‘No, it’s nothing really, just that when I was going through the files on Toal, I couldn’t help noticing that he always seemed to have inside info.’
‘Careful, laddie.’
The ‘laddie’ rankled; it was meant to.
‘Well,’ Rebus went on, ‘everyone knows the west coast is open to bungs. Not always cash, you understand. Could be watches, ID bracelets, rings, maybe even a few suits...’
Ancram looked around the bar, as though begging for witnesses to Rebus’s remarks.
‘Would you care to name any names, Inspector, or is hearsay good enough for Edinburgh CID? The way I hear it, there’s no cupboard-space left in Fettes, they’re so jam-packed with skeletons.’ He picked up his drink. ‘And half those skeletons seem to have your fingerprints all over them.’
The smile again, sparkling eyes, laughter lines. How did he know? Rebus turned to go. Ancram’s voice followed him out of the pub.
‘We can’t all go running to friends in Barlinnie! I’ll see you around, Inspector...’
7
Aberdeen.
Aberdeen meant away from Edinburgh; no Justice Programme, no Fort Apache, no shite for him to skite in. Aberdeen looked good.
But Rebus had things to do in Edinburgh. He wanted to see the locus in daylight, so drove out there, not risking his own Saab; leaving it at Fort Apache and taking the spare Escort. Jim MacAskill wanted him on the case because he hadn’t been around long enough to make enemies; Rebus was wondering how you ever made friends in Niddrie. The place was if anything bleaker by day: blocked-in windows, glass like shrapnel on the tarmac, kids playing in the sunshine with no real enthusiasm, eyes and mouths narrowing as his car cruised past.
They’d knocked a lot of the estate down; behind it was better housing, semi-detached. Satellite dishes a status symboclass="underline" the owners’ status — unemployed. The estate boasted a derelict pub — insurance job blaze — and one all-purpose corner shop, its window full of video posters. The kids made this last their base. BMX bandits blowing bubble-gum. Rebus drove past slowly, his eyes on them. The death flat wasn’t quite on the edge of the estate, not quite visible from Niddrie Mains Road. Rebus was thinking: Tony El didn’t come from round here, and if he’d picked the spot by chance, there were other derelict flats nearer the main road.
Two men plus the victim. Tony El and an accomplice.
The accomplice had local knowledge.
Rebus climbed the stairs to the flat. The place had been sealed, but he had keys to both padlocks. The living room as before, upside-down table, blanket. He wondered who’d slept there, maybe they’d seen something. He reckoned his chances of finding them were one per cent; of getting them to talk, slightly less. Kitchen, bathroom, bedrooms, hallway. He kept close to the walls, so as not to fall through the floor. There was no one living in the block, but the next block along had glass in a couple of its windows: one on the first storey, one on the second. Rebus knocked on the first door. A dishevelled woman answered, an infant clinging round her neck. He didn’t need to introduce himself.
‘I don’t know anything, and I didn’t see or hear anything.’ She made to close the door.
‘You married?’
She opened the door again. ‘What’s it to you?’
Rebus shrugged; good question.
‘He’s down the boozer, most likely,’ she said.
‘How many kids have you got?’
‘Three.’
‘Must be pushed for space.’
‘That’s what we keep telling them. All they’ll say is our name’s on the list.’
‘What age is your oldest?’
Eyes narrowing. ‘Eleven.’
‘Any chance he saw something?’
She shook her head. ‘He’d’ve told me.’
‘What about your man?’
She smiled. ‘He’d have seen everything twice.’
Rebus smiled too. ‘Well, if you hear anything... from the kids or your man...’
‘Aye, right.’ Slowly, so as not to cause offence, she shut the door on him.
Rebus climbed the next flight. Dog shit on the landing, a used condom: he tried not to connect the two. Felt-marker graffiti on the door — Wanker, HMFC, cartoon coitus. The occupier had given up trying to wipe it off. Rebus pushed the doorbell. No answer; he tried again.
A voice from within: ‘Bugger off!’
‘Could I have a word?’
‘Who is it?’
‘CID.’
A chain rattled, and the door opened two inches. Rebus saw half a face: an old woman, or maybe an old man. He showed his warrant card.
‘You’re not moving me out. I’ll be here when they pull the place down.’
‘I don’t want to move you out.’
‘Eh?’
Rebus raised his voice. ‘Nobody wants to move you out.’
‘Aye they do, but I’m not moving, you can tell them that.’ Rebus caught foul breath, a meaty smell.
‘Look, have you heard what happened next door?’
‘Eh?’
Rebus peered through the gap. The hallway was littered with sheets of newspaper, empty cat-food tins. One more try.
‘Someone was killed next door.’
‘Don’t try your tricks with me, boyo!’ Anger in the voice.
‘I’m not trying any... ach, to hell with it.’ Rebus turned, started back downstairs. Suddenly the outside world looked good to him in the warm sunshine. It was all relative. He walked over to the corner shop, asked the kids a few questions, handed out mints to anyone who wanted one. He didn’t learn anything, but ended up with an excuse to go inside. He bought a packet of extra-strong, put it in his pocket for later, asked the Asian behind the counter a couple of questions. She was fifteen, maybe sixteen, extraordinarily pretty. A video was playing on the TV, high up on one wall. Hong Kong gangsters shooting chunks out of each other. She didn’t have anything to tell him.
‘Do you like Niddrie?’ he asked.
‘It’s all right.’ Her voice was pure Edinburgh, eyes on the TV.
Rebus drove back to Fort Apache. The Shed was empty. He drank a cup of coffee and smoked a cigarette. Niddrie, Craigmillar, Wester Hailes, Muirhouse, Pilton, Granton... They all seemed to him like some horrible experiment in social engineering: scientists in white coats sticking families down in this maze or that, seeing what would happen, how strong they’d have to become to cope, whether or not they’d find the exit... He lived in an area of Edinburgh where six figures bought you a three-bedroom flat. It amused him that he could sell up and be suddenly rich... except, of course, that he’d have nowhere to live, and couldn’t afford to move anywhere nicer in the city. He realised he was just about as trapped as anyone in Niddrie or Craigmillar, nicer model of trap, that was all.
His phone rang. He picked it up and wished he hadn’t.
‘Inspector Rebus?’ A woman’s voice: administrative. ‘Could you attend a meeting tomorrow at Fettes?’
Rebus felt a chill run the length of his spine. ‘What sort of meeting?’
A cool smiling voice. ‘I don’t have that information. The request comes from the ACC’s office.’
The Assistant Chief Constable, Colin Carswell. Rebus called him the ‘CC Rider’. A Yorkshireman — as close to a Scot as the English got. He’d been with Lothian and Borders two and a half years, and so far nobody had a bad word to say about him, which should have put him in the Guinness Book of Records. There had been a hairy few months after the last Deputy Chief Constable resigned and before they appointed a new one, but Carswell had coped. Some were of the opinion that he was just too good, and therefore would never make it to Chief Constable. Lothian and Borders used to boast one DCC and two ACCs, but one of the ACC posts had now become ‘Director of Corporate Services’, about which no one on the force seemed to know anything at all.