In October ’69, Paddy Meehan had been sentenced at the High Court in Edinburgh and had shouted out, ‘You’ve made a terrible mistake – I’m innocent!’ That made Rebus think of Lenny Spaven; he shook the thought away and turned to a new paper. November 8: gales forced the evacuation of the Staflo oil rig; November 12: a report that the owners of the Torrey Canyon had paid out £3 million in compensation after losing 5,000 tons of Kuwaiti crude into the English Channel. Elsewhere, Dunfermline had decided to allow The Killing of Sister George to be shown in the town, and a brand new Rover three-and-a-half litre would cost you £1,700. Rebus turned to late December. The SNP chairman was predicting that Scotland stood ‘on the threshold of a decade of destiny’. Nice one, sir. December 31: Hogmanay. The Herald wished its readers a happy and prosperous 1970, and led with the story of a shootout in Govanhill: one constable dead, three wounded. He put the paper down, the gust blowing some photos off the desk. He picked them up: the three victims, so full of life. Victims one and three shared some facial similarities. All three looked hopeful, like the future just might bring them everything they were dreaming of. It was good to have hope, and never to give up. But Rebus doubted many people managed that. They might smile for the camera, but if caught unawares they’d more likely look bedraggled and exhausted, like the bystanders in the photos.

How many victims were there? Not just Bible John or Johnny Bible, but all the killers, the punished and the never found. The World’s End murders, Cromwell Street, Nilsen, the Yorkshire Ripper … And Elsie Rhind … If Spaven hadn’t killed her, then the murderer must have been hooting with laughter all through the trial. And he was still out there, maybe with other scalps added to his tally, other unsolveds. Elsie Rhind lay in her grave unavenged, a forgotten victim. Spaven had committed suicide because he couldn’t bear the weight of his innocence. And Lawson Geddes … had he killed himself over grief for his wife, or because of Spaven? Had cold realisation finally crept over him?

The bastards were all gone; only John Rebus was left. They wanted to shift their burdens on to him. But he was refusing, and he’d go on refusing, denying. He didn’t know what else he could do. Except drink. He wanted a drink, wanted one desperately. But he wasn’t going to have one, not yet. Maybe later, maybe sometime. People died and you couldn’t bring them back. Some of them died violently, cruelly young, without knowing why they’d been chosen. Rebus felt surrounded by loss. All the ghosts … yelling at him … begging him … shrieking …

‘John?’

He looked up from the desk. Jack was standing there with a mug in one hand and a roll in the other. Rebus blinked, his vision was going: it was like he was looking at Jack through a heat haze.