Strip Jack by Ian Rankin Page B

sure I should tell you. Ronnie would kill me.’ He considered for a moment, gave a mellow shrug. ‘Well, we were on a school trip to Switzerland, and a girl went into Ronnie’s room and found him . . . doing something. She went and told everyone about it, and Ronnie was so embarrassed that he ran outside and lay down in the road. He said he was going to kill himself, only no cars came past, so eventually he got up.’
    ‘And suicide abbreviates to Suey?’
    ‘That’s right.’ Jack studied the card again. ‘Sexton, that’s Alice Blake. Sexton Blake, you see. A detective like yourself.’ Jack smiled. ‘Alice works in London, too. Something to do with PR.’
    ‘And what about . . .?’ Rebus was pointing to the last secret name, Mack. Jack’s face changed.
    ‘Oh, that’s . . . Andy Macmillan.’
    ‘And what does Mr Macmillan do these days?’ Mack, Rebus was thinking. As in Mack the Knife, grimly apt . . .
    Jack was aloof. ‘He’s in prison, I believe. Tragic story, tragic.’
    ‘In prison?’ Rebus was keen to pursue the subject, but Jack had other ideas. He pointed to the names on the card.
    ‘Notice anything, Inspector?’
    Yes, Rebus had, though he hadn’t been going to mention it. Now he did. ‘The names are all written by the same person.’
    Jack gave a quick smile. ‘Bravo.’
    ‘Well, Mr Macmillan’s in prison, and Mr Fisher and Miss Blake could hardly have signed, could they, living in London? The story only broke yesterday . . .’
    ‘Ah yes, good point.’
    ‘So who . . .?’
    ‘Cathy. She used to be an expert forger, though you might not think it to look at her. She used to have all our signatures off by heart.’
    ‘But Mr Pond lives in Edinburgh . . . couldn’t he have signed his own?’
    ‘I think he’s in the States on business.’
    ‘And Mr Steele . . .?’ Rebus tapped the ‘Suey’ scrawl.
    ‘Well, Suey’s a hard man to catch, Inspector.’
    ‘Is that so,’ mused Rebus, ‘is that so.’
    There was a knock at the door.
    ‘Come in, Helen.’
    Helen Greig put her head round the door. She was dressed in a raincoat, the belt of which she was tying. ‘I’m just off, Gregor. Ian not back yet?’
    ‘Not yet. Catching up on his sleep, I expect.’
    Rebus was replacing the card on the mantelpiece. He was wondering, too, whether Gregor Jack was surrounded by friends or by something else entirely . . .
    ‘Oh,’ said Helen Greig, ‘and there’s another policeman here. He was at the back door . . .’
    The door opened to its full extent, and Brian Holmes walked into the room. Awkwardly, it seemed to Rebus. Itstruck him that Holmes was awkward in the presence of Gregor Jack MP.
    ‘Thank you, Helen. See you tomorrow.’
    ‘You’re at Westminster tomorrow, Gregor.’
    ‘God, so I am. Right, see you the day after.’
    Helen Greig left, and Rebus introduced Jack to Brian Holmes. Holmes still seemed unnaturally awkward. What the hell was the matter? It couldn’t just be Jack could it? Then Holmes cleared his throat. He was looking at his superior, avoiding eye contact with the MP altogether.
    ‘Sir, er . . . there’s something maybe you should see. Round the back. In the dustbin. I had some rubbish in my pockets and I thought I’d get rid of it, and I happened to lift the lid off the bin . . .’
    Gregor Jack’s face turned stark white.
    ‘Right,’ said Rebus briskly, ‘lead the way, Brian.’ He made a sweeping motion with his arm. ‘After you, Mr Jack.’
    The back of the house was well lit. Two sturdy black plastic bins sat beside a bushy rhododendron. Each bin had attached inside it a black plastic refuse bag. Holmes lifted the lid off the left-hand bin and held it open so that Rebus could peer inside. He was staring at a flattened cornflake packet and the wrapping from some biscuits.
    ‘Beneath,’ Holmes stated simply. Rebus lifted the cornflake packet. It had been concealing a little treasure chest. Two video cassettes, their casings broken, tape spewing from