Ian Rankin: A Good Hanging and other stories

Rebus stayed silent, but pursed his lips. Cluzeau nodded to himself, frowning.

‘Maybe,’ said Rebus, ‘you could explain your exhibition to us, M s Davies?’

‘Well, it’s a comment on Knox of course.’

‘Knocks?’ asked Cluzeau.

‘John Knox,’ Rebus explained. ‘We passed by his old house a little way back.’

‘John Knox,’ she went on, principally for the Frenchman’s benefit, but perhaps too, she thought, for that of the Scotsman, ‘was a Scottish preacher, a follower of Calvin. He was also a misogynist, hence the title of one of his works — The First Blast of the Trumpet Against the Monstrous Regiment of Women.’

‘He didn’t mean all women,’ Rebus felt obliged to add. Serena Davies straightened her spine like a snake rising up before its kill.

‘But he did,’ she said, ‘by association. And, also by association, these works are a comment on all Scotsmen. And all men.’

Cluzeau could feel an argument beginning. Arguments, to his knowledge, were always counter-productive even when enjoyable. ‘I think I see,’ he said. ‘And your exhibition responds to this man’s work. Yes.’ He tapped the catalogue. “Monstrous Trumpet” is a pun then?’

Serena Davies shrugged, but seemed pacified. ‘You could call it that. I’m saying that Knox talked with one part of his anatomy — not his brain.’

‘And,’ added Rebus, ‘that at the same time he talked out of his arse?’

‘Yes,’ she said.

Cluzeau was chuckling. He was still chuckling when he asked: ‘And who could have reason for stealing your work?’

The mane rippled again. ‘I’ve absolutely no idea.’

‘But you suspect one of your guests,’ Cluzeau continued. ‘Of course you do: you have already stated that there was no one else here. You were among friends, yet one of them is the Janus figure, yes?’

She nodded slowly. ‘Much as I hate to admit it.’

Rebus had taken the catalogue from Cluzeau and seemed to be studying it. But he’d listened to every word. He tapped the missing statue’s photo.

‘Do you work from life?’

‘Mostly, yes, but not for “Monstrous Trumpet”.’

‘It’s a sort of... ideal figure then?’

She smiled at this. ‘Hardly ideal, Inspector. But in that it comes from up here—’ she tapped her head, ‘from an idea rather than from life, yes, I suppose it is.’

‘Does that go for the face, too?’ Rebus persisted. ‘It seems so lifelike.’

She accepted the compliment, studying the photo with him. ‘It’s not any one man’s face,’ she said. ‘At most it’s a composite of men I know.’ Then she shrugged. ‘Maybe.’

Rebus handed the catalogue to Cluzeau. ‘Did you search anyone?’ he asked the artist.

‘I asked them to open their bags. Not very subtle of me, but I was - am — distraught.’

‘And did they?’

‘Oh yes. Pointless really, there were only two or three bags big enough to hide the statue in.’

‘But they were empty?’

She sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose between two fingers. The bracelets were shunted from wrist to elbow. ‘Utterly empty,’ she said. ‘Just as I feel.’

‘Was the piece insured?’

She shook her head again, her forehead lowered. A portrait of dejection, Rebus thought. Lifelike, yet not quite real. He noticed too that, now her eyes were averted, the Frenchman was appraising her. He caught Rebus watching him and raised his eyebrows, then shrugged, then made a gesture with his hands. Yes, thought Rebus, I know what you mean. Only don’t let her catch you thinking what I know you’re thinking.

And, he supposed, what he was thinking too.

‘I think we’d better go through,’ he said. ‘The other women will be getting impatient.’

‘Let them!’ she cried.

‘Actually,’ said Rebus, ‘perhaps you could go ahead of us? Warn them that we may be keeping them a bit longer than we thought.’

She brightened at the news, then sneered. ‘You mean you want me to do your dirty work for you?’

Rebus shrugged innocently. ‘I just wanted a moment to discuss the case with my colleague.’

‘Oh,’ she said. Then nodded: ‘Yes, of course. Discuss away. I’ll tell them they’ve to stay put.’

‘Thank you,’ said Rebus, but she’d already left the room.

Cluzeau whistled silently. ‘What a creature!’

It was meant as praise, of course, and Rebus nodded assent. ‘So what do you think?’

‘Think?’

‘About the theft.’

‘Ah.’ Cluzeau scraped at his chin with his fingers. ‘A crime of passion,’ he said at last and with confidence.

‘How do you work that out?’

Cluzeau gave another of his shrugs. ‘The process of elimination. We eliminate money: there are more expensive pieces here and besides, a common thief would burgle the premises when they were empty, no?’

Rebus nodded, enjoying this, so like his own train of thought was it. ‘Go on.’

‘I do not think this piece is so precious that a collector would have it stolen. It is not insured, so there is no reason for the artist herself to have it stolen. It seems logical that someone invited to the exhibition stole it. So we come to the figure of the Janus. Someone the artist herself knows. Why should such a person - a supposed friend - steal this work?’ He paused before answering his own question. ‘Jealousy. Revenge, et voilà, the crime of passion.’

Rebus applauded silently. ‘Bravo. But there are thirty-odd suspects out there and no sign of the statue.’

‘Ah, I did not say I could solve the crime; all I offer is the “why”.’

‘Then follow me,’ Rebus said, ‘and we’ll encounter the “who” and the “how” together.’

In the main gallery, Serena Davies was in furious conversation with one knot of women. Brian Holmes was trying to take names and addresses from another group. A third group stood, bored and disconsolate, by the drinks table, and a fourth group stood beside a bright red gash of a painting, glancing at it from time to time and talking among themselves.

Most of the women in the room either carried clutch-purses tucked safely under their arms, or else let neat shoulder-bags swing effortlessly by their sides. But there were a few larger bags and these had been left in a group of their own between the drinks table and another smaller table on which sat a small pile of catalogues and a visitors’ book. Rebus walked across to this spot and studied the bags. There was one large straw shopping-bag, apparently containing only a cashmere cardigan and a folded copy of the Guardian. There was one department store plastic carrier-bag, containing an umbrella, a bunch of bananas, a fat paperback and a copy of the Guardian. There was one canvas shopping-bag, containing an empty crisp packet, a copy of the Scotsman and a copy of the Guardian.

All this Rebus could see just by standing over the bags. He reached down and picked up the carrier-bag.

‘Can I ask whose bag this is?’ he said loudly.

‘It’s mine.’

A young woman stepped forward from the drinks table, starting to blush furiously.

‘Follow me, please,’ said Rebus, walking off to the next room along. Cluzeau followed and so, seconds later, did the owner of the bag, her eyes terrified.

‘Just a couple of questions, that’s all,’ Rebus said, trying to put her at ease. The main gallery was hushed; he knew people would be straining to hear the conversation. Brian Holmes was repeating an address to himself as he jotted it down.

Rebus felt a little bit like an executioner, walking up to the bags, picking them up in turn and wandering off with the owner towards the awaiting guillotine. The owner of the carrier-bag was Trish Poole, wife of a psychology lecturer at the university. Rebus had met Dr Poole before, and told her so, trying to help her relax a little. It turned out that a lot of the women present today were either academics in their own right, or else were the wives of academics. This latter group included not only Trish Poole, but also Rebecca Eiser, wife of the distinguished Professor of English Literature. Listening to Trish Poole tell him this, Rebus shivered and could feel his face turn pale. But that had been a long time ago.