Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
REBUS MYSTERY CONTINUES
since he was a good foot taller than his elder. He was holding a briefcase. The chief, however, held only a piece of paper.
He was frowning, glancing towards this. He looked at Rebus, sizing him up, then back to the paper. He didn’t appear to have heard what Rebus said.
“I’m Catholic,” Rebus repeated, but hollowly.
The man shook his head. Maybe they were foreign missionaries, come to convert the heathen. He consulted his scrap of paper again.
“I think this is the wrong address,” he said. “There isn’t a Mr Bakewell here?”
“Bakewell?” Rebus started to relax. A simple mistake; they weren’t JWS. They weren’t salesmen or cowboy builders or tinkers. Simply, they’d got the wrong flat. “No,” he said. “No Mr Bakewell here. And his tart’s not here either.”
Oh, they laughed at that. Laughed louder than Rebus had expected. They were still laughing as they made their apologies and started back downstairs. Rebus watched them until they were out of sight. He’d stopped laughing almost before they’d begun.
He checked that his keys were in his pocket, then slammed shut his door – but with himself still out on the landing.
Their footsteps sent sibilant echoes up towards the skylight. What was it about them? If pressed, he couldn’t have said. There was just something. The way the smaller, older man had seemed to weigh him up in a moment, then mentioned Bakewell. The way the younger man had laughed so heartily, as if it were such a release. A release of what? Tension, obviously.
The footsteps had stopped. Outside Mrs Cochrane’s door. Yes, that was the ting-ting of her doorbell, the kind you pulled, tightening and releasing the spring on a bell inside the door. The door which was now being pulled open. The older man spoke.
“Mrs Cochrane?” Well, they’d got that name right. But then it was on her nameplate, wasn’t it? Anyone could have guessed at it.
“Aye.” Mrs Cochrane, Rebus knew, was not unique in making this sound not only questioning but like a whole sentence. Yes, I’m Mrs Cochrane, and who might you be and what do you want? “Councillor Waugh.”
Councillor! No, no, there was no problem: Rebus had paid his Poll Tax, always put his bin bags out the night before, never earlier. They might be after Bakewell, but Rebus was in the clear.
“It’s about the roadworks.” “Roadworks?” echoed Mrs Cochrane.
Roadworks? thought Rebus. “Yes, roadworks. Digging up the roads. You made a complaint about the roads. I’ve come to talk to you about it.”
“Roadworks? Here, you mean?” He was patient, Rebus had to grant him that. “That’s right, Mrs Cochrane. The road outside.”
There was a bit more of this, then they all went indoors to talk over Mrs Cochrane’s grievances. Rebus opened his own door and went in, too. Then, realising, he slapped his hand against his head.
Ian Rankin’s novel WESTWIND is published in paperback by Orion on June 11.