'For your help, and to keep this on the q. t.' The bar hadn't been damaged, but he insisted on paying up anyway. 'Sometimes it takes a while for the damage to show,' he told the barman. Then he bought a round of drinks and clapped a hand on Rab's neck.
'Time you were in bed, son.' Rab's room key was on the bar. The staff all knew he was with Big Ger. 'Next time you want a rammy, try playing away from home, eh?'
'Sorry, Big Ger.'
'Got to look out for one another, eh, Rab? Sometimes that means using the brain as well as the brawn.'
'I'll be fine, Big Ger. Sorry again.'
'Off you go now. There's a mirror in the lift, so don't you go swinging a punch at it.'
Rab tried to smile. He looked sleepy after all the excitement. Cafferty watched him slouch out of the bar. He felt like a drink, but not here, not with these people. Leave them be, let them get it out of their systems with gossip and retelling. There was a minibar in his room, and that would do him for tonight. He apologised with a wave of his arms, then followed Rab to the lift, stood with him in its close confines all the way to the third floor. It was like being back in a cell. Rab's eyes were closed. He was leaning against the mirror. Gafferty kept his eyes on him and didn't blink once.
Does it matter? That had been Rab's question. Cafferty was beginning to wonder.
As Rebus walked into St Leonard's next morning, two uniforms were discussing a film from the previous night's TV.
'When Harry Met Sally, you must've seen it, sir.'
'Not last night. Some of us have got better things to do.'
'We're just talking about whether men can be friends with women without wanting to sleep with them. That's the plot, you see.'
'I reckon,' the second uniform said, 'as soon as a bloke claps eyes on a woman, first thing he wonders is what she'd be like in the scratcher.'
Rebus could hear raised voices in the CID suite. 'If you'll excuse me, gents, more urgent business...'
'Lovers' tiff,' one of the uniforms said.
Rebus turned back towards him. 'Pal, you couldn't be further from the truth.'
Siobhan had Derek Linford backed into a corner of the room. She also had an audience: DI Bill Pryde, DS Roy Frazer and DS George Hi-Ho Silvers. They were seated at their desks, enjoying the spectacle. Rebus gave all three a withering glance as he waded in. Siobhan had Linford by the throat, her face close to his - by dint of standing on tiptoe. He had paperwork in one hand, turned into a crumpled wad by the involuntary tightening of his fist. He was holding his other hand up in a gesture of surrender.
'And if you so much as think my telephone number, never mind calling it,' Siobhan was yelling, 'I'll twist your balls so hard they'll drop off!'
From behind, Rebus brought his hands down hard on hers, pulling them off Linford. Her head snapped round, face flushed with anger. Linford was coughing.
'This what you call a word?' Rebus asked her.
'Knew you'd be involved somewhere,' Linford spat.
Siobhan turned back to him. 'This is you and me. arsehole, nobody else!'
'Think you're God's gift, don't you?'
Rebus: 'Shut up, Linford. Don't make it any worse than you have.'
'I haven't done anything.'
Siobhan tried pulling away from Rebus. 'You fucking snake!'
And then a voice behind them, booming with authority: 'What the hell's going on here?' All three looked towards the open doorway. Chief Superintendent Watson was standing there. And he had a visitor: Colin Carswell, the Assistant Chief Constable.
Rebus was the last to be 'invited' to give the Chief Super his side of the story. There were just the two of them in the office. The Farmer - nicknamed for his ruddy-coloured face and north-east agricultural background - sat with hands pressed together, a sharpened pencil resting between them.
'Am I supposed to fall on that?' Rebus asked, pointing to the pencil. 'Ritual hara-kiri?'
'You're supposed to tell me what was happening back there. The one day the ACC comes calling...'
'He'll be taking Linford's side, of course?'
The Farmer glared at him. 'Don't start. Just give me your version, for what it's worth.'
'What's the point? I know what the other two will have told you.'
'What exactly?'
'Siobhan will have told the truth, and Linford will have come up with a pack of lies to save his arse.' Rebus shrugged as the Farmer's face grew darker.
'Humour me,' he said.
'Siobhan went out a couple of times with Linford.' Rebus recited. 'Nothing serious. Then she sent him packing. I was round her place one evening discussing her case. Came out and was sitting in my car, saw someone from the opposite tenement come out, go for a pee round the corner, and head back again. I went to investigate, and it was Linford, spying on her from the tenement stairwell. Then last night, she phones me, says she thinks she's being watched. So I told her about Linford.'
'Why didn't you tell her before?'
'Didn't want to upset her. Besides, I thought Fd scared him off.' Rebus shrugged again. 'I'm obviously not the hard case I think I am.'
The Farmer leaned back in his chair. 'And what does Linford say?'
'I'm betting he's told you it's a pile of shite concocted by DI John Rebus. Siobhan was mistaken, I made up this story, and she swallowed it.'
'And why would you do that?'
'So he'd push off and let me work the case the way I want to work it.'
The Farmer looked down at the pencil he was still holding. 'Actually, that's not the reason he gave.'
'What then?'
'He says you want Siobhan for yourself.'
Rebus screwed his face into a sneer. 'Well, that's his fantasy, not mine.'
'No?'
'Absolutely not.' .
'I can't let this go, you know. Not with Carswell as witness.'
'Yes, sir.'
'What do you think I should do?'
'If it were me, sir, pack Linford off back to Fettes where he can continue to be their desk-bound blue-eyed boy. far from the hurly-burly of actual policing.'
'Mr Linford doesn't want that.'
Rebus couldn't help reacting. 'He wants to stay here?' The Farmer nodded. 'Why?'
'He says he holds no grudge. Puts it down to the 'hothouse conditions' on the case.'
'I don't get it.'
'Frankly, neither do I.' The Farmer rose, made for his coffee machine. Pointedly, he poured just the one mug. Rebus tried not to let his relief show. 'If I was him, I'd want to be shot of the lot of you.' The Farmer paused, sat down again. 'But what DI Linford wants, DI Linford gets.'
'It's going to be ugly.'
'Why?'
'Seen the CID suite lately? We're swamped. Hard enough to keep Siobhan and him apart under normal conditions, but the cases we're working on could be connected.'
'So DS Clarke tells me.'
'She said you were thinking of pulling the Supertramp inquiry.'
