Ian Rankin - The Beat Goes On

‘I’m guessing you’ve looked at Mr Forbes’s emails?’

‘Your lot told me to — there was nothing out of the ordinary.’

‘How about stuff he deleted?’

‘I’m sorry?’

‘When you press delete, stuff doesn’t just vanish.’

She was studying a list of recent transaction details. ‘His cards still haven’t been used,’ she muttered.

‘The ones you’re able to check,’ Rebus added.

‘What were you saying about emails?’

‘Even deleted ones will be stored somewhere, unless your husband really wanted them gone.’

She had closed the banking website and clicked on the email account.

‘See where it says “deleted”?’ Rebus reached past her so his finger nearly touched the screen. If you click on that...’

She did so, and a long list appeared.

‘I’d no idea,’ she said.

Rebus’s eyes were running down the items. They were mostly rubbish — offers for insurance and Canadian medicines. But one caught his attention, the one right at the top — received on the Sunday, the eve of Forbes’s disappearing act. The subject line consisted of only the one word — Philip — followed by three exclamation marks. The sender was marked as Unknown.

‘Can you open that?’ Rebus asked.

Barbara Forbes did as she was asked, then gave a little gasp.

WE NEED TO MAKE A RUN FOR IT! THEY KNOW!!!

Nothing else. It didn’t look as if Philip Forbes had replied. He had just deleted the message and followed the instruction.

‘What does it mean?’ Barbara Forbes’s voice was shaking. Clarke was standing in the doorway, a carton of milk in her hand.

‘You might want to offer Mrs Forbes something stronger,’ Rebus said, gesturing towards the screen.

‘It’s called forensic computing,’ Clarke told Rebus. They were in her car again. The laptop had spent the afternoon at the forensic science facility at Howdenhall. Now night had fallen and Rebus was holding his fifth or sixth takeaway coffee of the day.

‘So just because it says “Sender Unknown...”?’

‘There’s information tucked away for a lab coat to work with.’

‘Like a deleted file that isn’t actually deleted?’

‘Exactly.’

Rebus drained the last of his drink. ‘No news from the airport?’

‘No record of P. T. Forbes as a passenger with any carrier.’

‘But he did take his passport.’

‘Airport might be a red herring. Plenty of other ways to leave the country.’

‘It would help if we knew the why.’

‘Fingers crossed Archie Sellers has some answers.’

They parked on a wide residential street near Inverleith Park. The houses were substantial. Archie Sellers’s top-floor flat had been carved from one of them. The windows were small but gave views south across the city, the castle and Calton Hill silhouetted against the darker sky.

‘Is this about Philip?’ Sellers had asked when he’d answered the door. In place of an answer, Clarke had suggested they go in.

‘Lovely view, Mr Sellers,’ Rebus said as he stood by one of the living room’s three windows. Sellers had lowered himself into a leather armchair. The room had a distinct bachelor feel to it: car magazines, a dartboard on the back of the door, untidy stacks of CDs on the floor next to a hi-fi system. ‘Better than from the police station anyway.’ With a smile, Rebus settled on the sofa beside Clarke.

‘It was DS Rebus’s opinion,’ Clarke explained to Sellers, ‘that Gayfield Square police station should be where we’re having this little chat.’

Sellers’s eyes widened a fraction. He hadn’t shaved in a day or two and his collar-length hair was unruly. A generation younger than his employer, but maybe still too old for the distressed denims and Cuban-heeled boots.

‘Why? What have I done?’

‘How was business, Mr Sellers? Anything untoward that an audit might be about to throw up? VAT in order?’

‘Things were fine.’

‘Then how do you explain this?’ Clarke unfolded the sheet of paper and held it up towards him, the message printed there clear to see. ‘You sent this,’ she stated.

‘Did I?’

‘We have proof that you did. Identifiers lead more or less straight back to your Hotmail account.’

‘There must be a mistake.’

‘Must there?’ The two detectives sat side by side in silence, while Sellers twisted in his chair, looking as though it were made of drawing pins rather than cowhide. He sprang to his feet, but couldn’t think what came next.

‘Sit down,’ Rebus ordered, glowering until Sellers obeyed.

Clarke turned the sheet of paper round again so she could recite the words. ‘“We need to make a run for it! They know!!!” Sent by you to Philip Forbes on Sunday afternoon at half past three. What was it the pair of you had to be scared of, Mr Sellers? And why are you still here?’

‘It was a joke!’ Sellers blurted out, clasping his hands around his knees.

‘A joke?’

‘A prank. I sent it to half a dozen people. Just to see what their reaction would be.’

‘Who else got one?’

‘A mate I play squash with... couple of old school friends... a cousin... plus Philip and Andrea.’

‘Andrea being...?’

‘She works for us.’

‘On reception?’

‘Reception, secretary, you name it. I was going to go into work on Tuesday and see what they said. It was supposed to be a bit of fun.’ He paused. ‘You don’t know the story?’

‘Enlighten us,’ Clarke said, no emotion in her voice.

‘Arthur Conan Doyle — Sherlock Holmes and all that. It was in an article I was reading about him. He sent an anonymous telegram to a few of his friends. It said something like “We’ve been rumbled! What will we do?”’

Sellers was grinning, with the eager-to-make-amends look of a schoolkid caught red-handed.

‘And?’ Rebus asked.

The grin vanished. Sellers licked his lips, eyes towards the floor. ‘Apparently one of them did a runner. He was never seen again. That’s what’s happened, isn’t it? Philip did have something he didn’t want rumbled.’

‘Any idea what that might have been?’

The man shook his head.

‘Do you have a number for Andrea, Mr Sellers?’

‘Andrea?’

‘To verify your story.’

The man’s face sagged further. ‘She’s going to be furious with me.’ Then he thought of something. It was obvious in his eyes, in the way his spine stiffened.

‘Yes?’ Clarke nudged.

But Sellers shook his head.

‘We’ll need the other names, too,’ Rebus stated. ‘Your friends, your cousin...’

‘Can’t I tell them myself?’ Sellers begged.

Clarke eventually nodded. ‘If you let us speak to them first, just so we hear it from them. After that, we’ll hand the phone back to you and you can come clean.’ She was gesturing towards Sellers’s mobile. It was sitting on the coffee table, half hidden under the magazine he’d been reading only ten minutes ago, before his world started to go wrong.

‘How funny is that joke looking now?’ Rebus decided to enquire, as Sellers reached towards the phone.

They were seated in the back room of the Oxford Bar, having found a parking space right outside. That had been the deal: no convenient place to park, no stopping for a drink. Instead of which, Rebus was starting on his third pint while Clarke nursed a soda water and lime.

‘I can take a taxi home if you want a proper drink,’ Rebus had offered.

‘And leave the car outside to be towed in the morning?’

‘Right enough.’

There was an open packet of crisps in front of them, but neither had turned out to be hungry enough. The back room was midweek empty. Only four regulars in the front bar, and some European football game on the TV.