Ian Rankin - Resurrection Men

“That could be in your favor,” Rebus told the Weasel. “Puts pressure on Claverhouse to do something about it.”

“Like charge Aly, you mean?”

Rebus shrugged. “Or hand it over to Customs, so they all end up taking credit . . .”

“And Aly still goes down?” The Weasel had risen to his feet, pockets filled and rustling.

“If he cooperates, he could get a light sentence.”

“Cafferty’s still going to nail him.”

“So maybe you should get your retaliation in first. Give the Drug Squad what they want.”

The Weasel was thoughtful. “Give them Cafferty?”

“Don’t tell me you haven’t been thinking about it.”

“Oh, I’ve thought about it. But Mr. Cafferty’s been very good to me.”

“He’s not family, though, is he? He’s not blood . . .”

“No,” the Weasel said, stretching the single syllable out.

“Can I ask you something?” Rebus flicked ash from the cigarette.

“What?”

“Do you have any idea where Donny Dow is?”

The Weasel shook his head. “I heard he’d been taken in for questioning.”

“He’s done a runner.”

“That was silly of him.”

“It’s why I wanted to talk to you, because now we have to send out search parties, which means talking to all his friends and associates. I’m assuming you’ll cooperate?”

“Naturally.”

Rebus nodded. “Let’s say Cafferty does know about the drugs . . . what do you think he’ll do?”

“Number one, he’ll want to know who brought them up here.” The Weasel paused.

“And number two?”

The Weasel looked at him. “Who said there was a number two?”

“There usually is, when there’s been a number one.”

“Okay. . . number two, he might decide he wanted them for himself.”

Rebus examined the tip of his cigarette. He could hear sounds of tenement life: music, TV voices, plates colliding on the drying rack. Shapes passing a window . . . ordinary people living ordinary lives, all of them thinking they were different from the rest.

“Did Cafferty have anything to do with the Marber murder?” he asked.

“When did I become your snitch?” the Weasel asked.

“I don’t want you for my snitch. I just thought maybe one question . . .”

The small man stooped down again, as though he’d spotted something in the grass, but there was nothing, and he rose again slowly.

“Other people’s shit,” he muttered. It sounded like a mantra. Maybe he meant his son, or even Cafferty: the Weasel cleaning up after them. Then he locked eyes with Rebus. “How am I supposed to know something like that?”

“I’m not saying Cafferty did this himself. It would be one of his men, someone he’d hired . . . probably through you, so as to distance himself from it. Cafferty’s always been good at letting other people take the fall.”

The Weasel seemed to be considering this. “Is that what those two cops were doing there the other day? Asking questions about Marber?” He watched as Rebus nodded. “The boss wouldn’t say what it was about.”

“I thought he trusted you,” Rebus said.

The Weasel paused again. “I know he knew Marber,” he said at last, his voice dropping to a level where the slightest gust of wind would erase it. “I don’t think he liked him much.”

“I hear he stopped buying paintings from Marber. Is that because he found out Marber had been cheating?”

“I don’t know.”

“Do you think it’s possible?”

“It’s possible,” the Weasel conceded.

“Tell me . . .” Rebus’s own voice dropped further still. “Would Cafferty organize a hit without your knowledge?”

“You’re asking me to incriminate myself.”

“This is just between the two of us.”

The Weasel folded his arms. The rubbish in his pockets crackled and clicked. “We’re not as close as we once were,” he confided, ruefully.

“A hit like this one, who would he have gone to?”

The Weasel shook his head. “I’m not a rat.”

“Rats are clever creatures,” Rebus said. “They know when to leave a sinking ship.”

“Cafferty isn’t sinking,” the Weasel said with a sad smile.

“That’s what they said about the Titanic, ” Rebus replied.

There wasn’t much more to be said. They went back into the stairwell, the Weasel heading for the front door and Rebus for the stairs. He wasn’t inside his flat two minutes when there was a knock at the door. He was in the bathroom, running a bath. He did not want the Weasel in here. This was where he could try shutting it all out and pretend he was like everyone else. Another knock, and this time he walked to the door.

“Yes?” he called.

“DI Rebus? You’re under arrest.”

Put his face to the peephole, then unlocked the door. Claverhouse was standing there, sporting a smile as thin and sharp as a surgeon’s blade. “Going to invite me in?” he said.

“Wasn’t thinking of it.”

“Not entertaining, are you?” Claverhouse craned his neck to look down the hallway.

“I’m just about to get in the bath.”

“Good idea. I’d do the same, under the circumstances.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about the fact that you’ve just spent a good fifteen minutes being contaminated by Cafferty’s right-hand man. Does he often make house calls? You’re not busy counting out a payoff in there, are you, John?”

Rebus took two steps forward, backing Claverhouse against the banister. It was a two-story drop to the ground.

“What do you want, Claverhouse?”

The feigned humor had vanished from Claverhouse’s face. He wasn’t scared of Rebus; he was just angry.

“We’ve been trying to nail Cafferty,” he spat, “in case you’ve forgotten. Now word’s starting to leak out about the shipment, and Weasel’s got a nasty little lawyer chewing at my balls. So we’re on surveillance, and what do we find? Weasel himself paying you a visit.” He stabbed a finger into Rebus’s chest. “And how’s that going to look in my report, Detective Inspector?”

“Fuck you, Claverhouse.” But at least Rebus knew where Ormiston was now: he was tailing the Weasel.

“Fuck me?” Claverhouse was shaking his head. “You’ve got it all wrong, Rebus. It’s you the boys in Barlinnie will be telling to bend over. Because if I can tie you to Cafferty and his operation, so help me I’ll send you so far down, they’ll need a bulldozer to find you.”

“Consider me warned,” Rebus said.

“It’s all starting to unravel for friend Cafferty,” Claverhouse hissed. “Make sure you know whose side you’re on.”

Rebus thought of the Weasel’s words: Cafferty isn’t sinking. And the smile that had accompanied his words . . . why had the Weasel looked sad? He took a step back, giving Claverhouse room. Claverhouse saw it as a weakening.

“John . . . ,” reverting to Rebus’s first name, “whatever it is you’re hiding, you need to come clean.”

“Thanks for your concern.” Rebus saw Claverhouse for what he was: a chip-on-the-shoulder careerist who had ideas he couldn’t follow through on. Nailing Cafferty — or at the very least inserting a mole into Cafferty’s operation — would, in his own eyes, be the making of him, and he couldn’t see past it. It was consuming him. Rebus was almost sympathetic: hadn’t he been there himself?

Claverhouse was shaking his head at Rebus’s stubbornness. “I see the Weasel was driving himself tonight. That because Donny Dow did a runner?”

“You know about Dow?”

Claverhouse nodded. “Maybe I know more than you think, John.”

“Maybe you do at that,” Rebus agreed, trying to loosen him up. “Such as what, exactly . . . ?”