‘What’s under here, Mrs Corbie?’

‘That’s Alec’s property!’ she shrieked. ‘Don’t touch it! It’s nothing to do with –’

But he’d already yanked the tarpaulin off. What was he expecting to find? Something . . . nothing. What he did find was a black BMW 3-series bearing Elizabeth Jack’s registration. It was Rebus’s turn to tut-tut, but only after he’d sucked in his breath and held back a whoop of delight.

‘Dear me, Mrs Corbie,’ he said. ‘This is just the very car I’ve been looking for.’

But Mrs Corbie wasn’t listening. ‘He’s a good laddie, he doesn’t mean any harm. I don’t know what I’d do without him.’ And so on. While Rebus circled the car, looking but not touching. Lucky the forensics team was on its way. They’d be kept busy . . .

Wait, what was that? On the back seat. A huddled shape. He peered in through the tinted glass.

‘Expect the unexpected, John,’ he muttered to himself.

It was a microwave.

7
Duthil

Rebus telephoned Edinburgh to make his report and request an extra day’s stay up north. Lauderdale sounded so impressed that the car had been found that Rebus forgot to tell him about the break-in at the lodge. Then, once Alec Corbie had arrived home (drunk and in charge of a vehicle – but let that pass), he’d been arrested and taken to Dufftown. Rebus seemed to be stretching the local police like they’d never been stretched before, so that Detective Sergeant Knox had to be diverted from the lodge and brought to the farm instead. He looked like an older brother of Constable Moffat, or perhaps a close cousin.

‘I want forensics to go over that car,’ Rebus told him. ‘Priority, the lodge can wait.’

Knox rubbed his chin. ‘It’ll take a tow-truck.’

‘A trailer would be better.’

‘I’ll see what I can do. Where will you want it taken?’

‘Anywhere secure and with a roof.’

‘The police garage?’

‘It’ll do.’

‘What exactly are we looking for?’

‘Christ knows.’

Rebus went back into the kitchen, where Mrs Corbie was sitting at the table studying an array of burnt cakes. He opened his mouth to speak, but kept his silence. She was an accessory, of course. She’d lied to him to protect her son. Well, they had the son now, and he was the one that mattered. As quietly as he could, Rebus left the farmhouse and started his car, staring through the windscreen at his bonnet, where one of the chickens had left him a little gift . . .

He was able to avail himself of Dufftown police station for the interview with Alec Corbie.

‘You’re in keech up to your chin, son. Start at the beginning and leave nothing out.’

Rebus and Corbie, seated across the table from one another, were smoking, DS Knox, resting against the wall behind Rebus, was not. Corbie had prepared an extremely thin veneer of macho indifference, which Rebus was quick to wipe off.

‘This is a murder investigation. The victim’s car has been found in your barn. It’ll be dusted for prints, and if we find yours I’m going to have to charge you with murder. Anything you think you know that might help your case, you’d better talk.’