There was a chalkboard menu behind the bar. Three staff were busy with the lunchtime crush; more perfume than alcohol in the air. Office girls, screeching over the slam of the music, nursing gaudy drinks; sometimes one or two men with them, smiling, saying nothing, older. They wore suits that said ‘management’: the banshees’ bosses. There were more cellphones and pagers on the tables than there were glasses; even the staff seemed to carry them.

‘What do you want?’

‘Pint of eighty,’ Rebus said.

‘To eat?’

Rebus ran down the menu. ‘Is there anything with meat?’

‘Game pie.’

Rebus nodded. They were a row back from the bar, but Ancram had caught a barman’s attention. He stood on tiptoe and yelled the order over the straw-perm heads of the teenagers in front. They turned, gave hostile looks: he’d jumped the queue.

‘All right, ladies?’ Ancram leered. They turned away again.

He led Rebus through the bar to a far corner, where a table groaned with green food: salads, quiche, guacamole. Rebus got himself a chair; there was one already waiting for Ancram. Three CID officers sat there, not one with a pint glass in front of him. Ancram made introductions.

‘Jack you already know.’ Jack Morton nodded, chewing pitta bread. ‘That’s DS Andy Lennox, and DI Billy Eggleston.’ The two men gave curt greetings, more interested in their food. Rebus looked around.

‘What about the drinks?’

‘Patience, man, patience. Here they come.’

The barman was approaching with a tray: Rebus’s pint and game pie; Ancram’s smoked salmon salad and gin and tonic.

‘Twelve pounds ten,’ the barman said. Ancram handed over three fives, told him to keep the change. He raised his glass to Rebus.

‘Here’s tae us.’

‘Wha’s like us,’ Rebus added.

‘Gey few, and they’re a’ deid,’ Jack Morton said, raising his own glass of what looked suspiciously like water. They all drank, got down to eating, exchanging the day’s gossip. There was a table of office girls nearby; Lennox and Eggleston tried intermittently to engage them in conversation. The girls got on with their own gossip. Clothes, Rebus reflected, did not necessarily make the man. He felt stifled, uncomfortable. There wasn’t enough space on the table; his chair was too close to Ancram’s; the music was using him as a punchbag.

‘So what do you reckon to Uncle Joe?’ Ancram asked at last.

Rebus chewed on a tough crescent of pastry. The others seemed to be waiting for his answer.

‘I reckon I’ll be visiting him some time today.’

Ancram laughed. ‘Let me know if you’re serious, we’ll lend you some armour.’ The others laughed too, and started eating again. Rebus wondered just how much of Uncle Joe’s money was floating around Glasgow CID.

‘John and me,’ Jack Morton was saying, ‘worked the Knots and Crosses case together.’

‘Is that right?’ Ancram looked interested.

Rebus shook his head. ‘Ancient history.’

Morton caught the tone of voice, lowered his head to his food, reached for the water.

Ancient history; and far, far too painful.