Ian Rankin: A Question of Blood

“Just one question, Bobby.”

Bobby Hogan looked tired and slightly lost. Leith meant drugs, stabbings, prossies. Those, Bobby could deal with. Rebus got the feeling he’d been summoned here because Bobby Hogan needed a friend by his side.

“Fire away,” Hogan said.

“Got a cigarette on you?” Rebus asked.

There were too many people fighting for space in the Portakabin. Hogan loaded Siobhan’s arms with paperwork, everything they had on the case, the copies still warm from the machine in the school office. Outside, a group of herring gulls had gathered on the lawn, seemingly curious. Rebus flicked them his cigarette butt and they sprinted towards it.

“I could report you for cruelty,” Siobhan told him.

“Ditto,” he said, looking the amount of paperwork up and down. Grant Hood was finishing a phone call, tucking his mobile back in his pocket. “Where did our friend go?” Rebus asked him.

“You mean Dirty Mac Jack?” Rebus smiled at the nickname, which had graced the front page of a tabloid the morning after Bell’s arrest.

“That’s who I mean.”

Hood nodded down the hill. “A member of the press corps called him, offering a TV slot at the school gates. Jack was off like a flash.”

“So much for not budging from the spot. Are the press boys behaving themselves?”

“What do you think?”

Rebus responded with a twitch of the mouth. Hood’s phone sounded again, and he turned away to take the call. Rebus watched Siobhan maneuver the car trunk open, some of the sheets slipping onto the ground. She picked them up again.

“That everything?” Rebus asked her.

“For now.” She slammed shut the trunk. “Where are we taking them?”

Rebus examined the sky. Thick, scudding clouds. Probably too windy for rain. He thought he could hear the distant sound of rigging clanging against yacht masts. “We could get a table at a pub. Down by the rail bridge, there’s a place called the Boatman’s…” She stared at him. “It’s an Edinburgh tradition,” he explained with a shrug. “In times past, professionals ran their businesses from the local pub.”

“We wouldn’t want to mess with tradition.”

“I’ve always preferred the old-fashioned methods.”

She didn’t say anything to this, just walked around to the driver’s side and opened the door. She’d closed it and put the key in the ignition before she remembered. Cursing, she reached across to open Rebus’s door for him.

“Too kind,” he said, smiling as he got in. He didn’t know South Queensferry that well, but he knew the pubs. He’d been brought up on the other side of the estuary, and remembered the view from North Queensferry: the way the bridges seemed to drift apart as you looked south. The same uniformed officer opened the gates to let them out. Jack Bell was in the middle of the road, saying his piece to the camera.

“A nice long blast on the horn,” Rebus ordered. Siobhan obliged. The journalist lowered his microphone, turned to glower at them. The cameraman slid his headphones down around his neck. Rebus waved at the MSP, gave him what might pass for an apologetic smile. Sightseers blocked half the carriageway, staring at the car.

“I feel like a bloody exhibit,” Siobhan muttered. A line of traffic was passing them at a crawl, wanting a look at the school. Not professionals, just members of the public who’d brought their families and video cameras with them. As Siobhan made to pass the tiny police station, Rebus said he would get out and walk.

“I’ll meet you at the pub.”

“Where are you going?”

“I just want to get a feel for the place.” He paused. “Mine’s a pint of IPA if you get there first.”

He watched her drive away, taking her place in the slow procession of tourist traffic. Rebus stopped and turned to look up at the Forth Road Bridge, hearing its swoosh of cars and lorries, something almost tidal about it. There were tiny figures up there, standing on the footpath, looking down. He knew there would be more at the side of the opposite carriageway, where there was a better view of the school grounds. Shaking his head, he started walking.

Commerce in South Queensferry took place on a single thoroughfare, stretching from the High Street to the Hawes Inn. But change was coming. Driving past the town recently, headed for the road bridge, he’d noticed a new supermarket and business park. A sign tempting the backup: TIRED OF COMMUTING? YOU COULD BE WORKING HERE. The message telling them that Edinburgh was full to the brim, the traffic slowing every year. South Queensferry wanted to be part of the movement away from the city. Not that you’d know it from the High Street: locally owned small shops, narrow pavements, tourist information. Rebus knew some of the stories: a fire at the VAT 69 distillery, hot whiskey running down the streets, people drinking it and ending up in the hospital; a pet monkey that, teased to distraction, ripped open the throat of a scullery maid; apparitions such as the Mowbray Hound and the Burry Man…

There was a celebration every year to commemorate the Burry Man, bunting and flags put up, a procession through the town. It was months away yet, but Rebus wondered if there’d be a procession this year.

Rebus passed a clock tower, Remembrance Day wreaths still pinned to it, untouched by vandals. The road grew so narrow, traffic had to use passing places. Every now and then he caught glimpses of the estuary behind the buildings on the left. Across the road, the single-story row of shops was topped with a terrace, itself fronted by houses. Two elderly women were standing by an open front door, their arms folded as they shared the latest rumors, eyes flitting towards Rebus, knowing him for a stranger. Their scowls dismissed him as just another ghoul.

He walked on, passing a newsagent’s. Several people had gathered inside, sharing information from the evening paper’s early printing. A news crew passed him on the other side of the road-a different crew from the one outside the school gates. The cameraman carried his camera in one hand, tripod slung over the other shoulder. Soundman with his rig hanging by his side, headphones around his neck, boom held like a rifle. They were on the lookout for a good spot, led by a young blond woman who kept peering down vennels in her search for the perfect shot. Rebus thought he’d seen her on TV, reckoned the crew were probably from Glasgow. Her report would start: A shattered community is today trying to come to terms with the horror which visited this once peaceful haven… Questions are being asked, but as yet the answers seem to be eluding everyone… Blah blah. Rebus knew he could write the script himself. With the police offering no leads, the media had nothing to do but harass the locals, seeking droplets of news and prepared to squeeze them out of any rock or stone that might yield.

He’d seen it at Lockerbie and didn’t doubt Dunblane had been the same. Now it was South Queensferry’s turn. He came to a curve in the road, beyond which was the esplanade. Stopping for a moment, he turned back to view the town, but most of it was hidden: behind trees, behind other buildings, beyond the arc he’d just traveled. There was a seawall here, and he decided it was as good a place as any to light the spare cigarette Bobby Hogan had gifted him. The cigarette was tucked behind his right ear, and he pawed at it, not quite catching it as it fluttered to the ground, a gust sending it rolling. Stooped, eyes down, Rebus started following and almost collided with a pair of legs. The cigarette had come to rest against the pointed toe of a gloss-black ankle-high stiletto. The legs above the shoes were covered in ripped black fishnet tights. Rebus stood up straight. The girl could have been anything from thirteen to nineteen years old. Dyed black hair lay like straw against her head, Siouxsie Sioux style. Her face was deathly white, the eyes and lips painted black. She was wearing a black leather jacket over layers of gauzy black material.