‘Changed days,’ he said to himself.
Hoardings advertised new developments further into the estate. The houses here were of a vintage, but roofs had been replaced and the double-glazed windows looked new. Gardens were tidier than would have been the case at one time. Oram had run a successful little business and could have afforded to live elsewhere in the city, but Rebus knew that a sense of community and belonging were sometimes more important. He’d known gangsters — in many ways Cafferty was an anomaly — who stayed in the same council houses they’d grown up in long after they’d amassed their fortunes. There was safety, too, in surrounding yourself with people who would look out for you. They felt you were one of them, long after this had ceased to be the case, and a few quid handed round could always oil the machine of neighbourliness.
Rebus had the address from the phone book. It was at the end of a terrace, pebble-dashed like the others in the street. The front garden had been replaced by a driveway, though no car sat there at present. There was a garage at the side and hanging baskets, currently devoid of life, flanking the front door. The door itself looked new, dark varnished wood with a tall rectangle of stained glass above the letter box. The bell had a camera attached. Rebus pressed it and waited.
The woman who opened up rolled her eyes when she saw him. ‘What’s he done this time? I hardly ever see him, you know.’
‘You think I’m the police?’
‘You mean you’re not?’
She was in her forties, dyed orange hair falling to her shoulders, and dressed for a gym she almost certainly never visited.
‘Just to be clear, who are we talking about?’
‘Maybe start with who you are and what you’re doing here.’ She folded her arms and tipped her head slightly to one side.
‘You’re Ishbel Oram, I recognise you from the photo.’
She narrowed her eyes. ‘What photo?’
‘Your wedding. You’ve hardly changed,’ Rebus lied. ‘And the reason I’m here is your husband, Jack. I’ve heard he’s back in town and I’d like a word.’
‘Back in town?’ Her eyebrows rose. ‘Who’s saying that?’
‘So you’ve not seen him?’
‘I don’t go to seances.’
‘You reckon he’s no longer with us?’
She stepped down from the doorway so she was level with Rebus. ‘A man called Cafferty had him done away with,’ she stated. ‘I didn’t used to think that, but I do now, though we have to wait three more years to make it official.’
‘Presumption of death, you mean?’ Rebus watched her nod. ‘What makes you so sure Cafferty’s to blame?’
‘Jack got on the wrong side of him — that’s something you don’t want to happen. Then there’s the envelope. Stuck through the letter box a few weeks past. No note, just five hundred quid. That’s got to be him, hasn’t it?’
Rebus thought of his own envelope, the sum probably identical. ‘Cafferty, you mean? Why not Jack himself?’
‘Dead men tend not to be earners.’
‘Why wait four years to send it?’
She considered this. ‘A guilty conscience sometimes takes a while.’ She peered at him. ‘What is it you wanted with Jack anyway?’
‘Your first instinct wasn’t far off — I used to be CID. There’s a bit of unfinished business from back in the day, and I thought Jack could help, so when I heard he’d been seen...’
‘Seen where?’
‘A lettings office on Lasswade Road.’
Her face grew quizzical. ‘Why would he be there?’ Rebus didn’t like to say: a fresh start, new identity, no family. ‘Anyway,’ she went on, ‘I’m sorry to disappoint you.’
‘So the person you thought I was here about...’
‘Is sweet FA to do with you, mister whoever you are.’ She began to retreat inside the house.
‘Thanks for the chat,’ Rebus said to the door as it closed. He walked to his car, thinking about the newspaper coverage of Jack Oram’s disappearance. Yes, a son had been mentioned, described as a school-leaver, making him sixteen or seventeen then, early twenties now.
What’s he done this time?
Well, yes, that was a good question.
He got as far as the main road, but when a parking bay presented itself, he pulled over. Among all the rejuvenation of Craigmillar, one row of unkempt shops remained. A newsagent/post office, bookmaker, laundrette, barber and nail salon. Plus, at one end, a bar with grilles over both windows and a sign that identified it as the Moorfoot. Aka Jack Oram’s old place, the Potter’s Bar.
‘You used to do this all the time,’ Rebus told himself under his breath. ‘How hard can it be?’
Officers working on an inquiry used to joke that they kept shoemakers in business. You could wear out a decent pair while doorstepping a neighbourhood, asking the same questions at every door, facing the same sights and smells. Faces sullen or antagonistic; wafts of whatever was being fried in the kitchen; almost always a blaring television or growling mongrel. So Rebus wasn’t exactly surprised when, pushing open the door to the newsagent’s, a dog started alerting everyone to his arrival. It was the owner’s German shepherd by the look of things, and its message to Rebus was: don’t mess with my human.
The post office section of the shop was a fortress of security screens and reinforced door. But there was also a counter nearer the front where groceries and cigarettes could be bought. The racks dedicated to newspapers and magazines were almost non-existent, reminding Rebus of the way tastes had shifted in a few short years. He grabbed an Evening News — the thing seemed to be on sale from dawn these days — and showed Oram’s photograph to the woman at the till, who just shrugged and shook her head. He then queued behind a woman who seemed to be sending the contents of an Amazon distribution centre back to base, one box at a time. While he waited, he skimmed the pages of the newspaper. There was a follow-up story on the acid and fire-raising attacks in West Lothian, police apparently investigating a possible connection between the two.
‘Consider me shocked,’ Rebus muttered to himself.
The Royal Mile traders and their shoplifting woes also merited a follow-up, with fresh photos and interviews. The cops and the council came in for the usual drubbing, with a spokesperson from Police Scotland stating by way of defence that patrols would be increased in order to restore confidence in a street considered ‘the jewel in Edinburgh’s tourist crown’.
Having finished reading everything apart from the sports and small ads, Rebus stepped forward, interrupting the customer to ask if he could just put one really quick question to the exasperated-looking man behind the screen. Without waiting for an answer, he held up the photo, receiving another shake of the head. Nothing ventured, he showed it to the customer too, with the same result. He gestured towards her packages.
‘You’d be quicker driving them to the warehouse yourself,’ he suggested, leaving the paper on the counter and heading for the door.
He gave the laundromat and nail salon a miss, found the barber’s closed, so tried the bookie’s instead. There was only a smattering of customers, and again he was reminded that times were changing. Like the news, betting had moved online. As a child, Rebus had found betting shops intriguing and mysterious. His father would meet pals there and could spend half a Saturday studying form and listening to the races over a distorted loudspeaker, a stub of pencil in one hand, cigarette in the other. Rebus sensed that no one lingered long in this modern equivalent. There were no chairs and tables, no stove to keep the place heated. Just banks of TV monitors and a scattering of slot machines, plus a long shelf you could lean against while filling in a slip.