'This is totally out of order,' Jo Banks said. Seona Grieve touched her arm.
'It's all right, Jo. Best just put their minds at rest.' She glared at Rebus. 'It was when I realised that one of them, Ure, Mollison or Bone, would take Roddy's place... I thought: I could do it, maybe better than any of them, so why not ask?'
'Good for you,' Jo Banks said. 'It's in memory of Roddy. It's what he would have wanted.'
They had the sound of words used previously. Rebus wondered: maybe Jo Banks had come to the widow with the idea. Just maybe...
'I can see your point, Inspector,' Seona Grieve informed Rebus. 'But if I'd wanted to, I could have stood. Roddy wouldn't have minded. I didn't need him dead for me to stand.'
'And yet he's dead, and here you are.'
'Here I am,' she agreed.
'With the whole of the party behind her,' Jo Banks cautioned. 'So if you're thinking of making any accusations...'
'They just want to find Roddy's killer,' Seona Grieve told her. 'Isn't that right, Inspector?'
Rebus nodded.
'Then we're still on the same side, aren't we?'
Rebus nodded again, but judging from the look on Jo Banks' face, he wasn't so sure she'd agree.
By the time Hamish arrived with a tray bearing coffee pot and cups, Seona Grieve was asking for a progress report and Linford was hauling out the usual flannel about 'pursuing leads' and 'inquiries still to make'. None of which looked to be convincing the two women, despite the effort he was putting in. Seona Grieve met Rebus's eyes and inclined her head a little, telling him she knew what he was thinking. Then she turned to Linford, interrupting him.
'It's an American phrase, I think. Never kid a kidder... Or is it never shit a shitter?' She looked to Hamish as if for help, but he merely shrugged and went on handing out the coffees. 'Sounds to me, DI Linford, as though you've made precious little progress.'
'Clutching at straws, more like,' Jo Banks muttered. 'We still have every confidence...' Linford began. 'Oh, I can see that. I can see you're positively brimming with the stuff. Because that's what's got you where you are today. I'm a teacher, DI Linford. I've seen plenty of boys like you. They leave school and feel it in their bones that they can do anything they set their minds to. With most of them, it doesn't last long. But you...' She wagged a ringer, then turned towards Rebus, who was blowing on the scalding coffee. 'DI Rebus, on the other hand...'
'What?' The question coming from Linford. 'DI Rebus has no confidence in anything very much any more. An accurate assessment?' Rebus blew on the coffee, said nothing. 'DI Rebus is jaded and cynical about most things. Weltschmerz, do you know that word, Inspector?'
'I think I ate some last time I was abroad,' Rebus said. She smiled at him; a smile without happiness. 'World-weariness.'
'Pessimism,' Hamish agreed.
'You won't be voting, will you, Inspector?' Seona Grieve asked. 'Because you don't see the point.'
'I'm all for job creation schemes,' Rebus said. Jo Banks let out a hiss of air; Hamish snorted good- naturedly. 'But there's something I can't figure out. If I've got a problem, who do I go to - my MSP, my list MSP, or my MP? Maybe my MEP or councillor? That's what I mean about job creation.'
'Then why am I doing this?' Seona Grieve said quietly, her hands in her lap. Jo Banks reached out and touched her hand.
'Because it makes sense,' she said.
When Seona Grieve looked up at Rebus, there were tears in her eyes. Rebus looked away.
'This may not seem like the time,' he said, 'but you told us your husband didn't drink. I believe at one time his drinking may have been a problem.'
'For heaven's sake,' Jo Banks hissed.
Seona Grieve blew her nose, sniffed. 'You've been talking to Billie.'
'Yes,' he acknowledged.
'Trying to blacken a dead man's name,' Jo Banks muttered.
Rebus looked at her. 'See, there's a problem, Ms Banks. We don't know what Roddy Grieve was doing in the hours prior to his death. So far we've a sighting of him in one pub, just the one, drinking on his own. We need to know if that's the kind of man he was: a solitary drinker. Then maybe we can stop wasting our time trying to locate the friends we've been told he would be out drinking ¦ Its all right, Jo,' Seona Grieve said quietly. Then, to Rebus: 'He said he felt he sometimes had to get out of himself.'
Where would he have gone?' e shook her head. 'He never said.'
The times he stayed out all night...?'
'I think maybe he went to hotels, or slept in the car.'
Rebus nodded, and she seemed to read his thoughts. Maybe he wasn't alone in doing that, Inspector?'
'Maybe,' he conceded. Some mornings, he'd woken in his car and didn't even know where he was... country roads, the middle of nowhere... 'Is there anything else we should know?'
She shook her head slowly.
'I'm sorry,' he said. 'I really am. I'm sorry.' Rebus laid his coffee cup on the table, got up, and left the room.
By the time Linford caught up with him, Rebus was seated in his Saab, window down, smoking. Linford leaned down so their faces were almost touching. Rebus blew some smoke past his ear.
'So what do you think?' Linford asked. Rebus considered his answer. Late afternoon; light had died from the sky. 'I think we're in the dark,' he said, 'swiping at things we think might be bats.'
'What does that mean?' The young man sounding genuinely annoyed.
'It means we'll never understand one another,' Rebus answered, starting his engine.
Linford stood at the kerbside, watching the Saab move off. He reached into his pocket for his mobile, put in a call to ACC Carswell at Fettes. He had the words formed and waiting in his head: I think maybe Rebus is going to be a problem after all. But as he waited to be put through, he had another thought: in saying as much to Carswell, he'd be admitting defeat, showing weakness. Carswell might understand, but that didn't mean he wouldn't see it as such: defeat; weakness. Linford cut the call, switched the phone off. This was his problem. It was up to him to think of a way round it.
Dean Coghill was dead. His building firm had been wound up, the company office now a design consultancy, the builders' yard turned into a three-storey block of flats. Hood and Wylie eventually tracked down an address for Coghill's widow.
'All these dead guys...' Grant Hood had commented.
Ellen Wylie's reply: 'The male of the species doesn't live as long as the female.'
They couldn't get a phone number for the widow, so went to the last known address.
'Probably died or retired to Benidorm,' Wylie said.
'Is there a difference then?'
Wylie smiled, brought the car in to the kerbside and pulled on the handbrake. Hood opened his door a fraction and peered down.
'No,' he said, 'this is fine. I can walk to the kerb from here.'
Wylie gave his arm a thump. He suspected it would bruise.
Meg Coghill was a short, spry woman in her early seventies. Though it didn't look like she was going out or ready for visitors, she was dressed immaculately and had made up her face. As she led them into the sitting room, there were noises from the kitchen.
'My cleaner,' Mrs Coghill explained. Hood felt like asking if she always dressed up for the cleaner, but thought he probably knew the answer already.
Do you want a cup of tea or something?'
'No. thank you, Mrs Coghill.' Ellen Wylie sat on the sofa. Hood remained standing, while Mrs Coghill sank into an armchair big enough to accommodate someone three times her size. Hood was looking at some framed
