It was important that John should stay on the force. It was therefore important to keep him off Shit Street. Jack wondered why nothing in life was ever easy. When he’d been told by Chick Ancram that he’d be ‘keeping an eye’ on Rebus, he’d been pleased. He’d seen them going out together, reminiscing about cases and characters, haunts and high points. He should have known better. He might have changed – become a ‘yes man’, a pencil-pusher, a careerist – but John was the same as always … only worse. Time had seasoned his cynicism. He wasn’t a terrier now: he was a fighting dog with locking jaws. You just knew that no matter how bloody he got, how much pain there was behind the eyes, the grip was there to the death …

‘Traffic’s beginning to shift,’ Rebus said.

It was true; whatever the problem had been, it was clearing. The speedo was up to fifty-five. They’d be in Glasgow in no time at all. Jack glanced over at Rebus, who winked without moving his eyes from the road ahead. Jack had a sudden image of himself propping up a bar, dipping into his pension for another drink. Fuck that. For his friend’s sake, he’d go the ninety minutes, but no more: no extra time, no penalties. Definitely no penalties.

They made for Partick police station, since their faces were known there. Govan had been another possibility, but Govan was Ancram’s HQ and not a place they could do business on the q.t. The Johnny Bible investigation had picked up some momentum from the most recent murder, but all the Glasgow squad were really doing was reading through and filing material sent from Aberdeen. It made Rebus shiver to think he’d walked past Vanessa Holden in Burke’s Club. For all that Lumsden had been trying to stitch him up, Aberdeen CID had one thing right: quite a string of coincidences tied Rebus to the Johnny Bible inquiry. So much so that Rebus was beginning to doubt coincidence had much to do with it. Somehow, he couldn’t yet say how exactly, Johnny was connected to one of Rebus’s other investigations. At present it was no more than a hunch, nothing he could do anything about. But it was there, niggling him. It made him wonder if he knew more about Johnny Bible than he thought …

Partick, new and bright and comfortable – basically your state of the art cop-shop – was still enemy territory. Rebus couldn’t know how many friendly ears Uncle Joe might have on-site, but he thought he might know a quiet spot, a place they could make their own. As they wandered through the building, a few officers nodded or greeted Jack by name.

‘Base camp,’ Rebus said at last, turning into the deserted office which was temporary home to Bible John. Here he was, spread out across tables and the floor, pinned and taped to the walls. It was like standing in the middle of an exhibition. The last photofit of Bible John, the one compiled by his third victim’s sister, was repeated around the room, along with her description of him. It was as if by repetition, by piling image upon image, they could will him into physical being, turn wood pulp and ink into flesh and blood.