Rebus got on to his knees, then his feet, staying at a crouch. He felt moderately safe. After all, his luck had held today, too.

`You okay, Siobhan?’

Voice low, eyes on the gunmen. The two getaway cars added up to seven men. Two still left. Where was number ten? `Fine,' Clarke said. `What about you?’

`I'm okay.’

Rebus left her, worked his way round to the front of the truck. The driver was unconscious behind his wheel, head bleeding where it had connected after the collision. There was some kind of grenade launcher on the seat beside him. It had left a bloody great hole in the wall of Maclean's. Rebus checked the driver for firearms, found none. Then checked the pulse: steady. Recognised the face: one of the arcade regulars; looked about nineteen, twenty. Rebus took out his handcuffs, hooked the driver to the steeringwheel, threw the grenade launcher on to the road.

Then headed for the gatehouse. Jack Morton, in uniform but missing his cap, prone on the floor, covered by a glass shroud. The bullet had pierced his right breast-pocket. Pulse was weak.

`Christ, Jack…’

There was a telephone in the booth. Rebus punched 999 and asked for ambulances.

`Police officers down at the Maclean's factory on Slateford Road!' Staring down at his friend.

`Whereabouts on Slateford Road?’

`Believe me, they won't be able to miss it.’

Five marksmen, dressed in black, aimed rifles at Rebus from outside. Saw him on the phone, saw him shake his head, moved on. Saw their targets out on the road, getting into a patrol car. Yelled the order to stop, warning that they would fire.

Response: muzzle-flash. Rebus ducked again. Fire was returned, the noise deafening but momentary.

Shouts from the road: `Got them!' A plaintive wail: one of the gunmen wounded. Rebus looked. The other was lying quite still on the road. Marksmen yelling to the wounded man: `Drop the weapon, turn on to your front, hands behind your back.’

Response: `I'm shot!' Rebus to himself. `Bastard's only wounded. Finish him off.’

Jack Morton unconscious. Rebus knew better than to move him. He could staunch the bleeding, that was all. Removed his jacket, folded it and pressed it to his friend's chest. Must've hurt, but Jack was out of it. Rebus dug the fuel rod out of his own pocket, the tiny canister still warm. Pressed it into Jack's right hand, curled the fingers around it.

`Stick around, pal. Just keep sticking around.’

Siobhan Clarke art the doorway, tears welling in her eyes.

Rebus pushed past her, slid his way across the road to where the Armed Response Team were cuffing the wounded man. Nobody much bothering with his dead partner. A little group of onlookers, keeping their distance. Rebus walked right up to the corpse, prised the handgun from its fingers, walked back around the front of the car. Heard someone call out: `He's got a gun!' Rebus bending down until the barrel of the gun touched the back of the wounded man's neck. Declan from the shop: breath coming in short gasps, hair matted with sweat, burrowing his face into the tarmac.

`John…’

Claverhouse. No megaphone needed. Standing right behind him. `You really want to be like them?’

Like them… Like Mean Machine. Like Telford and Cafferty and Tarawicz. He'd crossed the line before, made several trips forth and back. His foot was on Declan's neck, the gun barrel so hot it was singeing nape-skin.

`Please, no… oh, Christ, please… don't… don't…’

`Shut up,' Rebus hissed. He felt Claverhouse's hand close over his, flick on the safety.

`My responsibility, John. My fuck-up, don't make it yours, too.’

`Jack…’

`I know.’

Rebus's vision blurred. `They're getting away.’

Claverhouse shook his head. `Road blocks. Back-up are already on it.’

`And Telford?’

Claverhouse checked his watch. `Ormie will be picking him up right about now.’

Rebus grabbed Claverhouse's lapels. `Nail him!' Sirens nearing. Rebus shouted for the drivers to move their cars, make room for the ambulance. Then he ran back to the gatehouse. Siobhan Clarke was kneeling beside Jack, stroking his forehead. Her face was streaked with tears. She looked up at Rebus and shook her head.

`He's gone,' she said.

`No.’

But he knew the truth. Which didn't stop him saying the word over and over again.

35

They divided the gang between two different locations Torphichen and Fettes – and took Telford and a few of his `lieutenants' to St Leonard's. Result: a logistical nightmare. Claverhouse was washing Pro-Plus down with double strength coffee, part of him wanting to do things right, the other part knowing he was answerable for the blood-bath at Maclean's. One officer dead, six wounded or otherwise injured – one of them seriously. One gunman dead, one wounded – not seriously enough to some people's minds.

The getaway cars had been apprehended and arrests made – shots exchanged but no bloodshed. None of the gang was saying anything, not a single damned word.

Rebus was sitting in an empty Interview Room at St Leonard's, arms on the table, head resting on arms. He'd been sitting there for a while, just thinking about loss, about how suddenly it could strike. A life, a friendship, just snatched away.

Irretrievable.

He hadn't cried, and didn't think he would. Instead, he felt numb, as if his soul had been spiked with novocaine. The world seemed to have slowed, like the mechanism was running down. He wondered if the sun would have the energy to rise again.

And I got him into it.

He had wallowed before in feelings of guilt and inadequacy, but nothing to measure up to this. This was overwhelming. Jack Morton, a copper with a quiet patch in Falkirk… murdered in Edinburgh because a friend had asked a favour. Jack Morton, who'd brought himself back to life by swearing off cigarettes and booze, getting into shape, eating right, taking care of himself… Lying in the mortuary, deep-body temperature dropping.

And I put him there.

He jumped up suddenly, threw the chair at the wall. Gill Templer walked into the room.

`All right, John?’

He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

`Fine.’

`My office is empty if you want to get your head down.’

`No, I'll be fine. Just…’

He looked around. `Is this place needed?’

She nodded.

`Right. Okay.’

He picked up the chair. `Who is it?’

`Brian Summers,' she said.

Pretty-Boy. Rebus straightened his back.

`I can make him talk.’

Templer looked sceptical.

`Honest, Gill.’

Hands trembling. `He doesn't know what I've got on him.’

She folded her arms. `And what's that?’

`I just need…’

He checked his watch. `An hour or so; two hours tops. Bobby Hogan needs to be here. And I want Colquhoun brought in pronto.’

`Who's he?’

Rebus found the business card and handed it over. `Pronto,' he repeated. He worked at his tie, making himself presentable. Smoothed back his hair. Said nothing.

`John, I'm not sure you're in any state to…’

He pointed at her, turned it into a wagging finger. `Don't presume, Gill. If I say I can break him, I mean it.’

`No one else has said a single word.’

`Summers will be different.’

He stared at her. `Believe me.’

Looking back at him, she believed. `I'll hold him back till Hogan gets here.’

`Thanks, Gill.’

`And, John?’

`Yes?’

`I'm really sorry about Jack Morton. I didn't know him, but I've heard what everyone's saying.’

Rebus nodded.

`They're saying he'd be the last one to blame you.’

Rebus smiled. `Right at the back of the queue.’

`There's only one person in the queue, John,' she, said quietly. `And you're it.’

Rebus phoned the night-desk at the Caledonian Hotel, learned that Sakiji Shoda had checked out unexpectedly, less than two hours after Rebus had dropped off the green folder which had cost him fifty-five pence at a stationer's on Raeburn Place. Actually, the folders had come in three-packs at one sixty-five. He had the other two in his car, only one of them empty.