Black Book

with. Will you be joining us tomorrow?’

‘Probably.’

‘Only I thought maybe we could talk about the Central Hotel.’

‘Speaking of which, have you seen Brian?’

‘I popped in after work. He looks great.’ She paused. ‘You sound tired. Have you been working?’

‘Yes.’

‘The Central?’

‘Christ knows. I suppose so.’ Rebus rubbed the back of his neck. The hangover was starting already.

‘You had to buy a few drinks?’ Siobhan guessed.

‘Yes.’

‘And drink a few?’

‘Right again, Sherlock.’

She laughed, then tutted. ‘And afterwards you drove home. I’d be happy to chauffeur you if it would help.’ She sounded like she meant it.

‘Thanks, Clarke. I’ll bear it in mind.’ He paused. ‘Know what I’d like for Christmas?’

‘It’s a long way off.’

‘I’d like someone to prove that the corpse belongs to one of the Bru-Head Brothers.’

‘The body had a broken-’

‘I know, I’ve checked. The hospitals came up with spit.’ He paused again. ‘Not your problem,’ he said. ‘I’ll see you tomorrow.’

‘Good night, sir.’

Rebus sat in silence for a minute or two. Something about his conversation with Siobhan Clarke made him want to talk with Patience. He picked up the receiver again and rang her.

‘Hello?’

Ye Gods, not an answering machine!

‘Hello, Patience.’

‘John.’

‘I’d like to talk. Are you ready?’

There was silence, then: ‘Yes, I think so. Let’s talk.’

John Rebus lay down on the sofa, one hand behind his head. Nobody else used the phone that night.

15

John Rebus was in a good mood that Tuesday morning, for no other reason than that he’d spent what seemed like half the previous night on the phone with Patience. They were going to meet for a drink; he just had to wait for her to get back to him with a place and a time. He was still in a good mood when he opened the ground floor door and started up the stairs towards Operation Moneybags’ Gorgie centre of operations.

He could hear voices; nothing unusual about that. But the voices grew in intensity as he climbed, and he opened the door just in time to see a man lunge at DC Petrie and butt him square on the nose. Petrie fell back against the window, knocking over the camera tripod. Blood gushed from his nostrils. Rebus only half took in that two small boys were watching, along with Siobhan Clarke and Elsa-Beth Jardine. The man was pulling Petrie upright when Rebus got an arm lock around him, pinning the man’s arms to his side. He pulled Rebus to right and left, trying to throw him off, all the time yelling so loudly it was a wonder nobody on the street below could hear the commotion.

Rebus heaved the man backwards and turned him, so that he lost balance and fell to the floor, where Rebus sat on top of him. Petrie started forward, but the man lashed out with his legs and sent Petrie back into the window, where his elbow smashed the glass. Rebus did what he had to do. He punched the man in the throat.

‘What the hell’s going on here?’ he asked. The man was gasping but still struggling. ‘You, stop it!’ Then something hit Rebus on the back of his head. It was the clenched fist of one of the boys, and it hit him right on his burnt patch of scalp. He screwed shut his eyes, fighting the stinging pain of the blow and a nausea in his gut, right where his muesli and tea with honey were sitting.

‘Leave my dad alone!’

Siobhan Clarke grabbed the boy and dragged him off.

‘Arrest that little bugger,’ Rebus said. Then, to the boy’s father: ‘I mean it, too. If you don’t calm down, I’m going to have him charged with assault. How would you like that?’

‘He’s too young,’ gasped the man.

‘Is he?’ said Rebus. ‘Are you sure?’

The man thought about it and calmed down.

‘That’s better.’ Rebus rose from the man’s chest. ‘Now is someone going to explain all this to me?’

It was quickly explained, once Petrie had been sent off to find a doctor for his nose and the boys had been sent home. The man was called Bill Chilton, and Bill Chilton didn’t like squatters.

‘Squatters?’

‘That’s what Wee Neilly told me.’

‘Squatters?’ Rebus turned to Siobhan Clarke. She’d been downstairs to check no passers-by had been injured by falling glass, and more importantly to explain the ‘accident’.

‘The two boys,’ she said now, ‘came barging in. They said they sometimes played here.’

Rebus stopped her and turned to Chilton. ‘Why isn’t Neil at school?’

‘He’s been suspended for fighting.’

Rebus nodded. ‘He’s got a fair punch on him.’ The back of his head throbbed agreement. He turned back to Siobhan.

‘They asked us what we were doing, and Ms Jardine’-at this Elsa-Beth Jardine lowered her head-‘told them we were squatters.’

‘Just joking,’ Jardine found it necessary to add. Rebus feigned surprise, and she lowered her eyes again, blushing furiously.

‘DC Petrie joined in, the boys cleared out, and we all had a laugh about it.’

‘A laugh?’ Rebus said. ‘It wasn’t a laugh, it was a breach of security.’ He sounded as furious as he looked, so that even Siobhan turned her eyes away from his. He now turned his gaze on Bill Chilton.

‘Well,’ Chilton continued, ‘Neil came home and told me there were squatters here. We’ve had a lot of that going on this past year or two, deserted tenement flats being broken open and used for all sorts of thing…drug pushing and that. Some of us are doing something about it.’

‘What are we talking about here, Mr Chilton? Vigilante tactics? Pickaxe handles at dawn?’

Chilton was unabashed. ‘You lot are doing bugger all!’

‘So you came up here looking to scare the squatters off?’

‘Before they got a toe-hold, aye.’

‘And?’

Chilton said nothing.

‘And,’ Rebus said for him, ‘you started shouting the odds at DC Petrie, who started shouting back that he was a police officer and you’d better bugger off. Only by that time you were too fired up to back off. Got a bit of a temper, Mr Chilton? Maybe it’s rubbed off on Neilly, eh? Did you get into a lot of fights at school?’

‘What the hell’s that got to do with anything?’ Chilton’s anger was rising again. Rebus raised a pacifying hand.

‘It’s a serious offence, assaulting a police officer.’

‘Mistaken identity,’ said Chilton.

‘Even after he’d identified himself?’