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called Damon.’
    ‘What’s he done?’
    ‘He’s vanished.’
    ‘Run away?’
    ‘More like a puff of smoke. He was in this club with his pals, see—’
    ‘Have you tried calling the police?’ Rebus caught himself. ‘I mean Fife Constabulary.’
    ‘Thing is, the club’s in Edinburgh. Police there say they looked into it, asked a few questions. See, Damon’s nineteen. They say that means he’s got a right to bugger off if he wants.’
    ‘They’ve got a point, Brian. People run away all the time. Girl trouble maybe.’
    ‘He was engaged.’
    ‘Maybe he got scared.’
    ‘Helen’s a lovely girl. Never a raised voice between them.’
    ‘Did he leave a note?’
    ‘I went through this with the police. No note, and he didn’t take any clothes or anything.’
    ‘You think something’s happened to him?’
    ‘We just want to know he’s all right …’ The voice fell away. ‘My mum always speaks well of your dad. He’s remembered in this town.’
    And buried there, too, Rebus thought. He picked up his pen. ‘Give me a few details, Brian, and I’ll see what I can do.’
    A little later, Rebus visited Grant Hood’s desk and retrieved the discarded newspaper from the bin. Turning the pages, he found the editorial section. At the bottom, in bold script, were the words ‘Do you have a story for us? Call the newsroom day or night.’ They’d printed the telephone number. Rebus jotted it into his notebook.

5
    The silent dance resumed. Couples writhed and shuffled, threw back their heads or ran hands through their hair, eyes seeking out future partners or past loves to make jealous. The video monitor gave a greasy look to everything.
    No sound, just pictures, the tape cutting from dancefloor to main bar to second bar to toilet hallway. Then the entrance foyer, exterior front and back. Exterior back was a puddled alley boasting rubbish bins and a Merc belonging to the club’s owner. The club was called Gaitano’s, nobody knew why. Some of the clientele had come up with the nickname ‘Guiser’s’, and that was the name by which Rebus knew it.
    It was on Rose Street, started to get busy around ten thirty each evening. There’d been a stabbing in the back alley the previous summer, the owner complaining of blood on his Merc.
    Rebus was seated in a small uncomfortable chair in a small dimly lit room. In the other chair, hand on the video’s remote, sat DC Phyllida Hawes.
    ‘Here we go again,’ she said. Rebus leaned forward a little. The view jumped from back alley to dancefloor. ‘Any second.’ Another cut: main bar, punters queuing three deep. She froze the picture. It wasn’t so much black and white as sepia, the colour of dead photographs. Interior light, she’d explained earlier. She moved the action along one frame at a time as Rebus moved in on the screen, bending so one knee touched the floor. His finger touched a face.
    ‘That’s him,’ she agreed.
    On the desk was a slim file. Rebus had taken from it a photograph, which he now held to the screen.
    ‘All right,’ he said. ‘Forward at half-speed.’
    The security camera stayed with the main bar for another ten seconds, then switched to second bar and all points on the compass. When it returned to the main bar, the crush of drinkers seemed not to have moved. She froze the tape again.
    ‘He’s not there,’ Rebus said.
    ‘No chance he got served. The two ahead of him are still waiting.’
    Rebus nodded. ‘He should be there.’ He touched the screen again.
    ‘Next to the blonde,’ Hawes said.
    Yes, the blonde: spun-silver hair, dark eyes and lips. While those around her were intent on catching the eyes of the bar staff, she was looking off to one side. There were no sleeves to her dress.
    Twenty seconds of footage from the foyer showed a steady stream entering the club, but no one leaving.
    ‘I went through the whole tape,’ Hawes said. ‘Believe me, he’s not on it.’
    ‘So what happened to him?’
    ‘Easy, he walked out, only