By the time they reached the restaurant, however, it was closed — even to Rebus — so they stayed in the taxi and Rebus directed the driver towards his flat.
‘I’m a dab hand at bacon sandwiches,’ he said.
‘What a pity,’ she said. ‘I’m a vegetarian.’
‘Good God, you mean you eat no vegetables at all?’
‘Why is it,’ acid seeping into her voice, ‘that carnivores always have to make a joke out of it? It’s the same with men and women’s lib. Why is that?’
‘It’s because we’re afraid of them,’ said Rebus, quite sober now.
Gill looked at him, but he was watching from his window as the city’s late-night drunks rolled their way up and down the obstacle-strewn hazard of Lothian Road, seeking alcohol, women, happiness. It was a never-ending search for some of them, staggering in and out of clubs and pubs and take-aways, gnawing on the packaged bones of existence. Lothian Road was Edinburgh’s dustbin. It was also home to the Sheraton Hotel and the Usher Hall. Rebus had visited the Usher Hall once, sitting with Rhona and the other smug souls listening to Mozart’s Requiem Mass. It was typical of Edinburgh to have a crumb of culture sited amidst the fast-food shops. A requiem mass and a bag of chips.
‘So how is the old Press Liaison these days?’
They were seated in his rapidly tidied living-room. His pride and joy, a Nakamichi tape-deck, was tastefully broadcasting one of his collection of late-night-listening jazz tapes; Stan Getz or Coleman Hawkins.
He had rustled up a round of tuna fish and tomato sandwiches, Gill having admitted that she ate fish occasionally. The bottle of wine was open, and he had prepared a pot of freshly ground coffee (a treat usually reserved for Sunday breakfasts). He now sat across from his guest, watching her eat. He thought with a small start that this was his first female guest since Rhona had left him, but then recalled, very vaguely, a couple of other one-nighters.
‘Press Liaison is fine. It’s not really a complete waste of time, you know. It serves a useful purpose in this day and age.’
‘Oh, I’m not knocking it.’
She looked at him, trying to gauge how serious he was being.
‘Well,’ she went on, ‘it’s just that I know a lot of our colleagues who think that a job like mine is a complete waste of time and manpower. Believe me, in a case like this one it’s absolutely crucial that we keep the media on
‘Hear, hear.’
‘Be serious, you rat.’
Rebus laughed.
‘I’m never anything other than serious. A one-hundred percent policeman’s policeman, that’s me.’
Gill Templer stared at him again. She had a real inspector’s eyes: they worked into your conscience, sniffing out guilt and guile and drive, seeking give.
‘And being a Liaison Officer,’ said Rebus, ‘means that you have to … liaise with the press quite closely, — right?’
‘I know what you’re getting at, Sergeant Rebus, and as your superior, I’m telling you to stop it.’
‘Ma’am!’ Rebus gave her a short salute.
He came back from the kitchen with another pot of coffee.
‘Wasn’t that a dreadful party?’ said Gill.
‘It was the finest party I have ever attended,’ said Rebus. ‘After all, without it, I might never have met you.’
She roared with laughter this time, her mouth filled with a paste of tuna and bread and tomato.
‘You’re a nutter,’ she cried, ‘you really are.’
Rebus raised his eyebrows, smiling. Had he lost his touch? He had not. It was miraculous.
Later, she needed to go to the bathroom. Rebus was changing a tape, and realising how limited his musical tastes were. Who were these groups that she kept referring to?
‘It’s in the hall,’ he said. ‘On the left.’
When she returned, more jazz was playing, the music at times almost too low to be heard, and Rebus was back in his chair.
‘What’s that room across from the bathroom, John?’
‘Well,’ he said, pouring coffee, ‘it used to be my daughter’s, but now it’s just full of junk. I never use it.’
‘When did your wife and you split up?’
‘Not as long ago as we should have. I mean that seriously.’
‘How old is your daughter?’ She sounded maternal now, domestic; no longer the acid single woman or the professional.
‘Nearly twelve,’ he said. ‘Nearly twelve.’
‘It’s a difficult age.’
‘Aren’t they all.’
When the wine was finished and the coffee was down to its last half-cup, one or the other of them suggested bed. They exchanged sheepish smiles and ritual promises about not promising anything, and, the contract agreed and signed without words, went to the bedroom.
It all started well enough. They were mature, had played this game before too often to let the little fumblings and apologies get to them. Rebus was impressed by her agility and invention, and hoped that she was being impressed by his. She arched her spine to meet him, seeking the ultimate and unobtainable ingress.
‘John,’ pushing at him now.
‘What is it?’
‘Nothing. I’m just going to turn over, okay?’
He knelt up, and she turned her back to him, sliding her knees down the bed, clawing at the smooth wall with her fingertips, waiting. Rebus, in the slight pause, looked around at the room, the pale blue light shading his books, the edges of the mattress.
‘Oh, a futon,’ she had said, pulling her clothes off quickly. He had smiled in the silence.
He was losing it.
‘Come on, John. Come on.’
He bent towards her, resting his face on her back. He had talked about books with Gordon Reeve when they had been captured. Talked endlessly, it seemed, reading to him from his memory. In close confinement, torture a closed door away. But they had endured. It was a mark of the training.
‘John, oh, John.’
Gill raised herself up and turned her head towards his, seeking a kiss. Gill, Gordon Reeve, seeking something from him, something he couldn’t give. Despite the training, despite the years of practice, the years of work and persistence.
‘John?’
But he was elsewhere now, back inside the training camp, back trudging across a muddy field, the Boss screaming at him to speed up, back in that cell, watching a cockroach pace the begrimed floor, back in the helicopter, a bag over his head, the spray of the sea salty in his ears …
‘John?’
She turned round now, awkwardly, concerned. She saw the tears about to start from his eyes. She held his head to her.
‘Oh, John. It doesn’t matter. Really, it doesn’t.’
And a little later: ‘Don’t you like it that way?’
They lay together afterwards, he guiltily, and cursing the facts of his confusion and the fact that he had run out of cigarettes, she drowsily, caring still, whispering bits and pieces of her life-story to him.
After a while, Rebus forgot to feel guilty: there was nothing, after all, to feel guilty about. He felt merely the
