“Hell’s fucking bells,” Hogan cried. Rebus was staring at the spot… the plane already reduced to wreckage, wisps of smoke rising from it as the pieces began to disappear beneath the surface.
“We’ve got to get down there!” Rebus shouted.
“How?”
“I don’t know… get a boat! Port Edgar… they’ve got boats!” They got back into the car and did a squealing U-turn, drove to the boatyard, where a siren was sounding, regular sailors already heading for the scene. Rebus parked, and they ran down to the jetty, past Herdman’s boathouse, Rebus aware of movement at the corner of his eye, a flash of color. Dismissing it in the urgency to reach the water’s edge. Rebus and Hogan showed their ID to a man who was untying his speedboat.
“We need a lift.”
The man was in his late fifties, bald-headed with a silver beard. He looked them up and down. “You need life jackets,” he protested.
“No, we don’t. Now just get us out there.” Rebus paused. “Please.”
The man took another look at him, and nodded agreement. Rebus and Hogan clambered aboard, holding on as the owner raced out of the harbor. Other small boats had already congregated around the slick of oil, and the lifeboat from South Queensferry was approaching. Rebus scanned the surface of the water, knowing it was futile.
“Maybe it wasn’t them,” Hogan said. “Maybe she didn’t go.”
Rebus nodded in the hope that his friend might shut up. What debris there was, was already spreading out, the tide and the swell from the various craft dispersing it. “We need divers, Bobby. Frogmen… whatever it takes.”
“It’ll be taken care of, John. Somebody else’s job, not ours.” Rebus realized that Hogan’s hand was squeezing his arm. “Christ, and I made that stupid crack about the coast guard…”
“Not your fault, Bobby.”
Hogan was thoughtful. “Nothing we can do here, eh?”
Rebus was forced to admit defeat: there was nothing they could do. They asked the skipper to take them back, which he did.
“Terrible accident,” he yelled above the noise of the outboard engine.
“Yes, terrible,” Hogan agreed. Rebus just stared at the choppy surface of the water. “We still going to the airfield?” Hogan asked as they climbed back onto dry land. Rebus nodded, started striding towards the Passat. But then he paused outside Herdman’s boathouse, and turned his head to look at the much smaller shed next door, the one with the car parked in front. The car was an old 7-series BMW, tarnished black. He didn’t recognize it. Where had the flash of color come from? He looked at the shed. Its door was closed. Had it been open when they’d arrived? Had the flash of color flitted across the doorway? Rebus walked up to the door, gave it a push. It bounced back: someone behind it, holding it closed. Rebus stood back and gave the door an almighty kick, then shouldered it. It flew open, sending the man behind it sprawling.
Red short-sleeved shirt with palm trees on it.
Face turning to meet Rebus’s.
“Holy shit,” Bobby Hogan was muttering, studying the blanket on the ground, the array of weapons laid out on it. Two lockers stood gaping, emptied of their secrets. Pistols, revolvers, submachine guns…
“Thinking of starting a war, Peacock?” Rebus said. And when Peacock Johnson scrambled forwards, making towards the nearest gun, Rebus took a single step, swung back a foot, and kicked him straight in the middle of his face, throwing him back onto the floor again.
Johnson lay unconscious, spread-eagled. Hogan was shaking his head.
“How the hell did we miss this lot?” he was asking himself.
“Maybe because it was right under our noses, Bobby, same as everything else in this damned case.”
“But what does it mean?”
“I suggest you ask our friend here,” Rebus said, “just as soon as he wakes up.” He turned to walk away.
“Where are you going?”
“The airfield. You stay here with him, call it in.”
“John… what’s the point?”
Rebus stopped. He knew what Hogan meant: what’s the point of going to the airfield? But then he started walking again, couldn’t think of anything else to do. He punched Siobhan’s number into his mobile, but a recording told him the number wasn’t available and he should try again later. He punched it in again, same response. Dropped the tiny silver box onto the ground and stamped on it, hard as he could, with the heel of his shoe.
It was dusk by the time Rebus arrived at the locked gates.
He got out of the car and tried the entry phone, but no one was answering. He could see Siobhan’s car through the fence, parked next to the office. The office door was standing open, as though someone had been in a hurry.
Or maybe struggling… not bothering to close it after them.
Rebus pushed at the gate, put his shoulder to it. The chain rattled but wasn’t going to yield. He stood back and kicked it. Kicked it again and again. Shouldered it, smashed his fists against it. Pressed his head to it, eyes squeezed shut.
“Siobhan…” His voice breaking.
He knew what he needed: bolt cutters. A patrol car could bring some, if Rebus had any way of calling one.
Brimson… he knew it now. Knew Brimson was running drugs, had planted them on his dead friend’s boat. He didn’t know why, but he’d find out. Siobhan had discovered the truth somehow, and had died as a result. Perhaps she’d wrestled with him, explaining the erratic flight path. He opened his eyes wide, blinking back tears.
Staring through the gate.
Blinking his vision back into focus.
Because someone was there… A figure in the doorway, one hand to its head, another to its stomach. Rebus blinked again, making sure.
“Siobhan!” he yelled. She raised a hand, waved it. Rebus grabbed the fence and hauled himself onto it, shouted her name again. She disappeared back into the building.
His voice cracked. Was he seeing things now? No: she was out of the building again, getting into her car, driving the short distance to the gate. As she neared, Rebus saw that it really was her. And she was fine.
She stopped the car and got out. “Brimson,” she was saying. “He’s the one with the drugs… in cahoots with Johnson and Teri’s mother…” She’d brought Brimson’s keys, was finding the right one to use on the padlock.
“We know,” Rebus told her, but she wasn’t listening.
“Must’ve made a run for it… laid me out cold. I only came to when the phone started buzzing.” She yanked the padlock free, the chain coming with it. Pulled open the gate.
And was picked off the ground by Rebus, his hug enveloping her.
“Ow, ow, ow,” she said, causing him to ease off. “Bit bruised,” she explained, her eyes meeting his. He couldn’t help himself, planted his lips on hers. The kiss lingered, his eyes tight shut, hers wide open. She broke away, took a step back, tried to catch her breath.
“Not that I’m not overwhelmed or anything, but what’s this all about?”
27
It was Rebus’s turn to visit Siobhan in the hospital. She’d been admitted for a concussion, was due to stay the night.
“This is ridiculous,” she protested. “I’m fine, really I am.”
“You’ll stay where you are, young lady.”
“Oh, yes? Like you did, you mean?”
As if to emphasize her point, the same nurse who had changed Rebus’s dressings walked past, pushing an empty cart.
Rebus pulled a chair across and sat down.
“You didn’t bring anything, then?” she asked.
Rebus shrugged. “Been a bit rushed; you know how it is.”
“What’s the story with Peacock?”
“He’s doing a good impression of a clam. Not that it’ll do him any good. Way Gill Templer sees it, Herdman wouldn’t want the guns lying around in his own boathouse, so Peacock rented the one next door. That’s where Herdman worked on them, reconditioning them, and they were stored in the shed. When he put a bullet to his head, things got too hot, no way Peacock could shift them…”
“But then he panicked?”