‘Were you ever in the Scouts, Jack?’

‘I was a sixer in the Cubs, never made the transfer to Scouts. I had other hobbies by then. Are the Scouts still going?’

‘Last I heard.’

‘Remember Bob-a-Job week? You had to go round the neighbours, washing windows, digging their gardens. Then at the end, you handed all the cash over to Akela.’

‘Who promptly stuck half in his pocket.’

Jack looked at him. ‘There’s a touch of the cynic in you, isn’t there?’

‘Maybe just a touch.’

‘So where to now? Fort Apache?’

‘After what I’ve just been through?’

‘The Ox?’

‘You’re learning.’

Jack opted for tomato juice – watching his weight, he said – while Rebus had a half-pint and, after a moment’s thought, a nip. The lunchtime trade wasn’t in yet, but the pies and bridies were heating in preparation. Maybe the barmaid had been in the Girl Guides. They took their drinks through to the back room, settled at a corner table.

‘It’s funny being back in Edinburgh,’ Jack said. ‘Never used to drink here, did we? What was the name of the local along Great London Road?’

‘I don’t remember.’ It was true; he couldn’t even recall the pub’s interior, yet must have been in there two or three hundred times. It was just a place for drink and discussion; what life it had the drinkers brought with them.

‘Jesus, the money we wasted in there.’

‘There speaks the reformed drinker.’

Jack forced a smile, lifted his glass. ‘John, tell me though, why do you drink?’

‘It kills my dreams.’

‘It’ll kill you in the end, too.’

‘Something’s got to.’

‘Know what someone said to me? They said you were the world’s longest surviving suicide victim.’

‘Who said that?’

‘Never mind.’

Rebus was laughing. ‘Maybe I should apply to the Guinness Book of Records.’

Jack drained his glass. ‘So what’s the itinerary?’

‘There’s someone I’m supposed to call, a journalist.’ He looked at his watch. ‘I suppose she might be home. I’m going back to the bar to use the phone. Are you coming?’

‘No, I’ll trust you.’

‘You sure?’

‘Fairly.’

So Rebus went to call Mairie, but all he got was her answering machine. He left a brief message, and asked the barmaid if there was a photographer’s within walking distance. She nodded, gave him directions, then went back to wiping glasses. Rebus summoned Jack, and they drifted out of the pub into a day that was growing warmer. There was still a blanket of cloud overhead, oppressive, almost thundery. But you just knew the sun was pummelling it, like a child with its pillow. Rebus took his jacket off, slung it over his shoulder. The photographer’s was one street further along, so they cut through Hill Street.

The shop carried a window display of portraits – wedding couples seeming to radiate light, young children beaming smiles. Frozen moments of happiness – the great deception – to frame and put in pride of place in your cabinet or on top of the television.