Rebus tried out the word. She smiled, her eyes softer than Rebus remembered them, as if some transformation. were beginning. She bent forward.

‘Kiss the girl,’ she said.

A peck on both cheeks. Her eyes filling with tears again. Rebus nodded, to let her know he understood everything.

At his car, he waved once, and she blew him another kiss. Then he drove around the corner and stopped, gripping the steering-wheel herd. He wondered if she’d cope. If she’d learn to forget. He thought again of his ex-wife’s words. What would she think of him now? Had he exploited Dunya? No, but he wondered if that was only because she hadn’t been able to give him anything on Telford. He felt he had somehow failed to do the right thing. So far, the only choice she’d had to make was when she’d waited for him by his car rather than going back to Telford. Before then and after, all the decisions had been taken for her. In a sense, she was still as trapped as ever, because the locks and chains were in her mind; they were what she expected from life. It would take time for her to change, to begin trusting the world again. The Petrecs would help her.

Heading south down the coast, thinking about families, he decided to visit his brother.

Mickey lived on an estate in Kirkcaldy, his red BMW parked in the driveway. He was just home from work and suitably surprised to see Rebus.

‘Chrissie and the kids are at her mum’s,’ he said. ‘I was going to grab a curry for dinner. How about a beer?’

‘Maybe just a coffee,’ Rebus said. He sat in the lounge until Mickey returned, toting a couple of old shoe-boxes.

‘Look what I dug out of the attic last weekend. Thought you might like a look. Milk and sugar?’

‘A spot of milk.’

While Mickey went to the kitchen to fetch the coffee, Rebus examined the boxes. They were filled with packets of photographs. The packets had dates on them, some with questionmarks. Rebus opened one at random. Holiday snaps. A fancy dress parade. A picnic. Rebus didn’t have any pictures of his parents, and the photos startled him. His mother had thicker legs than he remembered, but a tidy body, too. His father used the same grin in every shot, a grin Rebus shared with Mickey. Digging further into the box, he found one of himself with Rhona and Sammy. They were on a beach somewhere, the wind playing havoc. Peter Gabriel: ‘Family Snapshot’. Rebus couldn’t place it at all. Mickey came back through with a mug of coffee and a bottle of beer.

‘There are some,’ he said, ‘I don’t know who the people are. Relatives maybe? Grandma and Granddad?’

‘I’m not sure I’d be much help.’

Mickey handed over a menu. ‘Here,’ he said, ‘best Indian in town. Pick what you want.’

So Rebus chose, and Mickey phoned the order in. Twenty minutes till delivery. Rebus was on to another packet. These photos were older still, the 1940s. His father in uniform. The soldiers wore hats like McDonald’s counter staff. They also wore long khaki shorts. ‘Malaya’ written on the backs of some, ‘India’ on the others.