Another day down.

He awoke a few hours later, blinked, got up and went to the bathroom. A shower and shave, change of clothes. He’d been dreaming of Johnny Bible, getting it all mixed up with Bible John. Cops on the scene wearing tight suits and thin black ties, white bri-nylon shirts, pork-pie hats. 1968, Bible John’s first victim. To Rebus it meant Van Morrison, Astral Weeks. 1969, victims two and three; the Stones, Let It Bleed. The hunt went on into 1970, John Rebus wanting to go to the Isle of Wight Festival, not managing it. But of course Bible John had disappeared by then … He hoped Johnny Bible would just sod off and die.

There was nothing in the kitchen to eat, nothing but newspapers. The nearest corner shop had closed down; it wasn’t much more of a walk to the next grocer’s along. No, he’d stop somewhere on route. He looked out of the window and saw a light-blue estate double parked outside, blocking three resident cars. Equipment in the back of the estate, two men and a woman standing on the pavement, supping coffee from take-away beakers.

‘Shit,’ Rebus said, knotting his tie.

Jacketed, he walked outside and into questions. One of the men was hoisting a video camera up to his shoulder. The other man was speaking.

‘Inspector, could we have a word? Redgauntlet Television, The Justice Programme.’ Rebus knew him: Eamonn Breen. The woman was Kayleigh Burgess, the show’s producer. Breen was writer/presenter, loved himself, RPIA: Royal Pain in Arse.

‘The Spaven case, Inspector. A few minutes of your time, that’s all we need really, help everybody get to the bottom —’

‘I’m already there.’ Rebus saw the camera wasn’t ready yet. He turned quickly, his nose almost touching the reporter’s. He thought of Mental Minto breathing the word ‘harassment’, not knowing what harassment was, not the way Rebus had grown to know.

‘You’ll think you’re in childbirth,’ he said.

Breen blinked. ‘Sorry?’

‘When the surgeons are taking that camera out of your arse.’ Rebus tore a parking ticket from his windscreen, unlocked the car, and got in. The video camera was finally up and running, but all it got was a shot of a battered Saab 900 reversing at speed from the scene.

Rebus had a morning meeting with his boss, Chief Inspector Jim MacAskill. The boss’s office looked as chaotic as any other part of the station: packing cases still waiting to be filled and labelled, half-empty shelves, ancient green filing cabinets with their drawers open, displaying acre upon acre of paperwork, all of which would have to be shipped out in some semblance of order.

‘The world’s hardest jigsaw puzzle,’ MacAskill said. ‘If everything gets to the other end unscathed, it’ll be a miracle on a par with Raith Rovers winning the UEFA Cup.’

The boss was a Fifer like Rebus, born and raised in Methil, back when the shipyard had been making boats rather than rigs for the oil industry. He was tall and well-built and younger than Rebus. His handshake was not masonic, and he’d not yet married, which had caused the usual gossip that maybe the boss was a like-your-loafers. It didn’t worry Rebus – he never wore loafers himself – but he hoped that if his boss was gay there was no guilt involved. It was when you wanted a secret kept that you fell prey to blackmailers and shame merchants, destructive forces both interior and exterior. Jesus, and didn’t Rebus know about that.