embrace … a fall.
He shrugged non-committally and made for his car.
Chief Inspector Frank Lauderdale was going to be all right.
That was the good news.
The bad news was that DI Alister Flower was looking for temporary promotion to fill Lauderdale’s shoes.
‘And with the funeral meats not yet cold,’ said Chief Superintendent ‘Farmer’ Watson. He blushed, realising what he’d said. ‘Not that there’s … I mean, no funeral or …’ He coughed into his bunched fist.
‘Flower’s got a point though, sir,’ said Rebus, covering his boss’s embarrassment. ‘It’s just that he’s got the tact of a tomcat. I mean, somebody’ll have to fill in. How long’s Frank going to be out of the game?’
‘We don’t know.’ The Farmer picked up a sheet of paper and read from it. ‘Both legs broken, two broken ribs, broken wrist, concussion: there’s half a page of diagnosis here.’
Rebus rubbed his bruised cheekbone, wondering if it was responsible for the broken wrist.
‘We don’t even know,’ the Farmer went on quietly, ‘whether he’ll walk again. The breaks were pretty severe. Meantime, the last thing I need is Flower and you vying for any temporary promotion it may or may not be in my power to give.’
‘Understood.’
‘Good.’ The Farmer paused. ‘So what can you tell me about last night?’
‘It’ll be in my report, sir.’
‘Of course it will, but I’d prefer the truth. What was Frank playing at?’
‘How do you mean?’
‘I mean driving around like the Dukes of Hazzard. We’ve got expendables for that sort of escapade.’
‘We were just maintaining a pursuit, sir.’
‘Of course you were.’ Watson studied Rebus. ‘Nothing you’d like to add to that?’
‘Not much, sir. Except that it was no accident, and they’d no intention of getting away. It was a suicide pact: unspoken, but suicide all the same.’
‘And why would they do that?’
‘I’ve no idea, sir.’
The Farmer sighed and sat back in his chair. ‘John, I think you should know my feelings on all of this.’
‘Yes, sir?’
‘It was an utter balls-up from start to finish.’
… And that was putting it mildly.
They were only there because of power, because of influence, because a favour was asked. That was how it had started: with a discreet call from the city’s Lord Provost to the deputy chief constable of Lothian and Borders Police, requesting that his daughter’s disappearance be investigated.
Not that anything unlawful was hinted at. It wasn’t that she’d been abducted, assaulted, murdered, nothing like that. It was just that she’d walked out of the house one morning and not come back. Yes, she’d left a note. It was addressed to her father and the message was simple: ‘Arseholes, I’m off.’ It was unsigned, but was in the daughter’s handwriting.
Had there been a disagreement? An argument? Strong words? Well, it was impossible to have a teenager in the house without the occasional difference of view. And how old was the Lord Provost’s daughter, little Kirstie Kennedy? There came the crux: she was seventeen, and a mature, well-educated seventeen at that, well able to look after herself and old enough legally to leave home any time she wished. Which should have taken the matter out of the police’s hands, except … except that it was the Lord Provost asking, the Right Honourable Cameron McLeod Kennedy, JP, Councillor for South Gyle.
So the message filtered down from the DCC: take a look for Kirstie Kennedy, but keep it quiet.
Which was, everyone agreed, next to impossible. You didn’t ask questions on the street without rumours starting, people fearing the worst for the subject of your questions. This was the excuse given when the media got hold of the story.
There was a photograph of the daughter, a photo police had been given and which somehow the media got their paws on. The Lord Provost was furious about that. It proved to him that he had enemies within the force. As Rebus could have told him, if you went
So there she was, on TV and in the papers: little Kirstie Kennedy. Not a very recent photo, maybe two or three years out of date; and the difference between fourteen or fifteen and seventeen was crucial. Rebus, father of a one-time teenage daughter, knew that. Kirstie was grown up now, and the photo would be next to useless in helping trace her.
The Lord Provost quietened the media hubbub by giving a press conference. His wife was with him — his second wife, not Kirstie’s mother; Kirstie’s mother was dead — and she was asked what she’d like to say to the runaway.
‘I’d just like her to know we’re praying for her, that’s all.’
And then came the first phone call.
It wasn’t hard to phone the Lord Provost. He was in the phone book, plus his appointments number was listed alongside every other councillor in a useful pamphlet handed out to tens of thousands of Edinburgh residents.
The caller sounded young, a voice not long broken. He hadn’t given a name. All he’d said was that he had Kirstie, and that he wanted money for her return. He’d even put a girl on the phone. She’d squealed a couple of words before being pulled away. The words had been ‘Dad’ and ‘I’.
The Lord Provost couldn’t be sure it was Kirstie, but he couldn’t not be sure either. He wanted the police’s help again, and they told him to set up a drop with the kidnappers; only there wouldn’t be money waiting for them, there’d be police officers and plenty of them.
The intention wasn’t to confront but to tail. A police helicopter was brought into play, along with four unmarked cars. It should have been easy.
It should have been. But the caller had selected as drop zone a bus stop on the busy Queensferry Road. Lots of fast-moving traffic, and nowhere to stop an unmarked car inconspicuously. The caller had been clever. When it came time for the pick-up, the Cortina had stopped on the other side of the road from the bus stop. The passenger had come hurtling across the road, dodging traffic, picked up the bag full of wads of newspaper, and taken it back to the waiting car.
Three of the police cars were facing the wrong way, and it took a devil of a time to turn them round. But the fourth had radioed back with the suspect car’s whereabouts. The helicopter, of course, had been grounded earlier, the weather being impossible. All of which left Lauderdale — officer in charge — furiously gunning his car to catch up with the race, and shedding years in the process.
Rebus hoped it had been worth it. He hoped Lauderdale, lying strapped up in hospital, would get a thrill from remembering the chase. All it had given Rebus were a sick feeling in the gut, a bad dream, and this damned sore face.
There was a collection going around to buy something for the chief inspector. Pointedly and all too quickly, DI Alister Flower put in a tenner. He was walking around with his chest stuck out and a greasepaint smile on his face. Rebus loathed him more than ever.
Everybody kept looking at Rebus, wondering if he’d be promoted over Flower. Wondering what Rebus would do if Flower suddenly became
Rebus was not alone in reckoning the kidnapping for a hoax. They’d know for sure very soon, now that they had traced the car, located its owner, discovered that he’d loaned it to two friends and gone to those friends’ shared house only to find nobody home.
The car owner was downstairs in an interview room. They were telling him that if he was straight with them, they’d forget about the car’s lack of proper insurance. He was telling them story after story, the life and times of
