10 Great Rebus Novels (John Rebus)

by Ian Rankin

  ‘Yes, why is that?’

  ‘Because she’s still the proverbial wild child. Still runs around with her old crowd. Jamie Kilpatrick, Matilda Merriman, all that sort. Parties, booze, drugs, orgies . . . God knows. The press never gets a sniff.’ He turned again to Patience. ‘If you’ll pardon the phrase. Not a sniff do we get. And anything we do get is blue pencilled with a fair amount of prejudice.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘Well, editors are nervous at the best of times, aren’t they? And you’ve got to remember that Sir Hugh Ferrie is never slow with a libel suit where his family’s concerned.’

  ‘You mean that electronics factory?’

  ‘Case in point.’

  ‘So what about this “old crowd” of Mrs Jack’s?’

  ‘Aristos, mostly old money, some new money.’

  ‘What about the lady herself?’

  ‘Well, she certainly spurred Jack on in the early days. I think he always wanted to go into politics, and MPs can hardly afford not to be married. People start to suspect a shirt-lifting tendency. My guess is he looked for someone pretty, with money, and with a father of influence. Found her and wasn’t going to let go. And it’s been a successful marriage, so far as the public’s concerned. Liz gets wheeled out for the photo opportunities and looks just right, then she disappears again. Completely different to Gregor, you see. Fire and ice. She’s the fire, he’s the ice, usually with whisky added . . .’

  Kemp was in a talkative mood tonight. There was more, but it was speculation. Still, it was interesting to be given a different perspective, wasn’t it? Rebus considered this as he excused himself and visited the gents’. The Horsehair’s trough-like urinal was brimful of liquid, as had always, to Rebus’s knowledge, been the case. The condensation on the overhead cistern dripped unerringly on to the heads of those unwise enough to get too close, and the graffiti was mostly the work of a dyslexic bigot: REMEMBER 1960. There was some new stuff though, written in biro. ‘The Drunk as a Lord’s Prayer,’ Rebus read. ‘Our Father which are in heavy, Alloa’d be they name . . .’

  Rebus reckoned that if he didn’t have all he needed, he had all Chris Kemp was able to give. No reason to linger then. No reason at all. He came out of the gents’ briskly, and saw that a young man had stopped at the table to chat with Patience. He was moving away now, back to the main bar, while Patience smiled a farewell in his direction.

  ‘Who was that?’ Rebus asked, not sitting down.

  ‘He lives next door in Oxford Terrace,’ Patience said casually. ‘Works in Trading Standards. I’m surprised you haven’t met him.’

  Rebus murmured something, then tapped his watch with his finger.

  ‘Chris,’ he said, ‘this is all your fault. You’re too interesting by half. We were supposed to be at the restaurant twenty minutes ago. Kevin and Myra will kill us. Come on, Patience. Listen, Chris, I’ll be in touch. Meantime . . .’ he leaned closer to the reporter, lowering his voice. ‘See if you can find who tipped off the papers about the brothel raid. That might be the start of the story.’ He straightened up again. ‘See you soon, eh? Cheers.’

  ‘Cheerio, Chris,’ said Patience, sliding out of her seat.

  ‘Oh, right, bye then. See you.’ And Chris Kemp found himself alone, wondering if it was something that he’d said.

  Outside, Patience turned to Rebus. ‘Kevin and Myra?’ she said.

  ‘Our oldest friends,’ explained Rebus. ‘And as good a get-out clause as anything. Besides, I did promise you dinner. You can tell me all about our next-door neighbour.’

  He took her arm in his and they walked back to the car – her car. Patience had never seen John Rebus jealous before, so it was hard to tell, but she could have sworn he was jealous now. Well well, wonders would never cease . . .

  3

  Treacherous Steps

  Springtime in Edinburgh. A freezing wind, and near-horizontal rain. Ah, the Edinburgh wind, that joke of a wind, that black farce of a wind. Making everyone walk like mime artists, making eyes water and then drying the tears to a crust on red-nipped cheeks. And throughout it all, that slightly sour yeasty smell in the air, the smell of not-so-distant breweries. There had been a frost overnight. Even the prowling, fur-coated Lucky had yowled at the bedroom window, demanding entry. The birds had been chirping as Rebus let him in. He checked his watch: two thirty. Why the hell were the birds singing so early? When he next awoke, at six, they’d stopped. Maybe they were trying to avoid the rush hour . . .

  This sub-zero morning, it had taken him a full five minutes to start his clown of a car. Maybe it was time to get one of those red noses for the radiator grille. And the frost had swollen the cracks in the steps up to Great London Road police station, swollen and then fissured, so that Rebus stepped warily over wafers of stone.

  Treacherous steps. Nothing would be done about them. The rumours were still rife anyway; rumours that Great London Road was shagged out, wabbit, past its sell-by. Rumours that it would be shut down. A prime site, after all. Prime land for another hotel or office block. And the staff? Split up, so the rumours went. With most of them being transferred to St Leonard’s, the Divisional HQ (Central). Much closer to Rebus’s flat in Marchmont; but much further from Oxford Terrace and Dr Patience Aitken. Rebus had made himself a little pact, a sort of contract in his head: if, within the next month or two, the rumours became fact, then it was a message from on high, a message that he should not move in with Patience. But if Great London Road remained a going concern, or if they were moved to Fettes HQ (five minutes from Oxford Terrace) . . . what then? What then? The fine print on the contract was still being decided.

  ‘Morning, John.’

  ‘Hello, Arthur. Any messages?’

  The duty desk sergeant shook his head. Rebus rubbed his hands over his ears and face, thawing them out, and climbed the stairs towards his room, where treacherous linoleum replaced treacherous stone. And then there was the treacherous telephone . . .

  ‘Rebus here.’

  ‘John?’ It was the voice of Chief Superintendent Watson. ‘Can you spare a minute?’

  Rebus made noisy show of rustling some papers on his desk, hoping Watson would think he’d been in the office for hours, hard at work.

  ‘Well, sir . . .’

  ‘Don’t piss about, John. I tried you five minutes ago.’

  Rebus stopped shuffling papers. ‘I’ll be right along, sir.’

  ‘That’s right, you will.’ And with that the phone went dead. Rebus shrugged off his weatherproof jacket, the one which always let water in at the shoulders. He felt the shoulders of his suit-jacket. Sure enough, they were damp, matching his enthusiasm for a Monday-morning meeting with the Farmer. He took a deep breath and spread his hands in front of him like an old-time song and dance man.

  ‘It’s showtime,’ he told himself. Only five working days till the weekend. Then he made a quick phone call to Dufftown Police Station and asked them to check on Deer Lodge.

  ‘Is that d-e-a-r?’ asked the voice.

  ‘D-double e-r,’ corrected Rebus, thinking: But it probably was dear enough when they bought it.

  ‘Anything we’re looking for in particular?’

  An MP’s wife . . . leftovers from a sex orgy . . . flour bags full of cocaine . . . ‘No,’ said Rebus, ‘nothing special. Just let me know what you find.’

  ‘Right you are. It might take a while.’

  ‘Soon as you can, eh?’ And so saying, Rebus remembered that he should be elsewhere. ‘Soon as you can.’

  Chief Superintendent Watson was as blunt as a tramp’s razor blade.

  ‘What the hell were you doing at Gregor Jack’s yesterday?’

  Rebus was almost caught off guard. Almost. ‘Who’s been telling tales?’

  ‘Never mind that. Just give me a bloody answer.’ Pause. ‘Coffee?’

  ‘I wouldn’t say no.’

  Watson’s wife had bought him the coffee-maker as a Christmas present. Maybe as a hint that he should cut down his consumptio
n of Teacher’s whisky. Maybe so that he’d stand a chance of being sober when he returned home of an evening. All it had done so far though was make Watson hyperactive of a morning. In the afternoon, however, after a few lunchtime nips, drowsiness would take over. Best, therefore, to avoid Watson in the mornings. Best to wait until afternoon to ask him about that leave you were thinking of taking or to tell him the news of the latest bodged operation. If you were lucky, you’d get off with a ‘tut-tut’. But the mornings . . . the mornings were different.

  Rebus accepted the mug of strong coffee. Half a packet of espresso looked as though it had been tipped into the generous filter. Now, it tipped itself into Rebus’s bloodstream.

  ‘Sounds stupid, sir, but I was just passing.’

  ‘You’re right,’ said Watson, settling down behind his desk, ‘it does sound stupid. Even supposing you were just passing . . .’

  ‘Well, sir, to be honest, there was a little more to it than that.’ Watson sat back in his chair, holding the mug in both hands, and waited for the story. Doubtless he was thinking: this’ll be good. But Rebus had nothing to gain by lying. ‘I like Gregor Jack,’ he said. ‘I mean, I like him as an MP. He’s always seemed to me to be a bloody good MP. I felt a bit . . . well, I thought it was bad timing, us happening to bust that brothel the same time he was there . . .’ Bad timing? Did he really believe that was all there was to it? ‘So, when I did happen to be passing – I’d stayed the night at Sergeant Holmes’ new house . . . he lives in Jack’s constituency – I thought I’d stop and take a look. There were a lot of reporters about the place. I don’t know exactly why I stopped, but then I saw that Jack’s car was sitting out on the drive in full view. I reckoned that was dangerous. I mean, if a photo of it got into the papers. Everybody’d know Jack’s car, right down to its number plate. You can’t be too safe, can you? So I went in and suggested the car be moved into the garage.’

  Rebus stopped. That was all there was to it, wasn’t it? Well, it was enough to be going on with. Watson was looking thoughtful. He took another injection of coffee before speaking.

  ‘You’re not alone, John. I feel guilty myself about Operation Creeper. Not that there’s anything to feel guilty about, you understand, but all the same . . . and now the press are on to the story, they’ll keep on it till the poor bugger’s forced to resign.’

  Rebus doubted this. Jack hadn’t looked like a man ready or willing or about to resign.

  ‘If we can help Jack . . .’ Watson paused again, wanting to catch Rebus’s eye. He was warning Rebus that this was all unofficial, all unwritten, but that it had already been discussed, at some level far above Rebus himself. Perhaps, even, above Watson. Had the Chief Super been rapped over the knuckles by the high heidyins themselves? ‘If we can help him,’ he was saying, ‘I’d like him to get that help. If you see what I mean, John.’

  ‘I think so, sir.’ Sir Hugh Ferrie had powerful friends. Rebus was beginning to wonder just how powerful . . .

  ‘Right then.’

  ‘Just the one thing, sir. Who gave you the info about the brothel?’

  Watson was shaking his head even before Rebus had finished the question. ‘Can’t tell you that, John. I know what you’re thinking. You’re wondering if Jack was set up. Well, if he was, it had nothing to do with my informant. I can promise you that. No, if Jack was set up, the question that needs answering is why he was there in the first place, not why we were there.’

  ‘But the papers knew, too. I mean, they knew about Operation Creeper.’

  Watson was nodding now. ‘Again, nothing to do with my informant. But yes, I’ve been thinking about that. It had to be one of us, hadn’t it? Someone on the team.’

  ‘So nobody else knew when it was planned for?’

  Watson seemed to hold his breath for a moment, then shook his head. He was lying, of course. Rebus could see that. No point probing further, not yet at any rate. There would be a reason behind the lie, and that reason would come out in good time. Right now, and for no reason he could put his finger on, Rebus was more worried about Mrs Jack. Worried? Well, maybe not quite worried. Maybe not even concerned. Call it . . . call it interested. Yes, that was it. He was interested in her.

  ‘Any progress on those missing books?’

  What missing books? Oh, those missing books. He shrugged. ‘We’ve talked to all the booksellers. The list is doing the rounds. We might even get a mention in the trade magazines. I shouldn’t think any bookseller is going to touch them. Meantime . . . well, there are the private collectors still to be interviewed. One of them’s the wife of Rab Kinnoul.’

  ‘The actor?’

  ‘The very same. Lives out towards South Queensferry. His wife collects first editions.’

  ‘Better try to get out there yourself, John. Don’t want to send a constable out to see Rab Kinnoul.’

  ‘Right, sir.’ It was the answer he’d wanted. He drained his mug. His nerves were already sizzling like bacon in a pan. ‘Anything else?’

  But Watson had finished with him, and was rising to replenish his own mug. ‘This stuff’s addictive,’ he was saying as Rebus left the office. ‘But by God, it makes me feel full of beans.’

  Rebus didn’t know whether to laugh or cry . . .

  Rab Kinnoul was a professional hit man.

  He had made his name initially through a series of roles on television: the Scottish immigrant in a London sitcom, the young village doctor in a farming serial, with the occasional guest spot on more substantial fare such as The Sweeney (playing a Glasgow runaway) or the drama series Knife Ledge, where he played a hired killer.

  It was this last part which swung things for Kinnoul. Noticed by a London-based casting director, he was approached and screen-tested for the part of the assassin in a low-budget British thriller, which went on to do surprising business, picking up good notices in the USA as well as in Europe. The film’s director was soon persuaded to move to Hollywood, and he in turn persuaded his producers that Rab Kinnoul would be ideal for the part of the gangster in an Elmore Leonard adaptation.

  So, Kinnoul went to Hollywood, played minor roles in a series of major and minor murder flicks, and was again a success. He possessed a face and eyes into which could be read anything, simply anything. If you thought he should be evil, he was evil; if you thought he should be psychotic, he was psychotic. He was cast in these roles and he fitted them, but if things had taken a different turning in his career he might just as easily have ended up as the romantic lead, the sympathetic friend, the hero of the piece.

  Now he’d settled back in Scotland. There was talk that he was reading scripts, was about to set up his own film company, was retiring. Rebus couldn’t quite imagine retiring at thirty-nine. At fifty, maybe, but not at thirty-nine. What would you do all day? Driving towards Kinnoul’s home just outside South Queensferry, the answer came to him. You could spend all day every day painting the exterior of your house; supposing, that is, it was the size of Rab Kinnoul’s house. Like the Forth Rail Bridge, by the time you’d finished painting it, the first bit would be dirty again.

  Which was to say that it was a very large house, even from a distance. It sat on a hillside, its surroundings fairly bleak. Long grass and a few blasted trees. A river ran nearby, discharging into the Firth of Forth. Since there was no sign of a fence separating house from surroundings, Rebus reckoned Kinnoul must own the lot.

  The house was modern, if the 1960s could still be considered ‘modern’, styled like a bungalow but about five times the scale. It reminded Rebus mostly of those Swiss chalets you saw on postcards, except that the chalets were always finished in wood, whereas this house was finished in harling.

  ‘I’ve seen better council houses,’ he whispered to himself as he parked on the pebbled driveway. Getting out of the car he did, however, begin to see one of the house’s attractions. The view. Both spectacular Forth Bridges not too far away at all, the firth itself sparkling and calm, and the sun shining on green and pleasant Fife across the wa
ter. You couldn’t see Rosyth, but over to the east could just about be made out the seaside town of Kirkcaldy, where Gregor Jack and, presumably, Rab Kinnoul, had been schooled.

  ‘No,’ said Mrs Kinnoul – Cath Kinnoul – as she walked, a little later, into the sitting room. ‘People are always making that mistake.’

  She had come to the door while Rebus was still staring.

  ‘Admiring the view?’

  He grinned back at her. ‘Is that Kirkcaldy over there?’

  ‘I think so, yes.’

  Rebus turned and started up the steps towards the front door. There were rockeries and neat borders to either side of them. Mrs Kinnoul looked the type to enjoy gardening. She wore homely clothes and a homely smile. Her hair had been permed into waves, but pulled back and held with a clasp at the back. There was something of the 1950s about her. He didn’t know what he’d been expecting – some Hollywood blonde, perhaps – but certainly he’d not been expecting this.

  ‘I’m Cath Kinnoul.’ She held out a hand. I’m sorry, I’ve forgotten your name.’

  He’d phoned, of course, to warn of his visit, to make sure someone would be at home. ‘Detective Inspector Rebus,’ he said.

  ‘That’s right,’ she said. ‘Well, come in.’

  Of course, the whole thing could have been done by telephone. The following rare books have been stolen . . . has anyone approached you . . .? If anyone should, please contact us immediately. But like any other policeman, Rebus liked to see who and what he was dealing with. People often gave something away when you were there in person. They were flustered, edgy. Not that Cath Kinnoul looked flustered. She came into the sitting room with a tray of tea things. Rebus had been staring out of the picture window, drinking in the scene.

  ‘Your husband went to school in Kirkcaldy, didn’t he?’

  And then she’d said: ‘No, people are always making that mistake. I think because of Gregor Jack. You know, the MP.’ She placed the tray on a coffee table. Rebus had turned from the window and was studying the room. There were framed photographs of Rab Kinnoul on the walls, stills from his movies. There were also photos of actors and actresses Rebus supposed he should know. The photos were signed. The room seemed to be dominated by a thirty-eight-inch television, atop which sat a video recorder. To either side of the TV, piled high on the floor, were videotapes.