And where were all the bloody taxis?
`Sod it then.' He walked up to the first patrol car he saw and tapped on the window, flashing his ID.
`Inspector Rebus,' he announced. `Can you give me a lift to Gower Street?'
The building seemed as deserted as ever and Rebus feared that on this occasion perhaps even the secretary might have scarpered for an early start to the weekend. But no, she was there, like the retainer of some dusty mansion. He cleared his throat, and she looked up from her crochet.
`Yes?' she said. `Can I help you?' She appeared not to remember him. Rebus brought out, his ID and pushed it towards her.
`Detective Inspector Rebus,' he said, his voice stiff with authority. `Scotland Yard. I want to ask you a few questions about Dr Frazer.'
The woman looked frightened. Rebus feared he had overdone the menace. He tried a don't-worry-it's-not-you-we're-interested-in sort of smile, a peaceable smile. But the woman looked no less afraid, and her fear flustered her.
`Oh, gracious,' she stammered. `Oh my, oh my.' She looked up at him. 'Who did you say? Dr Frazer? But there's no Dr Frazer in the Department.'
Rebus described Lisa Frazer. The woman suddenly raised her head, recognising the description.
`Oh, Lisa?. You mean Lisa? But there's some mistake. Lisa Frazer isn't a member of staff here. Gracious me, no. Though I believe she may have taken a tutorial or two, just filling in. Oh dear, Scotland Yard. What, I mean, surely she hasn't . . . What has she done?'
`She doesn't work here?' Rebus needed to be certain. `Then who is she?'
`Lisa? She's one of our research students.'
'A student? But she's—' He was about to say `old'.
`A mature student,' the secretary explained. `Oh dear, is she in trouble?'
'I came here before,' Rebus said. `You didn't tell me any of this then. Why?'
`Came here before?' She studied his face. `Yes, I remember. Well, Lisa made me promise not to tell anyone.'
`Why?'
`Her' project, she said. She's doing a project on, now, what is it exactly?' She opened a, drawer of her desk and pulled out a sheet of paper. `Ah yes, “The Psychology of the Investigation of Serious Crime”. She explained it to me. How she needed access to a police investigation. How she, needed to gain trust. The courts, police and so on. She told me she was going to pretend to be a lecturer I told her not to, I warned her, but she said it was the only way. The police wouldn't waste time with a mere student, would they?'
Rebus was stuck for an answer. The answer was no, they wouldn't. Why, should they?
`So she got you to cover for her?'
The woman shrugged. `Lisa is quite a persuasive young woman. She said probably I wouldn't have to tell lies. I could just say things like she's not here, she's not teaching today, that sort of thing. Always supposing anyone bothered to check up on her.'
`And has anybody checked up on her?'
`Oh yes. Why, only today I had a telephone call from someone she had arranged to interview. He wanted to be sure that she really was part of University College, and not just a journalist or a Nosey Parker.'
Today? An interview today. Well, that was one appoint?ment she wouldn't be keeping.
`Who was this person?' Rebus asked. `Do you remem?ber?'
`I think I wrote it down,' she said. She lifted the thick notepad beside her telephone and flipped through it. 'He did say who he was, but I can't remember. It was at the Old Bailey. Yes, that's right. She'd arranged to meet him at the Old Bailey. I usually write these things down' as soon as someone mentions their name, just in case I forget later. No, there's no sign of it. That's funny.'
`Perhaps in the bin?' Rebus" suggested'
`Well, perhaps.' But she sounded doubtful. Rebus lifted the small wicker paper-basket onto her desk and sifted through it. Pencil shavings and sweet-wrappers, an empty polystyrene coffee cup and crumpled bits of paper. Lots of bits of paper.
`Too big,' she would say as he started to uncrumple one, or `too small.' Until finally, he pulled out a sheet and spread it out on the desk. It was like some bizarre work of art, filled with doodles and hieroglyphs and little notes, phone numbers, names, addresses.
'Ah,' she said, sliding a finger over to one corner where something had been written in very faint, wavering pencil. `Is that it?'
Rebus looked closer. Yes, that was it. That was most definitely it. 'Thank you,' he said.
`Oh dear,' said the secretary. `Have I, got her into trouble? Is Lisa in trouble? What has she done, Inspector?'
`She lied to us,' said Rebus. `And because of that, she's ended up having to go into hiding.'
`Hiding? Gracious, she didn't mention anything about that.'
Rebus was beginning to suspect that the secretary was a couple of keys short of a typewriter. `Well,' he said, 'she didn't know she was in trouble until today.'
The secretary was nodding. `Yes, but she only phoned a little over an hour ago.'
Rebus's face creased into an all-over frown. `What?'
'Yes, she said she was calling from the Old Bailey. She wanted to know if there were any messages for her. She told me she had time to kill before her second appointment.'
Rebus didn't bother to ask. He dialled quickly, the receiver gripped in his hand like a weapon. `I want to talk to George Flight.'
`Just a minute, please.' The ch-ch-ch-ch of a re-routing. Then: `Murder Room, Detective Sergeant Walsh speaking.'
`It's Inspector Rebus here.'
`Oh yes?' The voice had become as rudimentary as a chisel.
`I need to speak to Flight. It's urgent.'
`He's in a meeting.'
`Then get him out! I told you; this is urgent,'
There was doubt, cynicism in the Sergeant's voice Everyone knew that the Scotsman's, `urgent' wasn't worth its weight in breath. `I can leave a message—'
`Don't fuck me around, Walsh! Either get him, or put me on to someone with a spare brain they're not sitting on!'
Ca —click. Brrrrr. The ultimate put-down. The secretary was staring at Rebus in horror. Perhaps psychologists never got angry. Rebus attempted a reassuring smile, but it came out like a clown's drunken greasepaint. He made a bowing motion before turning to leave, and was watched all the way out to, the stairwell by a woman mortified almost to the core of her being.
Rebus's face was tingling with a newly-stoked anger. Lisa Frazer had tricked him, played him like a fool. Christ, the things he'd told her Thinking she wanted to help with the Wolfman case. Not realising he was merely part of her project. Christ, the things he had said. What had he said? Too much to recall. Had she been taping everything? Or simply jotting things down after he'd left? It didn't matter. What mattered was that he had seen in her something solid and believable amidst a sea of chaos. And she had been Janus. Using him. Jesus Christ, she had even slept with him. Was that, too, part of the project, part of her little experiment? How could he ever be sure it wasn't? It had seemed genuine enough, but . . . He had opened his mind to her, as she had opened her body to him. It was not a fair exchange.
`The bitch!' he exploded, stopping dead. `The lying little bitch!'
Why hadn't she told him? Why hadn't she just explained everything? He would have helped her, he would have found time for her. No, he wouldn't. It was a lie. A research student? A project? He would have shown her the door. Instead he had listened to her, had believed her, had learned from her. Yes, it was true. He had learned a lot from her. About psychology, about the mind of the killer. Had learned from her books. Yes, but that wasn't the point. The point was that it had all become crass and diluted, now that he knew her for what she was.