Ian Rankin - A Question of Blood

She looked at his plate. Most of the chop was still left. “You going veggie on me?”

He patted his stomach. “It’s great, but I’m not that hungry.”

She thought for a moment. “It’s the meat, isn’t it? It hurts your hands when you try to cut it.”

He shook his head. “I’m just full, that’s all.” But he could see she knew she was right. She started eating again, while he concentrated on the wine.

“I think you’re a lot like Lee Herdman,” she said at last.

“A backhanded compliment if ever I heard one.”

“People thought they knew him, but they didn’t. There was so much he managed to keep hidden.”

“And that’s me, is it?”

She nodded, holding his stare. “Why did you go back to Martin Fairstone’s house? I get the feeling it wasn’t just about me.”

“You ‘get the feeling’?” He peered down into his wine, seeing his reflection there, red-hued and wavering. “I knew he’d given you that black eye.”

“Which gave you an excuse to go talk to him… but what was it you really wanted?”

“Fairstone and Johnson were friends. I needed some ammo on Johnson.” He paused, realizing “ammo” was not the most subtle choice of word.

“Did you get any?”

Rebus shook his head. “Fairstone and Peacock had had a falling-out. Fairstone hadn’t seen him in weeks.”

“Why had they fallen out?”

“He wouldn’t say exactly. I got the feeling a woman might’ve been involved.”

“Does Peacock have a girlfriend?”

“One for every day of the year.”

“So maybe it was Fairstone’s girlfriend?”

Rebus nodded. “The blonde from the Boatman’s. What was her name again?”

“Rachel.”

“And there’s no good reason we can think of why she was in South Queensferry on Friday?”

Siobhan shook her head.

“But Peacock popped up in town, too, night of the vigil.”

“Coincidence?”

“What else could it be?” Rebus asked wryly. He stood up, taking the bottle with him. “You better help me out with this.” Went forwards to pour some wine into her glass, then emptied what was left into his own. He stayed standing, walked over to her window. “You really think I’m like Lee Herdman?”

“I don’t think either of you ever really managed to leave the past behind.”

He turned to look at her. She raised an eyebrow, inviting a comeback, but he just smiled and turned back to stare out at the night.

“And maybe you’re a bit like Doug Brimson, too,” she went on. “Remember what you said about him?”

“What?”

“You said he collected people.”

“And that’s what I do?”

“It might explain your interest in Andy Callis… and why it pisses you off to see Kate with Jack Bell.”

He turned slowly to face her, arms folded. “Does that make you one of my specimens?”

“I don’t know. What do you reckon?”

“I reckon you’re tougher than that.”

“You better believe it,” she said with just the hint of a smile.

When he’d called for the taxi, he’d given Arden Street as the destination, but that had been for Siobhan’s benefit. He told the driver there’d been a change of plan: they’d be making a short stop at the Leith police station before heading out to South Queensferry. At journey’s end, Rebus asked for a receipt, thinking he could maybe charge it to the inquiry. He’d have to be quick, though: he couldn’t see Claverhouse giving the nod to a twenty-quid taxi ride.

He walked down the dark vennel, pushing open the main door. There was no police guard anymore, no one checking the comings and goings at Lee Herdman’s address. Rebus climbed the stairs, listening for noise from the other two flats. He thought he could hear a TV set. Certainly he could smell the aftermath of an evening meal. A growl from his stomach reminded him that he maybe should have tried to eat more of the pork, and hang the pain. He took out the key to Herdman’s flat, the one he’d picked up at the station in Leith. It was a shiny, brand-new copy of the original and took a bit of maneuvering before it would meet with the tumblers, opening the door for him. Once inside, he closed the door behind him and switched on the hall light. The place was cold. Electricity hadn’t been disconnected yet, but someone had thought to turn off the central heating. Herdman’s widow had been asked if she would come north to empty the flat of its contents, but she had declined. What could that bastard have that I’d possibly want?

A good question, and one Rebus was here to consider. Lee Herdman assuredly had had something . Something people had wanted. He studied the back of the door. Bolts top and bottom, and two mortise locks as well as the Yale. The mortises would deter housebreakers, but the bolts were for when Herdman was at home. What had he been so afraid of? Rebus folded his arms and took a few steps back. There was one obvious answer to his question. The drug-dealing Herdman had been afraid of a bust. Rebus had encountered plenty of dealers over the course of his career. Usually they lived in high-rise public housing apartments, and their doors were steel-plated, offering considerably more resistance than Herdman’s. It seemed to Rebus that Herdman’s security measures were there to buy him a certain amount of time, and nothing more. Time, perhaps, to flush the evidence, but Rebus didn’t think so. There was nothing about the flat to suggest that it had been used at any time as a drug factory. Besides, Herdman could boast so many other hiding places: the boathouse, the boats themselves. He had no need to use his flat for storage. What then? Rebus turned and walked into the living room, seeking and finding the light switch.

What then?

He tried to think of himself as Herdman, then realized he didn’t need to. Hadn’t Siobhan hinted as much? I think you’re a lot like Lee Herdman . He closed his eyes, saw the room he was standing in as his own. This was his domain. He was in charge here. But say someone wanted in… some uninvited guest. He would hear them. Maybe they would try picking the locks, but the bolts would do them in. So then they’d have to shoulder the door. And he’d have time… time to fetch the gun from wherever it was hidden. The Mac-10 was kept in the boathouse, in case anyone came there. The Brocock was kept right here, in the wardrobe, surrounded by pictures of guns. Herdman’s little gun shrine. The pistol would give him the upper hand, because he didn’t expect the visitors to be armed. They might have questions, might want to take him away, but the Brocock would deter them.

Rebus knew who Herdman had been expecting: maybe not Simms and Whiteread exactly, but people like them. People who might want to take him away for questioning… questions about Jura, the helicopter crash, the papers fluttering from the trees. Something Herdman had taken from the crash site, could one of the kids have stolen it from him? Maybe at one of his parties? But the dead boys hadn’t known him, hadn’t come to his parties. Only James Bell, the sole survivor. Rebus sat down in Herdman’s armchair, his palms resting against its arms. Shooting the other two in order to scare James? So that James would tell all? No, no, no, because then why would Herdman turn the gun on himself? James Bell… so self-contained and apparently unperturbable… flicking through gun magazines to study the model that had wounded him. He, too, was an interesting specimen.

Rebus rubbed his forehead softly with one gloved hand. He felt close to an answer, so close he could taste it. He stood up again, walking into the kitchen and opening the fridge. There was food in there: an unopened packet of cheese, some slices of bacon and a box of eggs. Dead man’s food, he thought, I can’t eat it. He went to the bedroom instead. Not bothering this time with the light: enough was spilling through the open doorway.