Strip Jack

'I know architects my age, guys I went to college with, they've been on the dole for the past half dozen years. Or else they give up and go do something sensible like working on a building site or living on a kibbutz. Then there are some of us, for a time we can't put a foot wrong. This prize leads to that contract, and that contract gets noticed by an American corporation, and we start calling ourselves "international". Note, I say "for a time". It can all turn sour. You get in a rut, or the economic situation can't support your new ideas. I'll tell you, the best architectural designs are sitting locked away in drawers – nobody can afford to build the buildings, not yet anyway, maybe not ever. So I'm just enjoying my lucky break. That's all I'm doing.'

It was not quite all Tom Pond was doing. He was also crossing the Forth Road Bridge doing something in excess of one hundred miles an hour. Rebus daren't look at the speedo.

'After all,' Pond had explained, 'it's not every day I can go breaking the speed limit with a policeman in the car to explain it away if we get stopped.' And he laughed. Rebus didn't. Rebus didn't say much after they hit the ton.

Tom Pond owned a forty-grand Italian racing job that looked like a kit-car and sounded like a lawnmower. The last time Rebus had been sitting this close to ground level, he'd just slipped on some ice outside his flat.

'I've got three habits, Inspector: fast cars, fast women, and slow horses.' And he laughed again.

'If you don't slow down, son,' Rebus yelled above the engine's whine, 'I'm going to have to book you for speeding myself!'

Pond looked hurt, but eased back on the accelerator. And after all, he was doing them all a favour, wasn't he?

'Thank you,' Rebus conceded.

Holmes had told him he wouldn't believe it. Rebus was still trying. Pond had arrived back the previous day from the States, only to find a message waiting for him on his answering machine.

'It was Mrs Heggarty.'

'Mrs Heggarty being…?'

'She looks after my cottage. I've got a cottage up near Kingussie. Mrs Heggarty goes in now and again to give it a clean and check everything's okay.'

'And this time everything wasn't?'

'That's right. At first, she said there'd been a break-in, but then I called her back and from what she said they'd used my spare key to get in. I keep a key under a rock beside the front door. Hadn't made any mess or anything, not really. But Mrs Heggarty knew somebody'd been there and it hadn't been me. Anyway, I happened to mention it to the detective sergeant…"

The detective sergeant whose geography was better than fair. Kingussie wasn't far from Deer Lodge. It certainly wasn't far from Duthil. Holmes had asked the obvious question.

'Would Mrs Jack have known about the key?'

'Maybe. Beggar knew about it. I suppose everybody knew about it, really.'

All of which Holmes had relayed to Rebus. Rebus had gone to see Pond, their conversation lasting just over half an hour, at the end of which he had announced a wish to see the cottage.

'Be my guest,' Pond had said. And so Rebus was trapped in this narrow metal box, travelling so fast at times that his eyeballs were aching. It was well after midnight, but Pond seemed neither to notice nor to mind.

'I'm still in New York,' he said. 'Brain and body still disconnected. You know, this all sounds incredible, all this stuff about Gregor and Liz and her being found by Gowk. Just incredible.'

Pond had been in the United States for a month; already he was hooked. He was testing out the language, the intonation, even some of the mannerisms. Rebus studied him. Thick, wavy blond hair (dyed? highlighted?) atop a beefy ace, the face of someone who had been good-looking in youth. He wasn't tall, but he seemed taller than he was. A trick of posture; yes, to a certain extent, but he also had that confidence, that aura Gregor Jack had once possessed. He was firing on all cylinders.

'Can this car take a corner or what? Say what you like about the Italians, they build a mean ice cream and a meaner car.'

Rebus gritted his lower intestine. He was determined to taIk seriously with Pond. It was too good a chance to miss, the two of them trapped like this. He tried to talk without his teeth knocking each other out of his mouth.

'So, you've known Mr Jack since school?'

I know, I know, it's hard to believe, isn't it? I look so much younger than him. But yes, we only lived three streets apart. I think Bilbo lived in the same street as Beggar. Sexton and Mack lived in the same street, too. I mean, the same street as one another, not the same as Beggar and Bilbo. Suey and Gowk lived a bit further away, other side of the school from the rest of us.'

'So what drew you all together?'

I don't know. Funny, I've never really thought about it. I mean, we were all pretty clever, I suppose. Down a gear for this corner… and… like shit off a goddamned shovel'

Rebus felt as though his seat was trying to push its way irough his body.

'More like a motorbike than a car. What do you think, inspector?'