‘Sometimes.’
‘So maybe they took pity on her.’
‘And dropped her here? Better to wait for someone to take her further.’ Skiladz looked up from the photograph. ‘No?’
‘I suppose so.’
‘Could you keep the photo, show it around?’ Clarke suggested.
‘Sure.’ He took another look. ‘Pretty girl. I have a daughter, not so very different.’
‘Has that helped keep you out of trouble?’
Skiladz stared at Rebus. ‘I stopped with the drink. I got my head together.’ He tapped a blackened finger to his brow. ‘And I stopped getting into arguments.’
Rebus thought for a moment. ‘Any of the other lads got form?’
‘Trouble with the law, you mean? Why would I tell you?’
‘Because then we wouldn’t have to come back here with immigration officers and maybe the tax man too. And while we checked every person’s ID and history, we’d make sure your name was mentioned in dispatches. .’
Skiladz’s eyes drilled into Rebus. ‘You were a bastard back then, too. Just not so fat and old.’
‘Hard to disagree.’
‘So what’s your answer?’ Clarke added.
Skiladz turned his attention towards her. ‘One or two,’ he said eventually.
‘One or two what?’
‘Have had some trouble in the past.’
She got up and found a pad of lined paper, placing it in front of him, making sure not to obscure the photograph lying there.
‘Write them down,’ she said.
‘This is crazy.’
She held out a pen and made him take it from her. When she retrieved the pad a minute later, it contained three names.
‘Day shift?’ she asked.
‘Only the first.’
‘Thomas Robertson,’ she read out. ‘Doesn’t sound very Polish.’
‘He’s Scottish.’
The door opened again. Bill Soames was standing there. He watched as Clarke tore the sheet from the pad, folded it in half and slipped it into her pocket.
‘Nothing,’ he said, turning to close the door. ‘No one saw her.’ Then, laying a hand on Skiladz’s shoulder: ‘Everything all right, Stefan?’
‘Can I go now?’ Skiladz asked Rebus.
‘Ask her, not me.’ Rebus indicated Clarke. She nodded at Skiladz and he got up to leave.
‘What’s been going on?’ Soames asked.
Rebus waited until Skiladz was outside. ‘Mr Skiladz has been helping us with our inquiries,’ he told Soames. ‘Necessitating another visit.’ He rose and held out his hand for Soames to take.
Soames looked as though he had questions, but Rebus was already opening the door. Clarke shook Soames’s hand and asked a final question of her own.
‘How far do we have to drive before we can start heading south again?’
‘A bit over half a mile, if you don’t mind doing a U-turn on a dangerous bend.’
‘I don’t mind that in the slightest.’ Clarke gave him a smile as she made to follow Rebus.
Back in the car, she asked him for his thoughts.
‘We can’t just barge in and interview them,’ he obliged. ‘Tayside Constabulary need to be told.’
‘Agreed.’
‘So you talk to Tayside in the morning and come back later in the day. That way everything’s above board.’
‘You don’t want to be involved?’
Rebus shook his head. ‘I’m just the hired help.’
‘Earning your keep so far.’
‘Maybe let Communication Breakdown know that.’
Clarke smiled. ‘What about Stefan Skiladz?’
‘Worth doing a background check, but I doubt anything will come up.’
She nodded to herself and started the car. ‘I might have to buy you a pint when we get back to Edinburgh.’
‘What makes you think I don’t have plans?’
‘You’re not the type,’ she answered, signalling to pull out, always supposing a gap would eventually emerge in what looked like a solid convoy of lorries.
11
Rebus let her buy him two drinks in the end. Afterwards, he walked her back to her car and turned down the offer of a lift home.
‘It’s hardly on your route,’ he explained.
‘So you’re either going to take a taxi or keep on drinking.’
‘Flexing those sleuthing muscles of yours, eh?’
‘Today went pretty well. But if you start coming into Gayfield Square with the sweat of the previous night’s ale on you. .’
‘Understood.’ He gave her a mock salute, then watched until the Audi disappeared from view. The town was quiet, with plenty of cabs plying for the largely non-existent trade. Rebus held up a hand and waited. Twenty minutes later he was paying the driver his money, adding a quid as a tip, and stepping on to the pavement outside a pub called the Gimlet. It was situated next to a busy roundabout off Calder Road, one of the main routes into the city from the west. The area was a mix of commercial and residential — car showrooms, low-rise industrial units; but also two-storey terraces with the usual array of satellite dishes pointing up at the sky.
The Gimlet dated back to the 1960s. It was a squat, free-standing box of a place, with a sandwich board outside advertising quiz and karaoke nights and a cheap all-day breakfast. Rebus hadn’t been there in years. He wondered if it still operated as a glorified bazaar for shoplifters and housebreakers.
‘Only one way to find out,’ he told himself.
There was music blaring from loudspeakers, and a glamorous blonde on the TV reading out the sports news. Half a dozen sullen drinkers examined Rebus as he made for the taps. He studied the available beers, then checked the glass-fronted chiller.
‘Bottle of IPA,’ he decided. The barmaid was young, with tattooed arms and an array of facial piercings. Rebus reckoned she had chosen the soundtrack, whether the punters liked it or not. As she poured his beer, he asked if Frank was coming in.
‘Frank who?’
‘Hammell — this is still his place, isn’t it?’
‘No idea.’ She threw the empty bottle into a bucket with more force than was strictly necessary. Rebus handed her a twenty-pound note, which she checked beneath an ultraviolet scanner, prior to opening the till.
‘How about Darryl?’ Rebus tried again.
‘Are you from the papers?’ She placed his change on the bar top rather than handing it to him. It comprised a few coins, plus three of the ropiest-looking fivers Rebus had seen in quite some time.
‘Guess again,’ he said.
‘He’s a cop,’ one of the drinkers called out. Rebus turned to face the man. He was in his sixties and nursing a glass of dark rum. There were three empties in front of him.
