Ian Rankin & Rona Munro

Rebus: Long Shadows

(The Rehearsal Script)

Ian Rankin is the multi-million copy worldwide bestseller of over thirty novels and creator of John Rebus. His books have been translated into thirty-six languages and have been adapted for radio, the stage and the screen.

Rankin is the recipient of four Crime Writers’ Association Dagger Awards, including the Diamond Dagger, the UK’s most prestigious award for crime fiction. In the United States, he has won the celebrated Edgar Award and been shortlisted for the Anthony Award. In Europe, he has won Denmark’s Palle Rosenkrantz Prize, the French Grand Prix du Roman Noir and the German Deutscher Krimipreis.

He is the recipient of honorary degrees from universities across the UK, is a Fellow of The Royal Society of Edinburgh and a Fellow of The Royal Society of Literature, and has received an OBE for his services to literature.

Rona Munro has written extensively for stage, radio, film and television. Her theatre credits include Lucy Barton — a one-woman show performed by Laura Linney at The Bridge Theatre London in 2018; The James Plays — a trilogy of award-winning plays produced by the National Theatre of Scotland, The National Theatre UK and Edinburgh International Festival; Scuttlers; Little Eagles and Iron, for which she won the John Whiting Award in 2003. Her television credits include the BAFTA-nominated Bumping the Odds, and her films include the Ken Loach film Ladybird Ladybird, and Oranges and Sunshine, directed by Jim Loach. Her work for radio includes several dramas for The Stanley Baxter Playhouse. Rona is the only writer so far to have contributed episodes to both the ‘classic’ and contemporary series of Doctor Who.

Introduction

It was theatre producer Daniel Schumann who first mooted to me the idea of putting John Rebus on the stage. I’d be lying, however, if I said the notion hadn’t crossed my mind from time to time. I’ve never been in the same room with Rebus, you see, never watched him in three dimensions as he wrestles with a problem or wrangles with his (considerable) demons. I had co-written one stage play in the recent past, Dark Road, working alongside the Lyceum Theatre’s artistic director Mark Thomson, who also happens to be a hugely talented playwright. That play was a psychodrama set in contemporary Edinburgh and featuring a senior police officer at the end of her career, looking back on the one case from her early years that had never been resolved to her satisfaction while also coping with her demanding teenage daughter.

The challenge there had been, in part, to satisfy audiences that they weren’t just watching Rebus with a sex change. Indeed, with the benefit of hindsight, I think I was anxious not to pen a drama about a character who had been such a large part of my writing life. I wanted to break from Rebus, to write an original story rather than an adaptation.

I’m still not one for adaptation.

Early on, as Daniel and I discussed the project, we decided that this would hopefully be an all-new story, set at a slight remove from the universe of the Rebus novels. Rona Munro’s name cropped up very early in our conversations as someone who might work in partnership to bring Rebus to the stage, and to life. I’d been a fan of Rona’s writing for many years, not least her vast undertaking for the National Theatre of Scotland, The James Plays. I was really keen for her ‘take’ on Rebus. At our first meeting, she stressed that the story ahead of us would have to be one that could only be told by means of a stage play. We wanted something that would satisfy fans of the books, but also work on its own merits for theatregoers not acquainted with the characters.

We met for long brain-storming sessions in my living-room, fuelled by hot drinks and the occasional lunch at a nearby bistro. We talked about Rebus, about what sort of man he was and how he had become that man. We analysed Cafferty and Cafferty’s relationship with Rebus. And Rebus’s relationship with Detective Inspector Siobhan Clarke. We also touched on the city which surrounded all three, Edinburgh, a city with its own secrets and foibles and ghosts. Rebus, of course, has always been a haunted man — haunted by victims, by unsolved cases, by his inability to deal satisfactorily with his nemesis Cafferty. But haunted, too, by his own self-perceived failings as husband, father and friend.

The play we were feeling our way towards — Long Shadows — would be a character study, a whodunit, and a piece of choreography in which the central trio dance around each other as allegiances shift and hidden truths eventually reach the spotlight.

Talking, of course, is one thing, creating quite another.

Having workshopped ideas and even storyboarded the arc, much of the hard work then fell to Rona. She knows only too well what works and doesn’t work on a stage. As a novelist, I can shovel into a book all the pages, scene-changes and characters I need. This is impossible to replicate on the stage. Rona had to take my story and make it work within a very tight framework. Drafts began to bounce between us, as difficulties emerged and were dealt with, problems and niggles ironed out. But the real heart of the play didn’t change much. There stood Rebus and Cafferty, two men of advanced years whose world is no longer what it was. Faced by change and decay in all they see, their empathy is matched only by their antipathy. They understand one another — might even actually respect certain aspects of one another — and yet each would gladly take the other down. Indeed, no other ending would seem satisfactory.

This was another decision that we took early on: the play would feature the ‘older’ Rebus, the one readers of today have got to know. I began the series when I was twenty-five and Rebus was forty. He is now in his mid-sixties, retired, and yet unable to slough off the skin of the detective he once and for so long was. He has an itch, too, represented by Cafferty — the one who got away. Cafferty stands for every villain Rebus has encountered, every act of unfeeling cruelty fuelled by greed and anger. While Rebus seethes quietly in his tenement flat, music and alcohol keeping him company, Cafferty keeps watch over the city from his penthouse eyrie, fearful that all he has gained can still be snatched from him if he makes one single mistake.

All of this will be familiar to readers of the novels, but incidents and characters occur in Long Shadows which won’t be found in the books. We have played with elements of Rebus’s history — and Cafferty’s — to make for an engrossing two hours of theatre, even if it means stepping out of the universe of the books into a parallel world that is almost identical. I agreed wholeheartedly with Rona that the play had to work within its own system and on its own merits. Over the course of our collaboration she dug deep into the characters’ psyches and motivations, making me consider difficult questions and bringing me to a more rounded understanding of the interior lives of Rebus, Cafferty and Siobhan Clarke. I have said in the past that I keep writing about Rebus because I haven’t got to the heart of what makes him tick. Working with Rona took me closer than ever before.

One thing I know from my previous play, however, is that the writing is only one part of the whole. As I pen these words, rehearsals have yet to start. The main casting has been done, but minor roles remain to be filled. I have not seen the stage design or the costumes, nor heard the actors speak the lines. In rehearsal, the lines begin to lift from the page and take flight, becoming closer to music than to ink. They flit around the actors until the actors begin to fade and become the characters themselves. It’s a magical process. And when rehearsals are done and the action shifts to the stage, scenery completed, lighting devised, music ready... Well, that’s when Long Shadows truly becomes a thing in itself, independent of the authors who were there at its conception.

Rebus has cast a long shadow in the thirty years since he sprang to life between the pages of that first adventure, Knots and Crosses. He seems, however, more fully alive to me with each passing year and in each new episode of his career. He is complex, stubborn, intelligent, driven, and hard-edged. And in Long Shadows he needs to be at his sharpest, because forces are massing against him and both past and present are about to deal him blows heavier than any he has previously experienced. In Edinburgh, that most spectral of cities, Rebus knows the dead don’t always rest quietly, while the living remain troubled and — just occasionally — deadly dangerous.

Welcome to the world of Rebus. Welcome to Long Shadows...

Ian Rankin

Characters

John Rebus Retired detective

Heather Ross Daughter of unsolved murder victim Maggie Towler

Andy Neighbour to John Rebus

Maggie Towler Heather Ross’s mother

Siobhan Clarke Detective Inspector

Angela Simpson Cold case murder victim

Barman A barman

Charlie Informant

Big Ger Cafferty Crime boss of Edinburgh, long-term nemesis to John Rebus

Mordaunt Suspected murderer of Angela Simpson

Detective A police detective

Technician A police technician

Act One

The stairwell at Arden Street

Heather, a very young woman, is slumped on the stair. She’s dressed for a night out, revealing but not startling clothes, typical Saturday night girl out clubbing with mates. She’s plugged into her music. Now she sings along, a few lines, pure and accapella. The track she hears is audible only to her. She stops singing, moving gently to the song. She’s mellow and relaxed with something but not obviously under the influence. REBUS is coming up the stairs. He sees HEATHER. He checks for a moment. Looking at her.

REBUS  Comfy there are you?

HEATHER doesn’t seem to have heard him, lost in her music. He carries on past her. HEATHER sings again, just the one line, pure and beautiful. REBUS stops dead. He walks slowly back down to HEATHER.

REBUS  You’re too young to know that one.

She can’t hear him, he mimes for her to pull out her earphones. She does.

REBUS  You’re too young to know that one.

HEATHER  (Frampton Comes Alive, ‘Show Me the Way’) 1976. It’s my family heirloom.

REBUS  How’s that?

HEATHER  My Mum loved it. It was her favourite song when she was a tiny tiny wee girl.

REBUS  Is that right? I know you don’t I? I know your face.

HEATHER  Don’t think so.

REBUS  Waiting for someone?

HEATHER  I was just having a wee think.

REBUS  Who’re you after? Which flat?

HEATHER  He’s no in. I’m freezing. Can I wait in yours?

REBUS  No.

HEATHER  How no?

REBUS  Because you shouldny be sitting about on the stairs at 2 a.m. dressed like that and you definitely shouldny be asking to get into strange men’s flats.

HEATHER  Who are you? My Grandad?

REBUS  Apparently I could be.

HEATHER  So... what? You’re a murdering rapist that’ll cut me up with a steak knife?

REBUS  Well I could be that too. How do you know?

HEATHER  Are you?

REBUS  No... but...

HEATHER  So what do you do then?

REBUS  I was a policeman. Which makes me a bit of an expert on the kind of trouble wee lassies can get into on a Friday night.

HEATHER  A policeman? Wow. Aye, now you say it I can see it. You, have got the shiniest shoes I’ve ever, ever seen.

REBUS  Ah, that’s an army habit. I was in the paras once...

HEATHER  Seriously? So did you like kill people with floss tape? Gouge out their eyes with your thumbs?

REBUS  No. I’ll get you a cab home.

HEATHER  I’m staying here.

REBUS  Not an option.

HEATHER  Aye come on, I’ve got police protection.

REBUS  I’m retired. And I never did waste time protecting folk from their own stupidity.

HEATHER  You think I don’t know the worst that could happen?

REBUS  I think you imagine it’ll never happen to you.

HEATHER  It happened to my Mum. Strangled and dumped on a building site beside the Jackdaw pub in Newhaven. So there you go. I do know.

REBUS  When?

HEATHER  2001. I don’t remember her, I was a baby. Gran brought me up. Mum got killed ‘cause she went out on the raz. A good Mummy wouldny be out with a wee bairn at hame eh? She was always falling into trouble, first me, then death... She was just my age. Can you imagine it? I’m no getting lumbered with a bairn till I’ve made my money. Money first. Then we’ll see about getting domestic.

REBUS has placed the memory.

REBUS  Maggie Towler.

HEATHER  Aye! Jeez you really are polis eh? Aw Christ... was it... did you...?

REBUS  No, I wasn’t lead on that case. Remember it though.

HEATHER  That’s nice. That she’s remembered. When I play that song I tell myself I’m talking to her. It’s about the only thing I’ve got that’s hers.

REBUS  I thought you looked familiar. That must be why. Maggie Towler’s daughter.

HEATHER  You remember her face?

REBUS  I remember all the faces. And most of the names. What’s your name?

HEATHER  Heather. Heather Ross.

REBUS  Not Towler?

HEATHER  I got Gran’s name. What’s yours?

REBUS  John Rebus. So what about your Dad?

HEATHER  I don’t know. Gran said she didny know either but that was lies. She didny want me thinking about him. ‘Your mother thought she could take on the world. Then she met a man she couldny handle.’

REBUS  Every Granny’s warning.

HEATHER  Can you do me a favour John?

REBUS  I try to avoid them. Go on, what?

HEATHER  You’ve still got all my Mum’s stuff. The police have, I mean. Her clothes, the jewellery she was wearing...

REBUS  It’s evidence.

HEATHER  How can it be evidence when she’s been dead seventeen years?

REBUS  It’s an unsolved murder. So we... (corrects himself)... they, try and keep the evidence. Forensics get better all the time. DNA testing gets better all the time. One day we might be able to nail the bastard.

HEATHER  You’re still trying to catch him?

REBUS  Never close an unsolved killing.

HEATHER  What if he’s dead? The guy that did it to her?

REBUS  Then he got away with murder.

HEATHER  That’d shred me. I’d rather never know than that...

REBUS  Where do you need to get back to Heather?

HEATHER  What?

REBUS  Where do you live?

HEATHER  Och around and about.

REBUS  Where does Gran live?

HEATHER  You ask a lot of questions eh?

REBUS  Canny seem to break the habit.

HEATHER  My Gran’s dead. Home was Newhaven, the scuzzy bit that’s still scuzzy.

REBUS  The Jackdaw pub.

HEATHER  Aye, that’s still there. It’s a club now. Techno grunge every Friday. They get artists in from all over. Have you been?

REBUS  What do you think?

HEATHER  You canny dance to it?

REBUS  Canny dance to anything. Wouldn’t try.

HEATHER  I love dancing. You think that’s creepy? That I go the pub she did? The pub where she had her last drink.

REBUS  No. No I can understand why you might do that.

HEATHER  Don’t always think about her. She went out drinking and took the short cut home through the building site. Sometimes I get really mad at her for being that stupid. I knew better before I was ten. So you’ll help me?

REBUS  What?

HEATHER  You’ll see if they’re still trying to catch the guy that killed her? Chase up your pals in the police?

REBUS  I haven’t got many pals in the police. Never did.

HEATHER  But you could phone somebody.

REBUS  No. Look, I know it’s hard but you’d best forget it. Live your life. You don’t always get an answer.

HEATHER  I bet you could always get an answer.

REBUS  If I could, I’d sleep better.

HEATHER  Do you have nightmares then?

REBUS  Only since I stopped drinking.

HEATHER  Christ that’ll dae it.

A young man ANDY is coming up the stairs. He stops dead when he sees HEATHER and REBUS.

HEATHER  You’re late. I nearly called the polis on you.

ANDY  (wary) You been talking to him?

REBUS  Any reason she shouldn’t?

HEATHER  (on the move) Come on then... What’s your name again?

ANDY says nothing.

REBUS  A. Lamont. That’s what it says on the bit of cardboard. Don’t know what the A stands for. Archibald?

ANDY  Andy.

REBUS  Just being neighbourly Andy. (to Heather) You should maybe ask him how he’s supplementing his income. Doesny look like an impoverished student to me.

HEATHER  No?

REBUS  His post says he’s a student. Mature student is it Andy? Second degree? Don’t get your fees paid for that do you? How do you manage? Are you doing a wee sideline in pharmaceuticals? If I’ve noticed... (let’s that one hang)

ANDY  Fuck off.

HEATHER  You’ve noticed him dealing?

REBUS  Are you surprised? Isn’t that why you’re here?

HEATHER  No. No it’s not.

REBUS  Glad to hear it.

ANDY is still warily watching REBUS as HEATHER makes her way back upstairs.

HEATHER  I’m just visiting. I’m going to ask you again John. I think you’re the man that can help me.

REBUS  I don’t change my mind.

HEATHER  No? Don’t say things like that. I love a challenge. See you John.

She’s gone. REBUS is still watching ANDY.

ANDY  What do you think you’re looking at?

REBUS  I’ll let you know.

REBUS waits until ANDY goes upstairs. REBUS tries to get in, doesn’t have key. He searches all his pockets. It’s not there. Swears. Takes one from top of door jamb. Goes into his own flat—

* * *

Rebus’s Arden Street flat/dream

He’s walked into darkness. A young woman, MAGGIE, stands on her own, the only thing lit in darkness. She’s played by the same actress who plays HEATHER but MAGGIE is dressed differently, a coat from 2001 fashion, a scarf round her neck. She’s dancing to the same song, half singing along. We can’t see her face clearly.

REBUS  What are you doing here?

MAGGIE  Sit down John.

REBUS sits down in an armchair and watches as if this is television.

REBUS  Who are you?

MAGGIE  I thought you never forgot a face, or a name. You let me down John Rebus...

* * *

Rebus’s Arden Street flat

Lights snap up as REBUS wakes in his armchair. It was a dream. He’s fallen asleep in the chair. The song is still playing, just the last line, stuck on repeat. SIOBHAN has walked in. She goes and lifts the needle off the record.

SIOBHAN  So there’s something you need to know about twenty-first-century etiquette. If you get a dozen texts and you don’t answer inside twenty-four hours everyone thinks you’re dead.

There’s an empty glass beside REBUS’S chair. He picks it up and stares at it. SIOBHAN takes it out of his hand and replaces it with a take-away coffee.

SIOBHAN  And I thought you weren’t doing this any more.

REBUS  Doing what?

SIOBHAN  Drinking yourself to sleep in an armchair.

REBUS  Did I do that?

SIOBHAN  Pretty conclusive evidence.

REBUS  ’Time is it?

SIOBHAN  Time to check your phone.

REBUS mutters swearing as he pushes out of the chair and leaves the room, going to the bathroom.

SIOBHAN  (calling after him) Don’t mind me. I’ll just make myself at home.

She makes a half-hearted attempt to clear a few things up. Quickly gives up.

SIOBHAN  I’d make you another cup of coffee but I’m betting you’ve no milk.

She finds his phone. Sighs. REBUS comes back into the room, towelling his face. She holds up the phone at him. Accusing.

SIOBHAN  And you’ve no juice. Where’s your charger?

She’s looking for it, finding it, plugging in his phone.

REBUS  I do have a landline. You’ve heard of them? Ancient communication devices, never run out of juice?

SIOBHAN  I rang it. About half one?

REBUS  I was out.

SIOBHAN  Doing what?

REBUS  Walking.

SIOBHAN  Wandering round the Meadows in the middle of the night.

REBUS  Wandering’s part of my ongoing exercise regime.

She’s got the whisky bottle.

SIOBHAN  Is this part of your exercise regime?

REBUS  Better than sleeping pills. Natural product. Organic.

SIOBHAN  That’s great. You can put it on your muesli instead of milk.

REBUS  Muesli? I forgot my keys last night. Ageing brain. Too much content, no enough storage.

SIOBHAN  Throw some of the memories away.

REBUS  Working on it.

There are boxes and stacks of files all over the floor. REBUS is starting to look through these as they talk.

SIOBHAN  Don’t you want to know why I was trying to get hold of you?

REBUS  Aren’t you here to tell me?

SIOBHAN  No, I came round looking for proof of life.

REBUS  But since you’re here...?

SIOBHAN  They’re going to offer it.

REBUS  Promotion?

SIOBHAN  Had one of those ‘strictly between us but you might want to buy some smarter suits’ conversations.

REBUS  Well that’s great! (she’s not responding) Isn’t it great?

SIOBHAN  Just wanted to talk to you.

REBUS  What’s to talk about? About time isn’t it?

SIOBHAN  So I’d be crazy to knock it back?

REBUS  You want to be stalled at detective inspector for the rest of your days?

SIOBHAN  I could do something else.

REBUS  You’re no fit to do anything else.

SIOBHAN  Hey. We’re not all as sad as you! Some of us have other things in their lives apart from the job.

REBUS  Like what? Driving to Hibs away games? That’s a fast track to suicidal depression.

REBUS is still half looking for something in his heaps of paper.

SIOBHAN  I could do another job!

REBUS  No you couldn’t.

SIOBHAN  Well thanks for the vote of confidence. What are you doing?

REBUS  I just remembered something, about an old case.

SIOBHAN  What old case?

REBUS  A murder, 2001.

SIOBHAN  Seriously?

REBUS  Aye, I passed on it when it came in. Maggie Towler? Remember?

SIOBHAN  No.

REBUS  No, well, we were a bit busy that year. I bet you remember that.

SIOBHAN  Only on the bad nights. We’ve had worse years since.

REBUS  I was starting that case with you. I pushed Maggie Towler onto Fraser Morris. (he’s found the file he wants) Got it! (looking through file) Fraser was a sloppy wee shite, I think he just read the notes of the first officer on the scene and filed it as a lost cause.

SIOBHAN  So I want career advice and you want to rerun some whinge from 2001? Are you even listening?

REBUS  Take the promotion. You’ve come too far to stop now.

SIOBHAN  Have I?

REBUS  It’s our anniversary.

SIOBHAN  What?

REBUS  Twenty-five years since I started mentoring your illustrious career.

SIOBHAN  Oh is that what you were doing?

REBUS  Helping you scale the heights of Police Scotland, Shiv.

SIOBHAN  Keeping me on the brink of investigation for professional misconduct.

REBUS  The edge that sharpens the detective senses.

SIOBHAN  Is it really twenty-five years?

REBUS  I counted.

SIOBHAN  You’re right. It must be. Because I arrived just after the first time we tried to convict Mordaunt.

REBUS  Is that what’s got you in this state? The Mordaunt case?

SIOBHAN  I’m not in a state. Alright. I want the right result this time. I want that a lot. But you must be feeling that. You were part of the original investigation...

REBUS  I was just a baby detective. All I did was a wee bit of the leg work. But everyone was part of it... Something about it, it got to everyone. You know that last lassie he killed... Angela... (trying to get name) Jesus... dying brain...

SIOBHAN  (cutting in) Angela Simpson.

REBUS  Aye. That was her first proper night out you know. First time her Mum and Dad let her stay out past eleven. A sixteen year old lassie just excited to be out on a Saturday... Is it the Dad you’re getting ready for court?

SIOBHAN  Yes.

REBUS  How’s he doing?

SIOBHAN  He’s still blaming himself: ‘If I’d known she was going drinking...’ Sixteen. You ought to be able to sneak into a pub kidding on you’re old enough, laughing with all your mates. That shouldn’t get you killed.

REBUS  Sixteen. Still new. Still daft enough to fall for it when some older guy starts chatting you up. Young enough to swallow the lines...

SIOBHAN  But Jesus, look at Mordaunt!

REBUS  Aye. Even when he was young he looked like a feral weasel that lived in a sewer. He must have had some chat up lines.

SIOBHAN  He’d’ve had confidence by the time he murdered Angela wouldn’t he? He’d already got away with rape and murder twice.

REBUS  He was a cocky swaggering little prick. Then and now.

SIOBHAN  Now we’ll get him. The forensics will get him.

REBUS  Is it from the tights? Is the evidence on the tights he strangled them with?

SIOBHAN  Come on John, I’m not supposed to talk about ongoing...

REBUS  (cutting in) Aw come on yourself, that’s no even me guessing. He strangled those girls with their own tights. There must be traces the forensics weren’t good enough to catch at the time, but you can prove the bastard’s hands were on the knots now.

SIOBHAN  Alright. Good guess. Hopefully, finally, we can do a proper job of putting him away.

REBUS  You don’t think we did a proper job back in 1992?

SIOBHAN  I’m not saying that...

REBUS  Sounds like you are.

SIOBHAN  Look, I can’t help adding up the evidence the original detectives had. They had Mordaunt’s plumbers’ van parked up near where the young women vanished, three times. Every murder, there’s his van...

REBUS  And there’s his wife, giving him an alibi, every time.

SIOBHAN  And, ok, you find yourself thinking, ‘How hard did they lean on his wife?’ Because she must have known.

REBUS  Why would you want to know a thing like that? Way I heard it she was like concrete. They couldny budge her. Mordaunt was drinking with her, apparently, every time.

SIOBHAN  CCTV evidence might’ve knocked a hole in that lie now. Forensics would have nailed him, will nail him now... if nothing goes wrong.

REBUS  What might go wrong?

SIOBHAN  The trial starts Monday.

REBUS  I know. And what might go wrong? What’re you worried about?

SIOBHAN  Nothing. Nothing at all. Do I look worried?

REBUS  Yes.

SIOBHAN  You see you think you can read me but this just proves...

REBUS  (cutting her off) Why haven’t I been called to give evidence?

SIOBHAN  You just said it. You weren’t doing more than door to door back then. You weren’t the lead detective. Steve Cant was.

REBUS  Steve Cant couldny lead his own shite out his arse. It’s thanks to him we never nailed the pervy weasel the day we lifted him. He was so busy worrying about playing it by the book he barely asked Mordaunt his name and address...

SIOBHAN  (cutting in) It’s thanks to him and the forensic pathologist at the time that the evidence of the Angela’s clothing has been preserved properly all these years. Stored properly, logged properly, and believe me that’s going to be an issue for the defence.

Something in her tone alerts REBUS.

REBUS  What’s happened?

SIOBHAN  You did put Mordaunt away John. You got him the same year Angela died. For assault.

REBUS  Aye. What about it?

SIOBHAN  What made you so sure it was him?

REBUS  I could see rapist murdering scum beneath that cheery plumber exterior.

SIOBHAN  And could you really see the kind of man that could lay out a man twice his size? A man like Morris Gerald Cafferty?

REBUS  Cafferty was hit from behind.

SIOBHAN  True.

REBUS  And that was twenty-five years ago. Cafferty wasn’t the behemoth of crime and chaos he was in his prime.

SIOBHAN  He was a big man. And a lethal one.

REBUS  He turned his back for two minutes. All it took.

SIOBHAN  But I never understood why he let Mordaunt get away with it.

REBUS  How do you mean?

SIOBHAN  Well... Mordaunt mugs him behind one of his own bars, length of wood to the back of the skull... What was the motive anyway?

REBUS  Said Cafferty owed him for a plumbing repair on his indoor pool. Cafferty said the job was shoddy.

SIOBHAN  So he whacked the most feared crime boss in Edinburgh...

REBUS  (cutting in) He wasny quite that then but...

SIOBHAN  (cutting in) And Cafferty lets him live?

REBUS  We put him away for it. That was one time Mordaunt’s van in the car park was good enough evidence to convince a jury. Justice was done.

SIOBHAN  Since when does Big Ger Cafferty ever settle for our justice over his?

REBUS  And since when is it justice when a lying, murdering rapist gets away with only eighteen months for assault? Christ, it haunted everyone you know? Angela Simpson, just sixteen. In the photo in the incident room she was in her school uniform...

ANGELA walks through the scene, half dancing to music she’s quietly humming or in her head, aware of nothing else. This is just in REBUS’S mind’s eye.

REBUS  At least we got him for something.

SIOBHAN  That was the attitude at the time? From you and your fellow officers?

REBUS  The gutters ran with IPA and single malt. The fatted calf was put in a bun. Songs of triumph were sung. Aye. It was a result. A bit of one. A crumb of comfort.

SIOBHAN  You see, I don’t think that’s going to help.

REBUS  Help what? (she hesitates) Siobhan? Tell me!

SIOBHAN  I heard the defence think they have something. Something to put up against the forensic evidence. We think they’re going to suggest that someone tampered with the evidence that helped you put Mordaunt away for assaulting Big Ger.

REBUS  Why would we tamper with that evidence?

SIOBHAN  To put Mordaunt in the frame.

ANGELA stops dancing and looks directly at REBUS. Then she’s gone.

REBUS  Right.

SIOBHAN  He’d just got away with rape and murder after all. A third woman dead. The same method as two other young women. You all knew Mordaunt did it. You just couldn’t prove it. Must have been tempting to put him away for something?

REBUS  If we’d wanted to fix evidence to get Mordaunt we could have made a better job of it.

SIOBHAN  Maybe. Anyway, they do want to re-examine the forensic evidence from the attack on Cafferty.

REBUS  Has that been kept?

SIOBHAN  It has. Amazing I know, but it’s still there and they know it.

REBUS  And what’s that supposed to show?

SIOBHAN  DNA. Someone else’s DNA. Not Mordaunt’s. His defence team are going to claim that someone was so keen to get Mordaunt they framed him for the attack on Cafferty. Just so they could have the satisfaction of taking him off the streets. Putting him somewhere Cafferty might finish the job. But he didn’t. And that’s a puzzle isn’t it?

REBUS  They’re definitely re — examing the DNA evidence from the attack on Cafferty...? What would that even prove?

SIOBHAN  Oh like you can’t see it! If the evidence shows Mordaunt didn’t attack Cafferty it could suggest that the police might have been prepared to do anything to convict him. Then and now.

REBUS  Why would anyone even hold onto that evidence?! Case was solved. Cafferty deserved worse than a crack in his monster skull, and Mordaunt went down for it!

SIOBHAN  Maybe someone, somewhere in your team at the time, was uneasy with the quality of that conviction.

REBUS  Only thing that lot ever worried about was the quality of their porn mags and the size of their kick-backs.

SIOBHAN  John. Since we’re here, since we’re talking, I need to ask you...

REBUS  (cuts her off) No.

SIOBHAN  What?

REBUS  I never thought anyone on that squad tampered with evidence.

SIOBHAN  Seriously. Mordaunt is finally in our sights...

REBUS  Mordaunt is evil, rapist scum who preyed on girls who could barely walk out of school sandals.

SIOBHAN  But you never suspected anyone of framing him? Back then?

REBUS  No. Absolutely not.

SIOBHAN  And you’d tell me?

REBUS  Seriously. You need to ask me?

SIOBHAN  You know I do. I’ve put a lot into building the prosecution case here John, getting it in a proper state to match the modern forensic re-examination, making sure everything tallies...

REBUS  No-one I’d rather see picking up the baton than you.

SIOBHAN  And yes, it is this case. That’s what’s got me questioning everything. I’m at that point in my life John, the point where I’m asking what it’s all worth. I’ve seen promotions fly past me before, I sometimes asked myself what I’m hanging in this job for...

REBUS  Because you’re good at it.

SIOBHAN  Yes. It has to be because I’m good at it. Because I can get justice for a young girl, sixteen years old, twenty-five years dead, who just went out on a Friday night with her friends and died in pain and terror and shame before she ever really got to live. Now if I can’t nail this bastard Mordaunt...

REBUS  You will.

SIOBHAN  If you know anything that might weaken our case against him...

REBUS  I’d never do that to you Shiv, never. I won’t let that happen.

SIOBHAN slumps momentarily.

SIOBHAN  No. Course not. Alright. I need to get going. Are you really chasing up some bit of a murder case from 2001?

SIOBHAN is on the move.

REBUS  Fraser didn’t re — interview a key witness, just filed the initial notes. I called him on it at the time.

SIOBHAN  I don’t believe you really remembered that.

REBUS  (showing her) Here’s the file, look.

SIOBHAN  John, I’ve got a live case, now. I can’t even think about some cold case no-one remembers but you. (checks herself) Sorry, Sorry. I haven’t slept. The case is water tight... but now the defence is saying they need more days on the trial schedule, more evidence to present. And I can only guess what it is...

REBUS  Well, you know how it works. You show yours but they never show theirs.

SIOBHAN  Even if they do want to drag in forensics from that assault case, it’s convoluted, it’s not enough to put up against what we’ve got. They must have something more. They must have a witness to that attack on Cafferty.

REBUS  Something like that, aye.

SIOBHAN catches his tone.

SIOBHAN  Which is my problem. Not yours! John? Promise me.

REBUS  Different world back then D.I. Clarke. You might not know the right stones to turn over.

SIOBHAN  You think I haven’t been paying attention these last twenty-five years? Listen to me. Are you listening? Do not phone Cafferty. Promise me!

REBUS  Why would I talk to him?

SIOBHAN  Because you can’t stand not knowing what’s going on. Do not phone him. Do you hear me?

REBUS  I hear you.

SIOBHAN  Good.

She leaves. REBUS picks up his phone and dials. It connects. Answer machine.

REBUS  Cafferty? It’s me. Phone me.

He cuts the call. He looks at the file in his hand. MAGGIE walks out of the shadows.

MAGGIE  Maggie Towler. Seventeen years old. Seventeen years dead. Are you going to do right by me now John? What’s the hold up? I’ve been waiting since 2001.

REBUS  (the file) Aye... Aye, I need to chase this up...

MAGGIE  Oh don’t make me laugh. You don’t care. I’m just a distraction.

REBUS  I’m going to hunt this down. I don’t forget. I never forget.

ANGELA is on, watching him.

ANGELA  Aren’t you forgetting me?

REBUS  Siobhan’s got you, Angela. She has. (trying to convince himself) Siobhan will get justice for you, Angela. So I need to... I need to...

MAGGIE  What?

REBUS  Keep moving. Sort this out. Come on Rebus. (to MAGGIE) I’ll do better for you now Maggie. Promise.

The young women stand looking at him for another beat, then they’re gone again. REBUS snatches up car keys and hurries out of the flat.

* * *

Stairwell Jackdaw pub

REBUS is climbing up as a BARMAN is carrying boxes of booze down the steps, struggling. REBUS is in his way.

BARMAN  Help you?

REBUS  You alright there?

BARMAN  Fuck no.

REBUS helps him, grabbing the top box as the barman nearly drops the lot, dumping them on the steps.

BARMAN  (breathless) Thanks.

REBUS  No bother.

BARMAN  See what it is, I always used to be able to carry three. So I just keep doing it. I’m no ready to say I’m not fit to carry three boxes. Do you think the booze is getting heavier? Is that it?

REBUS  Could be.

BARMAN  It might be. It’s all the sugary shite they drink now. I’m sure it’s got to weigh more. It’s like treacle half of it.

REBUS  You’ve been here since it was a pub?

BARMAN  Aye. Jackdaw pub. Still got the name. Still got me. Everything else has gone to shite. This used to be a real dockers’ pub.

REBUS  No more dockers.

BARMAN  Extinct. Nothing but bankers, wankers and dockside redevelopment.

REBUS  That didny really take did it?

BARMAN  No round here. This place is still a dive, just got less smoke in it and louder music. I should sue the fuckers for industrial injury. See the way my heid pounds at the end of a Saturday night?

REBUS  You still work behind the bar?

BARMAN  Still do everything.

REBUS  Still got regulars?

BARMAN  Oh you see the same scabby wee faces...

REBUS  Don’t remember me though eh?

BARMAN  You used to come in here?

REBUS  Aye, a fair bit.

BARMAN  If you say so.

REBUS  (the box) Help you down with this?

BARMAN  After you.

They move down with the boxes. REBUS still talking.

REBUS  Don’t know that I’ve been in here this century mind you. Aye I have. You used to have a big screen tv in the bar there eh?

BARMAN  Aye.

REBUS  Aye that was it, January 2001. Raith Rovers got unlucky against Stirling Albion, terrible match...

BARMAN  That was on the big screen?

REBUS  (ignoring that)... That was no long before that poor lassie was killed here eh? Maggie Towler.

BARMAN  She wasny killed here.

REBUS  But she was drinking here that night eh? Only seventeen. Makes you think.

BARMAN  And she wouldny get in now. Is that what you’re getting at? You police eh? We check ID. On the door. So if you’re wanting to make issues about our license...

REBUS  Nothing like that. I’m no police.

BARMAN  Aye you are.

REBUS  Retired.

BARMAN  Aye. Right.

REBUS  So you remember her? Maggie Towler?

The BARMAN is on the move again, laboriously hefting up his boxes.

REBUS  And you saw her in here that night? You were working?

BARMAN  The fuck you’re not polis. You want to know the answers you should have tried harder at the time.

REBUS  We should. You’re not wrong.

BARMAN  No wonder you never caught the bastard.

REBUS  Which bastard.

BARMAN  The one that killed her.

REBUS  So who’s that then?

A beat.

BARMAN  I don’t need this kind of trouble any more.

REBUS  What kind of trouble?

BARMAN  We’re closed and I’m busy.

The BARMAN is nearly away.

REBUS  You think you know who did it.

BARMAN  No. I don’t. But I know she was scared of him. And I know you bastards didny even ask the right questions.

REBUS  So what would be the right question?

BARMAN  Maggie didny scare easy.

REBUS  So who scared her?

BARMAN  Wasny just a random guy leaping on her in the dark. It was someone she knew. She ran out of here because she saw someone who’d already scared her. Seventeen years and you still don’t know why? Guy like you wrote it all down. Go and ask him.

REBUS  Where did she die?

BARMAN  Building site just across the street there. It’s a high rise now, dockside redevelopment. You can’t even see the ground where they found her.

BARMAN leaves.

* * *

Granton high rise

REBUS is looking up. MAGGIE joins him. As always she’s only in his mind’s eye.

MAGGIE  So you do care. I’m touched. You think you know the stones to turn over, John?

REBUS starts to climb.

MAGGIE  In seventeen years most of the stones have been dug up. They’ve had concrete poured over them, car parks built on them, glass towers and gentrified tenements squeezing out the dark underworld that scuttled under the surface of the douce capital’s streets... Oh but the dark’s still there, isn’t it John?

REBUS is climbing up.

MAGGIE  They marked my grave with great towers. High rises with balconies in the clouds, sold to dreamers that believed they’d sit in the sky watching the sparkling silver sea laid out below... And the sharp east wind drives the grey Forth onto the glass.

REBUS is looking out over the view.

REBUS  What scared you Maggie? Someone you knew you couldny handle.

MAGGIE  I’m seventeen John, I think I can take on the world.

REBUS  Someone we never even questioned, because we didny do our job. We didny know he was there. Why was he there? And why did no-one see him?

REBUS is going quickly downstairs again. MAGGIE follows him.

MAGGIE  What makes you think you’ll see it now?

REBUS  Because it’s in here. All in my head. I don’t forget.

ANGELA is suddenly there too, talking to MAGGIE.

ANGELA  He does forget. He’s forgetting me.

MAGGIE  He’s only doing this to forget you.

ANGELA  I know.

REBUS is trying to think, stopped at the foot of the stairs.

ANGELA  Siobhan will nail my killer and you’ll find Maggie’s. That’d be nice.

MAGGIE  That’d be very nice.

ANGELA  Except he hasn’t told Siobhan everything.

MAGGIE  And no-one saw me fall John... Except the man that pushed me down. What are you trying to remember?

REBUS  A name...

MAGGIE  You better hope it’s the name of a man that’s still alive. You spend too much time talking to the dead these days, eh John?

REBUS  Got it!

Quick transition into—

* * *

A pub

Scuzzy, old — school drinking dive. A small man in a bunnet is nursing a pint and chaser. He startles as he sees REBUS moving towards him but REBUS blocks him before he can leave. REBUS is already carrying drinks.

REBUS  You running off with half your drink still on the bar Charlie? That’s no like you.

CHARLIE  What do you want Rebus?

REBUS  (offering glass) To buy you the other half of that.

CHARLIE  I’m no talking to you. You’re no even a policeman anymore. I don’t have to tell you anything.

REBUS  (the drink) So you don’t want this?

CHARLIE  What are you doing in here?

REBUS  Just looking for a bar that’s no been turned into a bistro. You canny get a drink in this town any more without some floppy haired article offering you a tapas menu.

CHARLIE  Aye you’re no wrong there.

CHARLIE accepts the drink.

REBUS  This place is holding out though.

CHARLIE  Just about.

REBUS  The Hebrides isny too bad.

CHARLIE  (snorts) You’re joking eh? Full of foreigners and fucking backpackers.

REBUS  Oh I’ll tell you where’s ruined. The Jackdaw, down in Newhaven.

CHARLIE  (not really interested) That right? No been down there in years.

REBUS  Did you no used to drink down there?

CHARLIE  Mebbe when I was working down there but...

REBUS  (cutting in) Working down there? Doing what?

CHARLIE  Rebus, what do you think I do?

REBUS  Five to ten for aggravated burglary usually.

CHARLIE  (dignity) I have a trade. I am a craftsman.

REBUS  Is that right?

CHARLIE  (handing him a card) I am a signed — up member of the Federation of Master Builders. Any home improvement, I’m your man.

REBUS  You do extensions and loft conversions and all that?

CHARLIE  My speciality.

REBUS  Right enough, great way to case the better quality home.

CHARLIE  Fuck yo, Rebus.

REBUS  That what you were doing in Newhaven?

CHARLIE  I don’t need to talk to you.

REBUS  So you keep saying.

CHARLIE  I was nothing but legit then. Didny need to worry about money, building never stopped then.

REBUS  You worked on the flats down there?

CHARLIE  You could name your price. They were throwing those flats up so fast...

REBUS  Happy days eh?

CHARLIE  They didn’t use marine grade on one single fixture or fitting. Not one. That sea wind has turned every block into a subsiding monster leaking rust from every hole.

REBUS  So you were working there when that lassie got strangled.

CHARLIE  Maggie Towler. Aye. I knew her.

REBUS  You knew her?

CHARLIE  Just to look at. She was a looker, wee Maggie. Know what got her killed?

REBUS  Tell me.

CHARLIE  Shagging above her pay grade.

REBUS  Go on.

CHARLIE  That’s it. Word was she was having a flingette with one of the developers.

REBUS  The property developers?

CHARLIE  That’s right.

REBUS  Name?

CHARLIE  I don’t know that! If I’d known that I’d’ve told you lot at the time. That was horrible what that monster did to wee Maggie.

REBUS  So how did you know about it?

CHARLIE  Must have heard someone talking about it on the site.

REBUS  Who?

CHARLIE  I don’t know! Half of them were Polish anyway.

REBUS  What was the name of the property company?

CHARLIE thinks for a moment.

CHARLIE  Weston? No, that’s no right. It began with an...

REBUS takes out a note and hands it to him.

REBUS  When it comes to you, phone me.

CHARLIE  Why would I do that?

REBUS  There’s another of those coming to you if you give me the name.

CHARLIE  Google it.

REBUS snatches the note back.

REBUS  Fuck, you’re right. Thanks Charlie.

REBUS is on the move. CHARLIE shouts after him.

CHARLIE  You tight bastard! I’m glad Ger Cafferty’s going to fuck you over!

REBUS is right back on him. He grabs his hand, hard.

REBUS  What’s that?

CHARLIE  Nothing.

REBUS  Charlie, don’t make me hurt these skilled craftsman’s fingers.

CHARLIE  (agony) Fuck off you bastard! You’ll get us both barred!

REBUS  Then stop screaming. What was that about Big Ger?

CHARLIE  He said he was going to fuck you over.

REBUS  He’s been saying that for thirty years. Said it to who?

CHARLIE  I might have heard him.

REBUS  Where was this?

CHARLIE  I was just lifting a motor he wanted shifted...

REBUS  When?

CHARLIE  Couple of months back mebbe... end of last year? I don’t fucking know, you bastard! Let go!

REBUS  Know what you are? A wee dug trying to borrow a big dog’s bark. Cafferty wouldn’t lift his leg to piss on you.

REBUS lets CHARLIE go and walks out onto—

* * *

Stairwell, Arden Street

At the foot of the stairs REBUS takes out his phone and punches the number. It’s answered almost at once.

REBUS  Cafferty, need to have a word...

He stops abruptly as, voiced by MAGGIE, we hear what he hears.

PHONE  The number you’ve dialled has not been recognised. The number you’ve dialled has not been recognised.

REBUS stares at it, checking the number. Then he cuts the call and slowly climbs the stairs. ANDY is coming down. He checks when he sees REBUS.

REBUS  Where’s your friend?

ANDY  What do you want?

REBUS  I need to talk to her, it’s about her mother. I need her number. Come on. Your pal, Heather Ross.

ANDY  Who?

REBUS  Oh don’t play games with me son.

ANDY tries to pass him. REBUS blocks him.

ANDY  Fuck off! I’m warning you...

REBUS  What you going to do? Call the police? You’ll no do that will you Andy?

ANDY  I said fuck off!

ANDY shoves REBUS and REBUS suddenly has him pinned against the wall.

REBUS  You think I couldn’t push you through this wall, Andy? Now you listen. First thing, you’re moving out. Give notice, get going, I don’t care where you go to peddle your sad wee packets of skunk but you’ll take it off my stair and if I see you even put your nose round the door I’ll have you in a cell before you’ve a chance to sniff.

ANDY  I’m not dealing...

REBUS  (shaking him) Are you packing your bags?

ANDY  Yes.

REBUS  Good. And I’ll let you. Once you give me Heather’s number.

ANDY  I don’t...

His tone is suddenly more subdued.

ANDY  I don’t phone her. She phones me. Number withheld.

REBUS  Smart girl.

He’s on the move.

REBUS  Start packing.

ANDY goes back into his flat, REBUS moves into—

* * *

Rebus’s Arden Street flat

CAFFERTY is sitting in his chair, watching the door. A moment as REBUS takes this in.

REBUS  Ghosts.

CAFFERTY  Don’t believe in them.

REBUS  I’ve spent half the day chasing them.

CAFFERTY  So I heard.

REBUS  You’ve changed your number.

CAFFERTY  I have. Don’t you want to know how I got in?

REBUS  Doesny take a master criminal. And I’ve nothing to steal.

CAFFERTY holds up keys.

CAFFERTY  You’ll be needing these back.

REBUS  No. I’m thinking of changing the locks.

CAFFERTY  Reckon that’ll stop me?

REBUS  Just ring the bell Big Ger. Mi casa, su casa, all that.

CAFFERTY  I’ve no even had the offer of a cup of tea yet. What kind of a welcome is that?

REBUS  There’s no milk.

CAFFERTY holds up a half pint.

CAFFERTY  Looks like I’m a better detective than you Strawman.

REBUS  I’ll put the kettle on.

REBUS leaves the room. CAFFERTY is prowling, inspecting it.

CAFFERTY  No been here for a while. Nothing’s changed though eh? No even the dust.

REBUS  (off) Canny get the staff.

CAFFERTY  I could recommend a couple of great women. Nae stour too hard to lift.

REBUS  Scrubbing bloodstains out of Persian rugs?

CAFFERTY  Nothing like that. Everything clean and sparkling in my world John, that’s the way I like it.

REBUS is back on.

REBUS  So I’m off your Christmas card list am I? What did I do? Something really annoying I hope...

CAFFERTY  It was time.

REBUS  Time for what?

CAFFERTY  We’ll get to that. Why did you want to get hold of me?

REBUS  Wanted to ask you something.

CAFFERTY  About the Mordaunt trial?

REBUS  Among other things.

CAFFERTY  You lot have taken your time eh? Twenty-five years to finally get that poisonous arse wipe in the dock again.

REBUS  You’re looking forward to a result then?

CAFFERTY  (ignoring the question) Twenty-five years. 1992 eh? John Major, royal divorces, Ravenscraig closes for good, IRA bombs... You could still see over your own belly. You could probably still run upstairs back then, eh John? Let’s get in the mood. You got any music from 1992?

REBUS  Nothing to your taste.

CAFFERTY  I’m going to tell you something now that’ll surprise you.

REBUS  Should I record it?

CAFFERTY  I’ve always been a bit of a Sheena Easton fan. You got any Sheena Easton?

REBUS  Strangely enough I haven’t.

CAFFERTY  Now there’s a woman with the X Factor. I met her once. On a chat show.

REBUS  She was promoting her new album. You were promoting your memoir of murder and mayhem...

CAFFERTY  You read it yet?

REBUS  Do you need to ask?

CAFFERTY  Keeps me in fine wine and classy company John. Did I tell you I’ve got a wine cellar now? A wine room to be accurate. Temperature controlled environment.

REBUS  Stops the bodies decomposing does it?

CAFFERTY  Wine is an investment, John. Something you should have considered before they kicked you into touch. Still, some of this old vinyl’s worth a bit these days they tell me.

REBUS  You canny put a price on memories.

CAFFERTY  True. And we’ve got our share eh John? 1992. Not a year I remember so well as it turned out. I was in intensive care for a bit of it.

REBUS  But Mordaunt paid for that.

CAFFERTY  And now it’s time for him to pay for the rest of it. We should have a proper drink to that eh?

REBUS  I’m pacing myself these days.

CAFFERTY  You’re no fun these days John, that’s the truth. Will you go to the trial?

REBUS  I don’t know.

CAFFERTY  I’ll be there. There’s a fascination eh? Staring at a man you know is a piece of pure evil. Don’t look at me like that, I never killed any civilians. And I wouldn’t even breathe the same air as a sick wee bastard like Mordaunt. Useless plumber as well. I ended up with raw sewage leaking into the jacuzzi. Subsidence my arse. Wee scumbag barely knew how to lag a pipe.

REBUS  You’re going to the trial?

CAFFERTY  Beats daytime television. Have you seen ‘Homes under the Hammer’?

REBUS  I know where I’d like to put the hammer.

CAFFERTY  What are you doing with yourself all day, when you’re not looking for me?

REBUS  I keep busy.

CAFFERTY  Talking to ghosts. So what did you want to ask me?

REBUS  Have Mordaunt’s defence team contacted you?

CAFFERTY  Now. Why would you be asking that? Mordaunt dunts me on the heid in 1992 and you think his defence might want to talk to me? Prosecution maybe... but the defence? What would put an idea like that in your head?

REBUS  Have they?

CAFFERTY  Maybe they have. How did you guess that?

REBUS  Maybe I’m still a detective after all.

CAFFERTY  In which case you shouldn’t be talking to me, should you?

REBUS  What are you playing at Cafferty? Why would you help Mordaunt? What’s in it for you?

CAFFERTY  I can think of almost nothing on this earth I’d enjoy more than seeing that piece of filth nailed down so he canny get up for the rest of his shrivelled wee life.

REBUS  So what are you doing?

CAFFERTY  Almost nothing I’d enjoy more.

REBUS realises.

REBUS  It’s you isn’t it? Shit it’s you. You’re the mystery witness for the defence!

CAFFERTY  How could I help Mordaunt, the man who attacked me?

REBUS  By saying it wasny him that attacked you at all! This is your idea of a game is it? You know this is the conviction half of Police Scotland have wanted for twenty-five years and you’re going to piss on our bonfire, just for the hell of it?

CAFFERTY  I never saw who attacked me. Did I? He was a cowardly piece of shite that whacked me when my back was turned. But I don’t like the idea the wrong cowardly shite took the rap for that John. That offends my sense of justice.

REBUS  Your sense of what?

CAFFERTY is on the move.

CAFFERTY  Listen. This is a bigger conversation. I’m running late. Places to go, people to see, you know how it is. Keeping busy. Why don’t you come over to my place tonight? Come and see the view. Let me repay your extravagant hospitality. Spot of dinner at mine.

REBUS  Dinner parties? What’s next? Saga cruises and National Trust membership?

CAFFERTY  There’s a working lift, no worries about getting your old legs up to the seventh floor. Home delivery from a Michelin starred chef...

REBUS  Stop fucking playing with me and tell me what’s going on!

CAFFERTY  I hope you’ve got someone keeping an eye on your blood pressure John, you’ve gone a terrible colour there. Come round tonight. I’ll explain the deal then.

REBUS  What deal? I’m not making deals with you.

CAFFERTY  You don’t have to. Seven for seven thirty. Alright? You know where I am, no need to bring a bottle. I’m well sorted.

REBUS  Aye and you’ll be well sorted out when I fill the defence team in on the quality of their witness. I don’t think a man who’s never knowingly embraced the truth in any court of law is going to make much of a star witness. Do you?

CAFFERTY  See, the way I heard it... there’s some suspicion the police have a habit of getting a bit creative with evidence, in their natural eagerness to see Mordaunt go down. The defence is going to ask for a reexamination of the DNA evidence from the attack on me. But you knew that, didn’t you? It’s an amazing thing, isn’t it an amazing thing? They’ve still got the stick of wood the guy whacked me with. Stupid bastard kicked it under a car two streets away. Careless, might have been pissed. Do you think he was maybe pissed John? They’ve got tiny tiny traces from that stick, wee scales of skin, that’s all they need now — wee scales of skin from whoever held that bit of wood twenty-five years ago, and then they’ll know who he is. And if it wasn’t Mordaunt that’ll raise a few questions about the quality of all the forensic evidence eh? Most dust is actually human skin scales. Did you know that? You should buy a hoover John, you’re choking on DNA in here.

CAFFERTY is almost gone.

REBUS  A court’s already decided who hit you Ger, it was Mordaunt.

CAFFERTY  That’s no who I saw.

REBUS  You didny see anyone.

CAFFERTY  How do you know?

REBUS  You said you couldn’t see your attacker.

CAFFERTY  I couldny remember at first. I was laid up in the Royal Infirmary with a crack in my heid.

REBUS  But now it’s all coming back to you. It’s a miracle.

CAFFERTY  Think what you like but basically I’m an honest man John. I don’t have to lie my way out of trouble. Always thought that was a sign of weakness.

REBUS  So be honest. You never saw his face. Did you?

CAFFERTY  No.

REBUS  Then stop playing your games and let us get a clear shot at Mordaunt...

CAFFERTY  I didny need to see his face. I saw his shoes. Last thing I saw before it all went dark. Beautiful polished shoes. Shoes buffed to a shine only a man with the army in his DNA could ever bring off. I saw my dying face in those shoes John. Or I thought I did. I’m prepared to swear I would have recognised them anywhere.

He’s looking at REBUS’S shoes.

CAFFERTY  Let’s have a look at your shoes John? No quite as shiny these days. Ah well. Standards are slipping. Nothing’s quite what it was in 1992 but the memories live on. As we started so we’ll finish. But I think it’s my turn to give the killer blow. Eh John? I’ll see you tonight and I’ll tell you the deal. Smart casual, what you’re wearing’s fine. Don’t even need to buff up your shoes.

CAFFERTY leaves. REBUS is frozen. ANGELA walks out of the dark and looks at him, reproachful.

ANGELA  You weren’t paying attention John, were you? You’ll have no time for me and Maggie now, will you? It’s all about your secrets now eh? Poor wee dead Maggie. No justice for her today. No justice for her or me any day.

There’s a scream off.

HEATHER  (off stage) Shit! No! Nooooo!

REBUS moves quickly into—

* * *

Stairwell, Arden Street

ANDY is crawling down the stairs, bleeding. He collapses. REBUS hurries to him. Checking him. He’s phoning. HEATHER appears further up the stairs, she’s in bits.

HEATHER  Look at him! Look!

REBUS  (on phone) Police and ambulance... possible assault... 17 Arden Street...

HEATHER comes slowly down the stairs, staring at ANDY in horror.

REBUS  (on phone) I don’t know. He’s bleeding out, multiple stab wounds... Just get here!

REBUS is trying to stop the bleeding. It’s too late. HEATHER is backing off down the stairs, horrified.

HEATHER  He’s dead isn’t he? He’s dead...

HEATHER is running.

REBUS  Heather wait... Heather... Heather!

She’s gone. REBUS crouches over ANDY’S body.

Act Two

Rebus’s Arden Street flat/dream

REBUS puts a record on, ‘Take the Weather’ by Crowded House. He stands looking out the window, listening to it. ANGELA steps out of the shadows, dancing, laughing.

ANGELA  You can’t dance to this!

She’s not talking to REBUS but he answers her.

REBUS  No.

ANGELA is looking at someone else. MORDAUNT steps out of the dark, smiling at ANGELA. Like the young woman he’s not really there.

MORDAUNT  You can. Not many girls with the confidence to dance on their own like that. You know you look good eh?

ANGELA stops dancing.

MORDAUNT  Don’t stop. Aw I’ve put you off. Sorry. Didny mean to stare. It’s just you’re a really good dancer. Are you a professional?

ANGELA  (laughing) What? No!

MORDAUNT  Not many girls with the confidence to dance on their own like that. You know you look good eh?

ANGELA  It’s just boring sitting drinking. I’d rather dance.

MORDAUNT  I can’t. Bad leg. My sister does though. She’s training to be a dancer. You could get on a course like hers. She started out here and now she’s dancing in London.

ANGELA  For real?

MORDAUNT  Aye, come and meet her, she’s just outside having a fag.

ANGELA hesitates.

ANGELA  I can’t leave my friends...

MORDAUNT  Aye come on. She clocked you earlier. She thinks you’re a great dancer too. Just come outside for a quick word.

MORDAUNT is leading ANGELA into the shadows. REBUS moves to stop them. But MORDAUNT is suddenly gone and ANGELA turns on him, attacking.

ANGELA  What are you going to do John? Stop him? Save me?

REBUS  I can’t.

ANGELA  No. You can’t. He already did his worst. It was horrible John. So horrible. I was so frightened, he hurt me so much, and I just prayed and prayed and begged to live... But I didn’t. He killed me. It wasn’t quick and I knew I was dying.

REBUS  He won’t get away with it. I won’t let it happen.

ANGELA  If he does, it’s on you John. Your fault!

* * *

Rebus’s Arden Street flat/dawn

REBUS wakes abruptly in an armchair. ANGELA is gone. A young woman DETECTIVE is sitting opposite him, taking his statement.

DETECTIVE  Are we keeping you up, Mr Rebus?

REBUS  Sorry, just... long night.

DETECTIVE  Sun’s coming up now.

REBUS  (looking) So it is.

DETECTIVE  So... you believe the deceased, Andrew Lamont to have been dealing drugs...

REBUS  Just low key I think, wee packets of skunk to get him better drinking money, maybe pills for the weekend ravers but...

DETECTIVE  (cutting in) And you didn’t report this?

REBUS  No. I dealt with it.

DETECTIVE  Dealt with it?

REBUS  I’d moved him on. (as she stares at him accusingly) Look, I don’t know what success rate the drugs squad are getting from busting wee dope heids these days, but when you want to catch the big fish, in my day, you...

DETECTIVE  (cutting him off) Aye I’m guessing there’s a lot different from your day.

REBUS  Look, you don’t want to believe all the stories you hear about me, I...

DETECTIVE  (cutting him off again) What stories? I’ve not heard any stories. I didn’t know you’d ever been a policeman till you told me Mr Rebus.

REBUS  When did you join the force?

DETECTIVE  Five years ago.

REBUS  You don’t look old enough.

DETECTIVE  And you don’t know anything else about the other witness, Heather Ross?

REBUS  She’s Maggie Towler’s daughter.

DETECTIVE  Who?

REBUS  A murder. Before your time. Everyone’s forgotten except me. And wee Heather.

The DETECTIVE is on the move.

DETECTIVE  Well if you see ‘wee Heather’ again, tell her we’re needing a word. Were you planning on going anywhere this morning sir?

REBUS  Don’t know yet.

DETECTIVE  Well can I ask you to wait in for a few hours. My boss might want another word.

REBUS  Who’s your boss?

DETECTIVE  D.I. Mackie.

REBUS  Don’t know him.

DETECTIVE  Her. No she didn’t know you either.

The DETECTIVE leaves. ANGELA is back in the room watching REBUS.

ANGELA  You think Cafferty had that boy gutted on your doorstep. A calling card. A wee reminder of all he is. Why didn’t you tell the nice police lady that John?

She follows REBUS as he moves restlessly.

ANGELA  I know why. You’re a man with dangerous secrets. Have to save yourself eh John? But what about me? And Maggie? And Heather? Canny save all of us, Rebus.

REBUS  The fuck I can’t.

He snatches up car keys, quick transition into—

* * *

Forensic lab, Fettes Police H.Q.

REBUS is facing a wall of bagged evidence. A lab TECHNICIAN is bustling past, busy with his work.

TECHNICIAN  You can’t be in here.

REBUS  I get that a lot.

The TECHNICIAN moves off as MAGGIE and ANGELA are on. They are reciting the contents of the evidence bags.

MAGGIE  Bloostained shirt. 1978.

ANGELA  Gerald Moore. Stabbed. Unsolved murder.

MAGGIE  2009. An adjustable spanner, brain matter and partial finger prints.

ANGELA  Susan Hickman. Coshed and left for dead. Assailant unknown.

MAGGIE  A pair of tights...

ANGELA  My tights...

MAGGIE  Trace DNA inside the knots, a tiny record of the fingers that pulled the knots tight... tight...

ANGELA  A indian silk scarf...

MAGGIE  My scarf...

ANGELA  Trace DNA on the folds, a tiny record of the fingers that pulled it tight... tight...

MAGGIE  A piece of building timber...

ANGELA  Morris Gerald Cafferty’s blood...

MAGGIE  And a tiny record of the hands that lifted that cosh and swung it... hard...

ANGELA  What would you do, even if they let you see it John?

MAGGIE  Steal it?

ANGELA  If he can just break the seal on the bag it’ll be useless in court.

MAGGIE  Is that the plan?

ANGELA  Christ that’s a useless plan. He’ll get caught.

REBUS moves restlessly.

REBUS  (to himself) Fuck’s sake hold it together.

MAGGIE and ANGELA are gone. The TECHNICIAN is back.

TECHNICIAN  I said you can’t be in here.

REBUS  Is Josie about?

TECHNICIAN  Who?

REBUS  Josie Cassidy? Technician here?

TECHNICIAN  Took maternity leave two years ago and never came back.

REBUS  How could she give all this up?

TECHNICIAN  Like I said, you need a visitor’s pass to be in here.

REBUS  Sorry son, we’ve not met before have we? D.I. Rebus.

TECHNICIAN  I’d need to see some ID.

REBUS  Retired.

TECHNICIAN  Then you have to leave.

REBUS  Aye, course, just one quick question...

TECHNICIAN  No, you really have to leave...

REBUS  How is Josie?

TECHNICIAN  (thrown) Eh...

REBUS  What did she have? Boy, girl?

TECHNICIAN  I think it was twins actually.

REBUS  Jeezo... she couldny have been more than four foot high.

TECHNICIAN  I know...

REBUS  God, must have been like a weeble wobble woman the last month. Did she work to the end? ’Cause she never liked the busy days anyway did she?

TECHNICIAN  No...

REBUS  Days like today with half the town’s lawyers and polis in keeping an eye on where the evidence is going. Have they been in to pick up the Mordaunt evidence yet?

TECHNICIAN  Eh... (he’s flustered checking paperwork) That went down last week I think...

REBUS  No. Different case. Not the rape/murder. The defence wants to look at the evidence from the assault Mordaunt was convicted of in 1992. Has that gone down yet?

SIOBHAN enters. Not pleased to see REBUS.

SIOBHAN  What’re you doing here? You can’t be in here.

TECHNICIAN  I told him.

REBUS  Just catching up on news of Josie and the kids.

SIOBHAN  Who?

REBUS  (to TECHNICIAN) See? No-one has time for the personal stuff any more.

SIOBHAN  What are you doing here John?

REBUS  What’re you doing here?

SIOBHAN  I work here.

REBUS  In forensic storage?

A beat.

SIOBHAN  Tom, can you tell me if anyone’s picked up the evidence to be tested for court 9? An assault on Morris Gerald Cafferty in 1992.

TECHNICIAN  That’s just what he was asking.

SIOBHAN  Is that so? Well, has it been picked up?

TECHNICIAN  (checking) Yup. That went on its way this morning.

SIOBHAN  Good. Glad to hear it. No-one else had a look at it before it went did they?

TECHNICIAN  No.

SIOBHAN  Just checking. Sorry to bother you. Got time for a word John?

REBUS  I’m glad you’re here D.I. Clarke. Tell him.

SIOBHAN  Tell him what?

REBUS  We need to check the evidence for Maggie Towler’s murder.

SIOBHAN is just staring at him.

REBUS  March, 2001. Building site between Granton and Newhaven. Lead detective D.I. Morris. (as no-one moves) Case number 4568/NM/ Morris.

SIOBHAN  (to TECHNICIAN) Can you look please?

TECHNICIAN  What am I checking?

REBUS  That it’s still there, safe, sealed and fit for court.

The TECHNICIAN moves off.

REBUS  And once we’ve done that we need to get the name of the property company that developed those flats...

SIOBHAN  We’re not doing anything John. I’ve been over this.

REBUS  Right. Fine. I’ll get it all together myself. Hand it over to you with a big bow tied round the case...

SIOBHAN  What case!?

REBUS  Maggie Towler. I told you. She’s the unsolved from seventeen years ago? I met her daughter, Heather, night before last. She was on my stair.

SIOBHAN  What was she doing there?

REBUS  Don’t know. She vanished on me.

SIOBHAN  You can have that effect on people.

REBUS  But I remembered we let mother her down.

SIOBHAN  And that’s why you’re here?

REBUS  Of course that’s why I’m here. Why else would I be here?

SIOBHAN  So why were you asking about the Mordaunt evidence?

REBUS  Just making conversation. It’s on my mind Siobhan. What can I tell you? Why were you here? Just checking no-one had tried tampering with the Mordaunt evidence?

SIOBHAN  Yes.

REBUS  Well there you go. Nothing to worry about.

SIOBHAN  You have to stop John...

REBUS  Stop what?

SIOBHAN  Poking into cold cases.

REBUS  Oh so Maggie Towler doesny deserve justice?

SIOBHAN  Will she get it if you steam in trampling all over the evidence...?

She’s cut off as the TECHNICIAN is back.

TECHNICIAN  Still there. Sealed, safe and ready for court.

SIOBHAN  Thank you.

TECHNICIAN  No problem. (indicating REBUS) But he shouldn’t be in here.

SIOBHAN  I’ll walk him out.

The TECHNICIAN leaves as SIOBHAN walks REBUS into—

* * *

Stairwell Police H.Q.

SIOBHAN  Have you slept?

REBUS  Have you?

He puts something in his mouth.

SIOBHAN  What’s that? You trying the nicotine lozenges?

REBUS  Had to try something.

SIOBHAN  What do they taste like?

REBUS  Well I’ve never actually licked an ashtray full of cat’s piss but...

SIOBHAN  We’ve got a family liason officer visiting Angela’s father. But I promised him I’d keep him informed personally. I took his hand and looked him in the eye and promised him I’d convict the man that destroyed his daughter twenty five years ago... Destroyed him too. He’s just a husk of a man, a living container of unbearable grief.

REBUS  No mother?

SIOBHAN  Cancer. Five years ago. They’d split up by then.

REBUS  Sorrow too heavy for two to carry. See it all the time.

SIOBHAN  We have to get Mordaunt convicted John. We have to.

REBUS  I know.

SIOBHAN  And there’s something you’re not telling me.

REBUS  Right.

SIOBHAN  Isn’t there?

REBUS  Mebbe.

SIOBHAN  Something to do with the attack on Big Ger. Who are you protecting John?

REBUS  You.

SIOBHAN  From what?

REBUS  A mess. A mess that you don’t need to worry about.

SIOBHAN  Oh dear god... (she slumps) You rang him didn’t you?

REBUS  He came round the flat.

SIOBHAN  I know. We’ve got a tail on him.

REBUS  (genuine) Smart girl...

SIOBHAN  Oh don’t even start with that! Don’t you...!

REBUS  What? It was the right thing to do.

SIOBHAN  Yes John, I know, because I’m a really good detective.

REBUS  You want to know what we talked about.

SIOBHAN  Are you going to tell me?

REBUS  He’s got nothing Shiv. It’s all a bluff. He’s just messing with your head. Last night? He just fancied tormenting me.

SIOBHAN  Is he going in the witness box?

REBUS  Not unless he wants to look like a clown. Big Ger will not mess up your case against Mordaunt. You can keep staring at me Siobhan but you’re either going to trust me on this or you’re not.

SIOBHAN  If I couldn’t trust you on something like this I wouldn’t trust this job, I wouldn’t trust myself, I wouldn’t trust any seeming solid thing in the whole world.

A beat.

REBUS  No pressure then.

SIOBHAN  Something I’ve always wanted to ask you: why does Cafferty call you ‘Strawman’?

REBUS  I was giving evidence against him in a case in Glasgow, the lawyer got me mixed up with another witness called ‘Stroman’. Cafferty loves that.

SIOBHAN  He thinks you’re a man of straw.

REBUS  He wishes I was.

SIOBHAN  And you think you’re a lone wolf. The last gunslinger in High Noon, taking down the bad guys as he goes.

REBUS  What do you think I am?

SIOBHAN  Retired. And good police work is team work John.

REBUS  You think? I think a result’s a result.

SIOBHAN  John...

REBUS  (cutting in) I hear you Siobhan. I do.

SIOBHAN  I see her you know. In my head.

REBUS  Who?

SIOBHAN  Angela. Just watching me. Never had that before on a murder, not even my first. I see her. Staring at me. Asking if I’m going to get her the only thing worth anything to her now. A bit of justice, for that little life snapped short...

MAGGIE and ANGELA are on.

REBUS  I know. I see her too. I remember watching Sam going out for a night with her pals at that age.

SIOBHAN  How is she?

REBUS  Good, pestering me to come and see the granddaughter before she’s taller than Sam is.

SIOBHAN  Well you’ve the time now.

REBUS  That’s what she says. In a few years that toddler will be a teenager. Then Sam will understand what it was like, looking at her, so fresh and full of life, beautiful... and fragile as a moth. She didn’t understand why I shouted at her for pulling her top down and making up her face like she was something glossy and available. She didn’t see what I saw... what the predatory monsters out there would see. Christ. The way young lassies dress themselves up Shiv...

SIOBHAN  A young woman’s got every right...

REBUS  (cutting her off) Aye I know I know.

SIOBHAN  Attacks like the one on Angela, on Maggie Towler are rare. Still. Women risk more in their own homes. Young women can’t be prisoners of their father’s fears...

REBUS  It is just a fact that a strong man can grab a woman and do whatever he likes. It’s just a fact that young women will always need protection, as long as that’s true. And we’re the protection, or we should be. We need to get them locked up.

SIOBHAN  Maybe the answer is to keep trying to make a world where no man ever would hurt a young woman.

REBUS is surrendering something, realising he can’t fix this, struggling with that.

REBUS  Aye. Alright. Alright.

SIOBHAN  What?

REBUS  I can’t see a way through...

SIOBHAN  What is it?

REBUS  Shiv... There’s maybe is something I do need to talk to you about...

She waits. He can’t find a way to go on.

SIOBHAN  Well what is it?

REBUS  Nothing. No it’s nothing. I’ll fix it myself. Just... Look... I might need your help, tonight...

SIOBHAN  (cutting him off) Oh I can’t tonight.

REBUS  (thrown) Oh. Right. Sorry.

SIOBHAN  No I’m going out. I have to... I mean I want to eh... (she’s floundering) It’s just this thing...

REBUS  (cutting in) Hot date?

SIOBHAN  Hardly. Important. Important date.

REBUS  Anyone I know?

SIOBHAN  It’s work. I can’t shift it so...

REBUS  No, no, fine. Work on the Mordaunt trial?

She says nothing.

REBUS  ’Course it is. And nothing you can tell me...

SIOBHAN  Sorry, it’s just...

REBUS  I’m no even asking. It’s fine. Really.

SIOBHAN  I could come and see you after? How late will you be up? Stupid question...

REBUS  (cutting her off) No, I’ll be out. I thought maybe you could come with but...

SIOBHAN  How about I buy you breakfast?

REBUS  Aye... aye that might work.

SIOBHAN  You can tell me all about it then.

REBUS  Yeah. Alright. I’ll tell you all about it then.

SIOBHAN  It’s a date.

She’s on the move, going back upstairs.

REBUS  So you know about the murder on my stair then?

She pauses.

REBUS  If you had eyes on me and Cafferty then you’ll have heard about the murder on my stair? (as she doesn’t reply) Why didn’t you say?

SIOBHAN  I was waiting to see when you’d tell me. You fancy Cafferty for that?

REBUS  Don’t you?

SIOBHAN  So why didn’t you tell that very competent police officer who interviewed you?

REBUS  I’ll tell you at breakfast.

SIOBHAN  You better.

SIOBHAN goes back upstairs. REBUS walks slowly down the stairs. ANGELA and MAGGIE are with him.

MAGGIE  You couldn’t tell her.

ANGELA  Couldn’t face it.

MAGGIE  Well that’s just weak!

REBUS  Fucking shut it!

Transition into—

* * *

Rebus’s Arden Street flat

REBUS is searching through paperwork, not even sure what he’s looking for. MAGGIE and ANGELA are still with him, still talking. REBUS has put music on, we barely hear it, it’s HEATHER and MAGGIE’S song ‘Show Me the Way’.

ANGELA  Look at him, did you really think he cared about us? It’s all about her.

MAGGIE  Siobhan... We’re dead.

ANGELA  No sense worrying about the dead.

MAGGIE  But if Siobhan Clarke finds out you lied to her...

ANGELA  Messed with her...

MAGGIE  Let her down...

REBUS shouts at them, at the world.

REBUS  Cafferty’s got nothing!

MAGGIE  But you know that’s not true.

ANGELA  Better go and find out.

MAGGIE  Under the dusk dark cherry trees on Middle Meadow walk, go and climb up the stairs of the old Infirmary, polished new and caged in with des res glass...

REBUS  (paperwork) Why did no fucker write down the name of the property company that owned the building site? I’m going to get the fucker that killed you Maggie I...

MAGGIE  (cutting him off) Too late for that John. I’ll still be dead.

ANGELA  And what about me?

MAGGIE  What about my baby girl, Heather?

Now we hear the music, MAGGIE’S song. REBUS goes and takes it off.

ANGELA  Maggie and Heather, Angela and Siobhan.

MAGGIE  And you.

ANGELA  And ex — detective John Rebus.

MAGGIE  Canny save all of us John.

REBUS  (quiet) The fuck I can’t.

MAGGIE  It’s too late.

REBUS  There’s a way through this... There must be...

MAGGIE  There’s not.

REBUS  There is. There’s a way...

ANGELA  Time you were on your way John.

Transition into—

* * *

Quartermile penthouse, stairwell/flat

MAGGIE and ANGELA are gone. Laboriously, REBUS climbs up to CAFFERTY’S penthouse and rings the bell. CAFFERTY lets him in.

CAFFERTY  What’s wrong with the lift?

REBUS  Someone’s getting a Waitrose delivery.

CAFFERTY  They’re supposed to use the service life for that. Come in, come in, take a seat, admire the view. Christ, state of you man. You can have a wee lie down if you like. What are you drinking?

REBUS has semi collapsed.

REBUS  Just give me some water.

CAFFERTY  Bit late to crawl back on the wagon isn’t it?

REBUS  (weary) Stick some whisky in it then.

CAFFERTY  I’ve got something better. Going to expand your mind John, wait till you taste this. (fixing the drink, wine) This is the best move I ever made, never get tired of that view. You can see half of Edinburgh from up here. 360 degrees of lights and life.

REBUS  And all the world can see you, up here in your glass tower.

CAFFERTY  What does that tell you? I’m at the top of the world John, nothing to hide, no-one to fear now, monarch of all I survey. Is that how it goes? I can see you of an evening John, down there, having a wee wander in the Meadows in the middle of the night. Didny know anyone was watching did you?

REBUS  Nothing better on the telly Ger? Thought you’d have all the sports channels.

CAFFERTY hands REBUS a glass of wine.

CAFFERTY  Taste that.

REBUS  I’m no a wine drinker.

CAFFERTY  No. No more was I. But try that.

REBUS does so.

CAFFERTY  That’s something eh?

REBUS  Is it?

CAFFERTY  Six hundred and fifty pounds a bottle. You just sipped twenty quid’s worth.

Laughs at REBUS’S expression.

CAFFERTY  I know! It’s an education John. If you’ve got that, if you’ve got the knowledge, you can declare a bottle of second hand plonk is worth a grand or more and no-one will argue with you. That’s what it’ll be worth.

REBUS  Just get me a water.

CAFFERTY  You’re no going to waste that are you? Knowledge. Information. That’s always the most valuable commodity there is.

REBUS is getting his own drink.

CAFFERTY  Tell you the other thing that makes a wine? Timing. It’s worth six hundred today, next year it’s tipped over into vinegar. Worthless. But this one is at its best. This is the moment.

REBUS  Why now?

CAFFERTY  The wine?

REBUS  No. Not the wine. Not the fucking wine Cafferty!

CAFFERTY  Not following you.

REBUS  How long have you known I hit you that night?

CAFFERTY  Is that a confession?

REBUS  How long!?

CAFFERTY  From the second I saw those shoes. Twenty-five years.

REBUS  And why now? Why are you doing this...?

CAFFERTY  (cutting him off) What am I doing?

REBUS  Why now!

CAFFERTY  Expert knowledge. You have to know the perfect moment, to savour when it’s ready.

REBUS  A memory of an ex-squaddies’ toe caps? You think a jury’ll buy that as an identification?

CAFFERTY  Oh I’ll say I saw your face on the way down. Of course I will, need to make it water tight. But the DNA’ll back that up eh?

REBUS  You’ll lie in the witness box.

CAFFERTY  Of course. Honesty can only get you so far, eh John? Sometimes, to get what you want, you have to do things your own way. Isn’t that your philosophy too?

REBUS  You’d let Mordaunt walk free, just so you can get me arrested?

CAFFERTY  Will they bother? Sweeping an old has-been cop into the bin in his final years? Aye they might, you’ve no made many friends in the force, have you John? And you’ve outlived most of those. Yeah they’ll probably arrest you. That would be a result.

REBUS  What do you want?

CAFFERTY  Nothing. Nothing from you. You’re about as much use now as a condom machine on a geriatric ward. My world gets larger every day and yours gets smaller.

SIOBHAN is on, coming to CAFFERTY’S door.

CAFFERTY  Sure you won’t try more of this wine? I think it just needed to breathe, it’s tasting better and better.

SIOBHAN rings the bell. CAFFERTY goes to answer.

CAFFERTY  ’Scuse me. Need to get that.

CAFFERTY opens the door.

CAFFERTY  D.I. Clarke. Glad you could make it.

SIOBHAN comes in and stops dead as she sees REBUS.

CAFFERTY  Sorry. Should have told you, you’re not the only guest tonight.

SIOBHAN  (to REBUS) What are you doing here?

REBUS  You tell me.

CAFFERTY  D.I. Clarke doesn’t know a thing. I thought it’d be better if she heard the story from you.

SIOBHAN  What story?

CAFFERTY  Glass of wine D.I. Clarke? White’s your poison eh? But I think you’ll like this one.

SIOBHAN  What the fuck’s going on John?

REBUS  What did he tell you, to get you here?

SIOBHAN doesn’t answer, trying to work out what’s going on.

REBUS  Siobhan?

CAFFERTY  I told D.I. Clarke I had important information about the defence lawyer’s investigation of the attack on me. I told her, if she came here alone, if she could just hold back that impulse to play it by the book, inform her superiors, blah blah... If we could just have a private meeting, I’d tell her all about it.

REBUS  And you came? On your own?

CAFFERTY  She learned to bend the rules from the best, eh John.

SIOBHAN  That’s what I’m doing here. What about you?

REBUS says nothing.

CAFFERTY  Tell her.

Still nothing.

CAFFERTY  I’m happy to give her my version, just thought you might like to put it in your own words John.

REBUS  I was going to tell you Shiv. It’s why I asked you to come with me tonight.

SIOBHAN  Tell me what?

REBUS  Let’s go, I’m no talking about it in front of this prick. He’s had his fun...

CAFFERTY  Christ no! Show’s just getting started. I’m the witness for the defence Siobhan. I’m the proof that the police were perfectly prepared to frame Mordaunt back in 1992. I’m the wee hand grenade of truth that’s going to blow up twenty-five years of work, trying to put the bastard away. I’ll send Mordaunt off singing to a wee retirement home where he’ll end his days drinking soup and trying to touch up the carers. But I might not. It depends. There’s a deal on the table. Something we should talk about when you know what’s going on. Tell her the story Strawman.

REBUS  What deal?! What are you playing at?

CAFFERTY  Tell her now or I tell her.

REBUS  I hit him.

SIOBHAN  What?

REBUS  In 1992. It was me. I hit him across the back of the head with a length of two by two. Wish I’d killed him.

SIOBHAN  But... you told me. You swore... You said none of the officers back then had done any cover up...

REBUS  They didn’t. It was all me. I’m sorry Siobhan. I am.

SIOBHAN  Tell me. Tell me what happened.

REBUS  (to CAFFERTY) Do you remember what you did that night?

CAFFERTY  It’s all a blur John, concussion’ll do that to a man.

REBUS  We had him. We had him for possession and supply. Five witnesses ready to testify he was the banker, the profiteer, the man making slick money off junky sweat... Five witnesses that went to court and magically changed their story under questioning. Even the jury knew they were lying but there was no evidence, every shred of it threatened and intimidated out of existence and he sits there, grinning like a toad full of worms...

CAFFERTY  Always the abuse. Enjoy it Strawman, clock’s ticking.

REBUS  He walks out of court. It was the day after Mordaunt walked out of another court. I wasn’t the lead on Mordaunt or anything like, but I felt that, like every cop in Edinburgh. And then Cafferty walks too.

CAFFERTY  (cutting in) Oh that was personal eh Strawman?

REBUS  One wee lassie, we’d spent days coaching her, reassuring her, promising her we’d keep her safe...

CAFFERTY  He’s always promising more than he delivers. Have you noticed that?

REBUS  She was shaking so hard in the witness box I thought she’d fall over, and all the while he’s staring at her... do you even remember her Cafferty? Moira Spibey. Where’s she now?

CAFFERTY  Thought it was a police job to keep track of all the lost souls.

REBUS  Dead. 1996. Overdose.

CAFFERTY  Well, some folk just kill themselves, and you canny help them. But have a wee bit more of my booze Strawman. If you need it.

REBUS  And this fucker... he’s just walking about a bar...

CAFFERTY  My bar. My bar Strawman, and why were you in there if you weren’t looking for me?

REBUS  The night after the trial, grinning, teflon coated, all the shite’s slid right off him and he’s grinning like he just ate it all with a spoon. Walking about the place, shaking hands, patting backs, soaking up the fake worship of his dark kingdom of fear...

CAFFERTY  Oh fucking poetry now is it?... You should have seen this one Siobhan, he was barely standing, swaying and glowering like a drunken prize fighter who doesny know the count’s finished.

REBUS  He has a word with the barman... And he’s gone. And there’s a drink in front of me...

CAFFERTY  I bought him a drink. And this is what happened, because I bought him a drink...

REBUS  ‘Mr Cafferty’s compliments, in appreciation of all you do to protect the citizens of Edinburgh...’

CAFFERTY  What was wrong with that?

REBUS  So aye, I followed him into the car park... There’s the fucker, no minders for once... He’s just standing there, having a smoke.

CAFFERTY  See if I’d only quit sooner in life...

REBUS  There’s the building timber. Aye. I picked it up. I swung at him... Walked two streets over. Dumped the two by two. Walked back. First officer at the scene. And there it was. Like a last chance. Like a neon sign flashing ‘Get them both John’ I saw Mordaunt’s van still parked up in the car park...

CAFFERTY  If I’d only known then how much whisky he could sink and keep walking...

REBUS  And a bar full of witnesses had seen Mordaunt nip through the back when Cafferty came in the front.

CAFFERTY  Only way I can figure it is the wee bastard saw this clown roll up and was feart to get done for drink driving so he just ran home and left the van. Ironic, eh?

REBUS  Cafferty went down. Mordaunt went down for it. Fucking result!

SIOBHAN  What have you done?

REBUS  It was done twenty-five years ago, what do you want?

SIOBHAN  Steve Cant was lack lustre in court? I bet he bloody was! He knew didn’t he? The whole squad knew what you’d done...

REBUS  Cheering me on.

SIOBHAN  Were they? All of them? Are you sure there weren’t more than your boss worried about the day a miscarriage of justice might come back and bite us all? Mordaunt’s going to walk John!

REBUS  I’m sorry.

SIOBHAN  What do you want me to tell Angela’s father? That you’re sorry!? Jesus.

CAFFERTY  So. Here’s the deal. He was first officer at the scene. He did inspect the evidence once it was located. A little cross contamination, not totally unbelievable eh? Without my sworn evidence of a clear view of his ugly mug it’s a bit of mud in the water at worst. I’ll withdraw that statement. Concussion, twenty-five years, failing memory, now I think about it I can’t be sure, no, I am sure, sure it couldn’t have been John Rebus, no, it was a much taller man, thinner, fitter, better looking, nothing like this wreck of an old police officer at all, can’t believe I ever made such a stupid mistake. They won’t even put me on the stand. Probably give up on the idea of even bringing the assault evidence into it. Police corruption? No. We’ll just forget about that. Let justice be done. Let Mordaunt burn. That sound like a good deal D.I. Clarke?

SIOBHAN  What do you want Cafferty?

CAFFERTY  Just... information.

SIOBHAN  What kind of information?

CAFFERTY  Things I need to know. As and when. The sort of thing a bright D.I. poised for promotion might happen to be able to pass on. I’ll be no bother at all, the odd phone call, the odd favour...

SIOBHAN  And if I tell you to take a running jump off your patio there?

CAFFERTY  Mordaunt walks and Rebus is up on charges of perverting justice and assault. So. Time to decide what’s most important to you Shiv.

SIOBHAN  Don’t call me that!

REBUS is on the move.

REBUS  (to SIOBHAN) Come on. We’re out of here.

SIOBHAN  No...

REBUS  Tell him to fuck off and let’s get out of here. What? You’re seriously thinking about this!?

SIOBHAN  (quiet) I have to... don’t I?

REBUS  No. No. Not happening. You’re not going to be his puppet. You’re not going to jump when he pulls your strings...

SIOBHAN  Mordaunt’s going to walk free because you...! (she can’t go on) Don’t talk to me John. Don’t even... (she can’t speak for another moment. To CAFFERTY) Can I have a moment? I need to think.

CAFFERTY  You can have a moment. No more.

REBUS  What the fuck is there to think about! Tell him to do his worst! It doesny matter what happens to me now!

SIOBHAN  And what happens to justice for Angela?! What happens to twenty-five years of work and hope and trying... I don’t give a fuck what happens to you now John. I seriously don’t give a fuck! (to CAFFERTY) I’m going outside. I’m going to walk round the Meadows. I’ll come back.

CAFFERTY  Twenty minutes then. Don’t go wandering off.

SIOBHAN  I won’t.

She’s leaving.

REBUS  I’ll come with you.

SIOBHAN  You’ll leave me alone!

She’s gone.

REBUS looks at CAFFERTY.

CAFFERTY  That was worth waiting for. That was almost as good as I ever imagined.

REBUS moves.

CAFFERTY  Don’t even try Strawman. There’s not enough breath left in you to hurt me.

REBUS hurls the bottle of wine at him. CAFFERTY lets it fly past.

CAFFERTY  Fuck it. I’d rather drink vodka anyway.

REBUS has no attack left. Cafferty is getting a drink.

CAFFERTY  Twenty-five years. Fucking flown by eh? You and me, head to head, think we’ve finally got a winner eh? Sweet, but kind of an easy win in the end. Not a contest of equals, but it’s been years since you could really give me a fight, eh Strawman? You let yourself go. No the will power to lay off the fags and booze. No the backbone to keep yourself in shape. It’s a basic thing see? Staying fit, staying ready. Bottom fucking line. There are still places in the world right now, hunners of them, where staying at the top means keeping the power to batter another man to pulp. The first time you do it, it’s terrifying, but after that, well you realise you’re just doing what the whole world does to get rich, only difference is you’re doing it with your own hands. History. Look at history. The guys with power were the ones who could win a battle with a fucking four-foot blade. I’d’ve been a king. Bottom. Line. Aye well, no those days is it? Need to move with the times. I’m a dancer Rebus. I’ve got the fucking moves. You’ve no even got the music. Shall we put on some music? While we’re waiting?

REBUS  If you put on Sheena Easton I’m going over that balcony rail and I’m taking you with me.

CAFFERTY  Stop blackening that woman’s name. Just ’cause you canny appreciate proper music.

REBUS  Christ you’re a real fan.

CAFFERTY  Always. Named my company after her. One of my companies. One of the many many wee cubby holes for cash you’ve never found yet John. Pick some music. I’ve got anything you like. Pick a soundtrack for your mood.

REBUS  You won’t have it.

CAFFERTY  I’ve got everything.

REBUS  You won’t have this.

CAFFERTY  Do you even know what Spotify is you fucking dinosaur?

REBUS  Frampton, ‘Lines on My Face’.

CAFFERTY is typing it into his phone. Music starts.

CAFFERTY  Straight through the surround system. All state of the art. Automatic recording of any noise in here too, just in case you were hoping there’d be no record of that conversation we just had. Fucking digital eh? Things you can do. And you lot still struggle away with audio tapes like it’s 1976.

REBUS  We use audio tapes because you can’t doctor an audio tape without leaving a trace.

CAFFERTY  It’s you that’s been leaving traces though. Eh John? (the music) What the fuck’s this shite?

He stabs at his phone, fast forwarding.

REBUS  Leave it!

CAFFERTY  A last request? Go on then. You want a soundtrack for defeat? I’ll indulge you.

He starts the track again, closer to the end of the song.

CAFFERTY  Winners and losers. What it all comes down to. See, when I was a young man, fighting my way up, this was the prize, the view from the top of Edinburgh. Wankers born to their green acres or banking millions can walk into this. The likes of you and me, we need to fight for it, inch by bloody inch.

REBUS  Aye, you’re a social revolutionary Cafferty.

CAFFERTY  But see when a man like me gets it? Gets it all? Fucking unstoppable. ’Cause I’ve got the millions and I can look any of those soft bastards in the eye and let them see I could punch right through them and it wouldny bother me. I’m terrifying Rebus. I’m ancient power. The original stuff.

REBUS  Original shite.

CAFFERTY  Aw change the record Strawman. We’re done. You’re finished. Admit it.

REBUS  And you really think, the whole purpose of my life was fighting you? Strictly supporting cast. Struggle to remember you most days.

CAFFERTY  Aye you’ve a wheen o’ regrets right enough but no getting me behind bars was the big one. Fucking ironic if I put you there. But I’d rather have your girl on my keyring. That’ll be the real victory, the one that’ll sting you the most.

REBUS  She’ll finish you in five seconds if you call her a girl to her face.

CAFFERTY  We’ll see.

The music’s changed to the next track. It is HEATHER’S song ‘Show Me the Way’.

REBUS  You can turn that up.

CAFFERTY  Turn it off more like. Hate that one.

REBUS  You know it?

CAFFERTY names it.

REBUS  How do you know that one?

CAFFERTY  I’m a complicated man Rebus. You never gave me credit for that.

CAFFERTY has stopped the music.

REBUS  You want another track? ‘Sympathy for the Devil’?

CAFFERTY  Tell me. Admit it, is there anything I could have done to you that would have hurt you worse than this? Turning Siobhan Clarke against you? Making her my snitch?

REBUS  We don’t know what she’s going to decide.

CAFFERTY  Aye we do. She won’t see Mordaunt walk. And she won’t see you go down.

REBUS  No. You hit the bullseye. You win. Only thing worse would be if you’d gone after my daughter.

CAFFERTY  Aye well, I wouldny do that.

REBUS  You’ll bring the smell of blood to my doorstep though. Careless. They’ll get you for that Cafferty.

CAFFERTY  What are we on about now?

REBUS  The boy, up the stairs from me?

CAFFERTY  Now that was a piece of pure cheek. If they knew I was in the building it was.

REBUS  That wasny you?

CAFFERTY  No it wasny me! Fucking amateurs. Come on John. Give me some credit.

REBUS  So who was it?

CAFFERTY  What do you care?

REBUS  There’s a girl I need to find. She’s in trouble.

CAFFERTY  Then she’s likely another lost wee thing John Rebus can’t save.

REBUS seems to slump.

CAFFERTY  (sings, mocking) ‘Regrets, I’ve had a few’. More than a few eh John?

No answer.

CAFFERTY  How is your daughter by the way? See, you’ve still got something as well as that sack of regrets. You’ve still got her.

REBUS  Biggest regret of the lot. All the ways I’ve failed her.

CAFFERTY  I’ve no regrets at all. None. Seriously. Except maybe that. No kids. A waster son that died and didny know me...

REBUS  No-one to inherit the royal house of Cafferty.

CAFFERTY  No.

REBUS  Nothing makes you vulnerable like a child does. Maybe that’s the secret of your success. They could never really get to you.

CAFFERTY  Maybe. We’re drinking now eh?

REBUS  Aye.

CAFFERTY  Good.

Gets them both another.

CAFFERTY  You nearly got me Strawman, I can say it now. I did have to scramble to stay ahead of you a few times.

REBUS  Good.

CAFFERTY toasts him.

CAFFERTY  To a fucking good fight and the best man won.

REBUS  Who says it’s over?

CAFFERTY  Ah come on. Maybe I could adopt. What do you think?

REBUS  I’m no sure you’d match the adoption agency profile of the ideal parent.

CAFFERTY  Buy a Chinese one. Na. Fuck that. Needs to look like me.

REBUS  Sam doesny look much like me.

CAFFERTY  Sure she’s yours?

REBUS  Fuck you.

CAFFERTY  She’ll have her mother’s looks. Way it goes eh? DNA. All the mysteries it solves, ’cause you canny tell by looking can you?

REBUS  So maybe there’s a few monster mini Cafferties running around like the wee bastards they are.

CAFFERTY  I’d know.

REBUS  But...

CAFFERTY  I’d fucking know!

REBUS  Christ. Sore point?

CAFFERTY  Ach. Alright, since we’re talking. You never got me put away for the heroin dealing you said I was doing.

REBUS  That you were doing.

CAFFERTY  That you never caught anyone for doing. And how many junkie deaths are we talking about?

REBUS  Conscience troubling you?

CAFFERTY  No. Not one bit. But yours is eh? Every death another reason to sook on your wee bottle. All those poor dead junkie wasters, and then there’s all the friends and colleagues, all drowned in the endless sea of John Rebus’s mistakes. Your fault. Every one. That’s what you think, eh Strawman, that’s what you see in the 3 a.m. dark. Regrets. Me? If I’ve killed anyone...

REBUS  If!?

CAFFERTY  Casualties of war, every one. Victims of the battle they brought to me. I sleep like a well-fed bairn. Only kind of death I’d ever regret... the kind that didn’t have to happen. That’s why I’d never drink like you. Responsibility of power. You can never lose control. Too dangerous.

REBUS  Sounds like maybe you did then? Just the once.

CAFFERTY  You make mistakes and you learn.

REBUS  What mistakes?

CAFFERTY  One woman. But I learned. Taught me how to behave. You’ve got another woman on the go I hear. Fuck did you pull that off? How’d you find yet another head case who hates herself so much she’ll lie down under a man that regurgitates his own lungs every time he coughs?

REBUS  Trick is to let them go on top.

CAFFERTY  Trick is to buy the best you can afford, someone smart enough no even to need to fake admiration for the size of your wallet. Big money buys you real respect from an intelligent woman.

REBUS  Aye dream on.

CAFFERTY  It’s a weird power relationship you see, men and women. If we’ve got the physical power what does that leave them with? Emotional manipulation. Fucking dangerous weapon to turn on a powerful man, do you not think?

REBUS  You don’t like that?

CAFFERTY  Do you?

REBUS  So what’re you saying?

CAFFERTY  Nothing. Just there’s very little I regret.

REBUS  Except beating up on ‘manipulative’ women?

CAFFERTY  Come on. Worst I’ve ever done is hand out a wee slap to some lassie too cheeky to take a telling.

REBUS  Christ you’re a feminist icon Big Ger.

CAFFERTY  (looking at his watch) She better be back soon. Want to text her Rebus?

REBUS  I tell you, I would like to hear that song again.

CAFFERTY  No.

REBUS  Bad memories?

CAFFERTY  What?

REBUS  Why do you hate it? Has it got anything to do with a woman. One particular woman?

CAFFERTY  Still the fucking detective.

REBUS  Your only regret?

CAFFERTY  Right. We’re done talking about this. Time’s up. I’m calling D.I. Clarke back.

REBUS  Easton property development. Not Weston. Something that begins with an ‘E’. That the name of your company? Easton property?

CAFFERTY  What about it?

REBUS  You built all those big flats down in Newhaven then.

CAFFERTY  Some of them. That company’s sold now. You’ll not get anything digging in that mud. My name wasny ever near the paperwork anyway.

REBUS  No you’d have been a bit scary sitting in your best suit eyeballing the ladies and gents of the planning application committee. I heard you were a bit scary altogether, no-one wants to talk about it even now.

CAFFERTY  Talk about what?

REBUS  Maggie Towler.

A beat.

CAFFERTY  What?

REBUS  Thought she could take on the world... Till she took on a man she couldny handle.

CAFFERTY  Not following, Strawman.

REBUS  Aye you are. (sees he’s got him) You are eh?

He snatches up CAFFERTY’S phone, keying up the music.

CAFFERTY  Give me that.

REBUS  How have you even heard of this one?

‘Show Me the Way’ is playing again.

CAFFERTY  Switch that off!

REBUS is turning up the volume.

REBUS  Maggie Towler’s favourite song. Was it ‘your tune’ Big Ger? Did you wander along the the Granton seafront to this one, swinging your hands and plotting which foundations to drop the bodies in...

CAFFERTY  (snatching for phone, REBUS evading) Give it!

REBUS  But she’d no have liked all that carry on eh? Is that what happened? She got a wee fright when she saw plain what kind of murdering scum she was shagging? Maybe she had the idea of letting a few other people know about the mess she was in? The police mebbe?

CAFFERTY has got the phone. He cuts the music, breathing heavily.

CAFFERTY  I had nothing to do with Maggie Towler after 1999. A year or more before she got herself killed.

REBUS  Interesting turn of phrase.

CAFFERTY  Wasn’t even questioned about her.

REBUS  That was careless of someone. Right enough though, I bet precious few folk knew about that wee romance. Not your usual type was she?

CAFFERTY says nothing.

REBUS  Leaving her taste in men aside I heard she was a nice enough lassie?

CAFFERTY  She was a lying wee hoor.

REBUS  Didn’t see her after 1999 you say?

Nothing from CAFFERTY.

REBUS  About the time she fell pregnant?

CAFFERTY  I’m ringing Clarke. I’ve given her long enough.

REBUS  So all that regret about the Cafferty legacy? A pile of keech eh? You left her high and dry didn’t you? Kicked her to the side and never looked back...

CAFFERTY  I’d’ve looked after her!

REBUS  So why didn’t you?

CAFFERTY  Bairn wasn’t mine. Alright?

REBUS  When did you find that out?

CAFFERTY  Doesny matter...

REBUS  Aye it does. Last night she was seen she ducked home early. Way I heard it she saw someone she didn’t expect to and it scared her. You had eyes and ears everywhere didn’t you, even then.

CAFFERTY  Give it up Strawman. We’re no talking about this.

REBUS  You caught her taking the back way home didn’t you?

CAFFERTY  I never knew she was pregnant, alright?

REBUS  Canny always be shooting blanks Ger.

CAFFERTY  The bairn was not mine!

REBUS  Is that what she told you? Is that what she said? To your face? You wouldny have liked that would you? So you get the news, she’s back on the town, first night out after having the kid... I bet that was the first you knew of the kid eh?

CAFFERTY  You sound like a fucking women’s magazine, you know that?

REBUS  You catch her going home alone, you ask her what she’s playing at? Keeping your daughter from you...

CAFFERTY  Chattering on like a cleaning wifie...

REBUS  She says, ‘Fuck you, fuck you Big Ger, think I’d ever have settled for the limp excuse for a cock you’ve got?’

CAFFERTY  Oh you better zip it right now!

REBUS  (cutting over him) ‘Fuck you, I was never with you even when you thought I was. Fuck you, it’s no even your kid!’

CAFFERTY lays him out. Walks away. Breathing hard. REBUS picks himself up. Recovers.

REBUS  And that’s what you did. Well no, nothing like that. You choked the life out of her eh? With her own scarf.

CAFFERTY  What do you think’s going to happen now Strawman? Think I’m going to break down and confess?

REBUS  No need for that. DNA evidence will put you in the frame. No doubt.

CAFFERTY  Fuck you talking about?

REBUS  Canny twist a piece of cloth that tight without losing a wee bit of skin. Teeny tiny bits of Cafferty dust. They couldny get a DNA identification at the time, science wasny good enough. It is now. Good thing they kept the evidence safe eh?

A beat.

CAFFERTY  Aye right.

REBUS  They really did Big Ger. We checked. Yesterday. I was thinking of reopening the case.

CAFFERTY  You’re no even a policeman. Who’s going to listen to you?

REBUS  You think I couldny get that done? I knew she looked familiar. Should have guessed, right then. Take away the ugly and I can see her, right there, on your face...

SIOBHAN is climbing back up, she comes in. CAFFERTY is just frozen.

SIOBHAN  Alright. Here’s what’s going to happen...

REBUS  (cutting her off) Cafferty’s changed his mind. The deal’s off.

SIOBHAN  What?

CAFFERTY’S still frozen.

REBUS  We had a wee talk. He’s had a change of heart.

SIOBHAN  Cafferty?

CAFFERTY  What?

SIOBHAN  The deal’s off?

REBUS  He’s no longer a witness for the defence. He’s withdrawing his statement. He’s denying he saw any bit of the bastard that mugged him.

CAFFERTY still doesn’t speak.

SIOBHAN  What’s going on?

REBUS  A Cold War. Mutually assured destruction. It’s a 60’s thing Shiv. Before your time.

SIOBHAN  (to CAFFERTY) Is that right? I need to hear you say it.

CAFFERTY  Get him out of here.

SIOBHAN  Are you withdrawing your statement?

CAFFERTY  YES! Now get him out of here before I... Just get out.

They start to leave. SIOBHAN is out and on the stair, recovering. She can’t hear the following dialogue.

CAFFERTY  John...

REBUS stops.

CAFFERTY  What do you mean... you recognised her?

REBUS  People can say anything Big Ger. Especially when they want to get rid of you. Maggie lied to you. But DNA canny lie.

CAFFERTY  Where is she? Where’s my daughter?

REBUS  I wouldny tell you if I knew.

Transition into—

* * *

Stairwell, Quartermile

SIOBHAN and REBUS on the stair. We see the stairwell but if the penthouse remains visible CAFFERTY does not move.

REBUS  Panic over. See? I told you. You just had to trust me. It’s fixed. I fixed it.

SIOBHAN  Do you know where I’ve just been, in the dark?

REBUS  Round the Meadows?

SIOBHAN  Don’t talk to me.

REBUS  Hey. You’ve seen me bend the rules before. You’ve helped me a few times.

SIOBHAN  The price of losing was never this high.

REBUS  We didn’t lose. We won.

SIOBHAN  Yes. I suppose you did.

She’s gone into darkness. ANGELA is in front of him.

ANGELA  But I’m still dead.

MAGGIE is there.

MAGGIE  And I’m still waiting.

ANGELA  Nothing solves murder. The dead stay dead.

MAGGIE  You promised me justice. You promised!

ANGELA  We’re lost in the dark.

MAGGIE  Always.

We see MORDAUNT. He walks forward. MAGGIE and ANGELA watch.

* * *

Outside court

SIOBHAN is making a press statement. We still see MORDAUNT.

SIOBHAN  I have a statement from Angela’s father which I’ll read to you now. (takes it out, reads) ‘Peter Mordaunt has been found guilty and today our daughter has finally received the justice she deserves. Nothing can fill the dark hole she has left in the lives of those who loved her. Nothing can replace her spirit or compensate for its loss, but there is some comfort in knowing that her killer has finally been identified and punished. All her surviving family would like to thank the police for their persistence and dedication over twenty-five years.’

Lights are going down on MORDAUNT. ANGELA fades away. MAGGIE is still with REBUS, watching.

SIOBHAN  In return I’d like to thank Angela’s family for their faith in the police over those twenty-five years. A conviction like the one we saw today would not have been possible in 1992. It is possible today because of advances in science, modern police techniques. It was not the work of one but of many, a team, working together to painstakingly preserve and examine evidence. No one person could have won justice for Angela. Good police work is team work and I’m grateful to each and every person who built this case. Thank you.

A flash of press cameras. SIOBHAN is moving away as we still see REBUS and MAGGIE.

MAGGIE  What about me?

REBUS  (quiet) I’m sorry. I’m sorry Maggie.

MAGGIE  What good’s that to me? You let me down John.

MAGGIE is gone. REBUS steps into—

* * *

Stairwell, Police H.Q.

SIOBHAN is coming downstairs. REBUS is waiting for her.

REBUS  I owe you breakfast.

SIOBHAN says nothing.

REBUS  Saw you on the box. Good stuff. You’re taking the promotion then? Sounded like a Chief Inspector to me.

SIOBHAN  What do you want John?

REBUS  Just... wanted to say congratulations. You got him.

SIOBHAN  Yes. We got him.

REBUS  Well done.

SIOBHAN  Thanks.

REBUS  Got to be worth a cappuccino, come on...

SIOBHAN  What have you got on Cafferty?

A beat.

REBUS  I can’t tell you that Shiv.

Another beat. Then SIOBHAN’S moving.

SIOBHAN  ’Course not.

REBUS  Siobhan...

SIOBHAN  (cutting him off) But it’s something big, something that could put him away for good, something that scares him. And the thing is John, the thing I’ve worked out is, that if we didn’t have to keep him quiet about your drunken, stupid violence, we could turn that weapon on Big Ger. We could use it. We could put him away. But hey, Mordaunt’s finally locked up eh? That what they called a win? In your day?

SIOBHAN is gone. REBUS waits a moment then moves into—

* * *

Stairwell, Arden Street

Slowly REBUS starts to walk up the stairs. HEATHER is sitting on the stairs.

REBUS  Where did you go to?

HEATHER  Och... around and about. You know.

REBUS is taking his phone out.

REBUS  I need to call this in...

HEATHER  (urgent) Don’t! Wait till I’m gone. I just wanted to know if you’d found anything. About my Mum.

A beat..

HEATHER  It’s lost history isn’t it? Didn’t realise I was hopeful but... That’s stupid eh? The way you can keep hoping. Like still believing in Santa... or life after death. Look it’s ok. As long as you tried.

REBUS  You have to talk to the police, Heather, about the night Andy was killed.

HEATHER  No!

REBUS  Why not?

HEATHER  Don’t call them.

REBUS  Well I have to...

He stops as HEATHER takes out a gun and points it at him.

HEATHER  Stupid fucker didn’t think I’d use a knife so he came at me. That’s when I knew I needed a gun. Should have realised: if you don’t look like you’re big enough to give them a doing they will try eh? And that’s just messy. And upsetting. I need folk to stand still when I’m talking to them.

REBUS  Right.

HEATHER  If I’d had a gun that night I probably wouldny have had to use it. But he thought he could take me. Stupid fuck.

REBUS  You were supplying Andy. You were his boss.

HEATHER  And he was a fucking idiot. All he had to do was take the business off the stair. Like you said. You noticed. You knew exactly what he was doing. Can’t have folk working for me that are that kind of stupid. I wouldny have killed him but... Like I said, he tried to take me. (breaks off) What are you looking at me like that for?

REBUS  That’s the business plan is it Heather? This is how you’re going to make your fortune?

HEATHER  This is just how I’ll get started. Then I’ll diversify.

REBUS  Thing is, when you’ve got a toe in one world, it’s awfy hard to pull it loose and jump into another.

HEATHER  Richard Branson kick started his millions by fiddling his VAT.

REBUS  Is that a fact? Och you’ll be fine then.

HEATHER  All I’m doing is what the whole world does to get rich.

REBUS  Only difference is you’re doing it with your own hands.

HEATHER  That’s right.

REBUS  Must be in your blood.

HEATHER  What do you mean?

REBUS  Remember your mum Heather. She’d want you to do that.

HEATHER  Sometimes I kid on she’s watching me. Think she’d be proud John?

REBUS  I think she’d be worried for you. There’s sharks out there Heather. Seriously sharp teeth.

HEATHER  I can look after myself. Better than she could. Maybe I take after my Dad eh? What do you think?

REBUS  Careful what you wish for.

HEATHER’S on the move.

HEATHER  You can make your phone call now. I’m going. See you around John.

She’s leaving.

REBUS  I won’t do that. I won’t call it in.

HEATHER  (stopped) Why not?

REBUS  (offering her a card) Because one day, if you ever meet the biggest shark out there, you should phone me.

HEATHER  Why?

REBUS  Because if you meet him, you’ll really need my help.

HEATHER  And what’s in it for you?

REBUS  Maybe something we called a win... back in my day.

HEATHER  Alright. I’ll do that.

She takes the card and leaves. After a moment REBUS follows her down the stairs. The song, HEATHER and MAGGIE’S song starts and swells in volume.

We see CAFFERTY lit up in his penthouse, staring out over the city.

REBUS is in the Meadows, staring up towards CAFFERTY’S penthouse. They can’t see each other but each knows the other is there.

Music hits a crescendo.

BLACKOUT.

Ian Rankin and Rona Munro

In conversation

Ian: So, Rona, what were your feelings when you were first approached about Long Shadows?

Rona: My first reaction was that I hadn’t read the books with enough attention! I think my brain clicked into ‘homework’ mode. Years of encounters with John Rebus, purely for pleasure, didn’t seem to qualify me for the responsibility. Of course, I then re-read the novels, especially the ones that focused on that strange, potent dynamic between Rebus and Cafferty. That reminded me that reading for pleasure was the point; that’s why the books are so fantastic. The job was to try and transfer that appreciation to the stage in a way that was theatrical but also satisfying to fans of the books.

Ian: Yes, I was certainly keen to see your ‘take’ on that powerful relationship between Rebus and Cafferty. The two share an empathy but also an antipathy. They seem to me like warring sides of the same split personality — and as you know I’ve always had a fascination for books such as R L Stevenson’s Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde and James Hogg’s Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner. I was also interested in the way you had dealt with masculine/ royal power (and disempowerment) in your James Plays for the National Theatre of Scotland. Scotland is such a small country, I think people outside reckon all the writers must know each other, but we had somehow conspired never to bump into one another until we started bouncing ideas around about a Rebus stage play. Do you remember the early stages of that working relationship?

Rona: Well, I think we made it up as we went along, didn’t we? I don’t know about you, but I always felt that it had to be as organic as a conversation. I didn’t go into the project with any expectations of how we would work together. I thought we’d probably just start from that first mug of coffee and chocolate biscuit in your living-room and see what felt comfortable. I think every creative collaboration I’ve ever been part of has depended on mutual respect and trust. In this case, the biggest leap of trust probably came from you — Rebus is yours, after all. I know you’ve let others get their sticky paws on him with TV adaptations, and you seem very laid back and not at all possessive of the great man. Is that something you’ve had to work at or did you always feel able to detach?

Ian: I think it was easier to detach in the early years. When the first Rebus novel came out, there was immediate TV interest from Leslie Grantham (who was famous at the time for playing Dirty Den on BBC’s East Enders). He wanted to move the action to London so he could play Rebus as a London cop. I took one look at the fee being offered and I was delighted with that. But then it never happened. I think throughout my years with Rebus I’ve come to accept that he belongs to everybody, most notably his fans. You and I did discuss this, I remember — we wanted to produce a play that would engage lifelong fans while still being accessible to an audience who might not know the books but love a night out at the theatre. I know you hadn’t worked with the whodunit genre previously — did the format present you with particular issues as a playwright?

Rona: I think it depends on the whodunit, doesn’t it? Drama is always a whydunit — that’s what creates drama, the emotions and character backstories are what creates the action. A whodunit then needs a twist which satisfies, a plot twist, something the audience can’t see coming but which satisfies when it does. There are very skilfully created detective novels that provide a puzzle or a plot twist but don’t necessarily have character change. I don’t think that kind of story transfers well to the theatre stage. Fortunately, the Rebus novels have always been as much about character — and character development — as plot. Over the course of the series we’ve been able to watch Rebus shift his views as he ages and takes in the moral lessons of the various cases he has worked on.

Ian: Yes, I think from the get-go we both felt this had to work both as a twisty psychological thriller and as a study in character. What did you feel the stage version of Rebus could bring out that the novels couldn’t?

Rona: You get to see the characters live in real-time. I think that has an excitement — as all theatre does — that’s unique. The characters appear in living, breathing 3D in front of the audience.

Ian: Yes, when I go to the theatre I feel a level of participation in these characters’ lives that rarely happens when they are on a screen, big or small. But let’s go back to the process, because as well as working with me, you were also liaising with the play’s director — can you say a little about that?

Rona: Where do I start? The relationship between playwright and director is a particularly close one in theatre. In this case, of course, it’s essentially a relationship between two writers and a director, and I think with new writing the director is an essential conduit between the writer’s intentions and the actors’ portrayal of those intentions. A good director understands what you meant by any particular line of dialogue and what’s working about the drama. They then know how to translate that into instructions and support that the actors will find useful or vital. Directors can also let you know when your intentions — what those lines of dialogue need to convey — is not surviving the test of the rehearsal room.

Ian: Not so dissimilar from the relationship between novelist and editor. A good editor makes the book better by pointing to where lines, scenes or characters don’t work or could work better.

Rona: Yes, sometimes what’s in the playwright’s head needs a rewrite to make it into better theatre. I always sit in on the first part of the rehearsal process and fully expect to have to ‘tweak’ a script (at the very least!) once we get things up on their feet and being played out live in that room.

Ian: God, I remember that experience from Dark Road. As a novelist, once the book is printed and bound, you can’t make any more alterations or improvements — you’re stuck with it. But right up until the previews, with a paying audience seeing that play for the first time, cuts and tweaks were being made. I remember one whole scene being cut by the director (who also happened to be the co-writer) and I thought: really? You can do that? The actors don’t mutiny? But those edits are always there for a purpose — to make the play as cohesive, coherent, and satisfying as possible. Of course, I was aware that you had worked with Roxana before and you really rated her, so that made the whole relationship easier. I recall the three of us enjoying more coffee and biscuits in my living-room, and the occasional brainstorming session over a meal.

Rona: We were challenged weren’t we? Our plot was interrogated with steely determination and we had to find the answers to a lot of probing questions! But I think the story became better for it.

Ian: Of course, we were writing a new Rebus adventure from scratch rather than adapting one of the existing stories. Do you recall how that decision was made? And is it easier than trying to adapt?

Rona: I can answer the second part of that but not the first. As a playwright I think adapting a novel for the stage is straightforward, insofar as the majority of plot- and character-decisions have already been taken for you. However, it is problematic when the form of the narrative needs a lot of wrestling to fit into an evening’s theatre. A very long novel with multiple scenes and flashbacks would, for example, present particular difficulties. I think a meaty short story is actually probably a much easier fit. But to bounce that back to you, why did you decide that we two should concoct a story between us and develop it collaboratively rather than present me with a completed narrative (in short story form, say)?

Ian: Ach, I think I just wanted to hang out with a great contemporary playwright and watch how their mind works, maybe learning some new skills or at least stretching myself along the way. Creative writers are very different in their attitudes, working methods and ways of seeing (and then presenting) the world. The relationship between Rebus and Cafferty is very male working-class, very macho, very Scottish. I wanted to watch how you would approach that. Our lengthy discussions made me think deeply about my own understanding (or lack of it) of these two characters — not forgetting Siobhan Clarke, who also has an important role to play in Long Shadows! As a novelist, of course, I have the lazy privilege of being able to use as many scenes, locations, words and characters as I like. Did you find any problem with retaining the atmosphere of the books within the necessary restrictions of a stage play?

Rona: Well, that was made easier because we did develop the story from scratch rather than try to shoehorn in some pre-existing narrative. It was a lot easier to concentrate the action in time and space. I also feel that a lot of the ‘action’ in your books is actually internal — it is formed of Rebus’s observations of and reactions to events. That’s a good fit for the stage as it can be shown in ways that are very theatrical.

Ian: I certainly enjoyed the journey, Rona.

Rona: Me, too. See you in the theatre!

Roxana Silbert, Birmingham Repertory Theatre’s artistic director

On bringing Rebus to the stage

Were you very aware that this is the first time onstage for a character who’s existed in other mediums, especially books but also more than one TV adaptation, as well as radio? Was that something that was on your mind?

We were really aware, because Ian has been approached quite often, either to adapt his work or to allow his work to be adapted, or to write something for the theatre. And obviously you’re dealing with a very iconic character, who readers absolutely adore. And that part of it is daunting, because you feel you have a real responsibility to not let them down.

How did that impact on your approach?

What mostly happens with things like novel adaptations is that there is a novel that a playwright adapts for the stage. And so, it is an adaptation of a story that already exists. What’s unique about this is that Ian has written a new story for the stage, alongside a playwright. So, it’s not that Rona Munro adapted this story, it’s that Ian has written it, and then they’ve worked very closely together to create the play.

As a result, when sometimes there might be something in the writer’s head that’s not really hitting the page — you often ask those questions of a playwright — in this case, I could ask those questions directly of Ian, who knows those people inside out. So even if something wasn’t clear on the page, it was absolutely vivid in his imagination, and then he was able to describe it in such a way that Rona could make it work for the stage. Novel writing and playwrighting are so different. I always think novels are more like film, in the sense that you can get inside someone’s head and you can work out what they’re thinking, and you don’t have to have a lot of action because you can have a lot of internal monologue. But, with theatre you only really know people by what they say and what they do, and so it’s a much more behavioural writing mode. Adaptations are always very challenging for that reason. So, doing it this way seemed to me the best of both worlds.

Because Rebus is a detective character and the books are crime novels, did you think much about the genre, more than in other plays?

In this particular instance, we thought about it a lot as a thriller. Rona is an avid thriller reader. She knew the Rebus books inside out before she was ever approached to work on them. One of the things we talked about a lot was that Rebus is a detective, so there has to be a crime to be solved. Looking at the evolution of the script, we have been very aware that it’s a detective story. What Ian and Rona have written into this, is that Rebus is a character who has a lot of demons, and those live in his head. One of the things theatre can do is make those manifest, and physicalise them and make them 3-D. So that’s one of the things that theatre has allowed him to do.

I think the other thing that Rona’s done brilliantly is writing a series of really strong and long dialogues. Interestingly, that’s not something you can do on film or in novel writing. In film, you have lots of short scenes, you can’t really sit in a dialogue for twenty minutes. It is a particularly theatrical thing you can do, which has allowed us to stay with these characters that we know really well, like Rebus and Cafferty and Siobhan, and watch the minutiae of their interaction over a sustained period of real-life time. So I think that that’s coinciding with being absolutely honourable to the form that he writes in, to the character and being a detective story, but also asking why are you going to do this on stage, why aren’t you going to do this in a different medium? Because there is Rebus on radio, there is Rebus on television — so why are people going to want to see a play?

We had to think why does this work for the stage and not for the television or a novel? Why is this story better told onstage?’ One of the things Ian had said, which I think is really smart, is he hadn’t wanted to write something until he felt he had a Rebus story that could only be told on the stage. And that was a really good way in for us understanding the story. For example, the way it’s designed is absolutely taking on board the noir thriller genre. It’s designed to feel very much like a thriller. A lot of inspirations have come from the noir thriller cinematic feel.

Theatre is a very collaborative medium but if you have the creator of the Rebus character there, did ownership come into it or was it as purely collaborative as theatre usually is?

It’s been incredibly collaborative — I have to say that Ian has allowed it to be so, he’s been very generous. What is not collaborative is that no one can know those characters better than he knows those characters, but that would be true of any playwright or any primary artist. But in terms of how you turn that story into something that works on stage, he has worked incredibly collaboratively with Rona, and how we, director Robin Lefevre, designer Ti Green and the production team at Birmingham Repertory Theatre, turn what’s on the page into something that’s going to be onstage.

In reality, what that means is that you’re constantly having a dialogue. We sat down and said who are the people you would like to see onstage playing Rebus; who would you like to see playing Siobhan; this is the world as I imagine it. So, it’s been really necessarily collaborative and I’ve learnt — because of course I’ve read and loved the novels — so much more about Ian’s approach to those characters through having access to him which has been fantastic.

Were there any themes particularly that spoke to you? Is that something that’s important to you, to approach it on that level or are you led by what’s interesting others in the first instance?

It has to strike at your heart — something in you has to be emotionally moved by it. What I found really interesting was the idea that you want to love Rebus for being a maverick and wanting to play outside the rules, but the story also really doesn’t romanticise the consequences of being a maverick. Someone is caught and someone goes to prison for a crime that they did, but someone else doesn’t and actually there is an inference that if you’d gone by the book and done it the right way — and it would have been a bit laborious and a bit boring and a bit administrative — but actually the result might have been a truer result. I think there’s a fascinating tension because it’s about how you choose to live your life, and whether you choose to live your life in the system or out of the system and what the pros and cons are. But it’s quite a dispassionate look at that. It doesn’t really say ‘this is the way to do it, we should all be romantic, outside-the-loop kind of people’. Because there are consequences to that, there are hard lessons to learn from it, and you wonder too ‘do I always want to be inside the system?’

I also think in this particular story Rebus’s relationship to young women — his desire to protect them — the huge cost to these young women of living a life that is slightly on the edges, is of enormous interest to me as well. And there’s just something about the world of the detectives or the high calibre criminal that Cafferty is. It’s not my world and it’s always fascinating. I’m sure it’s true of all arts but sometimes what’s fascinating about theatre is that it reflects a world, an experience that you’re living which it helps you process, but sometimes it’s an introduction to a world that you do not live in. Ian’s writing is so authentic and his knowledge of that world so profound that you feel you are genuinely glimpsing something that is usually behind closed doors.

Finally, I think because Rebus is now retired, and his way of policing — which is really hands-on, going to the bar where the incident happened and tracking someone down by foot — has been superseded by technology because most police work is now done at computers. Of course, there is a sense of nostalgia but there’s also a sense that he’s out of touch. The pros and cons, the benefits and risks of the different types of policing — which is a metaphor for a lot of the way the world is going — is again very intriguing. It’s also so human because he can’t race upstairs like he used to because he’s a man in his sixties! His back’s not great, and he can’t chase or and escape criminals because he’s a bit tired. I love that humanity in it, I love that he has become an older man who is retired, who’s struggling with technology, and who walks into police stations or places where he would have known everybody and knows nobody because there’s a new generation of people there. It’s a very interesting, slightly painful, look at late middle-age and how you’ve shifted and moved on.

And it sort of magnifies the loneliness of being a maverick as well, that he’s left with Cafferty as his closest friend and his biggest enemy — I’ve always found that dynamic between them really fascinating.

Yes, absolutely — the loneliness of deciding to go your own path.

That’s the cost, isn’t it? And that’s why most of us don’t and why we respect these heroes on-screen and on-stage who do.

Because it’s glamorous in your twenties and thirties. It’s less glamorous in your sixties or seventies!

Yes, because you’re left with the bill at the end of all that when you’ve isolated everyone and taken all these turns.

And your family — his daughter is estranged, he doesn’t have a partner, his friendships are tenuous, you mentioned Cafferty. It’s fascinating.

How much did you want to recreate the atmosphere of Edinburgh onstage? Given that it’s such a huge part of the books and on screen — was that a key aspect for you in terms of design and direction?

Edinburgh is another character in those novels. I lived and worked in Edinburgh for five years and met Rona in Edinburgh and our first shows were in Edinburgh — so I have a tremendous emotional connection to Edinburgh, it’s a city I really love.

The challenge in the play is that you’re in lots of different environments — mainly in Rebus’s front room — and so we were looking for a space that would allow us to move fluidly between a pub, to a tower block, to his house. The designer, Ti Green, and I felt that those stairwells — which is the kind of flat that Rebus lives in — are very iconic to Edinburgh and that we wanted something that was really simple and sculptural.

We weren’t trying to be naturalistic in our setting, but so that we were able to move between locations while keeping Edinburgh in the forefront, the stairwells became the focus of how we moved forward in the design. We were really lucky because we are working with a Scottish production manager and so he’s a very good reality test of what we’re doing. And it comes down to things like the paint finish — we can get the shape of the stairwell right but then you have to look at the paint finishes, it’s all in those details. If you have a very abstract sculptural space, then every object you put in becomes significant and has to tell a story. So those are the kind of conversations that we had.

Music has always been such a huge part of the novels. How important is music to this script and the production?

One of the things, of course, is that Rebus has very specific musical tastes and music is key in the detective storytelling of the play, so we have a composer who is going to write a new score for the play but also work quite closely with Ian to identify the right kinds of songs for Rebus to listen to. It’s just a really important part of Rebus’s world, the songs that he listens to. In terms of the questions you asked about genre, obviously music is quite a key part to that — you can tell a lot of story through music — so that’s another really strong component of the design and the storytelling.

Do you have a favourite scene or moment in the script that you think most about?

I think what really drew me was the way that those scenes are like a staircase — they lead up to that final confrontation. I read the play like I would read a thriller, I really wanted to know what happened. That is exciting to me because you need every moment, and it felt like no moment was wasted. And that, I thought, was quite genius.

Set design by Ti Green

Photography (unless otherwise stated): Gil Gillis ARPS

Early white card model of the set design (pub scene)

Early white card model of the set design (forensic lab)

Exploring texture and tone in the model (upper landing and curved staircase)

Exploring texture and tone in the model (whole stage)

Final model (Rebus’s apartment and neutral environment). Credit: Ti Green

Final model (pub). Credit: Ti Green

Birmingham Repertory Theatre

Birmingham Repertory Theatre Company is one of Britain’s leading producing theatre companies. Its mission is to inspire a lifelong love of theatre in the diverse communities of Birmingham and beyond. As well as presenting over sixty productions on its three stages every year, the theatre tours its productions nationally and internationally, showcasing theatre made in Birmingham.

The commissioning and production of new work lies at the core of The REP’s programme and over the last fifteen years, the company has produced more than 130 new plays. The theatre’s outreach programme engages with over 7,000 young people and adults through its learning and participation programme, equating to 30,000 individual educational sessions. The REP is also committed to nurturing new talent through its youth theatre groups, and training up and coming writers, directors and artists through its REP Foundry initiative. The REP’s Furnace programme unites established theatre practitioners with Birmingham’s communities to make high quality, unique theatre.

Many of The REP’s productions go on to have lives beyond Birmingham. Recent tours include What Shadows, The Government Inspector, Of Mice And Men, Anita And Me, Back Down, Nativity! The Musical and The King’s Speech. The theatre’s long-running production of The Snowman celebrates its 25th anniversary in 2018 and also its 21st consecutive Christmas season in the West End.

Content

Ian Rankin & Rona Munro
Rebus: Long Shadows
(The Rehearsal Script)

Introduction

Characters

Act One

Act Two

Ian Rankin and Rona Munro In conversation

Roxana Silbert, Birmingham Repertory Theatre’s artistic director

Set design by Ti Green

Birmingham Repertory Theatre