She shrugged, looked like she'd been through it all once too often. Danny's mother had seen them talking. Maybe she thought Rebus was a doctor. She got up and came towards him, then just stood there, waiting for him to speak.
`I came to see Danny,' he said.
`Yes?’
`The night he… the night of his accident, I was the one who brought him here. I just wondered how he was doing.’
`See for yourself.’
Her voice was breaking.
Rebus thought: a five-minute walk from here, he'd be in Sammy's room. He'd thought her situation unique, because it was unique to him. Now he saw that within a short radius of Sammy's bed, other parents were crying, and squeezing their children's hands, and asking why.
`I'm really sorry,' he said. `I wish…’
`Me, too,' the woman said. `You know, he's never been a bad laddie. Cheeky, but never bad. His problem was, he was always itching for something new, something to stop him getting bored. We all know where that can lead.’
Rebus nodded, suddenly not wanting to be here, not wanting to hear Danny Simpson's life story. He had enough ghosts to contend with as it was. He squeezed the woman's arm.
`Look,' he said, `I'm sorry, but I have to go.’
She nodded distractedly, wandered off in the direction of her son's bed. Rebus wanted to curse Danny Simpson for the mere possibility that he'd passed on the virus. He realised now that if they'd met on the doorstep, that's the way their conversation would have gone, and maybe Rebus would have gone further.
He wanted to curse him… but he couldn't. It would be every bit as efficacious as cursing the Big Man. A waste of time and breath. So instead he went to Sammy's room, to find that she was back on her own. No other patients, no nursing staff, no Rhona. He kissed her forehead. It tasted salty. Sweat: she needed wiping down. There was a smell he hadn't noticed before. Talcum powder. He sat down, took her warm hands in his.
`How are you doing, Sammy? I keep meaning to bring in some Oasis, see if that would bring you round. Your mum sits here listening to classical. I wonder if you can hear it. I don't even know if you like that sort of stuff. Lots of things we've never got round to talking about.’
He saw something. Stood up to be sure. Movement behind her eyelids.
'Sammy? Sammy?’
He hadn't seen her do that before. Pushed the button beside her bed. Waited for a nurse to come. Pushed it again.
`Come on, come on.’
Eyelids fluttering… then stopping.
'Sammy!' Door opening, nurse coming in.
`What is it?’
Rebus: `I thought I saw… she was moving.’
`Moving?’
`Just her eyes, like she was trying to open them.’
`I'll fetch a doctor.’
`Come on, Sammy, try again. Wakey-wakey, sweetheart.’
Patting her wrists, then her cheeks.
The doctor arrived. He was the same one Rebus had shouted at that first day. Lifted her eyelids, shone a thin torch. into them, pulling it away, checking her pupils.
`If you saw it, I'm sure it was there.’
`Yes, but does it mean anything?’
`Hard to say.’
`Try anyway.’
Eyes boring into the doctor's.
`She's asleep. She has dreams. Sometimes when you dream you experience REM: Rapid Eye Movement.’
`So it could be…’
Rebus sought the word `… involuntary?’
`As I say, it's hard to tell. Latest scans show definite improvement.’ He paused. `Minor improvement, but certainly there.’
Rebus nodding, trembling. The doctor saw it, asked if he needed anything. Rebus shaking his head. The doctor checking his watch, other places to be. The nurse shuffling her feet. Rebus thanked them both and headed out.
HOGAN: You agree to this interview being taped, Dr Colquhoun?
COLQUHOUN: I've no objections.
HOGAN: It's in your interests as well as ours.
COLQUHOUN: I've nothing to hide, Inspector Hogan. (Coughs.)
HOGAN: Fine, sir. Maybe we'll just start then?
COLQUHOUN: Might I ask a question? Just for the record, you want to ask me about Joseph Lintz – nothing else?
HOGAN: What else might there be, sir?
COLQUHOUN: I just wanted to check.
HOGAN: You wish to have a solicitor present?
COLQUHOUN: NO.
HOGAN: Right you are, sir. Well, if I can begin… it's really just a question of your relationship with Professor Joseph Lintz.
COLQUHOUN: Yes.
HOGAN: Only, when we spoke before, you said you didn't know Professor Lintz.
COLQUHOUN: I think I said I didn't know him very well.
HOGAN: Okay, sir. If that's what you said…
COLQUHOUN: It is, to the best of my recollection.
HOGAN: Only, we've had some new information…
COLQUHOUN: Yes?
HOGAN: That you knew Professor Lintz a little better than that.
COLQUHOUN: And this is according to…?
HOGAN: New information in our possession. The informant tells us that Joseph Lintz accused you of being a war criminal. Anything to say to that, sir?
COLQUHOUN: Only that it's a lie. An outrageous lie.
HOGAN: He didn't think you were a war criminal?
COLQUHOUN: Oh, he thought it all right! He told me to my face on more than one occasion.
HOGAN: When?
COLQUHOUN: Years back. He got it into his head… the man was mad, Inspector. I could see that. Driven by demons.
HOGAN: What did he say exactly?
COLQUHOUN: Hard to remember. This was a long time ago, the early 1970s, I suppose.
HOGAN: It would help us if you could…
COLQUHOUN: He came out with it in the middle of a party. I believe it was some function to welcome a visiting professor. Anyway, Joseph insisted on taking me to one side. He looked feverish. Then he came out with it: I was some sort of Nazi, and I'd come to this country by some circuitous route. He kept on about it.
HOGAN: What did you do?
COLQUHOUN: Told him he was drunk, babbling.
HOGAN: And?
COLQUHOUN: And he was. Had to be taken home in a taxi. I said no more about it. In academic circles, one becomes used to a certain amount of… eccentric behaviour. We're obsessive people, it can't be helped.
