Exit Music

Rebus had wondered at the time, how did he get a pub licence?

Reckoned money had changed hands, someone on the council pitching for him. Friends could always be bought. Time was, Cafferty himself had owned a number of councillors. That way, he stayed

one step ahead; cheap at whatever the price. He'd tried buying Rebus, too, but that was never going to run – Rebus had learned his lesson by then.

'Not my fault Grandpa Goodyear died in the clink…'

He stubbed out the cigarette and turned towards the door, but then paused. What was waiting for him inside? Another drink, plus a table of youngsters – Shiv, Phyl and Col would be discussing the case, bouncing ideas around. And what exactly could Rebus add to the mix? He took out another cigarette and lit it, then started walking.

He took a left on to Frederick Street and a right into Princes Street. The castle was being illuminated from below, its shape picked out against the night sky. The funfair was under construction in Princes Street Gardens, along with the market stalls and booths parked at the foot of The Mound. It would be a magnet for shoppers in the run-up to Christmas. He thought he could hear music: maybe the open-air ice rink was being tested out. Groups of kids were weaving their way past the shopfronts, paying him not the slightest heed. When did I become the invisible man? Rebus asked himself. Catching his reflection in a window he saw heft and bulk. Yet these kids teemed past as if he had no place in their version of the world.

Is this how ghosts feel? he wondered.

He crossed at the traffic lights and pushed open the door to the bar of the Caledonian Hotel. The place was busy. Jazz was playing on the hi-fi and Freddie was busy with a cocktail shaker. A waitress was waiting to take her tray of drinks over to a table filled with laughter. Everyone looked prosperous and confident. Some of them held mobile phones to their ears, even as they spoke to the person next to them. Rebus felt a moment's irritation that someone had taken his stool. In fact, all the stools were taken. He bided his time until the barman had finished pouring. The waitress moved off, balancing the tray on her hand, and Freddie saw Rebus. The frown he gave told Rebus that the situation had changed. The bar was no longer empty, and Freddie would be unwilling to talk.

'Usual, please,' Rebus said anyway. And then: You weren't exaggerating about the double shift…'

This time, when the whisky arrived, the bill came with it. Rebus smiled to let Freddie know this was fine with him. He trickled a few drops of water into the glass and swirled it in his hand, sniffing the contents as he sca

'They've gone, in case you're wondering,' Freddie told him.

'Who?'

'The Russians. Checked out this afternoon, apparently. Winging their way back to Moscow.'

Rebus tried not to look too deflated by this news. 'What I was wondering,' he said, 'is whether you've got that name for me.'

The barman nodded slowly. 'I was going to phone you tomorrow.'

The waitress had arrived with another order and he went to fill it. Two large helpings of red wine and a glass of the house champagne.

Rebus started listening in on the conversation next to him.

Two businessmen with Irish accents, eyes glued to the football on the soundless TV. Some property deal had failed to come off and they were drowning their sorrows.

'And God grant them a lingering death,' seemed to be the toast of choice. One of the things Rebus liked best about bars was the chance to eavesdrop on other people's lives. Did that make him a voyeur, not so very different from Charles Riordan?

'Any chance we get to screw them over…' one of the Irishmen was saying. Freddie had returned the champagne bottle to the ice bucket and was coming back to Rebus's end of the bar.

'He's Minister for Economic Development,' the barman explained.

'Ministers are listed first on the Parliament's website. Might've taken a while otherwise…'

'What's he called?'

'James Bakewell.'

Rebus wondered why he knew the name.

'Saw him on the TV a few weeks back,' Freddie was saying.

'On Question Time?' Rebus guessed. The barman was nodding.

Yes, because Rebus had seen Bakewell there, too, arguing the toss with Megan Macfarlane while Alexander Todorov sat between them. Jim, everyone seemed to call him… 'And he was in here with Sergei Andropov, same night as the poet?' Freddie kept nodding.

And the same night, too, as Morris Gerald Cafferty. Rebus rested his hands against the bar, letting them take his weight. His head was swirling. Freddie had moved to take another order. Rebus thought back to the tape of Question Time. Jim Bakewell had been New Labour with some of the rough edges left untreated. Either he wouldn't let the image consultants near him, or that was his image. Late forties with a mop of dark brown hair and wire-framed spectacles. Square-jawed and blue-eyed and self-deprecating. He'd got a lot of respect north of the border for the way he'd resigned a safe seat at Westminster to stand for the Scottish Parliament.

This made him a rare beast indeed. Seemed to Rebus that a lot of the political talent was still drawn to London. Freddie hadn't mentioned any minders, which Rebus also found interesting. If Bakewell had been meeting the Russians in an official capacity, surely there'd have been assistants and advisers on hand. The Minister for Economic Development… late-night drinks with a foreign businessman… Big Ger Cafferty crashing the party…

Too many questions were hammering away at the inside of Rebus's skull. It was as if his brain had developed a pulse. Finishing the drink, he left some money on the bar and decided it was time to head home. His phone alerted him to a text message. Siobhan was wondering where he'd got to.

'Took you long enough,' he muttered to himself. As he passed the Irishmen, one of them was leaning in towards the other.

'If he dies on Christmas morning,' he was confiding in a booming voice, 'that'll be tinsel enough for me…'

Two ways to leave the hotel: the bar's own door, or through reception.

Rebus wasn't sure why he chose the latter. As he crossed the lobby, two men had just emerged through the revolving door. The one in front he recognised: the man who'd been driving Andropov.

The other was Andropov himself. He had seen Rebus and his eyes were narrowing, wondering where he knew him from. Rebus gave a little bow of the head as they approached one another.

'Thought you'd all gone home,' he said, trying to sound casual.

'I'm staying a few more days.' There wasn't much of an accent at all. Rebus could tell Andropov was still trying to place him.

'Friend of Cafferty's,' he pretended to explain.

'Ah yes.' The chauffeur was standing just the other side of Rebus, hands clasped in front of him, feet splayed. Chauffeur and bodyguard.

'The few extra days,' Rebus enquired of Andropov, 'business or pleasure?'

'Usually I find business a distinct pleasure.' It sounded like a line he'd used dozens of times before, always expecting a laugh or a smile. Rebus obliged as best he could.

'Seen Mr Cafferty today?' he asked eventually.

'I'm sorry, I seem to have forgotten your name…'

'I'm John,' Rebus told him.

'And your co

'I was wondering the same about you, Mr Andropov.' Rebus decided he'd already been rumbled. 'It's fine to hobnob with the great and the good, being fawned over by politicians of all creeds

and colours… but when you start cosying up to a career criminal like Cafferty, alarm bells are bound to start ringing.'

Tfou were at the City Chambers,' Andropov a