‘So what’s our plan of attack?’

‘I’m looking for a girl, she’s in photos with Allan Mitchison, an environmental protester.’

‘Where do we start?’

‘You sure you want in on this?’ Rebus looked around the dining room. ‘You could spend the day here, try the health club, watch a film … It’s all on Uncle Joe.’

‘John, I’m sticking by you.’ Jack paused. ‘As a friend, not Ancram’s dog’s-body.’

‘In that case, our first port of call’s the Exhibition Centre. Now eat up, it’s going to be a long day, believe me.’

‘One question.’

‘What?’

‘How come you got the orange juice this morning?’

The Exhibition Centre was almost deserted. The various stalls and stands – many of them, as Rebus now knew, designed by Johnny Bible’s fourth victim – had been dismantled and taken away, the floors hoovered and polished. There were no demonstrators outside, no inflatable whale. They asked to speak to someone in charge, and were eventually taken to an office where a brisk, bespectacled woman introduced herself as ‘the Deputy’ and asked them how she could help.

‘The North Sea Conference,’ Rebus explained, ‘you had a bit of trouble with protesters.’

She smiled, her mind on other things. ‘Bit late to do anything about that, isn’t it?’ She moved some papers around her desk, looking for something.

‘I’m interested in one particular protester. What was the name of the group?’

‘It wasn’t that organised, Inspector. They came from all over: Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace, Save the Whale, God alone knows.’

‘Did they cause any trouble?’

‘Nothing we couldn’t handle.’ Another frozen smile. But she was looking harassed: she really had misplaced something. Rebus got to his feet.

‘Well, sorry to trouble you.’

‘No trouble. Sorry I can’t help.’

‘Don’t worry about it.’

Rebus turned to go. Jack bent down and retrieved a sheet of paper from the floor, handed it to her.

‘Thanks,’ she said. Then she followed them out of her office. ‘Look, a local pressure group was responsible for the march on the Saturday.’

‘What march?’

‘It ended at Duthie Park, there was some music afterwards.’

Rebus nodded: Dancing Pigs. The day he’d visited Bannock.

‘I can give you their phone number,’ she said. The smile was human now.

Rebus telephoned the group’s headquarters.

‘I’m looking for a friend of Allan Mitchison’s. I don’t know her name, but she’s got short fair hair, with some of it braided, you know, with beads and stuff. One braid hangs down past her forehead to her nose. Sort of an American accent, I think.’

‘And who might you be?’ The voice was cultured; for some reason, Rebus visualised the speaker sporting a beard, but it wasn’t the kilted Jerry Garcia, different accent.

‘My name’s Detective Inspector John Rebus. You know Allan Mitchison is dead?’

A pause, then an exhalation: cigarette smoke. ‘I heard. Bloody shame.’

‘Did you know him well?’ Rebus was trying to recall the faces in the photographs.

‘He was the shy type. Only met him a couple of times. Big fan of Dancing Pigs, that’s why he tried so bloody hard to get them to top the bill. I was amazed when it worked. He bombarded them with letters, you know. Maybe a hundred or more, probably wore down their resistance.’