Ian Rankin: Let It Bleed

‘Know who you should phone now?’ Rebus suggested. ‘Your pal Allan Gunner. Ask him why me instead of you. Know what he’ll say? Well, he might not say it, but it’s the truth. He’s promoting me because I’m dangerous to him. I’m too dangerous for the usual demotion, so instead he’s offering a bribe. And you’re being left behind because he can afford to ignore you. That’s a simple fact.’

‘Why are you telling me this?’ Flower hissed.

‘Believe me, it’s not just for the thrill of seeing you squirm.’

‘Why then?’

Rebus leaned forward. ‘How,’ he asked confidentially, ‘would you like my promotion?’ Flower just sneered. It hurt Rebus to say what he was saying, but he tried not to let that show. He would sacrifice this and much more for a single, risky shot at his quarry. Above all, though, he wouldn’t tell Flower about the move to Galashiels that went along with it … ‘I mean it,’ he said.

Flower saw with deep amazement that he did. ‘What do I have to do?’

Winter mornings could sap you of good intentions and foolhardy schemes. Rebus and Flower wanted to be in their separate beds, tucked beneath a nice heavy woman, but instead were sitting in Rebus’s car, across the street from Allan Gunner’s house. It was still dark. A milk van passed, and a bread van, and a few bleak souls on their way to catch the first bus of the day.

‘So this is morning,’ Flower said.

‘Not a pretty sight, is it?’

‘You think this will work?’

‘Have faith.’ Rebus looked towards the house. ‘He’s up.’

Flower peered out through the windscreen. A light had come on upstairs in the Gunner household.

‘We’ll give him five minutes,’ said Rebus.

But only two minutes later, the downstairs lights came on.

‘Could be the wife,’ Flower suggested, ‘cooking a hearty breakfast for her deserving husband.’

‘Have you ever heard the phrase “New Man”?’

‘It’s a shop, isn’t it? What do you reckon, a couple more minutes? Let him get his feet under the breakfast table?’

‘My legs are blocks of ice,’ Rebus said, opening the car door. ‘Let’s do it now.’

They rang the doorbell, and heard Gunner’s voice calling, ‘I’ll get it!’ Then the door opened, revealing the deputy chief constable in shirt but not yet necktie or cufflinks, a mug of coffee in his hand. He took a step back into the hall.

‘What the hell are you doing here?’

‘Canvassing for the Natural Law Party,’ Rebus said, stepping into the centrally heated house.

Gunner ran upstairs to have a word with his wife, and Rebus and Flower walked uninvited into the kitchen. Smoke was pouring from the electric grill. Flower lifted the grill-pan out and blew on the cremated bread. ‘New Man, eh?’

Rebus switched the kettle back on and lifted two mugs from the draining-board. He was unscrewing the lid from the coffee-jar when Gunner returned. Gunner snatched the jar from him.

‘Christ, you’ve got some gall.’ He switched the kettle off. ‘Why are you here?’ He checked his watch, saw he hadn’t put it on yet, and glanced instead at the wall-clock. ‘Half a minute, then you’re on your way.’

‘We want the file you’ve compiled,’ Rebus said, ‘and the tape Sir lain made. I think that’ll do for now.’

Gunner looked to Flower. ‘He’s roped you in, eh? You must be mad. I could have you both up before the chief constable.’

‘We’d like nothing better,’ Flower said. He threw the remains of the toast into the bin. ‘You lied to me.’

‘If we don’t get the file and the tape,’ Rebus said, ‘we take it further anyway. We’re going to kick up such a stink, you’ll think your drains have backed up. It’ll be everywhere, believe me. There won’t be enough clothes-pegs to go round.’

‘You are mad. I’m not going to give you anything.’

‘We’ll start with the chief constable and the newspapers.’

Gunner folded his arms. ‘Be my guests. You’ve just dug yourselves a very deep hole.’

‘Holes have their uses,’ Rebus said, ‘when the bullets start to fly.’

‘Get out!’ Gunner snarled.

They got out.

‘Think we were too obliging?’ Flower muttered as they walked back down the path. ‘We could have been harder on him.’

‘It went fine. It’s down to him now. Is he watching?’ Flower glanced back. ‘Bedroom window.’

‘Right.’

They walked to Rebus’s car, got in and drove off.

A hundred yards along the road, Rebus stopped long enough to let Flower out. Flower’s own car was parked there, and he got into it quickly. Rebus checked in his rearview, but Gunner hadn’t come out of the house to check their departure, not on a morning like this. He drove on, went around the block, and ended up on the other side of Gunner’s house.

They daren’t trust to police frequencies, so had borrowed a couple of on-line cellular phones from a dealer who’d owed Rebus a favour. Rebus’s phone rang, and he picked it up.

‘Any sign of him?’ Flower said.

‘Not yet.’

‘Maybe he’s on the mark-two toast.’

‘I don’t think he’ll have much of an appetite.’

It was five minutes more before Rebus heard a door bang shut. Then Gunner’s gate opened. His Rover 800 was directly outside, and he unlocked it, got in, and started the engine.

‘Bingo,’ said Rebus.

‘Has he anything with him?’

‘A briefcase.’

‘Well, here’s hoping.’

Rebus had parked away from the street-lighting, and was careful not to start his engine until Gunner was already on the move. Smoke billowed from his exhaust, hanging in the sub-zero air. Gunner’s back windscreen was frosted over, and he hadn’t taken time to scrape it.

‘Fall in behind me,’ Rebus told Flower, just before passing his stationary car.

Soon they joined a slow-moving stream of commuter traffic heading into town. The Rover’s rear de-mister had taken care of the frost. When they came to a section of dual carriageway, Flower overtook Rebus.

‘Where’s he headed?’

‘Not to work,’ Rebus said. ‘Not this way.’

They’d discussed routes he might take, places he might go. Princes Street hadn’t figured in their calculations. There was light in the sky now, a deep bruise hanging over the Castle and the Old Town. Rebus’s heater wasn’t working properly — it only did that in the summer — and he curled his toes inside his shoes.

‘He’s signalling,’ Flower said. ‘Turning left on to Waverley Bridge. Maybe he’s got a train to catch.’

Rebus thought he knew. ‘No, but he’s headed for the station.’

A long line of black taxis crept up from the subterranean concourse of Waverley Station, waiting their turn to take the commuters to business appointments and power breakfasts. They headed past the taxis, down the steep slope until they were underground. Gunner drove past the pick-up/drop-off point, and looked for a moment as if he was going to head up the exit ramp and back on to Waverley Bridge. But he took a left instead, and found a parking bay towards the back of the station.

‘Find yourself a space,’ Rebus told Flower, ‘and follow on foot.’

‘What if he sees me?’

‘Get on to the platform, walk down it.’

‘What if he goes on to the platform?’

‘He hasn’t come here for the trains. Hey, and take your phone with you.’

Rebus parked and headed round the other side of the concourse, anti-clockwise to Gunner’s clockwise. He managed a light jog, as if he was fighting a tight schedule. He walked down a platform towards the rear of the station, the telephone up to his face, as much for camouflage as anything.