It was a duty he had to perform, but it was also a chore and frankly he’d rather be back at work

The service was mercifully swift, and then the curtains pulled around the coffin, the edges not quite joining together enough to conceal its motorised passage through to the business end of the crematorium.

He remembered the first time he had been here; a bewildered four-year-old boy watching two wooden boxes and only dimly understanding that his parents were inside them; wondering why they wouldn’t wake up.

His grandmother had been beside him then, holding his hand and trying to be a comfort while she mourned her own loss.

She had explained to him, in her careful, logical way, all about the business of death. He understood why she had done that, but it hadn’t helped.

When the curtains began to close, he had expected to see a door open to a furnace, watch the flames leap towards their new source of fuel. The nightmares had stayed with him for years.

They exited through the front doors; a large party had already gathered at the rear, eager to send off the next dead.

Outside, the morning was growing hot, the sun risen over the tall trees that surrounded the site.

Unwilling

McLean shook hands with everyone and thanked them for coming, an act which took all of five minutes. Jenny Spiers hung back, he noticed, unwilling to commit herself to the line.

In the end he went over to her instead. “It was good of you to come.”

“Wasn’t sure if I should, to be honest. I never met your grandmother, after all.” Jenny flicked aside a stray bang of hair.

She’d come straight from the shop, if her outfit was anything to go by. Sombre, as befitted the tone, but probably the sort of thing McLean’s grandmother would have worn to a funeral when she was in her twenties.

He wondered whether the choice was on purpose. It suited her, though.

“I always say these things are about the living, not the dead. And anyway, if you hadn’t come, the average age of the people here would have been well into three figures.”

“It’s not that bad. Rae’s here, and she’s only 26.” “Fair point,” McLean conceded. “You coming over for a cup of over-stewed tea and a fish-paste sandwich?”

He nodded in the direction of the Balm Well across the road, then stuck out his arm for her to take.

Several elderly people in dark suits and dresses were trying to dodge the traffic, intent on getting their fill of the late Esther McLean’s final hospitality. Together they helped them across the road and into the pub.

Jonas Carstairs had organised a decent wake; it was just a shame he’d overestimated the catering numbers by an order of magnitude.

Old people, McLean noticed, had very small appetites too. He just hoped that the pub could find someone else to feed all the leftovers to.

Paying for it didn’t bother him so much as the thought that it would end up in the bin. His gran would have been horrified too, were she not past caring.

He left Jenny with Phil and her sister, worked his way around the small band of mourners with as much grace as he could muster.

Most of them said the same things about his gran; a few mentioned his parents.

Overestimated

It was a duty he had to perform, but it was also a chore and quite frankly he’d rather be back at work, helping DC MacBride plough his way through a stack of Mis-Per reports that were so old no one had bothered to digitise them.

Or trying to find out who had lived and partied in Farquhar House in the 1940s.

“I think it’s gone well enough, all things considered.” McLean turned away from the last wheelchair-bound friend of his gran, whose name he had forgotten almost as soon as it had been spoken, and stood up to face Jonas Carstairs.

The lawyer had a large whisky in his hand, took a long sip. “Perhaps overestimated the numbers coming?” McLean asked.

Something like a haunted look passed over Carstairs’ face. He glanced over his shoulder and for some inexplicable reason, McLean got the feeling he was looking for someone rather than appraising the numbers.

As if he had been expecting another mourner who hadn’t turned up.

“It’s always difficult to gauge these things.” Carstairs took another swig from his glass. “Looking for one more in particular?” “I sometimes forget the young boy turned into a detective inspector.” Carstairs grinned mirthlessly. “There was someone. Well, he might have come.

Maybe he didn’t know.”

“Anyone I’d know?”

“Oh, I doubt that very much. This was someone your grandmother knew before she married your grandfather. They were close.”

Carstairs shook his head. “For all I know he died ages ago.”

McLean was about to ask the name of this long lost friend, but something else occurred to him at the same time.

“Did you ever do any work for Farquhar’s Bank?” Carstairs choked a little on his whisky. “What makes you ask that?”

“Oh, just a case I’ve been working on. I’m trying to find out who was living in Farquhar House at the end of the Second World War.”

“Well, that’s easy enough. That would be old man Farquhar. Menzies Farquhar. He set up the bank at the turn of the century. I knew his son, Bertie. You’ll have heard of him.”

Crashed

McLean shook his head. “Doesn’t ring a bell.” “I forget how long ago it was, of course. Before you were even born. Poor old Bertie.” Carstairs shook his head.

“Or perhaps I should say stupid old Bertie. He crashed his car into a bus stop, killed half a dozen people.

“I think things would have been worse for the family if he hadn’t had the decency to kill himself at the same time.

“Old man Farquhar was never the same after that, though. He shut up Farquhar House and moved out to his place in the Borders. As far as I know it’s been empty ever since.”

“Not for much longer. Some property developer’s bought it. Going to turn it into luxury apartments or something.”

“Really?” Carstairs went to take another swig only to discover that he’d already finished his drink.

He put it down carefully on a nearby table, pulled a white handkerchief out of the breast pocket of his jacket and daubed at his lips.

“Who on earth would want to do that? I mean, it’s not exactly the most desirable of locations, is it.” “No, not really.”

“Mr Carstairs, sir?”

McLean turned around at the interruption.