“So what do you reckon, sir? Is it worth a day or two in Auld Reekie? It has to be your call in the end, not ours.” He opened his arms and gave a shrug.
“Maybe a couple of half days,” Tennant agreed at last. “Now what else have we got to go on . . . ?”
As it turned out, they did have something else by the end of that day’s play. But first, there were classes to attend. The canteen was noisy at lunchtime, everyone relieved that the top brass had come and gone. Tennant seemed strangely subdued, and Rebus wondered if secretly he’d wanted them to come to watch his “show.” It had crossed Rebus’s mind that Tennant had to be in on it. Much easier to smooth Rebus’s way into the course as a latecomer if the chief constables had someone on the inside. Then there was that niggling doubt about the “coincidence” that their unsolved case just happened to be one Rebus had worked . . .
One Francis Gray had worked, too.
Gray as a mole, sent in by Strathern. . . ? Rebus couldn’t get thoughts of the double bluff out of his head. The lasagna on his plate had flattened itself out, a swirl of yellow and red, rimmed with orange grease. The more he stared at it, the more the colors seemed to blur.
“Lost your appetite?” Allan Ward asked.
“You want it?” Rebus replied. But Ward shook his head.
“Frankly, it looks like afterbirth.”
As the description took effect, Allan Ward smirked from behind a forkful of ham.
Straight after lunch, some of the probationers took to one of the football pitches. Others took a stroll around the grounds. But up in Crime Management, the Wild Bunch were being taught how to put together a Manual of Murder Investigation, the MMI being, in the words of their tutor, “the bible of a good, tight inquiry.” It had to detail avenues taken and procedures followed. It showed that the investigating team had done their utmost.
To Rebus, it was paperwork.
And it was followed by Forensic Entomology, at the end of which they streamed out of the classroom.
“Gives me butterflies just thinking of it,” Tam Barclay said, referring to some of the slides they’d been shown. Then he winked and smiled. Down in the break-out area, they sprawled on the sofas, rubbing their foreheads, eyes squeezed shut. Rebus and Ward headed down a farther flight and outside for a ciggie.
“Does your head in, that stuff,” Ward said, nodding thanks as Rebus produced a lighter.
“Certainly makes you think,” Rebus agreed. They’d been shown close-ups of putrefying corpses and the bugs and insects found on them. They’d been told how maggots could help pinpoint time of death. They’d been shown floaters and bloaters and human forms reduced to something more akin to melted raspberry ripple.
Rebus thought of his uneaten lasagna and took another drag on his cigarette.
“Thing is, Allan, we let a lot of shite get in the way. We get cynical and maybe even a bit lazy. All we can see are brass breathing down our necks and another load of paperwork to be completed. We forget what the job’s supposed to be about.” Rebus looked at the younger man. “What do you think?”
“It’s a job, John. I joined because no other profession would have me.”
“I’m sure that’s not true.”
Ward thought about it, then flicked ash into the air. “Ach, maybe not. It feels that way sometimes, though.”
Rebus nodded. “You seem to have Francis on your back a lot of the time.”
When Ward looked up sharply, Rebus wondered if he’d introduced the subject too rapidly. But Ward just gave a wry smile.
“That stuff’s like water off a duck’s back.”
“You two know one another?”
“Not really.”
“It’s just that I’m not sure Francis would try it with everyone . . .”
Ward wagged a finger. “You’re not so daft, are you? We did work one case. I mean, we weren’t close or anything.”
“Understood. But you’re not complete strangers, so he feels he can rag you a bit, right?”
“Right.”
Rebus took another draw on the cigarette, then exhaled. He was staring into the distance, as though maybe there was something of interest to him in the football match. “What was the case?” he asked, finally.
“Some Glasgow drug dealer . . . gangster sort of thing.”
“Glasgow?”
“This guy had tentacles everywhere.”
“Even as far south as your patch?”
“Oh, aye. Stranraer, you know — gateway to and from Ireland. Guns, drugs and cash bouncing backwards and forwards like a Ping-Pong ball.”
“What was the guy’s name? Would I know him?”
“Not now you wouldn’t. He’s dead.” Rebus watched for some sign from Ward — a pause, or a hooding of the eyes. But there was nothing. “Name was Bernie Johns.”
Rebus made a show of running the name through his memory. “Died in jail?” he offered.
Ward nodded. “Couldn’t have happened to a more deserving bloke.”
“We’ve got one just like him in Edinburgh.”
“Cafferty?” Ward guessed. “Yeah, I’ve heard of that bastard. Didn’t you help put him away?”
“Problem was, they didn’t keep him there.” Rebus squashed the remains of his cigarette underfoot. “So you don’t mind the ribbing Francis is giving you?”
“Don’t you worry about me, John,” Ward said, patting him on the shoulder. “Francis Gray will know when he’s crossed the line . . . I’ll make sure of that.” He made to turn away, but stopped. Rebus felt a tingling in his shoulder from where he’d been touched. “You going to show us a good time in Edinburgh, John?”
“I’ll see what I can do.”
Ward nodded. There was still some steel in his eyes. Rebus doubted it was ever completely absent. He knew it wouldn’t do to underestimate Ward. But he still wondered if he could somehow turn him into an ally . . .
“You coming?”
“I’ll catch you up,” Rebus said. He thought about another cigarette but dismissed the idea. There were roars from the football pitch, arms raised high on the sideline. One of the players seemed to be rolling around on the ground.
“They’re coming to Edinburgh,” Rebus said quietly to himself. Then he shook his head slowly.
“Typical,” he muttered. So instead he called Jean. She was shopping at Napier’s the Herbalist, which made him smile. Jean trusted in homeopathy, and had a bathroom cabinet full of herbal medicines. She’d even made him use some when he’d felt flu coming on, and they’d seemed to work. But every time he looked in her cabinet, he felt he could use half the jars for cooking up a curry or a stew.
“Laugh all you like,” she’d told him more than once. “Then tell me which of us is the healthier.”
Now Jean wanted to know when she’d see him. He told her he wasn’t sure. He didn’t mention that his work would be bringing him back into the city sooner than expected, didn’t want that sense of expectation. If they made some arrangement, chances were he’d have to cancel at the last minute. Better for her not to know.
“I’m going round to Denise’s tonight anyway,” she informed him.
“Good to see you’re not pining.”
“You’re the one who’s done a runner, not me.”
“Part of the job, Jean.”
“Sure it is.” He heard her sigh. “How was your weekend anyway?”
“Quiet. I tidied the flat, did some washing . . .”
“Drank yourself into a stupor?”
“That accusation wouldn’t stand up in court.”
“How tough would it be to find witnesses?”
“No comment, Your Honor. How did the wedding go?”
