‘It’s pretty basic police practice to rule out all the possibilities, right?’

His father erupted. ‘Ah, you’re just another bloody journalist making up some drama to put on your front page, and you all love to point the finger at the force when we’re just doing our job, cleaning up all the mess that no one else has got the guts to.’

The drop in the noise around the bar was noticeable. James’s father smiled, raised his glass at the room, and as he drank from it, the wall of conversations returned.

‘I think it’s pretty clear what happened to Tony,’ James whispered. ‘It’s happened around Kippen before.’

His father dropped his volume too, but not his intensity: ‘Poor bloody Tony who had everything handed to him on a plate. Poor bloody Tony with his perfect wife and his big plans for the farm. Poor bloody Tony gave it all up and threw himself off the bridge because poor bloody Tony fit the profile of a self-hating loner, mate.’

‘What about Brian Fryer, was he a loner too?’ James said, really softly.

But his father swept it all aside with his broad, confident, cop smile. ‘This incident you allege took place at the river last night... the boys told me there was nothing called in, nothing substantial anyway. No one’s been reported injured.’

The only defence James had was to lean back and take another mouthful of beer.

‘If there was a witness, the police would be very interested in them coming forward and making a statement. We can’t do anything until they do,’ Dad said, hands up. ‘But it always turns out the witness was on the scene, illegally soliciting for sex in a public place,’ his father added, leaning over his beer and whispering it clearly. ‘Which means they are just not credible. Now, are you having another drink?’

James held up his glass, still half full.

‘I’ll get you another one,’ his father said.

James shrugged and watched Dad launching into another round of laughter with the office workers. A night of disturbed sleep was catching up with him. He leaned against the wall and tried to prevent his father’s version of Tony’s death from taking shape, but James had to admit, the suicide of a divorced former farmer, bored with packing shelves and the odd fuck in the local public toilets sounded credible enough.

It was just before two o’clock. There was no time for outlandish plans to improve policing standards in the border country. He could just finish his drink, make a polite exit and talk it all out with Dylan over dinner, minus any mention of the incident at the beat. By the time James was back in the city, he hoped that would just be a bad memory and a few scratches.

His father returned and unloaded more beers, a familiar face in his wake.