Strip Jack

'Meant to look in before now,' the man was saying, 'but you know how it is.' He really did look exhausted, with dark-ringed eyes and a stoop to his posture. His speech and movements were slow. 'I think I've clinched a nice collection of Italian art books…"

He now seemed ready to acknowledge the visitors' presence. Rebus had been given Urquhart's hand and was shaking it. The visitor nodded towards Rebus's right hand.

'You,' he said,' must be Inspector Rebus.'

'That's right.'

'How do you know that?' said Gregor Jack, suitably impressed.

'Scratch marks on the wrist,' the visitor explained. 'Vanessa told me an Inspector Rebus had been in, and that Rasputin had made his mark… his considerable mark, by the look of things.'

'You must be Mr Steele,' said Rebus, shaking hands.

'The very same,' said Steele. 'Sorry I wasn't in when you called. As Gregor here will tell you, I'm a hard man to -'

'Catch,' interrupted Jack. 'Yes, Ronnie, I've already told the Inspector.'

'No sign of those books then, sir?' Rebus asked Steele. He shrugged.

'Too hot to handle, Inspector. Do you have any idea how much that lot would fetch? My guess would be a private collector.'

'Stolen to order?'

'Maybe. A fairly broad range though…' Steele seemed to tire quickly of the topic. He turned again to Gregor Jack and held his arms wide open, half shrugging. 'Gregor, what the hell are they trying to do to you?'

'Obviously,' said Urquhart, who was helping himself unasked to a drink, 'someone somewhere is looking for a resignation.'

'But what were you doing there in the first place?'

Steele had asked the question. He asked it into a silence which lasted for a very long time. Urquhart had poured him a drink, and handed it over, while Gregor Jack seemed to study the four men in the room, as though one of them might have the answer. Rebus noticed that Brian Holmes was studying a painting on one wall, seemingly oblivious to the whole conversation. At last, Jack made an exasperated sound and shook his head.

'I think,' Rebus said, into the general silence, 'we'd better be off.'

'Remember to empty your dustbin, sir,' was his final message to Jack, before he led Holmes down the driveway towards the main road. Holmes agreed to give him a lift into Bonnyrigg, from where Rebus could pick up a ride back into town, but otherwise reached, opened and started the car without comment. As he moved up into second gear, however, Holmes finally said: 'Nice guy. Do you think maybe he'd give us an invite to one of those parties?'

'Brian,' Rebus said warningly. Then: 'Not his parties, parties attended by his wife. It didn't look like their house in those photos.'

'Really? I didn't get that good a look. All I saw was my MP being stripped by a couple of eager ladies.' Holmes gave a sudden chuckle.

'What?'

'Strip Jack Naked,' he said.

'Pardon?'

'It's a card game,' Holmes explained. 'Strip Jack Naked. You might know it as Beggar My Neighbour.'

'Really?' Rebus said, trying not to sound interested. But was that precisely what someone was trying to do, strip Jack of his constituency, his clean-cut image, perhaps even his marriage? Were they trying to beggar the man whose nickname also was Beggar?

Or was Jack not quite as innocent as he seemed? No, hell, be honest: he didn't seem all that innocent anyway. Fact: he had visited a brothel. Fact: he had tried to get rid of evidence that he himself had attended at least one fairly 'high-spirited' party. Fact: his wife hadn't been in touch. Big deal. Rebus's money was still on the man. In religion, he might be more Pessimisterian than Presbyterian, but in some things John Rebus still clung to faith.

Faith and hope. It was charity he usually lacked.

4 Tips

'We've got to keep this away from the papers,' said Chief Superintendent Watson. 'For as long as we can.'

'Right, sir,' said Lauderdale, while Rebus stayed silent. They were not talking about Gregor Jack, they were discussing a suspect in the Water of Leith drowning. He was in an interview room now with two officers and a tape recorder. He was helping with inquiries. Apparently, he was saying little.

'Could be nothing, after all.'

'Yes, sir.'

There was an afternoon smell of strong mints in the room, and perhaps this was why Chief Inspector Lauderdale sounded and looked more starched than ever. His nose twitched whenever Watson wasn't looking at him. Rebus all of a sudden felt sorry for his Chief Superintendent, in the way that he felt sorry for the Scotland squad whenever it was facing defeat at the hands of third-world part-timers. There but for the grace of complete inability go I…'

'Just a bit of bragging, perhaps, overheard in a pub. The man was drunk. You know how it is.'

'Quite so, sir.'

'All the same…'

All the same, they had a man in the interview room, a man who had told anyone who'd listen in a packed Leith pub that he had dumped that body under Dean Bridge.

'It wis me! Eh? How 'bout that, eh? Me! Me! I did it. She deserved worse. They all do.'