Ian Rankin - Knots And Crosses

‘You’re a student, I suppose?’

‘That’s right,’ she said, shuffling uncomfortably. She knew a buyer when she saw one. This was not a buyer.

‘Edinburgh University?’

‘Yes.’

‘Studying what?’

‘English and politics.’

‘English? Have you heard of a guy called Eiser? He teaches there.’

She nodded.

‘He’s an old fascist,’ she said. ‘His theory of reading is a piece of right-wing propaganda to pull the wool over the eyes of the proletariat.’

Rebus nodded.

‘What was your party again?’

‘Workers Revolutionary.’

‘But you’re a student, eh? Not a worker, not one of the proletariat either by the sound of you.’ Her face was red, her eyes burning fire. Come the revolution, Rebus would be first against the wall. But he had not yet played his trump card. ‘So really, you’re contravening the Trades Description Act, aren’t you? And what about that tin? Do you have a licence from the proper authority to collect money in that tin?’

The tin was old, its old job-description torn from it. It was a plain, red cylinder, the kind used on poppy-day. But this was no poppy-day.

‘Are you a cop?’

‘Got it in one, love. Have you got a licence? I may have to pull you in otherwise.’

‘Fucking pig!’

Feeling this a fitting exit line, she turned from Rebus and walked to the door. Rebus, chuckling, finished his whisky. Poor girl. She would change. The idealism would vanish once she saw how hypocritical the whole game was, and what luxuries lay outside university. When she left, she’d want it all: the executive job in London, the flat, car, salary, wine-bar. She would chuck it all in for a slice of pie. But she wouldn’t understand that just now. Now was for the reaction against upbringing. That was what university was about. They all thought they could change the world once they got away from their parents. Rebus had thought that too. He had thought to return home from the Army with a row of medals and a list of commendations, just to show them. It had not been that way, though. Chastened, he was about to go when a voice called to him from three or four bar-stools away.

‘It disnae cure anything, dis it, son?’

An aged crone offered him these few pearls of wisdom from her carious mouth. Rebus watched her tongue slopping around in that black cavern.

‘Aye,’ he said, paying the barman, who thanked him with green teeth. Rebus could hear the television, the jingle of the cash-register, the shouted conversations of the old men, but behind it all, behind the cacophony, lay another sound, low and pure but more real to him than any of the others.

It was the sound of Gordon Reeve screaming.

Let me out Let me out

But Rebus did not go dizzy this time, nor did he panic and run for it. He stood up to the sound and allowed it to make its point, let it wash over him until it had had its say. He would never run away from that memory again.

‘Drink never cured anything, son,’ continued his personal witch. ‘Look at me. I wis as guid as anybody once upon a time, but when my husband died I just went tae pieces. D’ye ken whit I mean, son? The drink wis a great comfort tae me then, or so I thocht. But it tricks ye. It plays games wi ye. Ye jist sit aw day daein’ nothing but drinking. And life passes ye by.’

She was right. How could he take the time to sit here guzzling whisky and sentiment when his daughter’s life was balanced so finely? He must be mad; he was losing reality again. He had to hang onto that at the very least. He could pray again, but that only seemed to take him further away from the brute facts, and it was facts that he was chasing now, not dreams. He was chasing the fact that a lunatic from his cupboard of bad dreams had sneaked into this world and carried off his daughter. Did it resemble a fairy tale? All the better: there was bound to be a happy ending.

‘You’re right, love,’ he said. Then, ready to leave, he pointed to her empty glass. ‘Want another of those?’

She stared at him through rheumy eyes, then wagged her chin in a parody of compliance.

‘Another of what the lady’s drinking,’ Rebus said to the green-toothed barman. He handed over some coins. ‘And give her the change.’ Then he left the bar.

‘I need to talk. I think you do, too.’

Stevens was lighting a cigarette, rather melodramatically to Rebus’s mind, directly outside the bar. Beneath the glare of the street-lighting, his skin seemed almost yellow, seemed hardly thick enough to cover his skull.

‘Well, can we talk?’ The reporter put his lighter back in his pocket. His fair hair looked greasy. He had not shaved for a day or so. He looked hungry and cold.

But inside, he felt electric.

‘You’ve led me a merry dance, Mister Rebus. Can I call you John?’

‘Look, Stevens, you know the score here. I’ve got enough on my plate without all this.’

Rebus made to move past the reporter, but Stevens caught his arm.

‘No,’ he said, ‘I don’t know the score, not the final score. I seem to have been ejected from the park at half-time.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘You know exactly who’s behind all this, don’t you? Of course you do, and so do your superiors. Or do they? Have you told them the whole truth and nothing but the truth, John? Have you told them about Michael?’

‘What about him?’

‘Oh, come on.’ Stevens started to shuffle his feet, looking around him at the high blocks of flats, the late-afternoon sky behind them. He chuckled, shivering. Rebus recalled seeing him make that curious shivery motion at the party. ‘Where can we talk?’ said the reporter now. ‘What about in the pub? Or is there someone in there you’d rather I didn’t see?’

‘Stevens, you’re off your bloody head. I’m serious. Go home, get some sleep, eat, have a bath, just get to hell away from me. Okay?’

‘Or you’ll do what exactly? Get your brother’s heavy friend to rough me up a little? Listen, Rebus, the game’s over. I know. But I don’t know all of it. You’d be wise to have me as a friend rather than as an enemy. Don’t take me for a monkey. I credit you with more sense than to do that. Don’t let me down.’

Don’t let me down

‘After all, they’ve got your daughter. You need my help. I’ve got friends everywhere. We’ve got to fight this together.’

Rebus, confused, shook his head.

‘I don’t have a bloody clue what you’re talking about, Stevens. Go home, will you?’

Jim Stevens sighed, shaking his own head ruefully. He threw his cigarette onto the pavement and stubbed it out heavily, sending little flares of burning tobacco across the concrete.

‘Well, I’m sorry, John. I really am. Michael’s going to be put behind bars for a very long time on the evidence I have against him.’

‘Evidence? Of what?’

‘His drug-pushing, of course.’

Stevens didn’t see the blow coming. It wouldn’t have helped if he had. It was a vicious, curving swipe, sweeping up from Rebus’s side and catching him very low in the stomach. The reporter coughed out a little puff of wind, then fell to his knees.

‘Liar!’

Stevens coughed and coughed. It was as if he had run a marathon. He gulped in air, staying on his knees, his arms folded in front of his belly.

‘If you say so, John, but it’s the truth anyway.’ He looked up at Rebus. ‘You mean you honestly don’t know anything about it? Nothing at all?’

‘You better have some good proof, Stevens, or I’m going to see you swing.’

Stevens hadn’t expected this, he hadn’t expected this at all.

‘Well,’ he said, ‘this puts a different complexion on everything. Christ, I need a drink. Will you join me? I think we should talk a little now, don’t you? I won’t keep you long, but I think you should know.’