In Blairgowrie he stopped for fish and chips, which he ate at a Formica-topped table in the chip shop. Lashings of salt, vinegar and brown sauce on the chips. Two slices of white pan bread thinly spread with margarine. And a cup of dark-brown tea. The haddock was covered in batter, which Rebus picked off, eating it first before starting on the fish.

‘You look as if you enjoyed that,’ the frier’s wife said, wiping down the table next to him. He had enjoyed it. All the more so since Patience wouldn’t be smelling his breath this evening, checking for cholesterol and sodium and starch . . . He looked at the list of delights printed above the counter. Red, white and black puddings, haggis, smoked sausage, sausage in batter, steak pie, mince pie, chicken . . . with pickled onions or pickled eggs on the side. Rebus couldn’t resist. He bought another bag of chips to eat while he drove . . .

Today was Tuesday. Five days since Elizabeth Jack’s body was found, probably six days since she died. Memories were short, Rebus knew. Her photograph had been in all the newspapers, had appeared on television and on several hundred police posters. And still no one had come forward with information. He’d worked through the weekend, seeing little of Patience, and he’d come up with this notion, this latest straw to be clutched at.

The scenery deepened around him, growing wilder and quieter. He was in Glenshee. In it and through it as quickly as he could. There was something sinister and empty about the place, a louring sense of dis-ease. The Devil’s Elbow wasn’t the treacherous spot it had seemed in his youth; the road had somehow been levelled, or the corner straightened. Braemar . . . Balmoral . . . turning off just before Ballater towards Cockbridge and Tomintoul, that stretch of road which always seemed to be the first of the winter to close for snow. Bleak? Yes, he’d call it bleak. But it was impressive, too. It just went on and on and on. Deep valleys hewn by glaciers, collections of scree. Rebus’s geography teacher had been an enthusiast.

He was close now, close to his destination. He turned to the directions which he had scribbled down, an amalgam of notes from Sergeant Moffat and Gregor Jack. Gregor Jack . . .

Jack had wanted to talk with him about something, but Rebus hadn’t given him the chance. Too dangerous to get involved. Not that Rebus believed for one second that Jack had anything to hide. All the same . . . The others though, the Rab Kinnouls and Ronald Steeles and Ian Urquharts . . . there was definitely . . . well, maybe not definitely . . . but there was . . . ach, no, he couldn’t put it into words. He didn’t really want to think about it even. Thinking about it, about all those permutations and possibilities, all those what ifs . . . well, they just made his head birl.