10 Great Rebus Novels (John Rebus)

by Ian Rankin

  Which, the ACC might have told them, was the whole point of the exercise.

  The dark eyes spoke of lost sleep. Despite his advancing years, the ACC had recently become a father for the fourth time. As his other kids were all grown-up, the conclusion reached by every station in the city was that the new addition was an accident, which would make it practically the only thing in the ACC’s life that he’d not been able to orchestrate or control.

  ‘How are you, John?’ he asked.

  ‘Not bad, sir. How’s the wee one?’

  ‘Fit as a fiddle. Look, John . . .’ Carswell never wasted time on preliminaries. ‘I’ve been asked to look into this murder case.’

  ‘Darren Rough?’

  ‘That’s the one.’

  ‘Social Work, was it, sir?’ Rebus settled his hands on the arm rests.

  ‘Fellow called Andrew Davies. Made a sort of complaint.’

  ‘Sort of?’

  ‘Couched fairly ambiguously.’

  ‘He’s probably got a point, sir.’

  The ACC held his breath for a second. ‘Am I hearing you right?’

  ‘I chased Rough through the zoo without probable cause, giving our poisoner the chance to strike again. Then when I found out Rough was living upstairs from a playground, I put word out on the street.’

  Carswell put his hands together, as if in prayer. Knowing Rebus’s reputation, a confession was the last thing he’d been expecting. ‘You outed him?’

  ‘Yes, sir. I wanted him off my patch. At the time . . .’ Rebus paused. ‘I didn’t work through the consequences. Later on, I helped him get away from Greenfield – at least, that was the plan. Only he left my flat and got himself murdered. Right at the end, though . . . I think I did try to make amends.’

  ‘I see. You want me to take this to Social Work?’

  ‘That’s up to you, sir.’

  ‘Then what do you want?’

  Rebus looked at him. It was bright outside: another ploy of the ACC’s – he tended to use the chair trick when it was sunny. All Rebus could see of his superior was a haze of light.

  ‘For a while, I thought I wanted out, sir. Maybe that was in my mind when I went after Rough: if I went after him hard, I might end up kicked off the force, but still feel all right about it.’

  ‘But that didn’t happen.’

  ‘It hasn’t happened yet, sir, no.’

  Carswell was thoughtful. ‘How do you feel now?’

  Rebus squinted into the light. ‘I’m not sure. Tired, mostly.’ He managed a smile.

  ‘A long time back, John – I know you all like to think I’ve spent my whole life behind a desk – but a long time back there was this man got himself into a fight down in Leith. Clean-cut type, suit and everything. Wife and kids at home. And he’d walked into a pub by the dockside, looked for the biggest, meanest-looking bugger he could find, and started having a go at him. I was young back then, they sent me to interview him in hospital. Turned out he’d been trying to commit suicide, hadn’t had the guts. So he’d gone looking for someone to do the job for him. Sounds a bit like what you were up to with Darren Rough: assisted career suicide.’

  Rebus smiled again, but he was thinking: Suicide again . . . like with Jim Margolies. Assisted career suicide . . .

  ‘I don’t think I’m going to give this to our friends in Social Work,’ the ACC said finally. ‘I think I’m going to sit on it for a while. Maybe there’s room for some sort of apology . . . that’ll be up to you.’

  ‘Thank you, sir.’

  ‘And John,’ rising to his feet, taking Rebus’s hand again, ‘I appreciate you not trying to spin me some yarn.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’ Rebus was on his feet, too. ‘And maybe, with respect, sir, there’s a way you could show your appreciation . . .’

  Nicol Petrie lived in a West End flat, sprawling over the top two floors of a Georgian pile. There was a shared entrance hall with occasional tables and rugs. The tables had vases and things on them. It was a far cry from the tenement stairwells Rebus was used to.

  And there was a lift, its mirrored interior highly polished, the wooden surrounds gleaming. Beside the buttons for each floor were printed labels listing the occupants. There were two Petries: N and A. Rebus guessed that A stood for Amanda.

  The lift brought Rebus out on to a landing, glass cupola above. Pot plants surrounded him. And more carpeting. Nicol Petrie opened the door and gave a little nod, leading Rebus inside.

  Rebus had been expecting antiquity, but was disappointed. The flat’s walls were painted an almost luminous white and were devoid of paintings or posters. The floors had been stripped and varnished. It was like stepping into an Ikea catalogue. An internal stairway led up to the top floor, but Nicol led Rebus past it and into the living room, fully thirty-five feet long and twelve high, and with double sash windows giving uninterrupted views across Dean Valley and the Water of Leith. The Fife coastline was visible in the distance. Walking into the room, taking it all in, Rebus missed the doll on the floor and ended up giving it a kick, sending it flying towards its owner.

  ‘Jessica!’ the little girl squealed, moving on hands and knees to pick up her property and nurse it to her bosom. Then she slid back across the floor to where a toys’ tea-party was in progress. Rebus apologised, but Hannah Margolies wasn’t listening.

  ‘Hello again,’ Hannah’s mother said. She was seated on a white sofa. ‘Sorry about that. Hannah’s toys get everywhere.’ She sounded tired. Rebus noted that she still wore black, albeit a short black dress with black tights. Mourning as fashion statement.

  ‘Sorry,’ he said to Nicol Petrie, ‘I didn’t know you had company.’

  ‘You know one another?’ Petrie bowed his head at the stupidity of the question. ‘Through Jim, of course. Sorry.’

  It seemed to Rebus that all anyone had done so far was make apologies. Katherine Margolies got to her feet in a sudden elegant movement.

  ‘Come on, Han-Han. Time to go.’

  Hannah didn’t argue or complain, just rose to her feet and joined her mother.

  ‘Nicky,’ Katherine said, kissing both his cheeks, ‘thanks as ever for listening.’

  Nicol Petrie embraced her, then crouched down for a kiss from Hannah. Katherine Margolies lifted Hannah’s coat from the back of the sofa.

  ‘Goodbye, Inspector.’

  ‘Bye, Mrs Margolies. Bye, Hannah.’

  Hannah gave him a look. ‘You think I should have won, don’t you?’

  Katherine stroked her daughter’s hair. ‘Everyone knows you were robbed, sweetheart.’

  Hannah was still staring at Rebus. ‘Someone stole my father,’ she said.

  Nicol Petrie made a fuss of her as he showed mother and daughter to the door. When he returned to the room, Rebus was standing at one of the windows, looking down into the street immediately below. Petrie began tidying the toys into a cardboard box.

  ‘Sorry again if I disturbed you, sir,’ Rebus said, not managing much enthusiasm for the lie.

  ‘That’s all right. Katy often pops in unannounced. Especially since . . . well, you know.’

  ‘Do you make a good listener, Mr Petrie?’

  ‘No more than most, I don’t suppose. Usually it’s because I can’t think of anything helpful to say, so all I do is fill the gaps with questions.’

  ‘You’d make a good detective then.’

  Petrie laughed. ‘I rather doubt that, Inspector.’ He opened one of the doors leading off the living room. It led to a walk-in cupboard. There were shelves inside, and he placed the box of toys on one of them. Everything tidied away. Rebus would bet the box always went back on the same shelf, always the same spot. He’d known people like that, people who managed their lives by compartments. Siobhan Clarke was just the same: if you wanted to annoy her, you only had to move something of hers from one desk-drawer to its neighbour.

  Below him, Katherine Margolies and her daughter emerged from the building. Their car had remote locking. It was a Mercedes saloon, new
-looking. The number plate was the same one he’d seen lipsticked on the wall in Leith.

  It was a white Mercedes.

  White . . .

  ‘Has it hit her hard?’ he asked, still watching from the window.

  ‘Devastated, I should think.’

  ‘And the little one?’

  ‘I’m not sure Han-Han’s taken it in yet. Like she said, she thinks he’s been stolen from her.’

  ‘She’s right in a way.’

  ‘I suppose so.’ Petrie came to the window, watched with Rebus as the car drove off. ‘Nobody could fail to be shocked by something like that.’

  ‘Why do you think he did it?’

  Petrie looked at him. ‘I haven’t the faintest idea.’

  ‘His widow hasn’t said anything?’

  ‘That’s between her and me.’

  ‘Sorry,’ Rebus said. ‘It’s just curiosity. I mean, someone like Jim Margolies . . . it makes you ask questions of yourself, doesn’t it?’

  ‘I think I know what you mean.’ Petrie turned back into the room. ‘If you’ve got it all and you’re still unhappy, what’s the point of everything?’ He slumped into a chair. ‘Maybe it’s a Scottish thing.’

  Rebus took a seat on the sofa. ‘What is?’

  ‘We’re just not supposed to have it all, are we? We’re supposed to fail gloriously. Anything we succeed at, we keep low-profile. It’s our failures we’re allowed to trumpet.’

  Rebus smiled. ‘Might be something in that.’

  ‘It runs right through our history.’

  ‘And ends at the national football team.’

  It was Petrie’s turn to smile. ‘I’ve been very rude: can I offer you something to drink?’

  ‘What are you having?’

  ‘I thought maybe a glass of wine. I’d opened a bottle for Katy, thinking she’d come by taxi. Parking around here is hellish.’ He left the room, Rebus following. The kitchen was long and narrow and spotless. The hob looked like it had never been used. Petrie went to the fridge, lifted out a bottle of Sancerre.

  ‘Lovely flat,’ Rebus said, as Petrie reached into a cupboard for two glasses.

  ‘Thank you. I like it.’

  ‘What do you work at, Mr Petrie?’

  Petrie glanced at him. ‘I’m a student, second year into my PhD.’

  ‘Was your first degree at Edinburgh?’

  ‘No, St Andrews.’ Pouring now.

  ‘Not many students with flats as grand as this – or am I behind the times?’

  ‘It’s not mine.’

  ‘Your father’s?’ Rebus guessed.

  ‘That’s right.’ Pouring the second glass; looking a little less serene now.

  ‘He must like you.’

  ‘He loves his children, Inspector. I’d assume most parents do.’

  Rebus thought of himself and Sammy. ‘Not always a two-way thing, though, is it?’

  ‘I don’t know what you mean.’

  Rebus shrugged, accepted the glass. ‘Cheers.’ He took a sip. Petrie was at the end of the narrow kitchen: no way out of there except past Rebus. And Rebus wasn’t moving. ‘Funny thing is, if I’d a father who loved me, who’d spent a fortune on a flat for me, any time I got into trouble I’d probably turn to him to bail me out.’

  ‘Look, what’s—’

  ‘Say, if I needed money. I wouldn’t go to a loan shark.’ Rebus paused, took another sip. ‘How about you, Mr Petrie?’

  ‘Christ, is that what this is about? Those two thugs giving me a kicking?’

  ‘Maybe it wasn’t about money. Maybe they just didn’t like your looks.’ Nicol Petrie: face unblemished, thin dark eyebrows, high cheekbones. A face so perfect you might just want to damage it.

  ‘I don’t know what they wanted.’

  Rebus smiled. ‘Yes you do. That handy amnesia of yours, you let it slip. You shouldn’t have known there were two of them.’

  ‘The police said as much at the time.’

  ‘Two men employed by Charmer Mackenzie. We call them “frighteners”, and believe me, I’d have been frightened too. He’s a hard bastard, Cal Brady, isn’t he?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Cal Brady. You must have come across him.’

  Petrie shook his head. ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘How much was it you owed? I’m assuming you’ve paid it off by now. And why didn’t you tap your dad for a loan in the first place? See, I’m curious, Mr Petrie, and when I start asking questions, I tend not to give up till I’ve found answers.’

  Petrie put his glass down on the worktop. He wasn’t looking at Rebus when he spoke. ‘This is strictly between us? No way I’m taking this any further.’

  ‘Fair enough,’ Rebus said.

  Petrie folded his arms around himself, looking skinnier than ever. ‘I did borrow money from Mackenzie. We knew, those of us who frequented the Clipper, knew he’d lend money. And I found myself needing some. My father can be generous when it suits him, Inspector, but I’d managed to fritter away a good deal of his money. I didn’t want him knowing. So I went to Mackenzie instead.’

  ‘Surely you could have arranged an overdraft?’

  ‘I dare say I could.’ Petrie looked away. ‘But there was something . . . the idea of dealing with Mackenzie was so much more appealing.’

  ‘How so?’

  ‘The danger, the whiff of the illicit.’ He turned back towards Rebus. ‘You know Edinburgh society loves that sort of thing. Deacon Brodie didn’t need to break into people’s houses, but that didn’t stop him. Strait-laced old town, how else are we going to get our thrills?’

  Rebus stared at him. ‘Know something, Nicky? I almost believe you. Almost, but not quite.’ He raised a hand towards Petrie, who flinched. But all Rebus did was place a fingertip against the young man’s temple. It came away with a bead of perspiration clinging to it. The droplet fell, splashed onto the worktop.

  ‘Better wipe that up,’ Rebus said, turning away. ‘You wouldn’t want anything marking that stainless surface of yours, would you?’

  38

  There was still no sign of Billy Horman.

  His mother Joanna had cried at the press conference, ensuring TV coverage. Ray Heggie, Joanna’s lover, had sat beside her, saying nothing. When the crying started, he’d tried to comfort her, but she’d pushed him away. Rebus knew he’d drift away eventually, as long as he was innocent.

  GAP was as active as ever. They were holding a vigil outside the High Court while the jury retired to reach a verdict in the Shiellion case. They’d lit candles and tied placards to the railings. The placards detailed child-killers and paedophiles and their victims. The police were instructed not to move the protesters on. Meantime, there were fresh news reports of paedophiles being released from prison. GAP sent members to the relevant towns. It had become a movement now, Van Brady its unlikely figurehead. She hosted her own news conferences, blown-up photos of Billy Horman and Darren Rough on the wall behind her.

  ‘The world,’ she’d said at one meeting, ‘should be a green field without limits, where our children can play free from harm, and where parents can leave their children without fear. That is the purpose and intention of the Green Field Project.’

  Rebus wondered who was writing her speeches for her. GFP was a departure for GAP, a funding application to set up patrolled play areas with security cameras and the like. To Rebus, it sounded less like the world as green field, more like the world as prison camp. They were applying to the Lottery and the EC for cash. Other housing schemes had made successful bids in the past, and were lending a hand to Greenfield. They wanted something like two million quid. Rebus shuddered to think of Van and Cal Brady in charge of such a fund.

  But then it wasn’t his problem, was it?

  His immediate problem, as he knew when he picked up the ringing phone, was Cary Oakes.

  The voice on the line belonged to Alan Archibald. ‘He’s agreed.’

  ‘Agreed to what?’

  ‘To go out to Hillend with me. T
o walk across the hills.’

  ‘He’s admitted it?’

  ‘As good as.’ Archibald’s voice shook with excitement.

  ‘But has he said anything specific?’

  ‘Once we get out there, John, I know he’ll tell me, one way or the other.’

  ‘You’re going to torture him, are you?’

  ‘I don’t mean it like that. I mean once he’s there, the scene of the crime, I think he’ll crack.’

  ‘I wouldn’t be so sure. What if it’s a trap?’

  ‘John, we’ve been through this.’

  ‘I know.’ Rebus paused. ‘And you’re still going.’

  The voice quiet now, calm. ‘I’ve got to, whatever happens.’

  ‘Yes,’ Rebus said. Of course Archibald would go. It was his destiny. ‘Well, count me in.’

  ‘I’ll ask him—’

  ‘No, Alan, you’ll tell him. It’s both of us or no go.’

  ‘What if he—’

  ‘He won’t. Trust me on this. I think he’ll want me out there too.’

  The tape was still running, but Cary Oakes hadn’t spoken for a couple of minutes. Jim Stevens was used to it, used to long pauses as Oakes gathered his thoughts. He let another sixty seconds spool on before asking: ‘Anything else, Cary?’

  Oakes looked surprised. ‘Should there be?’

  ‘That’s it then?’ Still Stevens left the tape running. Oakes only nodded, and reached his hands behind his head, job done. Stevens checked his watch, spoke the time into the machine, then squeezed the Stop button. He slipped the recorder into the breast pocket of his pale mauve shirt. It was pale because it had been through about three hundred washes in the five years since Stevens had bought it. He knew the other reporters thought he’d filled out in the past half-decade. The shirt could have proved them wrong, but would also have proved how seldom he bought new clothes.

  ‘Satisfied?’ Oakes said, getting to his feet, stretching as if after a long day at the coal-face.

  ‘Not really. Journalists never are.’