“Can you scare up a coat from one of the coppers, do you think?” I said to Melissa.
“Maybe,” she said. “Why?”
“For Elvis to wear,” I said. “I think the three of us need a cup of tea. There’s a twenty-four hour cafe round the corner, but he’ll freeze walking there in that outfit.”
It took Melissa eight minutes to return with a giant yellow high visibility jacket clutched in front of her. It took us four minutes to reach the cafe. And less than twenty seconds for the sight of us to clear the rest of the nocturnal customers out of the place.
We took the table furthest from the counter, our need for relative privacy trumping my desire to avoid the worst of the cracked, food-encrusted lino-covered benches. The crone who had the pleasure of working the nightshift stood and scowled at us for a few moments, apparently weighing her annoyance at our choice of location against a wish to not aggravate anyone connected to law enforcement. Eventually a solution struck her, and she bellowed across the room to us without moving an inch.
“What can I get you, my darlings?” she said, in a surprisingly gruff voice.
“Three teas, please,” Melissa said.
“Be right with you, my lovely,” the crone said, batting her way through a dilapidated fly screen and disappearing into their dingy excuse of a kitchen.
“I don’t like tea,” Elvis said, when she’d gone.
“You want something else?” Melissa said. “You tell her.”
Elvis stared at his fingernails for a moment.
“Tea’ll be fine,” he said.
“Good,” Melissa said. “I thought it would be. You can’t beat a nice cup of tea. Specially to get a bit of a conversation going.”
Elvis dropped his stare back to his nails and remained silent.
“You’re not big on hints, then,” Melissa said.
“What?” Elvis said. “The tea’s not here yet.”
Melissa let out a long, slow breath, like she was a teacher dealing with a class of delinquents.
“You’re right,” she said. “But let’s pretend it is. Let’s imagine it’s sitting right here in front of us, right now, and that you’re going to show your gratitude by telling us all about what you saw on the night of the fire alarm.”
“What fire alarm?” he said.
“The one at the hospital. Where you sometimes show up for work.”
“When was this?”
“Three days ago.”
“I don’t know anything about it.”
“Yes, you do. You told Commander Trevellyan all about it. Now I want you to tell me.”
“Commander Trevellyan? He said he’s a lawyer. What’s this all about?”
“Well, he also does legal things for the Navy. Sometimes. Anyway, that doesn’t matter right now. What’s important is you telling me about the night of the fire alarm.”
“I can’t remember.”
“Yes you can.”
“I wasn’t even there. I didn’t see anything. I just made up what I told him cause I thought that’s what he wanted to hear.”
“Is that true?”
“Yes. I swear.”
“David?” Melissa said.
I stood up and started to fasten my coat.
“Where are you going?” she said.
“Back to the restaurant I was at,” I said.
“Why?”
“I’m still hungry, and I don’t fancy eating here. Would you?”
“Well, no. But what about Elvis?”
“Yes, poor Elvis. When you’ve got him situated, please let him know how sorry I am.”
“For what?”
“His injuries.”
“What injuries?”
“The ones he’s going to sustain, trying to run away. Again. But then, those hard stone pavements can be very slippery at this time of year. Accidents will happen. I mean, can happen...”
“Wait,” Elvis said. “What do you mean? I didn’t run anywhere. I didn’t get any injuries.”
“Not yet, maybe,” I said. “But the night’s young. There’s plenty of time.”
Melissa called her contact at the Met to come and collect Elvis as soon as he’d finished babbling. She showed no emotion when she walked with them to the door of the cafe, but when she turned to make her way back to our table I could see she was feeling the same way as me.
“We didn’t make any progress at all, did we?” she said, as she slid onto the bench opposite me.
“None to speak of,” I said. “But realistically, what were expecting?”
“What I wanted was an ID. What we got was a vague description of two guys dressed as firefighters. He didn’t even see the one hit the door to the vault. He just assumed it. Great insight.”
“Did you believe what he said?”
“Yes. I think so.”
“I did too, and that’s the second time I’d heard it. What’s interesting, is he does make it sound like it all happened by accident. The way the one guy was yelling at the other, like he hadn’t known to stay away from the door.”
“True. But there are any number of explanations for that. We should have known better than to rely on a witness.”
“I was hoping he’d have remembered something, like a mark on the fireman’s suit or a scratch on his helmet. Some useful detail we could have narrowed the field with.”
“That would have been excellent. No such luck, though.”
“We shouldn’t complain. At least he didn’t break into song.”
“You’re right. But it was a good idea, bringing him here. I bet we wouldn’t have got a word out of him in the back of that police car. I wonder though, whether you’d have been so hospitable, if you’d known about the other thing.”
“What thing?” I said.
“Remember your boots?” she said. “The original ones, that were stolen?”
“Of course,” I said.
“Elvis had them.”
“Are you sure?”
“Absolutely.”
“I mean, are you sure they’re mine?”
“I’m certain. I know the make, size, colour, everything, remember.”
“So, seriously? Elvis is the boot thief?”
“I’m afraid so.”
“Those poor boots. They didn’t deserve that. He wasn’t wearing them, was he?”
“No.”
“Thank goodness. Now, just tell me one more thing. Please. He didn’t have them with him in his sex hovel, did he?”
“No. It’s OK. They were in another room, nearby.”
“How do you know it was Elvis who took them, then?”
“He confessed. The police say they might never have found the stash, otherwise.”
“He had a whole stash? What else was there?”
“It was amazing, apparently. Piled high, like his own private bank vault. He had all kinds of things. I’ve seen a preliminary list. Stuff he’d taken from the hospital. Pieces of furniture. Blankets. Crockery. Doctors’ coats. Nurses’ uniforms. Medical things, like crutches. Bandages. Medicines. Office supplies. Boxes of paper. Old files. A photocopier. Pieces of wood. Rocks. A lawnmower. Things that had fallen off cars, like door mirrors and radio aerials. Pretty much anything you can think of.”