‘And his girlfriend’s name?’

‘Not given out to strangers, I’m afraid. I mean, I’ve only your word for it you’re a police officer.’

‘I could come over —’

‘I don’t think so.’

‘Look, I’d really like to talk to you …’

But the telephone was dead.

‘Want to take a run down there?’ Jack suggested.

Rebus shook his head. ‘He won’t tell us anything he doesn’t want to. Besides, I’ve got the feeling by the time we got there he’d have gone out for the day. Can’t afford to waste time.’

Rebus tapped his pen against his teeth. They were back in his bedroom. The telephone had a speaker, and he’d kept it on so Jack could hear. Jack was helping himself to last night’s chocolates.

‘Local cops,’ Rebus said, picking up the receiver. ‘That gig was probably licensed, maybe Queen Street will have records of other organisers.’

‘Worth a go,’ Jack agreed, plugging in the kettle.

So Rebus spent twenty minutes knowing how a pinball feels, as he was shunted from one office to another. He was pretending to be a Trading Standards Officer, interested in bootleggers, following up on an operation at an earlier Dancing Pigs concert. Jack nodded his approval: not a bad story.

‘Yes, John Baxter here, City of Edinburgh Trading Standards. I was just explaining to your colleague …’ And off he went again. When he was passed on to yet another voice, and recognised it as belonging to the first person he’d spoken to, he slammed down the phone.

‘They couldn’t organise the proverbial piss-up.’

Jack handed him a cup of tea. ‘End of the road?’

‘No chance.’ Rebus consulted his notebook, picked up the phone again and was put through to Stuart Minchell at T-Bird Oil.

‘Inspector, what a pleasant surprise.’

‘Sorry to keep pestering you, Mr Minchell.’

‘How’s your investigation?’

‘To be honest, I could use a bit of help.’

‘Fire away.’

‘It’s about Bannock. The day I went out there, some protesters were brought aboard.’

‘Yes, I heard. Handcuffed themselves to the rails.’ Minchell sounded amused. Rebus remembered the platform, the strong gusts, the way his hard-hat wouldn’t stay on, and the helicopter overhead, filming everything …

‘I was wondering what happened to the protesters. I mean, were they placed under arrest?’ He knew they weren’t: a couple of them had been at the concert.

‘Best person to ask would be Hayden Fletcher.’

‘Do you think you could ask for me, sir? On the quiet, as it were.’

‘I suppose so. Give me your number in Edinburgh.’

‘That’s all right, I’ll call you back … say, twenty minutes?’ Rebus glanced towards the window: he could almost see the T-Bird headquarters from here.

‘Depends if I can find anyone.’

‘I’ll try again in twenty minutes. Oh, and Mr Minchell?’

‘Yes?’

‘If you should need to speak to Bannock, could you put a question from me to Willie Ford?’

‘What’s the question?’

‘I want to know if he knew Allan Mitchison had a girlfriend, blonde with braided hair.’