Fox shook his head again. “I don’t think Siobhan knows.”

“So why are you here?”

“The Saunders case.”

“Hauling me in for further questioning?” Rebus took a mouthful of beer, hanging on to the glass while he stared Fox out.

Fox rested his arms against the edge of the table, leaning in towards Rebus. “Saunders set up a meeting with his killer. He wanted to use the phone at a petrol station, but it was out of order. There was a kid behind the till—he’d got to know Saunders’s face from the few times he’d been in buying food. So when Saunders offered him a tenner for the loan of his mobile, the kid agreed. Saunders promised it was a local call and took the phone outside. The call lasted six and a half minutes.”

“That precise?”

“I was able to get the records. Took me most of today. Pinpointed the exact time the call was made. Not quite three hours before Saunders was killed.”

“That sounds suspiciously like proper detective work.” Rebus raised his glass in a silent toast. “So let me guess—he was phoning Stefan Gilmour?”

But Fox shook his head. “It was an Edinburgh number, a landline. Listed in the phone book, so easy for Saunders to track down.”

“Eamonn Paterson?”

Another shake of the head. “George Blantyre.”

“Dod?” Rebus’s eyes narrowed.

“Saunders spoke to him for six and a half minutes.”

Rebus was recalling Stefan Gilmour’s words: That old pistol…Dod was the one who lifted it…

“You’re telling me a man who can’t get out of his own armchair managed to haul himself to a canal path halfway across town?”

“Seems improbable,” Fox agreed. “But there is another explanation…”

He let his words drift off, knowing Rebus would see what he meant.

Rebus gnawed at his bottom lip, then arched his neck to stare at the ceiling. No matter how often they painted it, it seemed to retain a nicotine sheen.

“Bloody hell,” he said eventually. Then: “So why aren’t you there right now?”

“Thought you might want to tag along.”

“Siobhan’s idea?”

Fox shook his head. “Mine, actually. She needed a bit of persuading.”

“Why is she staying away?”

“She’s in a meeting with the bosses, laying it all out for them.” Fox finished his drink and gestured towards Rebus’s. “You going to drain that, or would you rather take a clear head with you?”

Rebus looked at the drink, pushed it away and got to his feet.

They rang the doorbell of the bungalow in Murrayfield and waited. Maggie Blantyre answered. She was dressed in a white T-shirt and baggy gray joggers, almost no makeup on her face.

“Can we come in?” Rebus asked, no warmth in his voice.

“John…” She placed a hand to one cheek. “If I’d known…”