‘Take my advice, Siobhan. Give it to Crime Squad or Special Branch or whoever’s supposed to be tracking this arsehole down. Or just e-mail him back telling him to get stuffed.’ He paused. ‘You said he knows where to find you?’

She nodded. ‘He knows my name, that I’m CID in Edinburgh.’

‘But nothing about where you live? He hasn’t got your phone number?’ She shook her head and Rebus nodded, satisfied. He was thinking of all the numbers pinned to Steve Holly’s office wall.

‘Then let him go,’ he said quietly.

‘Is that what you’d do?’

‘It’s what I’d strongly advise.’

‘Then you don’t want to help me?’

He looked at her. ‘Help you how?’

‘Copy the clue, do some detecting.’

He laughed. ‘You want me in even more trouble with Carswell?’

She looked down at the sheets of paper. ‘You’re right,’ she said. ‘I wasn’t thinking. Thanks for the tea.’

‘Stay and finish it.’ He watched her get to her feet.

‘I should be heading back. Lots to do.’

‘Starting with handing that clue over?’

She stared at him. ‘You know your advice is always important to me.’

‘Is that a yes or a no?’

‘Take it as a definite maybe.’

He was standing now, too. ‘Thanks for coming, Siobhan.’

She turned towards the doorway. ‘Linford’s out to get you, isn’t he? Him and Carswell both?’

‘Don’t fret over it.’

‘But Linford’s getting stronger. He’ll be Chief Inspector any day.’

‘For all you know, maybe I’m getting stronger too.’

She turned her head to study him, but didn’t say anything, didn’t need to. He followed her out into the hall, opened the door for her.

She was on the stairwell before she spoke again. ‘Know what Ellen Wylie said after that meeting with Carswell?’

‘What?’

‘Nothing at all.’ She looked at him again, one hand on the banister. ‘Strange that. I was expecting a long speech about your martyr complex …’

Back in the flat, Rebus stood in the hall, listening to her footsteps recede. Then he walked to the living-room window and stood on tiptoe, craning his neck to watch her leave the tenement, the door closing with an echo behind her. She’d come here asking for something, and he’d turned her down. How could he tell her that he didn’t want her getting hurt, the way so many people he’d let get close to him had been hurt in the past? How to tell her that she should learn her own lessons, not his, and that she’d be a better cop – as well as a better person – at the end of it?