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Do you have keys to all the offices? Reeve asked.
Of course.
Do you ever come here at night and rifle everyone s drawers?
Not everyone s.
Jesus, no wonder you re a PI.
Reeve opened his bag, took out the shoe box and tool kit, and
got to work again. Another bug in the telephone, another under
Dulwater s desk, and one for good measure under his colleague s
desk. There was nothing in the room about either James or Gor-
don Reeve, nothing about Kosigin or CWC, which was what
he d expected. Like Allerdyce had said, Dulwater reported directly
to him. As little in writing as possible.
They started downstairs again. Reeve had another idea. He
told Allerdyce what to do, and then pressed the button for the
lobby. The two of them marched up to the front desk. The guard
there stood up and straightened his clothes; he was obviously in
awe of Allerdyce. Allerdyce went to say something, but yawned
mightily instead.
Late night? the guard said with a smile. Reeve shrugged
blearily.
Donald, Allerdyce said, I d like the video of tonight.
The recording, sir?
Alan here has never seen himself on TV.
The guard looked to Alan. Reeve shrugged again and
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Ian Rankin
beamed at him. Allerdyce was holding out his hand. If you
please, Donald?
The guard unlocked a door behind him, which led to a
windowless room with nothing but screens and banks of video
recorders. The man ejected a tape, put in a fresh one, and came
back out, locking the door after him.
Thank you, Donald, Allerdyce said.
Reeve dropped the cassette into his bag. Thanks, Donald,
he echoed.
As they walked back towards the elevator, he heard the guard
mutter: The name s Duane . . .
Outside, Duhart was waiting for them.
Any trouble? Reeve asked.
No. You?
Reeve shook his head. I just hope those bugs are working.
Duhart smiled and held up a cassette player. He punched the
Play button.
Good evening. It was Reeve s own voice, tinny but clear.
Mr. Allerdyce there?
Would you like to speak to him? Jeffrey . . .
Reeve smiled an honest smile at Duhart, who began laughing.
I can t believe we just did it, he said at last, wiping tears
from his eyes. I can t believe we just bugged the buggers!
Reeve shook the shoe box. There are a few left. He turned
to the backseat. Let s take Mr. Allerdyce home . . .
They were aware, of course, that the Alliance building was
swept top to bottom for bugs quite regularly. They were aware
because Mr. Allerdyce told them so in answer to a question. The
last debugging had been a week ago. The building would be
swept again, of course, if Allerdyce discovered he d paid this
middle-of-the-night visit to his offices but that would depend
on the guard mentioning the visit. Allerdyce himself wouldn t
remember a damned thing about it, wouldn t even know he d left
his own house. And the night-duty guard, Duane, might not
mention the incident to anyone. It wasn t like it was going to
be public knowledge around Alliance that Jeffrey Allerdyce had
been drugged and used in this way.
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Blood Hunt
No, Allerdyce wouldn t want anyone to know about that.
Reeve didn t want either of the guards at Allerdyce s home to
see Duhart, but at the same time they couldn t leave the car out-
side for too long. A private police patrol cruised the vicinity once
an hour, so Allerdyce said, so they took the car in through the
gates and up the gravel drive. Duhart came with them into the
house, and Reeve warned him not to go into one particular room
downstairs, not to say anything, and not to leave his fingerprints.
Duhart made the sign of zipping his lips.
They took Allerdyce upstairs to his bedroom.
Mr. Allerdyce, Reeve said, I think you must be exhausted.
Get undressed and put your pajamas back on. Go to bed.
Sleep well.
They closed the bedroom door after them and went to the
office, which Reeve unlocked. Inside, they bugged the telephone,
the underside of the desk, the underside of the photocopier, and
the leg of the sofa.
Downstairs, they bugged the other telephones but none of
the rooms they d run out of bugs. They got back into the car
and started down the driveway.
What the hell is that? Duhart gasped.
It was a dog, its mouth, front and back legs taped, jerking
across the lawn towards the driveway.
Reeve pushed the button on the remote and the gates swung
silently inwards. After they d driven out, he used the remote to
close the gates, then rolled down his window and tossed the thing
high over the stone wall.
He hoped it would miss the dog.
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part seven
Confessional
265
EIGHTEEN
Reeve didn t hang around for the aftershock.
He flew out to Los Angeles that morning, grabbed a cab at
the airport, and told the driver he wanted a cheap rental service.
Cheapest I know is Dedman s Auto, the cabbie declared,
enjoying showing off his knowledge. The cars are okay no
stretch limos or nothing like that, just clean sedans.
Dead man s?
The cabbie spelled it for him. That s why he keeps his rates
so low. It s not the sort of name would leap out at you from Yel-
low Pages. He chuckled. Christ knows, with a name like that
would you go into car rental?
Reeve was studying the cabbie s ID on the dashboard. I
guess not, Mr. Plotnik.
It turned out that Marcus Aurelius Dedman, the blackest
man Reeve had ever seen, operated an auto-wrecking business,
and car rental was just a sideline.
See, mister, he said, I ll be honest with you. The cars I get
in here ain t always so wrecked. I spend a lot of time and money
on them, get them fit for battle again. I hate to sell a car I ve put
heart and soul into, so I rent them instead.
And if the client wrecks them, they come straight back for
hospitalization?
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Ian Rankin
Dedman laughed a deep, gurgling laugh. He was about six
feet four and carried himself as upright as a fence post. His short
hair had been painstakingly uncurled and lay flat against his head
like a Cab Calloway toupee. Reeve reckoned him to be in his
early fifties. He had half a dozen black kids ripping cars apart for
him, hauling out the innards.
Nobody strips a vehicle quite like a kid from the projects,
Dedman said. Damned clever mechanics, too. Here s the current
options. He waved a basketball player s arm along a line of
a dozen dusty specimens, any of which would be perfect for
Reeve s needs. He wanted a plain car, a car that wouldn t stand
out from the crowd. These cars had their scars and war wounds
a chipped windshield here, a missing fender there, a rusty line
showing where a strip of chrome had been torn off the side
doors, a sill patched with mastic and resprayed.
Take your pick, Dedman said. All one price.
Reeve settled for a two-door Dodge Dart with foam-rubber
suspension. It was dull green, the metallic sheen sanded away
through time. Dedman showed him the engine ( reliable run-
ner ), the interior ( bench seat ll come in handy at Lover s
Point ), and the trunk. Reeve nodded throughout. Eventually,
they went to Dedman s office to clinch the deal. Reeve got the
feeling Dedman didn t want the project kids, no matter what
their mechanical skills, to see any money changing hands. Maybe
it would give them ideas.
The office was in a ramshackle cinder-block building, but
surprised Reeve by being immaculately clean, bright, air-
conditioned, and high-tech. There was a large black leather director s
chair behind the new-looking desk. Dedman draped a sheet over
the chair before sitting, so as not to dirty the leather with his
overalls. There was a computer on the desk with a minitower
hard disk drive. Elsewhere Reeve glimpsed a fax and answering
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