Ian Rankin - The Complaints

Then he straightened up, turned and walked out. It was a few seconds before Tony Kaye joined him. Kaye was knotting his tartan scarf as he emerged from the pub.

‘What the hell do we do?’ he asked.

‘We don’t need to do anything – it’ll happen the way it happens. ’

‘We should at least tell McEwan.’

Fox nodded his agreement. ‘Giles will want us interviewed at Torphichen. We stick to my story. I might get a reprimand, but I doubt it’ll amount to much.’

Kaye considered this, then shook his head slowly. ‘Giles won’t let it go at that. Far as he’s concerned, this is payback time.’

‘All he’ll get is small change, Tony.’

Kaye thought for a further moment. ‘That bastard in Hull!’

‘We ought to have realised – everyone leaves traces, even on a computer.’

Kaye breathed out noisily through his nose. ‘So what now?’

Fox shrugged. ‘Do you need a lift? I don’t see your Nissan…’

‘I parked it legally for a change. It’s a couple of streets away.’

‘You didn’t want Torphichen nabbing you for that, too?’

Kaye shook his head. ‘How come you’re always so calm, Foxy?’

‘No point being anything else – like I say, what happens happens. ’

Kaye was staring at the door of Minter’s. ‘We should leg it before he comes out.’

‘He’s got that pint to drink, and maybe another one after it. By the way – what did you think of Jamie Breck?’

Kaye needed only a second to deliver his verdict. ‘Good guy, seems like.’

Malcolm Fox nodded his agreement. Seems like…

Wednesday morning, Fox was brushing his teeth when the home phone started ringing. The upstairs handset needed recharging, and he knew the caller would have hung up before he could reach the living room, so he stayed where he was. He’d woken early, Tony Kaye’s words in his head – good guy, seems like. Kaye had meant that Breck was the sort to help out a colleague. Didn’t mean he couldn’t be other things, too… Just as Fox was wiping his mouth, his mobile let out its little chirrup. It was on the dresser in the bedroom, and he walked through, tossing the towel on to the just-made bed.

‘Fox,’ he said, pressing the phone to his ear.

‘Mr Fox, it’s Alison Pettifer.’

Fox’s stomach tightened. ‘Is Jude all right?’

‘They’ve taken her.’

‘Who?’ But already knowing the answer.

‘Some policemen. C Division, they said.’

Meaning Torphichen. Fox looked at his watch – half seven. ‘It’s just routine,’ he started to explain.

‘That’s what they said – “routine questions”. All the same, I thought you’d want to know.’

‘That’s kind of you.’

‘Should I stay here, do you think?’ Fox wasn’t sure what she meant: was she suggesting she head to Torphichen herself? ‘To keep an eye on them, I mean.’

Fox lifted the phone from his ear and read the display. She was calling from Jude’s home phone. ‘They’re still there?’ he asked.

‘Some of them, yes.’

‘With a search warrant?’

‘They did get Jude to sign something,’ the neighbour confirmed.

‘Where are you now, Mrs Pettifer?’

‘The foot of the stairs.’ He heard her apologise as someone pushed past her. Heavy footsteps making for the upstairs landing. ‘They don’t seem to like me sticking around.’

‘What happened to Jude’s other friends, the ones who were going to look after her?’

‘Joyce stayed the night, but she had to leave for work at six thirty. The police started arriving just after, so I got dressed and…’

‘Thanks for everything, Mrs Pettifer. You can go home now.’

‘A couple of reporters came to the door yesterday evening, but I gave them short shrift.’

‘Thanks again.’

‘Well… I might just nip home then, if you think that’s for the best.’

Fox ended the call, fetched a fresh shirt from its hanger and decided yesterday’s tie would suffice. He was halfway down the stairs when the landline started ringing again. He lifted the receiver from the sofa and pressed it to his ear.

‘Fox,’ he said.

‘It’s McEwan.’

‘Morning, sir.’

‘You sound harassed.’

‘No, sir, just getting ready to leave.’

‘So I’ll see you here in half an hour?’

‘Actually, I need to stop off somewhere first.’

‘I don’t think that’s advisable, Malcolm.’

‘Sir?’

‘Torphichen have told me what’s happening. I got the call half an hour ago. That stunt you pulled with the PNC is going to take a bit of work to defuse.’

‘I was going to tell you, sir…’ Fox paused. ‘Truth is, they’ve taken my sister in for questioning. She needs someone with her.’

‘Not you, Malcolm. You need to be here.’

‘They know she’s my sister, Bob. They don’t like what I’ve done to their pal Heaton.’

‘I know people at Torphichen, Malcolm. I’ll see to it everything’s squared.’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Half an hour, then. You, me and Tony Kaye are going to have a fine wee natter…’ The phone went dead in Fox’s hand.

In fact, the journey took him longer than expected. His excuse: tram works. Really, he’d detoured to Jude’s street in Saughtonhall. Her front door was open. A Scene of Crime van stood kerbside. Someone had been dispatched to the corner shop – the crew were drinking from polystyrene cups and munching on pastries and crisps. He saw just a couple of plain-clothes cops – faces he recognised dimly from visits to Torphichen. No sign of either Billy Giles or Jamie Breck. A neighbour on the opposite side of the road stood watching from her window, arms folded. Fox let his engine idle, knowing there was nothing to be gained from going in. Eventually he signalled back out into the traffic. The drivers were all being polite; didn’t mind braking on his behalf.

It gave them more time to gawp.

‘My dabs will be all over the place,’ Fox told McEwan. They weren’t in the office: McEwan had found an empty meeting-room. An elliptical table and eight or nine chairs. There was a marker board on a tripod. Three words written there:

VISIBILITY VIABILITY VERSATILITY

Tony Kaye had found the only chair in the room with castors. He was rolling himself backwards from the table, then forward again.

‘That’s annoying me,’ McEwan warned him.

‘What are we going to do about Bad Billy?’ Kaye asked, still moving.

‘He’s DCI Giles to you, Sergeant Kaye – and we’re going to let him do his job.’ He turned his head in Fox’s direction. ‘Isn’t that right, Malcolm?’

Fox nodded. ‘Only thing we can do. They’ll feel better once they’ve given us a kicking.’

McEwan gave a sigh. ‘How many times have I told you? PSU has to be above reproach.’

‘Like I say, sir, searching the database for Vince Faulkner was my idea.’

McEwan glared at Fox. ‘That’s a load of balls and you know it. Tony here is the kind who’d decide a protocol could be bent – isn’t that right, Sergeant?’

‘Yes, sir,’ Kaye admitted.

‘Last night we told Giles something different,’ Fox cautioned.

‘Then you better stick to that,’ McEwan snapped back. ‘If he catches you in one lie, he’ll go looking for others…’ He paused. ‘Are there any others?’

‘No, sir,’ both men said in unison.

McEwan was thoughtful for a moment. ‘Billy Giles is all bile and bluster. Scratch the surface and there’s a lot less of him to be scared of.’ He held up a finger. ‘Doesn’t mean you should underestimate him.’

Malcolm Fox took out his handkerchief and blew his nose. ‘Are they treating Jude’s house as a crime scene?’