by Ian Rankin
‘No, thank you, sir.’
‘Something a little stronger perhaps?’
‘Thank you, but no.’ Rebus smiled. ‘I’d a bit too much last night.’
‘Your smile comes over in your voice.’
‘You don’t seem curious as to why I’m here, Mr Vanderhyde.’
‘Perhaps that’s because I know, Inspector. Or, perhaps it’s because my patience is limitless. Time doesn’t mean as much to me as to most people. I’m in no hurry for your explanations. I’m not a clock watcher, you see.’ He was smiling again, eyes fixed somewhere just right of Rebus and above him. Rebus stayed silent, inviting further speculation. ‘Then again,’ Vanderhyde continued, ‘since I no longer go out, and have few visitors, and since I have never to my knowledge broken the laws of the land, that certainly narrows the possible reasons for your visit. You’re sure you won’t have some tea?’
‘Don’t let me stop you making some for yourself.’ Rebus had spotted the near-empty mug sitting on the floor beside the old man’s chair. He looked down around his own chair. Another mug sat on the muted pattern of the carpet. He reached a silent arm down towards it. There was a slight warmth on the base of the mug, a warmth on the carpet beneath.
‘No,’ Vanderhyde said. ‘I had one just recently. As did my visitor.’
‘Visitor?’ Rebus sounded surprised. The old man smiled, giving a slight and indulgent shake of his head. Rebus, feeling caught, decided to push on anyway. ‘I thought you said you didn’t get many visitors?’
‘No, I don’t recall quite saying that. Still, it happens to be true. Today is the exception that proves the rule. Two visitors.’
‘Might I ask who the other visitor was?’
‘Might I ask, Inspector, why you’re here?’
It was Rebus’s turn to smile, nodding to himself. The blood was rising in the old man’s cheeks. Rebus had succeeded in riling him.
‘Well?’ There was impatience in Vanderhyde’s voice.
‘Well, sir.’ Rebus deliberately pulled himself out of the chair and began to circuit the room. ‘I came across your name in an undergraduate essay on the occult. Does that surprise you?’
The old man considered this. ‘It pleases me slightly. I do have an ego that needs feeding, after all.’
‘But it doesn’t surprise you?’ Vanderhyde shrugged. ‘This essay mentioned you in connection with the workings of an Edinburgh-based group, a sort of coven, working in the nineteen sixties.’
‘“Coven” is an inexact term, but never mind.’
‘You were involved in it?’
‘I don’t deny the fact.’
‘Well, while we’re dealing in fact, you were, more correctly, its guiding light. “Light” may be an inexact term.’
Vanderhyde laughed, a piping, discomfiting sound. ‘Touché, Inspector. Indeed, touché. Do continue.’
‘Finding your address wasn’t difficult. Not too many Vanderhydes in the phone book.’
‘My kin are based in London.’
‘The reason for my visit, Mr Vanderhyde, is a murder, or at the very least a case of tampering with evidence at the scene of a death.’
‘Intriguing.’ Vanderhyde put his hands together, fingertips to his lips. It was hard to believe the man was sightless. Rebus’s movements around the room were failing to have any effect on Vanderhyde at all.
‘The body was discovered lying with arms stretched wide, legs together –’
‘Naked?’
‘No, not quite. Shirtless. Candles had been burning either side of the body, and a pentagram had been painted on one wall.’
‘Anything else?’
‘No. There were some syringes in a jar by the body.’
‘The death was caused by an overdose of drugs?’
‘Yes.’
‘Hmm.’ Vanderhyde rose from his chair and walked unerringly to the bookcase. He did not open it, but stood as though staring at the titles. ‘If we’re dealing with a sacrifice, Inspector – I take it that’s your theory?’
‘One of many, sir.’
‘Well, if we are dealing with a sacrifice, then the means of death are quite unusual. No, more than that, are unheard of. To begin with, very few Satanists would ever contemplate a human sacrifice. Plenty of psychopaths have carried out murder and then excused it as ritual, but that’s something else again. But in any case, a human sacrifice – a sacrifice of any kind – requires blood. Symbolic in some rites, as in the blood and body of Christ. Real in others. A sacrifice without blood? That would be original. And to administer an overdose.… No, Inspector, surely the more plausible explanation is that, as you say, someone muddied the water as it were, after the life had expired.’
Vanderhyde turned into the room again, picking out Rebus’s position. He raised his arms high, to signal that this was all he had to offer.
Rebus sat down again. The mug when he touched it was no longer warm. The evidence had cooled, dissipated, vanished.
He picked up the mug and looked at it. It was an innocent thing, patterned with flowers. There was a single crack running downwards from its rim. Rebus felt a sudden surge of confidence in his own abilities. He got to his feet again and walked to the door.
‘Are you leaving?’
He did not reply to Vanderhyde’s question, but walked smartly to the bottom of the dark oak staircase. Halfway up, it twisted in a ninety-degree angle. From the bottom, Rebus’s view was of this halfway point, this small landing. A second before, there had been someone there, someone crouching, listening. He hadn’t seen the figure so much as sensed it. He cleared his throat, a nervous rather than necessary action.
‘Come down here, Charlie.’ He paused. Silence. But he could still sense the young man, just beyond that turning on the stairs. ‘Unless you want me to come up. I don’t think you want that, do you? Just the two of us, up there in the dark?’ More silence, broken by the shuffling of Vanderhyde’s carpet-slippered feet, the walking cane tapping against the floor. When Rebus looked round, the old man’s jaw was set defiantly. He still had his pride. Rebus wondered if he felt any shame.
Then the single creak of a floorboard signalled Charlie’s presence on the stair landing.
Rebus broke into a smile: of conquest, of relief. He had trusted himself, and had proved worthy of that trust.
‘Hello, Charlie,’ he said.
‘I didn’t mean to hit her. She had a go at me first.’
The voice was recognisable, but Charlie seemed rooted to the landing. His body was slightly hunched, his face in silhouette, his arms hanging by his side. The educated voice seemed discorporate, somehow not part of this shadow-puppet.
‘Why don’t you join us?’
‘Are you going to arrest me?’
‘What’s the charge?’ The question was Rebus’s, his voice tinged with amusement.
‘That should be your question, Charles,’ Vanderhyde called out, making it sound like an instruction.
Rebus was suddenly bored with these games. ‘Come on down,’ he commanded. ‘Let’s have another mug of Earl Grey.’
Rebus had pulled open the crimson velvet curtains in the living room. The interior seemed less cramped in what was left of the daylight, less overpowering, and certainly a lot less gothic. The ornaments on the mantelpiece were revealed as just that: ornaments. The books in the bookcase were revealed as by and large works of popular fiction: Dickens, Hardy, Trollope. Rebus wondered if Trollope was still popular.
Charlie had made tea in the narrow kitchen, while Vanderhyde and Rebus sat in silence in the living room, listening to the distant sounds of cups chinking and spoons ringing.
‘You have good hearing,’ Vanderhyde stated at last. Rebus shrugged. He was still assessing the room. No, he couldn’t live here, but he could at least imagine visiting some aged relative in such a place.
‘Ah, tea,’ said Vanderhyde as Charlie brought in the unsteady tray. Placing it on the floor between chairs and sofa, his eyes sought Rebus’s. They had an imploring look
. Rebus ignored it, accepting his cup with a curt nod of the head. He was just about to say something about how well Charlie seemed to know his way around his chosen bolt-hole, when Charlie himself spoke. He was handing a mug to Vanderhyde. The mug itself was only half filled – a wise precaution – and Charlie sought out the old man’s hand, guiding it to the large handle.
‘There you go, Uncle Matthew,’ he said.
‘Thank you, Charles,’ said Vanderhyde, and if he had been sighted, his slight smile would have been directed straight at Rebus, rather than a few inches over the detective’s shoulder.
‘Cosy,’ Rebus commented, sipping the dry perfume of Earl Grey.
Charlie sat on the sofa, crossing his legs, almost relaxed. Yes, he knew this room well, was slipping into it the way one slipped into an old, comfortable pair of trousers. He might have spoken, but Vanderhyde seemed to want to put his points forward first.
‘Charles has told me all about it, Inspector Rebus. Well, when I say that, I mean he has told me as much as he deems it necessary for me to know.’ Charlie glared at his uncle, who merely smiled, knowing the frown was there. ‘I’ve already told Charles that he should talk to you again. He seems unwilling. Seemed unwilling. Now the choice has been taken away from him.’
‘How did you know?’ asked Charlie, so much more at home here, Rebus was thinking, than in some ugly squat in Pilmuir.
‘Know?’ said Rebus.
‘Know where to find me? Know about Uncle Matthew?’
‘Oh, that.’ Rebus picked at invisible threads on his trousers. ‘Your essay. It was sitting on your desk. Handy that.’
‘What?’
‘Doing an essay on the occult, and having a warlock in the family.’
Vanderhyde chuckled. ‘Not a warlock, Inspector. Never that. I think I’ve only ever met one warlock, one true warlock, in my whole life. Local he is, mind.’
‘Uncle Matthew,’ Charlie interrupted, ‘I don’t think the Inspector wants to hear –’
‘On the contrary,’ said Rebus. ‘It’s the reason I’m here.’
‘Oh.’ Charlie sounded disappointed. ‘Not to arrest me then?’
‘No, though you deserve a good slap for that bruise you gave Tracy.’
‘She deserved it!’ Charlie’s voice betrayed petulance, his lower lip filling out like a child’s.
‘You struck a woman?’ Vanderhyde sounded aghast. Charlie looked towards him, then away, as if unable to hold a stare that didn’t – couldn’t – exist.
‘Yes,’ Charlie hissed. ‘But look.’ He pulled the polo-necked jumper down from around his neck. There were two huge weals there, the result of prising fingernails.
‘Nice scratches,’ Rebus commented for the blind man’s benefit. ‘You got the scratches, she got a bruise on her eye. I suppose that makes it neck and neck in the eye-for-an-eye stakes.’
Vanderhyde chuckled again, leaning forward slightly on his cane.
‘Very good, Inspector,’ he said. ‘Yes, very good. Now –’ he lifted the mug to his lips and blew. ‘What can we do for you?’
‘I saw your name in Charlie’s essay. There was a footnote quoting you as an interview source. I reckoned that made you local and reasonably extant, and there aren’t too many –’
‘– Vanderhydes in the phone book,’ finished the old man. ‘Yes, you said.’
‘But you’ve already answered most of my questions. Concerning the black magic connection, that is. However, I would just like to clear up a few points with your nephew.’
‘Would you like me to –?’ Vanderhyde was already rising to his feet. Rebus waved for him to stay, then realised the gesture was in vain. However, Vanderhyde had already paused, as though anticipating the action.
‘No, sir,’ Rebus said now, as Vanderhyde seated himself again. ‘This’ll only take a couple of minutes.’ He turned to Charlie, who was almost sinking into the deep padded cushions of the sofa. ‘So, Charlie,’ Rebus began. ‘I’ve got you down this far as thief, and as accessory to murder. Any comments to make?’
Rebus watched with pleasure as the young man’s face lost its tea-like colour and became more like uncooked pastry. Vanderhyde twitched, but with pleasure, too, rather than discomfort. Charlie looked from one man to the other, seeking friendly eyes. The eyes he saw were blind to his pleas.
‘I – I –’
‘Yes?’ Rebus prompted.
‘I’ll just fill my cup,’ Charlie said, as though only these five meagre words were left in his vocabulary. Rebus sat back patiently. Let the bugger fill and refill and boil another brew. But he’d have his answers. He’d make Charlie sweat tannin, and he’d have his answers.
‘Is Fife always this bleak?’
‘Only the more picturesque bits. The rest’s no’ bad at a’.’
The SSPCA officer was guiding Brian Holmes across a twilit field, the area around almost completely flat, a dead tree breaking the monotony. A fierce wind was blowing, and it was a cold wind, too. The SSPCA man had called it an ‘aist wind’. Holmes assumed that ‘aist’ translated as ‘east’, and that the man’s sense of geography was somewhat askew, since the wind was clearly blowing from the west.
The landscape proved deceptive. Seeming flat, the land was actually slanting. They were climbing a slope, not steep but perceptible. Holmes was reminded of some hill somewhere in Scotland, the ‘electric brae’, where a trick of natural perspective made you think you were going uphill when in fact you were travelling down. Or was it vice versa? Somehow, he didn’t think his companion was the man to ask.
Soon, over the rise, Holmes could see the black, grainy landscape of a disused mineworking, shielded from the field by a line of trees. The mines around here were all worked out, had been since the 1960s. Now, money had appeared from somewhere, and the long-smouldering bings were being levelled, their mass used to fill the chasms left by surface mining. The mine buildings themselves were being dismantled, the landscape reseeded, as though the history of mining in Fife had never existed.
This much Brian Holmes knew. His uncles had been miners. Not here perhaps, but nevertheless they had been great deep workings of information and anecdote. The child Brian had stored away every detail.
‘Grim,’ he said to himself as he followed the SSPCA officer down a slight slope towards the trees, where a cluster of half a dozen men stood, shuffling, turning at the sound of approach. Holmes introduced himself to the most senior-looking of the plain-clothes men.
‘DC Brian Holmes, sir.’
The man smiled, nodded, then jerked his head in the direction of a much younger man. Everyone, uniformeds, plain-clothes, even the SSPCA Judas, was smiling, enjoying Holmes’s mistake. He felt a rush of blood to his face, and was rooted to the spot. The young man saw his discomfort and stuck out a hand.
‘I’m DS Hendry, Brian. Sometimes I’m in charge here.’ There were more smiles. Holmes joined in this time.
‘Sorry, sir.’
‘I’m flattered actually. Nice to think I’m so young-looking, and Harry here’s so old.’ He nodded towards the man Holmes had mistaken for the senior officer. ‘Right, Brian. I’ll just tell you what I’ve been telling the lads. We have a good tip that there’s going to be a dog fight here tonight. It’s secluded, half a mile from the main road, a mile from the nearest house. Perfect, really. There’s a track the lorries take from the main road up to the site here. That’s the way they’ll come in, probably three or four vans carrying the dogs, and then who knows how many cars with the punters. If it gets to Ibrox proportions, we’ll call in reinforcements. As it is, we’re not bothered so much about nabbing punters as about catching the handlers themselves. The word is that Davy Brightman’s the main man. Owns a couple of scrap yards in Kirkcaldy and Methil. We know he keeps a few pit bulls, and we think he fights them.’
There was a blast of static from one of the radios, then a call sign. DS Hendry responded.
‘Do you have a Detective Constable Holmes with you?’ came the message. Hendry stared at H
olmes as he handed him the radio. Holmes could only look apologetic.
‘DC Holmes speaking.’
‘DC Holmes, we’ve a message for you.’
‘Go ahead,’ said Holmes.
‘It’s to do with a Miss Nell Stapleton.’
Sitting in the hospital waiting room, eating chocolate from a vending machine, Rebus went over the day’s events in his mind. Remembering the incident with Tracy in the car, his scrotum began to rise up into his body in an act of self-protection. Painful still. Like a double hernia, not that he’d ever had one.
But the afternoon had been very interesting indeed. Vanderhyde had been interesting. And Charlie, well, Charlie had sung like a bird.
‘What is it you want to ask me?’ he had said, bringing more tea into the living room.
‘I’m interested in time, Charlie. Your uncle has already told me that he’s not interested in time. He isn’t ruled by it, but policemen are. Especially in a case like this. You see, the chronology of events isn’t quite right in my mind. That’s what I want to clear up, if possible.’
‘All right,’ Charlie said. ‘How can I help?’
‘You were at Ronnie’s that night?’
‘Yes, for a while.’
‘And you left to look for some party or other?’
‘That’s right.’
‘Leaving Neil in the house with Ronnie?’
‘No, he’d left by then.’
‘You didn’t know, of course, that Neil was Ronnie’s brother?’
The look of surprise on Charlie’s face seemed authentic, but then Rebus knew him for an accomplished actor, and was taking nothing for granted, not any more.
‘No, I didn’t know that. Shit, his brother. Why didn’t he want any of us to meet him?’
‘Neil and I are in the same profession,’ Rebus explained. Charlie just smiled and shook his head. Vanderhyde was leaning back thoughtfully in his chair, like a meticulous juror at some trial.
‘Now,’ Rebus continued, ‘Neil says he left quite early. Ronnie was being uncommunicative.’
‘I can guess why.’
‘Why?’
‘Easy. He’d just scored, hadn’t he? He hadn’t seen any stuff for ages, and suddenly he’d scored.’ Charlie suddenly remembered that his aged uncle was listening, and stopped short, looking towards the old man. Vanderhyde, shrewd as ever, seemed to sense this, and waved his hand regally before him, as if to say, I’ve been too long on this planet and can’t be shocked any more.