Fleshmarket Alley (2004) (23 page)

“Oh ye of little faith.”

“Little faith, but big resources.” She closed down her document and logged on to the Web, typed Senegal into a search engine. Rebus pulled a chair up next to her.

“Just there,” she said, pointing to an on-screen map of Africa. Senegal was on the continent’s northwest coast, dwarfed by Mauritania to the north and Mali to the east.

“It’s tiny,” Rebus commented.

Wylie clicked on an icon and a reference page opened up. “Just the seventy-six thousand square miles,” she said. “I think that’s three-quarters the size of Britain. Capital: Dakar.”

“As in the Dakar rally?”

“Presumably. Population: six and a half million.”

“Minus one . . .”

“She’s sure the caller was from Senegal?”

“I think we’re talking best guess.”

Wylie’s finger ran down the list of statistics. “No sign here that the country’s in turmoil or anything.”

“Meaning what?”

Wylie shrugged. “She might not be an asylum seeker . . . maybe not even an illegal.”

Rebus nodded, said he might know someone who’d know, and called Caro Quinn.

“You’re crying off?” she guessed.

“Far from it—I’ve even bought you a present.” For Wylie’s information, he patted his jacket pocket, from which jutted the folded newspaper. “Just wondering if you can shed any light on Senegal?”

“The country in Africa?

“That’s the one.” He peered at the screen. “Mostly Muslim and an exporter of ground nuts.”

He heard her laugh. “What about it?”

“Do you know of any refugees from there? Maybe in Whitemire?”

“Can’t say I do . . . Refugee Council might help.”

“That’s a thought.” But as he said it, Rebus was having another thought entirely. If anyone would know, Immigration would.

“See you later,” he said, ending the call.

Wylie had her arms folded, a smile on her face. “Your friend from outside Whitemire?” she guessed.

“Her name’s Caro Quinn.”

“And you’re meeting her later.”

“So?” Rebus twitched his shoulders.

“So what was she able to tell you about Senegal?”

“Just that she doesn’t think there are any Senegalese in Whitemire. She says we should talk to the Refugee Council.”

“What about Mo Dirwan? He seems the sort who might know.”

Rebus nodded. “Why don’t you give him a call?”

Wylie pointed at herself. “Me? You’re the one he seems to worship.”

Rebus’s face creased. “Give me a break, Ellen.”

“But then I forgot . . . you’ve got a date tonight. You probably want to nip home for a facial.”

“If I hear that you’ve been blabbing about this . . .”

She raised both hands in a show of surrender. “Your secret’s safe with me, Don Juan. Now skedaddle . . . I’ll see you after the weekend.”

Rebus stared at her, but she fluttered her hands, shooing him off. He’d gone three steps towards the door when she called out his name. He turned his head towards her.

“Take a tip from one who knows.” She gestured towards the newspaper in his pocket. “A bit of gift wrapping goes a long way . . .”

19

T
hat evening, fresh from a bath and a shave, Rebus arrived at Caro Quinn’s flat. He looked around, but there seemed no sign of mother and child.

“Ayisha’s gone to visit friends,” Quinn explained.

“Friends?”

“She’s allowed to have friends, John.” Quinn was bending over to hook a black low-heeled shoe onto her left foot.

“I didn’t mean anything,” he said defensively.

She straightened up. “Yes, you did, but don’t worry about it. Did I tell you Ayisha was a nurse back in her homeland?”

“Yes.”

“She wanted work here, doing the same thing . . . but asylum seekers aren’t allowed to work. Still, she made friends with some nurses. One of them’s having a get-together.”

“I brought something for the baby,” Rebus said, sliding a rattle from his pocket. Quinn came towards him, took the rattle, and tried it out. She looked at him and smiled.

“I’ll put it in her room.”

Left on his own, Rebus realized he was sweating, his shirt clinging to his back. He thought of removing his jacket, but feared the stain would be visible. It was the jacket’s fault: hundred percent wool, too warm for indoors. He visualized himself at dinner, beads of perspiration falling into his soup . . .

“You haven’t told me how nicely I scrub up,” Quinn said, coming back into the room. She still had only the one shoe on. Her feet were covered in black tights, which disappeared beneath a knee-length black skirt. Her top was mustard-colored, with a wide neckline stretching almost to both shoulders.

“You look great,” he said.

“Thanks.” She slipped the other shoe on.

“I’ve got you a present, too.” He handed over the newspaper.

“And here I was, thinking you’d brought it along in case you got bored of my company.” Then she saw that he’d tied a narrow red bow around it. “Nice touch,” she added, removing it.

“Reckon the suicide will make any difference?”

She seemed to consider this, patting the newspaper against the palm of her left hand. “Probably not,” she finally conceded. “As far as the government’s concerned, they have to be kept somewhere. Might as well be Whitemire.”

“The newspaper talks about a ‘crisis.’”

“That’s because the word ‘crisis’ sounds like news.” She’d opened the paper to the page with her photograph. “That circle around my head makes me look like a target.”

Rebus narrowed his eyes. “Why do you say that?”

“John, I’ve been a radical all my life. Nuclear subs at Faslane, the Torness power station, Greenham Common . . . You name it, I’ve been there. Is my phone tapped right this second? I couldn’t tell you. Has it been tapped in the past? Almost certainly.”

Rebus stared at the telephone apparatus. “Do you mind if I . . . ?” Without waiting for an answer, he picked up the receiver, pressed the green button, and listened. Then he closed the connection, opened it and closed it again. Looked at her and shook his head, replacing the handset.

“You reckon you could tell?” she asked him.

He shrugged. “Maybe.”

“You think I’m exaggerating, don’t you?”

“Wouldn’t mean you don’t have a reason.”

“I’m betting you’ve bugged phones in the past—during the miners’ strike maybe?”

“Now who’s the one doing the interrogating?”

“That’s because we’re enemies, remember?”

“Are we?”

“Most of your lot would see me that way, with or without the combat jacket.”

“I’m not like most of my lot.”

“I’d say that’s true. Otherwise I’d never have let you over the threshhold.”

“Why did you? It was to show me those photos, right?”

She eventually nodded. “I wanted you to see them as human beings rather than problems.” She brushed down the front of her skirt, took a deep breath to indicate a change of subject. “So where are we gracing with our custom tonight?”

“There’s a good Italian on Leith Walk.” He paused. “You’re probably vegetarian, right?”

“God, you’re just full of assumptions, aren’t you? But as it happens, this time you’re right. Italian’s good though: plenty of pasta and pizza.”

“Italian it is, then.”

She took a step towards him. “You know, you’d probably put your foot in your mouth less often if you could try and relax.”

“This is about as relaxed as I get without the demon alcohol.”

She slipped her arm into his. “Then let’s go find your demons, John . . .”

“. . . and then there were those three Kurds, you must have seen it on the news, they sewed their mouths shut in protest, and another asylum seeker sewed his eyes shut . . . his
eyes,
John . . . most of these people are desperate by anyone’s standards, most don’t speak English, and they’re fleeing the most dangerous places on Earth—Iraq, Somalia, Afghanistan . . . a few years back, they had a good chance of being allowed to stay, but the restrictions now are crippling . . . some of them resort to desperate measures, tearing up any ID, thinking it means they can’t be sent home, but instead they’re sent to prison or end up on the streets . . . and now we’ve got politicians arguing that the country’s already too diverse . . . and I . . . well, I just feel there must be
something
we can do about it.”

Finally she stopped for a breath, picking up the wineglass which Rebus had just refilled. Though flesh and fowl were off Caro Quinn’s menu, alcohol, it appeared, was not. She’d eaten only half her mushroom pizza. Rebus, having demolished his own calzone, was restraining himself from reaching over for one of her remaining slices.

“I was under the impression,” he said, “that Britain takes more refugees than anywhere else.”

“That’s true,” she conceded.

“Even more than the United States?”

She nodded with the wineglass at her lips. “But what’s important is the number who are allowed to stay. The world’s number of refugees is doubling every five years, John. Glasgow has more asylum seekers than any other council in Britain—more than Wales and Northern Ireland combined—and do you know what’s happened?”

“More racism?” Rebus guessed.

“More racism. Racial harrassment is up; race attacks are growing by half each year.” She shook her head, sending her long silver earrings flying.

Rebus checked the bottle. It was three-quarters empty. Their first bottle had been Valpolicella; this one was Chianti.

“Am I talking too much?” she asked suddenly.

“Not at all.”

Her elbows were on the table. She rested her chin on her hands. “Tell me a bit about
you
, John. What made you join the police?”

“A sense of duty,” he offered. “Wanting to help my fellow human beings.” She stared at him and he smiled. “Only joking,” he said. “I just wanted a job. I’d been in the army for a few years . . . maybe I still had a thing for uniforms.”

She narrowed her eyes. “I can’t see you as the bobby-on-the-beat type . . . So what is it exactly that you get out of the job?”

Rebus was saved from answering by the appearance of the waiter. Since it was Friday night, the restaurant was busy. Their table was the smallest in the place, and situated in a dark corner between the bar and the door to the kitchen.

“You enjoy?” the waiter asked.

“It was fine, Marco, but I think we’re finished.”

“Dessert for the lady?” Marco suggested. He was small and round and had not lost his Italian accent, despite having lived in Scotland for the best part of forty years. Caro Quinn had quizzed him on his roots when they’d first entered the restaurant, realizing later that Rebus knew Marco of old.

“Sorry if I sounded like I was interrogating him,” she’d said by way of apology.

Rebus had just shrugged and told her she’d make a good detective.

She was shaking her head now, as Marco reeled off a list of desserts, each of which, apparently, was a particular specialty of the house.

“Just coffee,” she said. “A double espresso.”

“Same for me, thanks, Marco.”

“And a
digestif,
Mr. Rebus?”

“Just coffee, thanks.”

“Not even for the lady?”

Caro Quinn leaned forward. “Marco,” she said, “no matter how drunk I get, there’s no way I’m sleeping with Mr. Rebus, so don’t put yourself out trying to aid and abet, okay?”

Marco just shrugged and held up his hands, then turned sharply towards the bar and barked out the order for coffees.

“Was I a bit hard on him?” Quinn asked Rebus.

“A bit.”

She leaned back again. “Does he often help you in your seductions?”

“You might find this hard to fathom, Caro, but seduction had never entered my mind.”

She looked at him. “Why not? What’s wrong with me?”

He laughed. “There’s nothing wrong with you. I was just trying to be . . .” He sought the right word. “Gentlemanly,” was the one he came up with.

She seemed to think about this, then shrugged and pushed her glass away. “I shouldn’t drink so much.”

“We haven’t even finished the bottle yet.”

“Thanks, but I think I’ve had enough. I get the feeling I’ve been guilty of speechifying . . . probably not what you had in mind for a Friday night.”

“You’ve filled in a few gaps for me . . . I didn’t mind listening.”

“Really?”

“Really.” He could have added that this was partly down to the fact that he would rather listen to her than talk about himself any day.

“So how’s the work going?” he asked.

“It’s fine . . . when I get time to do any.” She studied him. “Maybe I should do a portrait of you.”

“You want to scare small children?”

“No . . . but there’s something about you.” She angled her head. “It’s hard to see what’s going on behind your eyes. Most people try to hide the fact that they’re calculating and cynical . . . with you, that’s what seems to be on the surface.”

“But I’ve got a soft, romantic center?”

“I’m not sure I’d go that far.”

They leaned back in their chairs as the coffees arrived. Rebus started to unwrap his amaretto biscuit.

“Have mine, too, if you want,” Quinn said, getting to her feet. “I need to pay a visit . . .” Rebus rose an inch from his chair, the way he’d seen actors do in old films. She seemed to realize that this was new to his repertoire and gave another smile. “Quite the gentleman . . .”

Once she’d gone, he searched his pockets for his mobile, switched it on to check for messages. There were two: both from Siobhan. He called her number, heard background noise.

“It’s me,” he said.

“Hang on a sec . . .” Her voice was breaking up. He heard a door swinging open and then shut again, muting the background voices.

“You at the Ox?” he guessed.

“That’s right. I was at the Dome with Les Young, but he had a prior engagement, so I drifted along here. What about you?”

“Dining out.”

“Alone?”

“No.”

“Anyone I know?”

“Her name’s Caro Quinn. She’s an artist.”

“The Whitemire one-woman crusade?”

Rebus’s eyes narrowed. “That’s right.”

“I read the papers, too, you know. What’s she like?”

“She’s fine.” His eyes looked up to where Quinn was returning to the table. “Look, I’d better ring off . . .”

“Wait a second. The reason I was calling . . . well, two reasons actually . . .” Her voice was drowned out by a vehicle as it rumbled past her. “. . . and I wondered if you’d heard.”

“Sorry, I missed that. Heard what?”

“Mo Dirwan.”

“What about him?”

“He’s been beaten up. Happened around six.”

“In Knoxland?”

“Where else?”

“How is he?” Rebus’s eyes were on Quinn. She was playing with her coffee spoon, making a show of not listening.

“He’s okay, I think. Cuts and bruises.”

“Is he in hospital?”

“Recuperating at home.”

“Do we know who did it?”

“I’m guessing racists.”

“I mean anyone in particular.”

“It’s Friday night, John.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning it’ll wait till Monday.”

“Fair enough.” He thought for a second. “So what was your other reason for calling? You said there were two.”

“Janet Eylot.”

“I know the name.”

“She works at Whitemire. Says she gave you Stef Yurgii’s name.”

“She did. What about it?”

“Just wanted to check she was on the level.”

“I told her she wouldn’t get into trouble.”

“She’s not.” Siobhan paused. “Not yet, at any rate. Any chance we’ll be seeing you at the Ox?”

“I might manage along later.”

Quinn’s eyebrows rose at this. Rebus ended the call and slipped the phone back into his pocket.

“A girlfriend?” she teased.

“Colleague.”

“And where is it you might ‘manage along’ to?”

“Just a place we sometimes drink.”

“The bar with no name?”

“It’s called the Oxford.” He picked up his cup. “Someone got a doing tonight, a lawyer called Mo Dirwan.”

“I know him.”

Rebus nodded. “Thought you might.”

“He often visits Whitemire. Likes to stop and talk to me afterwards, letting off steam.” She seemed lost in thought for a moment. “Is he all right?”

“Seems to be.”

“He calls me his ‘Lady of the Vigils’ . . .” She broke off. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” Rebus lowered the cup onto its saucer.

“You can’t be his white knight every time.”

“It’s not that . . .”

“What, then?”

“He was attacked in Knoxland.”

“So?”

“It was me who asked him to stick around, knock on doors . . .”

“And that makes it your fault? If I know Mo Dirwan, he’ll bounce back stronger and more bolshy than ever.”

“You’re probably right.”

She drained her coffee. “You should go to your pub. Might be the only place you can relax.”

Rebus signaled to Marco for the bill. “I’ll see you home first,” he told Quinn. “Got to keep up the pretense of being a gentleman.”

“I don’t think you understand, John . . . I’m coming with you.” He stared at her. “Unless you don’t want me to.”

“It’s not that.”

“What, then?”

“I’m just not sure it’s your kind of place.”

“But it’s yours, and that’s what I’m curious about.”