall double-doored filing cupboards. Davidson stood in thought for a moment, then pointed at one.
‘That’s probably got the year we’re after.’ He unlocked the cabinet. There was a smell of musty paper, much stronger than in the cupboard they’d tried earlier. Davidson ran his finger along each row of spines. ‘McAnally,’ he said at last, pulling out two thick files of A4 paper and handing them to Rebus. Each was loose-bound, held together by two removable metal clips. The blue covers were faded at their edges. Davidson’s surname was on the spine. Rebus read from one of the covers.
‘“The Case Against Hugh McAnally, Born 12.1.44.”’ He flipped through both files, not surprised to see their bulk consisted of witness statements.
‘Enjoy,’ said Davidson, relocking the cabinet.
Rebus stopped off on his way home and bought a jar of coffee, rolls, bacon, and two four-packs of Export. He was preparing for a long haul.
The flat was fairly warm. He emptied the jar beneath the leaking radiator and replaced it, then turned the hi-fi on. He washed three aspirin down with a swig of beer, then checked his face in the bathroom mirror. The skin around and below his nose was definitely inflamed. When he waggled one particular tooth it felt deadened, anaesthetised, while its neighbours jangled like they’d been wired to the mains. The blister on his palm had receded, and now sported only a thin strip of sticking-plaster. Beneath the plaster, the engine’s serial number was still there.
I’m in great shape, he thought. I’m the perfect fucking specimen.
He took the beer through to the living room, sat down with the reports in his chair, and started to read.
He started with the Summary of Evidence, barely glanced down the List of Productions and List of Witnesses, skipped the Annual Leave of Officers, and got to work on the Statements and Tape Transcriptions. The witnesses comprised neighbours, the victim, the accused’s wife, a couple of barmen, and the police doctor (Dr Curt, as it turned out), who had examined and taken samples from both victim and accused. Maisie Finch had been examined in hospital, where she spent the rest of the night under observation. It was noted that her mother – unaware of her daughter’s presence – was in the same hospital at the time, just one floor up.
Hugh McAnally had been examined in the medical examination room at Torphichen. During the examination he kept protesting, ‘I used a johnny, for fuck’s sake, what’s the problem?’
These words had endeared him to no one.
The story from the victim’s point of view: Maisie had been alone in the flat, her mum being in hospital for a minor operation. At this time, her mother was already all but housebound, looking after her a full-time occupation for Maisie. (Nobody had asked her how it felt to be cooped up all day with an invalid; or how it felt when her mum had been taken into hospital … Rebus remembered his own meeting with her – the bottles of strong lager, the ‘holiday mood’.) Maisie knew Mr McAnally very well, had known him for years. She regarded him not just as a neighbour but as a family friend.
McAnally told her he had come to ask after her mother. Though he smelled of alcohol, she’d let him into the flat and offered to make a cup of tea. He asked if she had anything stronger. She knew there was a bottle of whisky in the bottom of her mother’s wardrobe. It had been there since her father’s death. Maisie went to fetch it, and McAnally followed. He pushed her on to the bed so she was face down, and held her head down with one hand …
Afterwards, he mumbled something. She thought it might have been an apology, but maybe not. He went out, leaving the door to the flat ajar. She could hear him tramping noisily down the stairwell. She ran to Mrs McAnally’s door and thumped on it till she got an answer. Mrs McAnally herself called the police.
McAnally, by his own admission, left the tenement and headed for Lothian Road, drinking in a couple of pubs he frequented. This was backed up by the two barmen. Then he bought a fish supper, and was finishing it as he approached the main door of the tenement, where he was apprehended by two police officers who had been waiting in their car. He was taken to Torphichen Place police station and questioned, then charged.
McAnally’s version was: he had indeed go
ne to Maisie Finch’s flat to inquire about her mother, but also in the hope of having sex with Maisie. They’d had sex once before, while her mother was asleep in the other room. Both times, Maisie initiated proceedings. McAnally knew she was a ‘good girl’, but thought she got bored at home. He knew he was ‘no spring chicken’ nor yet ‘Mr Universe’, and her home life explained why Maisie wanted to have sex with him – ‘I dare say I wasn’t the only one.’ Maisie herself had never said anything, never explained, and McAnally wasn’t really bothered, ‘so long as I was getting my hole.’
After a minute or so’s conversation in the living room, Maisie suggested going through to her mother’s bedroom, her reasoning being that her mother had a double bed, while Maisie only had a single. (Asked to describe Maisie’s bedroom, McAnally was able to, though this proved nothing, since as he later acknowledged, he’d been in there the previous month to change a faulty light-fitting.)
On the night in question, they progressed to the mother’s bedroom, where – McAnally’s version – intercourse took place, ‘doggy style’. Asked why that particular position, McAnally said he thought maybe Maisie didn’t like to look at his ‘ugly old coupon’. (Rebus was glad he hadn’t interviewed McAnally; he’d probably have taken a swing at him.) McAnally said he left the flat immediately afterwards, as Maisie didn’t like him to hang about. One thing he said was that Maisie herself had provided the condom: ‘I can’t run around with johnnies in my pooch, Tresa’d be bound to find them.’
Yes, he was a choice article, Mr Hugh McAnally.
Rape cases could be difficult. Scottish law required corroboration, not just one person’s word against another’s. With allegations of rape, there was seldom absolute corroboration – rapists didn’t work to an uninvited audience. But in this case there was the girl’s cry, heard by some in the tenement (though not by all), and the fact that she made, as Davidson himself commented, a ‘stonking good witness’. She would go into the witness box – not all rape victims would, for very good emotional reasons – and she would testify. She would ‘put the old bastard behind bars’.