10 Great Rebus Novels (John Rebus)

by Ian Rankin

  ‘What’ve you got there?’ Rebus asked, suddenly hungry.

  ‘You’re the policeman, you tell me.’ Holmes produced a sandwich from the bag and held it in front of Rebus.

  ‘Corned chuck?’ Rebus guessed.

  ‘Wrong. Pastrami on rye bread.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘And decaffeinated filter coffee.’ Holmes prised the lid from the beaker and sniffed the contents with a contented smile. ‘From that new delicatessen next to the traffic lights.’

  ‘Doesn’t Nell make you up a sandwich?’

  ‘Women have equal rights these days.’

  Rebus believed it. He thought of Inspector Gill Templer and her psychology books and her feminism. He thought of the demanding Dr Patience Aitken. He even thought of the free-living Elizabeth Jack. Strong women to a man . . . But then he remembered Cath Kinnoul. There were still casualties out there.

  ‘What’s it like?’ he asked.

  Holmes had taken a bite from the sandwich and was studying what was left. ‘Okay,’ he said. ‘Interesting.’

  Pastrami – now there was a sandwich filling that would be a long time coming to the Sutherland Bar.

  Barney Byars, too, was a long time coming to the Sutherland. Rebus arrived at five minutes to six, Byars at twenty-five past. But he was well worth waiting for.

  ‘Inspector, sorry I’m late. Some cunt was trying to knock me down five per cent on a four-grand contract, and he wanted sixty days to pay. Know what that does to a cash flow? I told him I ran a lorry firm, not fuckin’ rickshaws.’

  All of which was delivered in a thick Fife tongue and at a volume appreciably above that of the bar’s early evening rumble of TV and conversation. Rebus was seated at one of the bar stools, but stood and suggested they take a table. Byars, however, was already making himself comfortable on the stool next to the policeman, laying his brawny arms along the bar-top and examining the array of taps. He pointed to Rebus’s glass.

  ‘That any good?’

  ‘Not bad.’

  ‘I’ll have a pint of that then.’ Whether from awe, fear, or just good management of his customers, the barman was on hand to pour the requested pint.

  ‘Another yourself, Inspector?’

  ‘I’m okay, thanks.’

  ‘And a whisky, too,’ ordered Byars. ‘A double, mind, not the usual smear-test.’

  Byars handed a fifty-pound note to the barman. ‘Keep the change,’ he said. Then he roared with laughter. ‘Only joking, son, only joking.’

  The barman was new and young. He held the note as though it were likely to ignite. ‘Ehh . . . you haven’t got anything smaller on you?’ His accent was effeminate west coast. Rebus wondered how long he’d last in the Sutherland.

  Byars exasperated but rejecting Rebus’s offer of help, dug into his pockets and found two crumpled one-pound notes and some change. He accepted his fifty back and pushed the coins towards the barman, then he winked at Rebus.

  ‘I’ll tell you a secret, Inspector, if I had to choose between having five tenners or one fifty, I’d go for the one fifty every time. Want to know why? Tenners in your pocket, people think nothing of it. But whip a fifty out, and they think you’re Croesus.’ He turned to the barman, who was counting the coins out into the open till. ‘Hey, son, got anything for eating?’ The barman jerked round as though hit by a pellet.

  ‘Ehh . . . I think there’s some Scotch broth left over from lunch.’ His vowels turned broth into ‘braw-wrath’. The braw wrath of the Scots, Rebus thought to himself. Byars was shaking his head. ‘A pie or a sandwich,’ he demanded.

  The barman proffered the last lonely sandwich in the place. It looked unnervingly like pastrami, but turned out to be, as Byars put it, ‘the guid roast beef’.

  ‘One pound ten,’ the barman said. Byars got out the fifty-pound note again, snorted, and produced a fiver instead. He turned back to Rebus and lifted his glass.

  ‘Cheers.’ Both men drank.

  ‘Not bad at all,’ Byars said of the beer.

  Rebus gestured towards the sandwich. ‘I thought you were going to dinner later on?’

  ‘I am, but more importantly, I’m paying. This way, I won’t eat as much and won’t cost myself so much.’ He winked again. ‘Maybe I should write a book, eh? Business tips for sole traders, that sort of thing. Heh, speaking of tips, I once asked a waiter what “tips” meant. Know what he said?’

  Rebus hazarded a wild guess. ‘To insure prompt service?’

  ‘No, to insure I don’t piss in the soup!’ Byars’ voice was back to the level of megaphone diplomacy. He laughed, then took a bite of sandwich, still chortling as he chomped. He was not a tall man, five seven or thereabouts. And he was stocky. He wore newish denims and a black leather jacket, beneath which he sported a white polo-shirt. In a bar like this, you’d take him for . . . well, just about anybody. Rebus could imagine him ruffling feathers in plush hotels and business bars. Image, he told himself. It’s just another image: the hard man, the no-nonsense man, a man who worked hard and who expected others to work hard, too – always in his favour.

  He had finished the sandwich, and was brushing crumbs from his lap. ‘You’re from Fife,’ he said casually, sniffing the whisky.

  ‘Yes,’ Rebus admitted.

  ‘I could tell. Gregor Jack’s from Fife too, you know. You said you wanted to talk about him. Is it to do with that brothel story? I found that a bit hard to swallow.’ He nodded towards the empty plate in front of him. ‘Not as hard as that sandwich though.’

  ‘No, it’s not really to do with the . . . with Mr Jack’s . . . no, it’s more to do with Mrs Jack.’

  ‘Lizzie? What about her?’

  ‘We’re not sure where she is. Any ideas?’

  Byars looked blank. ‘Knowing Lizzie, you’d better get Interpol on the case. She’s as likely to be in Istanbul as Inverness.’

  ‘What makes you say Inverness?’

  Byars looked stuck for an answer. ‘It was the first place that came to mind.’ Then he nodded. ‘I see what you mean though. You were thinking she might be at Deer Lodge, it being up that way. Have you looked?’

  Rebus nodded. ‘When did you last see Mrs Jack?’

  ‘A couple of weeks ago. Maybe three weekends ago, I can check. Funnily enough, it was at the lodge. A weekend party. The Pack mostly.’ He looked up from his drink. ‘I better explain that . . .’

  ‘It’s all right, I know who The Pack are. Three weekends ago, you say?’

  ‘Aye, but I can check if you like.’

  ‘A weekend party . . . you mean a party lasting the whole weekend?’

  ‘Well, just a few friends . . . all very civilized.’ A light came on behind his eyes. ‘Ah-ha, I know what you’re getting at. You know about Liz’s parties then? No, no, this was tame stuff, dinner and a few drinks and a brisk country walk on the Sunday. Not really my mug of gin, but Liz had invited me, so . . .’

  ‘You prefer her other kinds of party?’

  Byars laughed. ‘Of course! You’re only young once, Inspector. I mean, it’s all above board . . . isn’t it?’

  He seemed genuinely curious, not without reason. Why should a policeman know about ‘those’ parties? Who could have told him if not Gregor, and what exactly would Gregor have said?

  ‘As far as I know, sir. So you don’t know any reason why Mrs Jack might want to disappear?’

  ‘I can think of a few.’ Byars had finished both drinks, but didn’t look like he was hanging around for another. He kept shifting on the stool, as if unable to get comfortable. ‘That newspaper story for a start. I think I’d want to be well away from it, wouldn’t you? I mean, I can see how it’s bad for Gregor’s image, not having his wife beside him, but at the same time . . .’

  ‘Any other reasons?’

  Byars was half standing now. ‘A lover,’ he suggested. ‘Maybe he’s whisked her off to Tenerife for a bit of pash under the sun.’ He winked again, then his face became serious, as though he’d just remembered somethin
g. ‘There were those phone calls,’ he said.

  ‘Phone calls?’

  Now he was standing. ‘Anonymous phone calls. Lizzie told me about them. Not to her, to Gregor. Bound to happen, the game he’s in. Caller would phone up and say he was Sir Somebody-Somebody or Lord This ’n’ That, and Gregor would be fetched to the phone. Soon as he got to it, the line would go dead. That’s what she told me.’

  ‘Did these calls worry her?’

  ‘Oh yes, you could see she was upset. She tried to hide it, but you could see. Gregor just laughed it off, of course. Can’t afford to let something like that rattle him. She might even have mentioned letters. Something about Gregor getting these letters, but tearing them up before anyone could see them. But you’d have to ask Lizzie about that.’ He paused. ‘Or Gregor, of course.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Right . . .’ Byars stuck out his hand. ‘You’ve got my number if you need me, Inspector.’

  ‘Yes.’ Rebus shook hands. ‘Thanks for your help, Mr Byars.’

  ‘Any time, Inspector. Oh, and if you ever need a lift to London, I’ve got lorries make that trip four times a week. Won’t cost you a penny, and you can still claim the journey on expenses.’

  He gave another wink, smiled generally around the bar, and marched back out as noticeably as he’d marched in. The barman came to clear away plate and glass. Rebus saw that the tie the young man was wearing was a clip-on, standard issue in the Sutherland. If a punter tried to grab you, the tie came away in his hand . . .

  ‘Was he talking about me?’

  Rebus blinked. ‘Eh? What makes you think that?’

  ‘I thought I heard him mention my name.’

  Rebus poured the dregs from his glass into his mouth and swallowed. Don’t say the kid was called Gregor . . . Lizzie maybe . . . ‘What name is that then?’

  ‘Lawrie.’

  Rebus was more than halfway there before he realized he was headed not for Stockbridge comforts and Patience Aitken, but for Marchmont and his own neglected flat. So be it. Inside the flat, the atmosphere managed to be both chill and stale. A coffee mug beside the telephone resembled Glasgow insofar as it, too, was a city of culture, an interesting green and white culture.

  But if the living room was growing mould, surely the kitchen would be worse. Rebus sat himself down in his favourite chair, stretched for the answering machine, and settled to listen to his calls. There weren’t many. Gill Templer, wondering where he was keeping himself these days . . . as if she didn’t know. His daughter Samantha, phoning from her new flat in London, giving him her address and telephone number. Then a couple of calls where the speaker had decided not to say anything.

  ‘Be like that then.’ Rebus turned off the machine, drew a notebook from his pocket, and, reading the number from it, telephoned Gregor Jack. He wanted to know why Jack hadn’t said anything about his own anonymous calls. Strip Jack . . . beggar my neighbour . . . Well, if someone were out to beggar Gregor Jack, Jack himself didn’t seem overly concerned. He didn’t exactly seem resigned, but he did seem unbothered. Unless he was playing a game with Rebus . . . And what about Rab Kinnoul, on-screen assassin? What was he up to all the time he was away from his wife? And Ronald Steele, too, a ‘hard man to catch’. Were they all up to something? It wasn’t that Rebus distrusted the human race . . . wasn’t just that he was brought up a Pessimisterian. He was sure there was something happening here; he just didn’t know what it was.

  There was nobody home. Or nobody was answering. Or the apparatus had been unplugged. Or . . .

  ‘Hello?’

  Rebus glanced at his watch. Just after quarter past seven. ‘Miss Greig?’ he said. ‘Inspector Rebus here. He does keep you working late, doesn’t he?’

  ‘You seem to work fairly late hours yourself, Inspector. What is it this time?’

  Impatience in her voice. Perhaps Urquhart had warned her against being friendly. Perhaps it had been discovered that she’d given Rebus the address of Deer Lodge . . .

  ‘A word with Mr Jack, if possible.’

  ‘Not possible, I’m afraid.’ She didn’t sound afraid; she sounded if anything a bit smug. ‘He’s speaking at a function this evening.’

  ‘Oh. How did his meeting go this morning?’

  ‘Meeting?’

  ‘I thought he had some meeting in his constituency . . .?’

  ‘Oh, that. I think it went very well.’

  ‘So he’s not for the chop then?’

  She attempted a laugh. ‘North and South Esk would be mad to get rid of him.’

  ‘All the same, he must be relieved.’

  ‘I wouldn’t know. He was on the golf course all afternoon.’

  ‘Nice.’

  ‘I think an MP is allowed one afternoon off a week, don’t you, Inspector?’

  ‘Oh yes, absolutely. That’s what I meant.’ Rebus paused. He had nothing to say, really; he was just hoping that if he kept her talking Helen Greig herself might tell him something, something he didn’t know . . . ‘Oh,’ he said, ‘about those telephone calls . . .’

  ‘What calls?’

  ‘The ones Mr Jack was getting. The anonymous ones.’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about. Sorry, I’ve got to go now. My mum’s expecting me home at quarter to eight.’

  ‘Right you are then, Miss Gr –’ But she had already put the phone down.

  Golf? This afternoon? Jack must be keen. The rain had been falling steadily in Edinburgh since midday. He looked out of his unwashed window. It wasn’t falling now, but the streets were glistening. The flat felt suddenly empty, and colder than ever. Rebus picked up the phone and made one more call. To Patience Aitken. To say he was on his way. She asked him where he was.

  ‘I’m at home.’

  ‘Oh? Picking up some more of your stuff?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘You could do with bringing a spare suit if you’ve got one.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘And some of your precious books, since you don’t seem to approve of my taste.’

  ‘Romances were never my thing, Patience.’ In fiction as in life, he thought to himself. On the floor around him were strewn some of his ‘precious books’. He picked one up, tried to remember buying it, couldn’t.

  ‘Well, bring whatever you like, John, and as much as you like. You know how much room we’ve got here.’

  We. We’ve got.

  ‘Okay, Patience. See you later.’ He replaced the receiver with a sigh and took a look around him. After all these years, there were still gaps on the wall-shelves from where his wife Rhona had removed her things. Still gaps in the kitchen, too, where the tumble-drier had sat, and her precious dishwasher. Still clean rectangular spaces on the walls where her posters and prints had been hung. The flat had last been redecorated–when?–in ’81 or ’82. Ach, it still didn’t look too bad though. Who was he kidding? It looked like a squat.

  ‘What have you done with your life, John Rebus?’ The answer was: Not much. Gregor Jack was younger than him, and more successful. Barney Byars was younger than him, and more successful. Who did he know who was older than him and less successful? Not a single soul, discounting the beggars in the city centre, the ones he’d spent the afternoon with – without a result, but with a certain uncomfortable sense of belonging . . .

  What was he thinking about? ‘You’re becoming a morbid old bugger.’ Self-pity wasn’t the answer. Moving in with Patience was the answer . . . so why didn’t it feel like one? Why did it feel like just another problem?

  He rested his head against the back of the chair. I’m caught, he thought, between a cushion and a soft place. He sat there for a long time, staring up at the ceiling. It was dark outside, and foggy, too, a haar drifting in across the city from the North Sea. In a haar, Edinburgh seemed to shift backwards through time. You half expected to see press-gangs on the streets of Leith, hear coaches clattering over cobblestones and cries of gardy-loo in the High Street.

 
If he sold the flat, he could buy himself a new car, send some money to Samantha. If he sold the flat . . . if he moved in with Patience . . .

  ‘If shit was gold,’ his father used to say, ‘you’d have a tyke at yer erse.’ The old bugger had never explained exactly what a tyke was . . .

  Jesus, what made him think of that?

  It was no good. He couldn’t think straight, not here. Perhaps it was that his flat held too many memories, good and bad. Perhaps it was just the mood of the evening.

  Or perhaps it was that the image of Gill Templer’s face kept appearing unbidden (he told himself unbidden) in his mind . . .

  5

  Up the River

  Burglary with violent assault: just the thing for a dreich Thursday morning. The victim was in hospital, head bandaged and face bruised. Rebus had been to talk with her, and was at the house in Jock’s Lodge, overseeing the dusting for prints and the taking of statements, when word reached him from Great London Road. The call came from Brian Holmes.

  ‘Yes, Brian?’

  ‘There’s been another drowning.’

  ‘Drowning?’

  ‘Another body in the river.’

  ‘Oh Christ. Whereabouts this time?’

  ‘Out of town, up towards Queensferry. Another woman. She was found this morning by someone out for a walk.’ He paused while someone handed him something. Rebus heard a muted ‘thanks’ as the person moved away. ‘It could be our Mr Glass, couldn’t it?’ Holmes said now, pausing again to slurp coffee. ‘We expected him to stick around the city, but he could as easily have headed north. Queensferry’s an easy walk, and mostly across open land, well away from roads where he might be spotted. If I was on the run, that’s the way I’d do it . . .’

  Yes, Rebus knew that country. Hadn’t he been out there just the other day? Quiet back roads, no traffic, nobody to notice . . . Hang on, there was a stream – no, more a river – running past the Kinnouls’ house.

  ‘Brian . . .’ he started.

  ‘And that’s another thing,’ Holmes interrupted. ‘The woman who found the body . . . guess who it was?’

  ‘Cathy Gow,’ Rebus said casually.