Strip Jack

'Oh yes,' said Knox. 'How could I forget, you've been keeping us so busy? So, what do you think, sir?'

Rebus thought it was cold. Cold and wet. It wasn't raining now, but any minute it might be on again. 'You've called for reinforcements?'

Knox nodded. 'As many as can be mustered.'

'Well, we could wait it out till they arrive.'

'Yes?'

Rebus was sizing Knox up. He didn't seem the kind of man who enjoyed waiting. 'Or,' he said, 'we could go in, three of us, one standing guard on the gate. After all, he's either got a corpse or a hostage in there. If Steele's alive, the sooner we go in, the better chance he's got.'

'So what are we waiting for?'

Rebus looked to DC Wright and Constable Moffat, who nodded approval of the plan.

'It's a long walk up to the house, mind,' Knox was saying.

'But if we take a car, he's bound to hear it.'

'We can take one up so far and walk the rest,' suggested Moffat. 'That way the exit road's good and blocked. I wouldn't fancy wandering up that bloody road in the dark only to have him come racing towards me in that car of his.'

'Okay, agreed, we'll take a car.' Rebus turned to DC Wright. 'You stay on the gate, son. Moffat here knows the layout of the house.' Wright looked snubbed, but Moffat perked up at the news. 'Right,' said Rebus, 'let's go.'

They took Knox's car, leaving Moffat's parked across the entrance. Knox had taken one look at Rebus's heap and then shaken his head.

'Best take mine, eh?'

He drove slowly. Rebus in the front beside him, Moffat in the back. The car had a nice quiet engine, but all the same… all around was silence. Any noise would travel. Rebus actually began to pray for a sudden storm, thunder and rain, for anything that would give them sound-cover.

'I enjoyed that book,' said Moffat, his head just behind Rebus's.

'What book?'

'Fish Out of Water.'

'Christ, I'd forgotten all about it.'

'Cracking story,' said Moffat.

'How much further?' asked Knox. T can't remember.'

'There's a bend to the left then another to the right,' said Moffat. 'We better stop after the second one. It's only another couple of hundred yards.'

They parked, opening the doors and leaving them open. Knox produced two large rubber torches from the glove compartment. I was a cub scout,' he explained. 'Be prepared and all that.' He handed one torch to Rebus and kept the other. 'Moffat here eats his carrots, he doesn't need one. Right, what's the plan now?'

'Let's see how things look at the house, then I'll tell you.'

'Fair enough.'

They set off in a line. After about fifty yards, Rebus turned off his torch. It was no longer necessary: all the lights in and around the lodge seemed to be burning. They stopped just before the clearing, peering through what cover there was. The Saab was parked outside the front door. Its boot was open. Rebus turned to Moffat.

'Remember, there's a back door? Circle around and cover it.'

'Right.' The constable moved off the road and into the forest, disappearing from sight.

'Meantime, let's check the car first, then take a look through the windows.'

Knox nodded. They left their cover and crept forwards. The boot itself was empty. Nothing on the car's back seat either. Lights were on in the living room and the front bedroom, but there was no sign of anyone. Knox pointed with his torch towards the door. He tried the handle. The door opened a crack. He pushed it a little further. The hall was empty. They waited a moment, listening. There was a sudden eruption of noise, drums and guitar chords. Knox jumped back. Rebus rested a calming hand on his shoulder, then retreated to look again through the living room window. The stereo. He could see its LEDs pulsing. The cassette player, probably on automatic replay. A tape had been winding back while they'd approached the house. Now it was playing.

Early Stones. 'Paint It Black'. Rebus nodded. 'He's in there,' he said to himself. My secret vice, Inspector. One of many. At any rate, it meant he might not have heard the car's approach, and now the music was on again he might not even hear them entering the house.

So they entered. Moffat was covering the kitchen, so Rebus headed directly upstairs, Knox behind him. There was fine white powder on the wooden banister, leftovers from the dusting the house had been given by forensics. Up the stairs… and on to the landing. What was that smell? What was that smell?

'Petrol,' whispered Knox.

Yes, petrol. The bedroom door was closed. The music seemed louder up here than downstairs. Thump-thump-thump of drum and bass. Clashing guitar and sitar. And those cheesegrater vocals.

Petrol.

Rebus leaned back and kicked in the door. It swung open and stayed open. Rebus took in the scene. Gregor Jack standing there, and against the wall a bound and gagged figure, its face puffy, forehead bloody. Ronald Steele. Gagged? No, not exactly a gag. Scraps of paper seemed to fill his mouth, scraps torn from the Sunday papers on the bed, all the stories which had started with his plotting. Well, Jack had made him eat his words.

Petrol.