|
5bcd77e
|
Rebus remembered that the premature withdrawal of the penis during intercourse for contraceptive reasons was often referred to as 'getting off at Haymarket.
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
10e5b9f
|
Bad Men Do What Good Men
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
2e5bb5e
|
He's a piece of the jigsaw.' 'Maybe so, John, but if he is, he's a bit of sky or cloud - I can see the picture clearly enough without him.
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
13d2f56
|
I'm game if you are.
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
8c7c6c3
|
But you used to know a good thing when you saw it. Trouble is, that's never what I see when I look in the mirror. What do you see? He looked at her. Sometimes I don't see anything at all.
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
11345cc
|
I wouldn't join you if you were coming apart at the seams.
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
48520b5
|
If it were a peg, you couldn't hang a fucking hankie on it, never mind your coat.
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
0a2c947
|
muttered. Then:
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
48a0617
|
I'm caught, he thought, between a cushion and a soft place
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
0f4ce5f
|
There was a ring at the door. He did not answer. They would go away, and he would be alone again with his grief, his impotent anger, and his undusted possessions.
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
40abbfe
|
like he could use a good meal. Rebus had seen more meat on a butcher's pencil.
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
2083183
|
morning edition. Unless, of course, the
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
e7faa2b
|
when the shit was heading fanwards.
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
7ca0379
|
Everything you do from waking till sleeping is against somebody's Bible, Cafferty.
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
3cc9ea3
|
What happens to sanity when you chain it to a wall?
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
4c7aa29
|
Now is the first day of the rest of your strife.
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
7d0f69c
|
Strip the veneer, and the world had moved only a couple of steps from the cave.
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
aeca739
|
You weren't kidding about the rolls," Rebus said, taking another bite. "Bacon just the right side of crispy," Robert Chatham agreed. They were seated across from one another at a booth with padded seats and a Formica-topped table. Mugs of dark-brown tea and plates in front of them, Radio Forth belting out from the kitchen."
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
7627f99
|
Jim
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
70fb47c
|
James and his team were readying to brief a lawyer from the Procurator Fiscal's office. The Fiscal Depute's name was Shona MacBryer. MacBryer knew Clarke, and the two shared a nod of greeting as she arrived. Fox and Oldfield were handing round mugs. Someone had splashed out on a cafetiere and proper coffee, and the biscuits were Duchy Originals.
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
2328c0f
|
There's an insult buried in there somewhere, but I can't quite see it.
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
eba0fa0
|
one was very
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
bbf0095
|
POETS day," he reminded Siobhan. "Piss Off Early, Tomorrow's Saturday," she recited."
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
e715f90
|
Bad-mouthing everyone else is such a simple option.
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
a12ba49
|
They parked in a pay-bay on George Square and walked through the gardens, emerging in front of the university library. Most of the buildings here had gone up in the 1960s, and Rebus hated them: blocks of sand-colored concrete replacing the square's original eighteenth-century town houses. Rows of treacherous steps, and a notorious wind-tunnel effect which could blow over the unwary on the wrong day. Students walked between the buildings, hu..
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
83d7bd6
|
Woodwork creaks and out come the freaks, eh?
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
8c564bb
|
We've already eaten,' Fox said. 'Nice, was
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
3cb9d77
|
boffins
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
e14f20e
|
And little girls went to charm schools. Now you've all got degrees from the University of Sarcasm.
|
|
women
set-in-darkness
girls
sarcasm
university
|
Ian Rankin |
|
405c156
|
WE COMMIT ALL SORTS OF INJUSTICES AT EVERY STEP WITHOUT THE SLIGHTEST EVIL INTENTION. EVERY MINUTE WE ARE THE CAUSE OF SOMEONE'S UNHAPPINESS
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
9a5f863
|
Shi-vawn.
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
11a6759
|
her face had decided long ago that make-up wasn't going to cure anything. Her
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
bffc334
|
salmon was sliced thick, and had been sprinkled with lemon juice and pepper. He took a small nip of whisky when the hip-flask came round, then drank two mugs of strong tea. With all the games he felt were going on, he wanted to clear his head. He wasn't sure if he was a player, a counter, or the die. He'd been shown one thing, though - the game was dangerous, at stake his professional career, which was everything he lived for. Practically e..
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
09ab1e4
|
Acknowledgements Reading Group Notes Timeline About the Author By Ian Rankin Copyright Serendipity. According to the dictionary, it means the ability to make 'happy chance finds'. Serendip was the old name for Ceylon. Horace Walpole is credited with coining the term, after the fairy tale 'The Three Princes of Serendip', whose titular heroes were always stumbling across things they weren't looking for.
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
659155c
|
went to take a look at it. A plaque
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
556d2e1
|
Poor girl. She would change. The idealism would vanish once she saw how hypocritical the whole game was, and what luxuries lay outside university. When she left, she'd want it all: the executive job in London, the flat, car, salary, wine-bar. She would chuck it all in for a slice of pie.
|
|
truth-of-life
|
Ian Rankin |
|
d7e30a9
|
Nothing in the room was cheap, but none of it was exactly desirable either.
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
5ed2e47
|
Sky glowing dull pink. Simmer dim, as the Shetlanders called
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
c79958c
|
Also, he was more discriminating now than he had been then, back in the old days when he would read a book to its bitter end whether he liked it or not. These days, a book he disliked was unlikely to last ten pages of his concentration.
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
41dafd8
|
Perhaps if he stopped praying, God would take the hint and stop being such a bastard to one of his few believers on this near-godforsaken planet.
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
dcdf473
|
was still a fine, persistent drizzle. There was a word in Scots for it--"smirr."
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
038291b
|
I went to the Oxford Bar first off, but they said they hardly see you these days. I'm at the age where nothing should surprise me, but
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
4ff5625
|
As usual, Vanderhyde's memory was sharp enough when it suited him. 'That's true. All the same, you were there.' 'Yes, I was. But I left several hours before the fire started. Not guilty, your honour.' 'Why were you there in the first place?' 'To meet a friend for a drink.' 'A seedy place for a drink.' 'Was it? You'll have to remember, Inspector, I couldn't see anything. It certainly didn't smell or feel particularly disreputable.' 'Point ta..
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |
|
450dd33
|
silly buggers,
|
|
|
Ian Rankin |