by Ian Rankin
‘Oh aye, but not the same … couldn’t be the same. All the mums out scrubbing their steps, getting them whiter than white. Dads cutting the grass. Always popping into the other semis for a gossip or a loan of something.’ He paused, ordered them up a couple of refills. ‘Last I heard, Falls was all yuppies. Anything out of Meadowside’s too dear for the locals to buy. Kids grow up and move away – like I did. Anyone say anything to you about the quarry?’
Rebus shook his head, content to listen.
‘This was maybe two, three years back. There was talk of opening a quarry just outside the village. Plenty of jobs, all that. But suddenly this petition appeared – not that anyone on Meadowside had signed it, or been asked to sign it, come to that. Next thing, the quarry wasn’t coming.’
‘The yuppies?’
‘Or whatever you want to call them. Plenty of clout, see. Maybe Mr Balfour had a hand in it too, for all I know. Falls …’ He shook his head. ‘It’s not the place it was, John.’ He finished his roll-up and stubbed it into the ashtray. Then he thought of something. ‘Here, you like your music, don’t you?’
‘Depends what kind.’
‘Lou Reed. He’s coming to the Playhouse. I’ve two tickets going spare.’
‘I’ll think about it, Billy. Got time for another?’ He nodded towards the dregs in Billy’s glass.
The chef checked his watch again. ‘Got to get back. Maybe next time, eh?’
‘Next time,’ Rebus agreed.
‘And let me know about those tickets.’
Rebus nodded, watched Billy push his way back towards the door and out into the night. Lou Reed: there was a name from the past. ‘Walk on the Wild Side’, one of Rebus’s all-time favourites. And a bass-line played by the same guy who wrote ‘Grandad’ for that Dad’s Army actor. Sometimes there was such a thing as too much information.
‘Another, John?’ the barmaid asked.
He shook his head. ‘I can hear the call of the wild side,’ he said, pushing off from his stool and towards the door.
5
Saturday he went to the football with Siobhan. Easter Road was bathed in sunshine, the players throwing long shadows across the pitch. For a while, Rebus found himself following this shadow-play rather than the game itself: black puppet shapes, not quite human, playing something that wasn’t quite football. The ground was full, as only happened with local derbies and when Glasgow came to town. Today it was Rangers. Siobhan had a season ticket. Rebus was in the seat next to her, thanks to another season-ticket holder who couldn’t make it.
‘Friend of yours?’ Rebus asked her.
‘Bumped into him once or twice in the pub after the match.’
‘Nice guy?’
‘Nice family guy.’ She laughed. ‘When are you going to stop trying to marry me off ?’
‘I was only asking,’ he said with a grin. He’d noticed that TV cameras were covering the game. They would concentrate on the players, the spectators a background blur or piece of half-time filler. But it was the fans who really interested Rebus. He wondered what stories they could tell, what lives they’d led. He wasn’t alone: around him other spectators seemed equally interested in the antics of the crowd rather than anything happening on the pitch. But Siobhan, knuckles white as she clenched either end of her supporter’s scarf, brought the same concentration to the game as she did to police work, yelling out advice to the players, arguing each refereeing decision with fans nearby. The man on Rebus’s other side was equally fevered. He was overweight, red-faced and sweating. To Rebus’s eyes, he seemed on the verge of a coronary. He’d mutter to himself, the noise growing in intensity until there was a final defiant hurl of abuse, after which he’d look around, smile sheepishly, and begin the whole process again.
‘Easy … take it easy, son,’ he was now telling one of the players.
‘Anything happening your end of the case?’ Rebus asked Siobhan.
‘Day off, John.’ Her eyes never left the pitch.
‘I know, I was just asking …’
‘Easy now … go on, son, on you go.’ The sweating man was gripping the back of the seat in front of him.
‘We can have a drink after,’ Siobhan said.
‘Try and stop me,’ Rebus told her.
‘That’s it, son, that’s the way!’ The voice growing the way a wave would. Rebus took out another cigarette. The day might be bright, but it wasn’t warm. The wind was whipping in from the North Sea, the gulls overhead working hard to stay airborne.
‘Go on now!’ the man was yelling. ‘Go on! Get right into that fat Hun bastard!’
Then the look around, the sheepish grin. Rebus got his cigarette lit at last and offered one to the man, who shook his head.
‘It relieves stress, you know, the shouting.’
‘Might relieve yours, pal,’ Rebus said, but anything after that was drowned out as Siobhan joined a few thousand others in rising up to scream their reasoned and objective judgement concerning some infringement Rebus – along with the referee – had missed.
Her usual pub was heaving. Even so, people were still piling in. Rebus took one look and suggested somewhere else. ‘It’s a five-minute walk, and it’s got to be quieter.’
‘Okay then,’ she said, but her tone was one of disappointment. The after-match drink was a time for analysis, and she knew Rebus’s abilities in this field were somewhat lacking.
‘And tuck that scarf away,’ he ordered. ‘Never know where you’ll bump into a blue-nose.’
‘Not down here,’ she said confidently. She was probably right. The police presence outside the stadium had been large and knowledgeable, channelling Hibs fans down Easter Road while the visitors from Glasgow were dispatched back up the hill towards the bus and railway stations. Siobhan followed Rebus as he cut through Lorne Street and came out on Leith Walk, where weary shoppers were struggling home. The pub he had in mind was an anonymous affair with bevelled windows and an oxblood carpet pocked with cigarette burns and blackened gum. Game-show applause crackled from the TV, while two old-timers carried out a swearing competition in the corner.
‘You sure know how to treat a lady,’ Siobhan complained.
‘And would the lady like a Bacardi Breezer? Maybe a Moscow Mule.’
‘Pint of lager,’ Siobhan said defiantly. Rebus ordered himself a pint of Eighty with a malt on the side. As they took their seats, Siobhan told him he seemed to know every bad pub in the city.
‘Thanks,’ he said without a trace of irony. ‘So,’ he lifted his glass, ‘what’s the news on Philippa Balfour’s computer?’
‘There’s a game she was playing. I don’t know much about it. It’s run by someone called Quizmaster. I’ve made contact with him.’
‘And?’
‘And,’ she sighed, ‘I’m waiting for him to get back to me. So far I’ve sent a dozen e-mails and no joy.’
‘Any other way we can track him down?’
‘Not that I know of.’
‘What about the game?’
‘I don’t know the first thing about it,’ she admitted, attacking her drink. ‘Gill’s beginning to think it’s a dead end. She’s got me interviewing students instead.’
‘That’s because you’ve been to college.’
‘I know. If Gill’s got a flaw, it’s that she’s literal-minded.’
‘She speaks very highly of you,’ Rebus said archly, gaining him a punch on the arm.
Siobhan’s face changed as she picked up her glass again. ‘She offered me the liaison post.’
‘I thought she might. Are you going to take it?’ He watched her shake her head. ‘Because of what happened to Ellen Wylie?’
‘Not really.’
‘Then why?’
She shrugged. ‘Not ready for it, maybe.’
‘You’re ready,’ he stated.
‘It’s not real police work though, is it?’
‘What it is, Siobhan, is a step up.’
She looked down at her drink. ‘I know.’
‘I think Gill is.’ She paused. ‘We’re going to find Flip’s body, aren’t we?’
‘Maybe.’
She looked at him. ‘You think she’s still alive?’
‘No,’ he said bleakly, ‘I don’t.’
That night he hit a few more bars, sticking close to home at first, then hailing a taxi outside Swany’s and asking to be taken to Young Street. He made to light up but the driver asked him not to, and he noticed the No Smoking signs.
Some detective I am, he told himself. He’d spent as much time as possible away from the flat. The rewiring had come to a halt Friday at five o’clock with half the floorboards still up and runs of cable straggling everywhere. Skirting-boards had been uprooted, exposing the bare wall behind. The sparkies had left their tools – ‘be safe enough here’, they’d quipped, knowing his profession. They’d said they might manage Saturday morning, but they hadn’t. So that was him for the weekend, stumbling over lengths of wire and every second floorboard either missing or loose. He’d eaten breakfast in a café, lunch in a pub, and was now harbouring lubricious thoughts of a haggis supper with a smoked sausage on the side. But first, the Oxford Bar.
He’d asked Siobhan what her own plans were.
‘A hot bath and a good book,’ she’d told him. She’d been lying. He knew this because Grant Hood had told half the station he was taking her on a date, his reward for lending her his laptop. Not that Rebus had said anything to her: if she didn’t want him to know, that was fair enough. But knowing, he hadn’t bothered trying to tempt her with an Indian meal or a film. Only when they were parting outside the pub on Leith Walk had it struck him that maybe this had been bad manners on his part. Two people with no apparent plans for Saturday night: wouldn’t it have been natural for him to ask her out? Would she now be offended?
‘Life’s too short,’ he told himself, paying off the taxi. Heading into the pub, seeing the familiar faces, those words stayed with him. He asked Harry the barman for the phone book.
‘It’s over there,’ Harry answered, obliging as ever.
Rebus flipped through but couldn’t find the number he wanted. Then he remembered she’d given him her business card. He found it in his pocket. Her home number had been added in pencil. He stepped back outdoors again and fired up his mobile. No wedding ring, he was sure of that … The phone was ringing. Saturday night, she was probably …
‘Hello?’
‘Ms Burchill? It’s John Rebus here. Sorry to call you on a Saturday night.’
‘That’s all right. Is something the matter?’
‘No, no … I just wondered if maybe we could meet. It was all very mysterious, what you said about there being other dolls.’
She laughed. ‘You want to meet now?’
‘Well, I was thinking maybe tomorrow. I know it’s the day of rest and all, but we could maybe mix business with pleasure.’ He winced as the words came out. He should have thought it all through first: what he was going to say, how he was going to say it.
‘And how could we do that?’ she asked, sounding amused. He could hear music in the background: something classical.
‘Lunch?’ he suggested.
‘Where?’
Where indeed. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d taken someone to lunch. He wanted somewhere impressive, somewhere …
‘I’m guessing,’ she said, ‘that you like a fry-up on a Sunday.’ It was almost as if she could feel his discomfort and wanted to help.
‘Am I so transparent?’
‘Quite the opposite. You’re a flesh-and-blood Scottish male. I, on the other hand, like something simple, fresh and wholesome.’
Rebus laughed. ‘The word “incompatible” springs to mind.’
‘Maybe not. Where do you live?’
‘Marchmont.’
‘Then we’ll go to Fenwick’s,’ she stated. ‘It’s perfect.’
‘Great,’ he said. ‘Half-twelve?’
‘I look forward to it. Goodnight, Inspector.’
‘I hope you’re not going to call me Inspector all the way through lunch.’
In the silence that followed, he thought he could hear her smiling.
‘See you tomorrow, John.’
‘Enjoy the rest of your …’ But the connection was dead. He went back inside the pub and grabbed the phone book again. Fenwick’s: Salisbury Place. Less than a twenty-minute walk from his flat. He must have driven past it a dozen times. It was fifty yards from Sammy’s accident, fifty yards from where a killer had tried to stick a knife in him. He would make the effort tomorrow, push those memories aside.
‘Same again, Harry,’ he said, bouncing on his toes.
‘You’ll wait your turn like everyone else,’ Harry growled at him. It didn’t matter to Rebus; didn’t bother him at all.
He was ten minutes early.
She walked in only five minutes later, so she was early too. ‘Nice place,’ he told her.
‘Isn’t it?’ She was wearing a black two-piece over a grey silk blouse. A blood-red brooch sparkled just above her left breast.
‘Do you live nearby?’ he asked.
‘Not exactly: Portobello.’
‘But that’s miles away! You should have said.’
‘Why? I like this place.’
‘You eat out a lot?’ He was still trying to digest the fact that she’d come all the way into Edinburgh for lunch.
‘Whenever I can. One of the perks of my PhD is that I call myself “Dr Burchill” whenever I’m making a booking.’
Rebus looked around. Only one other table was occupied: down near the front, a family party by the look of it. Two kids, six adults.
‘I didn’t bother booking for today. It’s never too busy at lunchtime. Now, what shall we have … ?’
He thought about a starter and a main course, but she seemed to know that really he wanted the fry-up, so that was what he ordered. She went for soup and duck. They decided to order coffee and wine at the same time.
‘Very brunchy,’ she said. ‘Very Sunday somehow.’
He couldn’t help but agree. She told him he could smoke if he liked, but he declined. There were three smokers at the family table, but the craving was still a little way off.
They talked about Gill Templer to start with, finding common ground. Her questions were canny and probing.
‘Gill can be a bit driven, wouldn’t you say?’
‘She does what she has to.’
‘The pair of you had a fling a while back, didn’t you?’
His eyes widened. ‘She told you that?’
‘No.’ Jean paused, flattened her napkin against her lap. ‘But I guessed it from the way she used to speak about you.’
‘Used to?’
She smiled. ‘It was a long time ago, wasn’t it?’
‘Prehistoric,’ he was forced to agree. ‘What about you?’
‘I hope I’m not prehistoric.’
He smiled. ‘I meant, tell me something about yourself.’
‘I was born in Elgin, parents both teachers. Went to Glasgow University. Dabbled in archaeology. Doctorate from Durham University, then post-doctoral studies abroad – the USA and Canada – looking at nineteenth-century migrants. I got a job as a curator in Vancouver, then came back here when the opportunity arose. The old museum for the best part of twelve years, and now the new one.’ She shrugged. ‘That’s about it.’
‘How do you know Gill?’
‘We were at school together for a couple of years, best mates. Lost touch for a while …’
‘You never married?’
She looked down at her plate. ‘For a while, yes, in Canada. He died young.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘Bill drank himself to death, not that his family would ever believe it. I think that’s why I came back to Scotland.’
‘Because he died?’
She shook her head. ‘If I’d stayed, it would have meant participating in the myth t
hey were busy establishing.’
Rebus thought he understood.
‘You’ve got a daughter, haven’t you?’ she said suddenly, keen to change the subject.
‘Samantha. She’s … in her twenties now.’
Jean laughed. ‘You don’t know how old exactly though?’
He tried a smile. ‘It’s not that. I was going to say that she’s disabled. Probably not something you want to know.’
‘Oh.’ She was silent for a moment, then looked up at him. ‘But it’s important to you, or it wouldn’t have been the first thing you thought of.’
‘True. Except that she’s getting back on her feet again. Using one of those Zimmer frames old people use.’
‘That’s good,’ she said.
He nodded. He didn’t want to go into the whole story, but she wasn’t going to ask him anyway.
‘How’s the soup?’
‘It’s good.’
They sat in silence for a minute or two, then she asked him about police work. Her questions had reverted to the kind you asked of a new acquaintance. Usually Rebus felt awkward talking about the job. He wasn’t sure people were really interested. Even if they were, he knew they didn’t want to hear the unexpurgated version: the suicides and autopsies; the petty grudges and black moods that led people to the cells. Domestics and stabbings, Saturday nights gone wrong, professional thugs and addicts. When he spoke, he was always afraid his voice would betray his passion for the job. He might be dubious about methods and eventual outcomes, but he still got a thrill from the work itself. Someone like Jean Burchill, he felt, could peer beneath the surface of this and watch other things swim into focus. She would realise that his enjoyment of the job was essentially voyeuristic and cowardly. He concentrated on the minutiae of other people’s lives, other people’s problems, to stop him examining his own frailties and failings.
‘Are you planning to smoke that thing?’ Jean sounded amused. Rebus looked down and saw that a cigarette had appeared in his hand. He laughed, took the packet from his pocket and slid the cigarette back in.
‘I really don’t mind,’ Jean told him.
‘Didn’t realise I’d done it,’ he said. Then, to hide his embarrassment: ‘You were going to tell me about these other dolls.’