Hide & Seek

‘A very agricultural smell, sir,’ Holmes said, smiling also. They laughed at the shared reference to Farmer Watson. Then Rebus went to have his shower, and Holmes made the coffee, jealous of the sounds from the bathroom. He took another look at the photographs, a close look, hoping for something, something he could use to impress Rebus with, to cheer Rebus up just a little.

The boxers were young, photographed from ringside or near as dammit. But the photographer - Ronnie McGrath presumably - hadn’t used a flash, depending instead upon the smoky lights above the ring. Consequently, neither boxers nor audience were recognisable as distinct individuals. Their faces were grainy, the outlines of the combatants themselves blurred with sluggish movement. Why hadn’t the photographer used a flash?

In one photo, the right-hand side of the frame was dark, cut off at an angle by something getting in the way of the lens. What? A passing spectator? Somebody’s jacket?

It struck Holmes with sudden clarity: the photographer’s jacket had got in the way, and it had done so because the photos were being taken surreptitiously, from beneath a

jacket. This would explain the poor quality of the photos, and the uneven angles of most of them. So there had to be a reason for them, and they had to be the clue Rebus was seeking. All they had to do now was discover just what kind of clue.

The shower became a drip, then died altogether. A few moments later, Rebus appeared clad only in a towel, holding it around his gut as he went to the bedroom to change. He was balancing with one foot poised above a trouser leg when Holmes burst in, waving the photographs.

‘I think I’ve got it!’ he exclaimed. Rebus looked up, surprised, then slipped on the trousers.

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I think I’ve worked it out, too. It came to me just now in the shower.’

‘Oh.’

‘So fetch us a coffee,’ said Rebus, ‘and let’s go into the living room and see if we’ve worked out the same thing. Okay?’

‘Right,’ said Holmes, wondering again why it was that he’d joined the police when there were so many more rewarding careers out there to be had.

When he arrived in the living room, carrying the two mugs of coffee, Rebus was pacing up and down, his telephone handset wedged against his ear.

‘Right,’ he was saying. ‘I’ll wait. No, no, I won’t call back. I said I’ll wait. Thank you.’

Taking the coffee from Holmes, he rolled his eyes, exhibiting disbelief at the stupidity of the person on the other end of the telephone.

‘Who is it?’ Holmes mouthed silently.

‘The council,’ said Rebus aloud. ‘I got a name and an extension number from Andrew.’

‘Who’s Andrew?’

‘Andrew MacBeth, the foreman. I want to find out who

authorised the cleaning out of the house. A bit of a coincidence that, don’t you think? Cleaning it out just as we were about to do a bit of poking around.’ He turned his attention to the handset. ‘Yes? That’s right. Oh, I see.’ He looked at Holmes, his eyes betraying nothing. ‘How might that have happened?’ He listened again. ‘Yes, I see. Oh yes, I agree, it does seem a bit curious. Still, these things happen, eh? Roll on computerisation. Thanks for your help anyway.’

He pressed a button, kiling the connection. ‘You probably caught the gist of that.’

‘They’ve no record of who authorised the clear-out?’

‘Quite so, Brian. The documentation is all in order, but for the little matter of a signature. They can’t understand it.’

‘Any handwriting to go on?’

‘The chitty Andrew showed me was typed.’

‘So, what are you saying?’

‘That Mr Hyde seems to have friends everywhere. In the council, for starters, but probably in the police, too. Not to mention several less savoury institutions.’

‘What now?’

‘Those pictures. What else is there to go on?’

They studied each frame closely, taking their time, pointing out this or that blur or detail, trying ideas out on one another. It was a painstaking business. And throughout Rebus was muttering to himself about Ronnie McGrath’s final words to Tracy, about how they had been the key throughout. The triple meaning: make yourself scarce, beware a man called Hyde, and I’ve hidden something away. So clever. So compact. Almost too clever for Ronnie. Maybe the meanings had been there without his realising it himself….

At the end of ninety minutes, Rebus threw the final photograph down onto the floor. Holmes was half lying along the settee, rubbing his forehead with one hand as

he held up one of the pictures in the other, his eyes refusing to focus any longer.

‘It’s no use, Brian. No use at all. I can’t make sense out of any of them, can you?’

‘Not a lot,’ Holmes admitted. ‘But I take it Hyde wanted - wants - these pictures badly.’

‘Meaning?’

‘Meaning he knows they exist, but he doesn’t know how crude they are. He thinks they show something they don’t.’

‘Yes, but what? I’ll tell you something, Ronnie McGrath had bruises on his body the night he died.’

‘Not surprising when you remember that someone dragged his body down the stairs.’