10 Great Rebus Novels (John Rebus)

by Ian Rankin

  Rebus examined the typed name and address, the first class stamp, and the postmark: London EC4. The frank stated that the letter had been posted the previous morning.

  ‘He knows where I live, John. When I opened it this morning, I nearly died on the spot. I had to get out of the flat, but all the time I knew that maybe he was watching me.’ Her eyes filled with water again, but she threw back her head so that the tears would not escape. She fished in her bag and came out with some paper tissues, peeling off one so that she could blow her nose. Rebus said nothing.

  ‘It’s a death threat,’ she explained.

  ‘A death threat?’

  She nodded.

  ‘Who from? Does it say?’

  ‘Oh yes, it says all right. It’s from the Wolfman, John. He says I’m going to be next.’

  It was a rush job, but the lab, when they heard the circumstances, were happy to cooperate. Rebus stood with hands in pockets watching them at work. There was the crackle of paper in his pocket. He had folded the description of the gang members and tucked it away, perhaps for future use: for now, there were more important matters to attend to.

  The story was straightforward enough. Lisa had been scared out of her wits by the letter, and more so by the fact that the Wolfman knew where she lived. She had tried contacting Rebus and when that failed had panicked, fleeing from her flat, aware that he might be watching her, might be about to pounce at any moment. The pity was, as the lab had already explained, she’d messed up the letter, gripping it in her hand as she fled, destroying any fingerprints or other evidence that there might have been on the envelope itself. Still, they’d do their best.

  If the letter was from the Wolfman and not from some new and twisted crank, then there might well be clues to be had from the envelope and its contents: saliva (used to stick down both flap and stamp), fibres, fingerprints. These were the physical possibilities. Then there were more arcane elements: the typewriter itself might be traceable. Were there oddities of speech or misspellings which might yield a clue? And what about that postmark? The Wolfman had outwitted them in the past, so was the postal address another red herring?

  The various processes involved would take time. The lab was efficient, but the chemical analyses could not be hurried. Lisa had come to the lab, too, as had George Flight. They were off in another part of the building drinking tea and going over the details for the fourth or fifth time, but Rebus liked to watch the lab boys at work. This was his idea of sleuthing. It also helped calm him to watch someone working in such painstaking detail. And he certainly needed calming.

  His plan had worked. He had prodded and teased the Wolfman into action. He should, though, have realised the danger Lisa might be in. After all, her photo had been in the papers, as had her name. They had even mistakenly termed her a police psychologist – the very people who, according to the earlier planted story, had come to the conclusion that the Wolfman might be gay, or transsexual, or any of the other barbs they had used. Lisa Frazer had become the Wolfman’s enemy, and he, John Rebus, had led her into it by the nose. Stupid, John, oh so very stupid. What if the Wolfman had actually tracked her to her flat and . . .? No, no, no: he couldn’t bear to think of it.

  But though Lisa’s name had appeared in the newspapers, her address had not. So how had the Wolfman found out her address? That was much more problematic.

  And much more chilling.

  She was ex-directory, for a start. But as he knew only too well, this was no barrier to someone in authority, someone like a police officer. Jesus: was he really talking about another police officer? There had to be other candidates: staff and students at University College, other psychologists – they would know Lisa. Then there were those groups who could have linked an address to a name: civil servants, the local council, taxmen, gas and electricity boards, the postman, the guy next door, numerous computers and mailshot programmes, her local public library. Where could he start?

  ‘Here you are, Inspector.’

  One of the assistants handed him a photocopy of the typed letter.

  ‘Thanks,’ said Rebus.

  ‘We’re testing the original at the moment, scanning for traces of anything interesting. We’ll let you know.’

  ‘Right. What about the envelope?’

  ‘The saliva tests will take a little longer. We should have something for you in the next couple of hours. There was also the photograph, of course, but it won’t photocopy too well. We know which paper it was from, and that it was cut out with a pair of fairly sharp scissors, perhaps as small as manicure scissors judging from the length of each cut.’

  Rebus nodded, staring at the photostat. ‘Thanks again,’ he said.

  ‘No problem.’

  No problem? That wasn’t right; there were plenty of problems. He read through the letter. The typing seemed nice and even, as though the typewriter used was a new one, or a good quality model, something like the electronic machine he’d been using this morning. As for the content, well, that was something else again.

  GET THIS, I’M NOT HOMOSEXUL, O.K.? WOLFMAN IS WHAT WOLFMAN DOES. WHAT WOLFMAN DOES NEXT IS THIS: HE KILLS YOU. DON’T WORRY, IT WON’T HURT. WOLFMAN DOES NOT HURT; JUST DOES WHAT WOLFMAN IS. KNOW THIS, WOMIN, WOLFMAN KNOWS YOU, WHERE YOU LIVE, WHAT YOU LOOK LIKE. JUST TELL THE TRUTH AND NO HARM CAN CUM TO YOU.

  On a piece of plain A4-sized paper, folded in four to get it into the small white envelope. The Wolfman had cut a picture of Lisa from one of the newspapers. Then he had cut her head off and drawn a dark pencilled circle on her stomach. And this photograph of her trunk had accompanied the letter.

  ‘Bastard,’ Rebus hissed. ‘Jesus, you bastard.’

  He took the letter along the corridor and up the stairs to the room where Flight was sitting, rubbing at his face again.

  ‘Where’s Lisa?’

  ‘Ladies’ room.’

  ‘Does she seem . . .?’

  ‘She’s upset, but she’s coping. The doctor’s given her some tranqs. What have you got there?’ Rebus handed over the copy. Flight read through it quickly, intently. ‘What the hell do you make of it?’ he asked. Rebus sat himself down on a hard chair still warm from Lisa’s presence. He reached out a hand and took the paper from Flight, then angled his chair so that both men could inspect the letter together.

  ‘Well,’ he said. ‘I’m not sure. At first sight, it looks like the work of a near-illiterate.’

  ‘Agreed.’

  ‘But then again, there’s something artful about it. Look at the punctuation, George. Absolutely correct, right down to every comma. And he uses colons and semi-colons. What sort of person could spell “woman” as “womin”, yet know how to use a semi-colon?’

  Flight studied the note intently, nodding. ‘Go on.’

  ‘Well, Rhona, my ex-wife, she’s a teacher. I remember she used to tell me how frustrating it was that nowadays no one in schools bothered to teach basic grammar and punctuation. She said that kids were growing up now with no need for things like colons and semi-colons and no idea at all of how to use them. So I’d say we’re dealing either with someone who has been well educated, or with someone in middle age, educated at a time when punctuation was still taught in every school.’

  Flight gave a half-smile. ‘Been reading your psychology books again I see, John.’

  ‘It’s not all black magic, George. Mostly it’s just to do with common sense and how you interpret things. Do you want me to go on?’

  ‘I’m all ears.’

  ‘Well,’ Rebus was running a finger down the letter again. ‘There’s something else here, something that tells me this letter is genuinely from the killer, and not the work of some nutter somewhere.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘Go on, George, where’s the clue?’

  He held the paper out towards Flight. Flight grinned for a moment, then took it.

  ‘I suppose,’ he said, ‘you’re talking about the way the writer refers to the Wolfman in the third person?’

  ‘Yo
u’ve just named the tune in one, George. That’s exactly what I mean.’

  Flight looked up. ‘Incidentally, John, what the hell happened to you? Did you get in a fight or something? I thought the Scots gave up wearing woad a couple of years back?’

  Rebus touched his bruised jaw. ‘I’ll tell you the story sometime. But look, in the first sentence, the writer refers to himself in the first person. He’s taken our homosexual jibe personally. But in the rest of the letter, he speaks of the Wolfman in the third person. Standard practice with serial murderers.’

  ‘What about the misspelling of homosexual?’

  ‘Could be genuine, or it could be to throw us off the scent. “U” and “a” are at different ends of the keyboard. A two-fingered typist could miss the “a” if he was writing fast, if he was angry.’ Rebus paused, remembering the list in his pocket. ‘I speak from recent experience.’

  ‘Fair enough.’

  ‘Now look at what he actually says: “Wolfman is what Wolfman does”. What the books say is that killers find their identity through killing. That’s exactly what this sentence means.’

  Flight exhaled noisily. ‘Yes, but none of this gets us any closer, does it?’ He offered a cigarette to Rebus. ‘I mean, we can build up as clear a picture as we like of the bastard’s personality, but it won’t give us a name and address.’

  Rebus sat forward in his chair. ‘But all the time we’re narrowing down the possible types, George. And eventually we’ll narrow it down to a field of one. Look at this final sentence.’

  ‘“Just tell the truth and no harm can cum to you,”’ Flight recited.

  ‘Skipping the pun, which is intriguing in itself, don’t you think there’s something very, I don’t know, official sounding about that construction? Something very formal?’

  ‘I don’t see what you’re getting at.’

  ‘What I’m getting at is that it seems to me the sort of thing someone like you or me would say.’

  ‘A copper?’ Flight sat back in his chair. ‘Oh, come on, John, what kind of crap is that?’

  Rebus’s voice grew quiet and persuasive. ‘Someone who knows where Lisa Frazer lives, George. Think about it. Someone who knows that kind of information, or knows how to get it. We can’t afford to rule out –’

  Flight stood up. ‘I’m sorry, John, but no. I simply can’t entertain the notion that . . . that someone, some copper, could be behind all this. No, it’s just not on.’

  Rebus shrugged. ‘Okay, George, whatever you say.’ But Rebus knew that he had planted a seed now in George Flight’s head, and that the seed would surely sprout.

  Flight sat down again, confident that this time he had won a point from Rebus. ‘Anything else?’

  Rebus read the letter through yet again, sucking on his cigarette. He remembered how at school, in his English class, he had loved writing summaries and close interpretations of texts. ‘Yes,’ he said eventually. ‘Actually there is. This letter seems to me more of a warning, a shot across the bows. He starts off by saying that he’s going to kill her, but by the end of the letter he’s tempered that line. He says nothing will happen if she tells the truth. I think he’s looking for a retraction. I think he wants us to put out another story saying he’s not gay.’

  Flight checked his watch. ‘He’s in for another fright.’

  ‘How do you mean?’

  ‘The lunchtime edition will be hitting the streets. I believe Cath Farraday’s put out the Jan Crawford story.’

  ‘Really?’ Rebus revised his idea of Farraday. Maybe she wasn’t a vindictive old bat after all. ‘So now we’re saying we’ve got a living witness, and he must realise it’s a fact. I think it might just be enough to blow what final fuses he’s got up here.’ Rebus tapped his head. ‘To send him barking mad, as Lamb would put it.’

  ‘You reckon?’

  ‘I reckon, George. We need everybody at their most alert. He could try anything.’

  ‘I dread to think.’

  Rebus was staring at the letter. ‘Something else, George. EC4: where’s that exactly?’

  Flight thought it over. ‘The City, part of it anyway. Farringdon Street, Blackfriars Bridge, all around there. Ludgate, St Paul’s.’

  ‘Hmm. He’s tricked us before, making us see patterns where none exist. The teeth for example, I’m sure I’m right about them. But now that we’ve got him rattled –’

  ‘You think he lives in the City?’

  ‘Lives there, works there, maybe just drives through there on his way to work.’ Rebus shook his head. He didn’t yet want to share with Flight the image which had just passed through his mind, the image of a motorcycle courier based in the City, a motorcyclist with easy access to every part of London. Like the man in leathers he’d seen on the bridge that first night down by the canal.

  A man like Kenny Watkiss.

  ‘Well,’ he said instead, ‘whatever, it’s another piece of the jigsaw.’

  ‘If you ask me,’ said Flight, ‘there are too many pieces. They won’t all fit.’

  ‘Agreed.’ Rebus stubbed out the cigarette. Flight had already finished his own, and was about to light another. ‘But as the picture emerges, we’ll know better which bits we can discard, won’t we?’ He was still studying the letter. There was something else. What was it? Something at the back of his mind, lurking somewhere in memory. . . . Something stirred momentarily by the letter, but what? If he stopped thinking about it, maybe it would come to him, the way the names of forgotten actors in films did.

  The door opened.

  ‘Lisa, how are you?’ Both men rose to offer her a seat, but she lifted a hand to show she preferred to stand. All three of them stood, a stiff triangle in the tiny box of a room.

  ‘Just been sick again,’ she said. Then she smiled. ‘Can’t be much more to bring up. I think I’m back to yesterday’s breakfast already.’ They smiled with her. She looked tired to Rebus, exhausted. Lucky she had slept so soundly yesterday. He doubted she’d get much sleep for the next night or ten, tranqs or not.

  Flight spoke first. ‘I’ve arranged for temporary accommodation, Dr Frazer. The less people who know where, the better. Don’t worry, you’ll be quite safe. We’ll have a guard on you.’

  ‘What about her flat?’ asked Rebus.

  Flight nodded. ‘I’ve got two men there keeping an eye on the place. One inside the flat itself, the other outside, both of them hidden. If the Wolfman turns up, they’ll cope with him, believe me.’

  ‘Stop talking as though I’m not here,’ Lisa snapped. ‘This affects me too.’

  There was a cold silence in the room.

  ‘Sorry,’ she said. She covered her eyes with her ringless left hand. ‘I just can’t believe I was so scared back there. I feel –’

  She tipped her head back again. The tears were too precious to be released. Flight placed a hand softly on her shoulder.

  ‘It’s all right, Dr Frazer. Really it is.’ She gave a wry smile at this.

  Flight kept on talking, feeding her with comforting words. But she wasn’t listening. She was staring at Rebus, and he was staring back at her. Rebus knew what her eyes were telling him. They were telling him something of the utmost importance.

  Catch the Wolfman, catch him quickly and destroy him utterly. Do it for me, John. But just do it.

  She blinked, breaking the contact. Rebus nodded slowly, almost imperceptibly, but it was enough. She smiled at him, and suddenly her eyes were dry sparkling stones. Flight felt the change and lifted his hand away from her arm. He looked to Rebus for some explanation, but Rebus was studying the letter, concentrating on its opening sentence. What was it? There was something there, something just beyond his line of vision. Something he didn’t get.

  Yet.

  Two detectives, one of them extraordinarily burly, like the prop-forward from a rugby team, the other tall and thin and silent, came to the labs to take Lisa away with them, away to a place of safety. Despite vigorous protests, Rebus wasn’t allowed to know the destina
tion. Flight was taking all of this very seriously indeed. But before Lisa could go, the lab people needed her fingerprints and to take samples of fibres from her clothes, all for the purpose of elimination. The two bodyguards went with her.

  Rebus and Flight, exhausted, stood together at the drinks machine in the long, brightly-lit hallway, feeding in coins for cups of powdery coffee and powdery tea.

  ‘Are you married, George?’

  Flight seemed surprised by the question, surprised perhaps that it should come only now. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Have been the past twelve years. Marion. She’s the second. The first was a disaster – my fault, not hers.’

  Rebus nodded, taking hold of the hot plastic beaker by its rim.

  ‘You said you’d been married, too,’ Flight remarked. Rebus nodded again.

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘So what happened?’

  ‘I’m not really sure any more. Rhona used to say it was like the continental drift: so slow we didn’t notice until it was too late. Her on one island, me on another, and a great big bloody sea between us.’

  Flight smiled. ‘Well, you did say she was a teacher.’

  ‘Yes, she still is actually. Lives in Mile End with my daughter.’

  ‘Mile End? Bloody hell. Gentrified gangland, no place for any copper’s daughter.’

  Rebus smiled at the irony. It was time to confess. ‘Actually, George, I’ve found out she’s going out with someone called Kenny Watkiss.’

  ‘Oh dear. Who is? Your missus or your daughter?’

  ‘My daughter. Her name’s Samantha.’

  ‘And she’s going out with Kenny Watkiss? How old is he?’

  ‘Older than her. Eighteen, nineteen, something like that. He’s a bike messenger in the City.’

  Flight nodded, understanding now. ‘He was the one who shouted from the public gallery?’ Flight thought for a moment. ‘Well, from what I know of the Watkiss family history, I’d say Kenny must be Tommy’s nephew. Tommy’s got a brother, Lenny, he’s doing time just now. Lenny’s a big softie, not like Tommy. He’s in for fraud, tax evasion, clocking cars, naughty kites, I mean bad cheques. It’s all fourth division stuff, but it mounts up, and when there’s enough of it against you at any one sitting of the bench, well, it’s odds on you’ll go inside, isn’t it?’