"How old are you?" Con was asking. "Where are you from? How long have you been here? Why pick this city? How many others have your murdered? Where are the bodies? What have?"
He stopped at a knock on the door. Turning away, he went to see who was there. Ivan's eyes followed Con as he went, but Morgan's stayed on me. He blinked once every four seconds, no more, no less, like a robot.
Con had a murmured conversation with the person outside the door, then stood back and motioned the guard with the rifle away. The guard sidestepped over to the wall and trained his weapon on me, making sure I wouldn't try anything funny.
I was expecting another police officer, or maybe a soldier - I hadn't seen anyone from the army since I'd been arrested - but the meek little man who entered took me by complete surprise.
"MrBlaws ?" I gasped.
The school inspector who'd forced me to go to Mahler's looked nervous. He was carrying the same huge briefcase as before, and wearing the same old-fashioned bowler hat. He advanced half a metre, then stopped, reluctant to come any closer.
"Thank you for coming, Walter," Ivan said, rising to shake the visitor's hand.
Mr Blaws nodded feebly and squeaked, "Glad to be of assistance."
"Would you like a chair?" Ivan asked.
Mr Blaws shook his head quickly. "No thanks. I'd rather not stop any longer than necessary. Rounds to do. Places to be. You know how it is."
Ivan nodded sympathetically. "That's fine. You brought the papers?"
Mr Blaws nodded. "The forms he filled in, all the files we have on him. Yes. I left them with a man at the front desk. He's photocopying them and giving the originals back to me before I leave. I have to hang on to the originals for the school records."
"Fine," Ivan said again, then stepped aside and jerked his head at me. "Can you identify this boy?" he asked officiously.
"Yes," Mr Blaws said. "He's Darren Horston. He enrolled with Mahler's on the ?" He paused and frowned. "I've forgotten the exact date. I should know it, because I was looking at it on the way in."
"That's OK," Ivan smiled. "We'll get it from the photocopies. But this is definitely the boy who called himself Darren Horston? You're sure?"
Mr Blaws nodded firmly. "Oh yes," he said. "I never forget the face of a pupil, especially one who's played truant."
"Thank you, Walter," Ivan said, taking the school inspector's arm. "If we need you again, we'll ?"
He stopped. Mr Blaws hadn't moved. He was staring at me with wide eyes and a trembling lip. "Is it true?" Mr Blaws asked. "What the media are saying - he and his friends are the killers?"
Ivan hesitated. "We can't really say right now, but as soon as we?"
"How could you?" Mr Blaws shouted at me. "How could you kill all those people? And poor little Tara Williams - your own classmate!"
"I didn't kill Tara," I said tiredly. "I didn't kill anybody. I'm not a killer. The police have arrested the wrong people."
"Hah!" Con snorted.
"You're a beast," Mr Blaws growled, raising his briefcase high in the air, as though he meant to throw it at me. "You should be - you should - should ?"
He couldn't say any more. His lips tightened and his jaw clenched shut. Turning his back on me, he started out of the door. As he was stepping through, I reacted to a childish impulse and called him back.
"Mr Blaws?" I shouted. He paused and looked over his shoulder questioningly. I adopted an innocent, dismayed expression. "This won't harm my grades, will it, sir?" I enquired sweetly.
The school inspector gawped at me, then glared furiously when he realized I was teasing him, turned up his nose, showed me a clean pair of heels and clacked away down the corridor.
I laughed aloud as Mr Blaws departed, taking absurd comfort in the annoying little man's irate expression. Con, Ivan and the guard with the gun smiled too, despite themselves, but Morgan didn't. He remained as steely-faced as ever, a terrible, unspoken menace in his sharp, mechanical eyes.
Chapter SIX
IVAN WASreplaced by a burly police officer called Dave shortly after Mr Blaws had departed. Dave acted friendly - the first thing he did when he came in was ask me if I'd like anything to eat or drink - but I wasn't fooled. I'd watched enough TV shows to know all about the good cop/bad cop routine.
"We're here to help you, Darren," Dave assured me, tearing open a sachet of sugar and pouring it into a plastic cup filled with steaming coffee. Some of the sugar spilt over the side, on to the table. I was ninety per cent certain the spill was deliberate - Dave wanted me to think he was a bumbler.
"Taking off these handcuffs and setting me free would be a big help," I quipped, watching Dave cautiously as he tore open another sachet of sugar. Morgan worried me the most - Con might knock me around a bit, if things got rough, but I believed Morgan was capable of worse - but I'd have to be extra careful with Dave, or he'd worm my secrets out of me. I'd been awake a long time. I was drained and light-headed. Prone to slips.
"Take off your handcuffs and set you free," Dave smirked, winking at me. "Good one. Of course, we both know that isn't going to happen, but there are things Ican do. Get you a lawyer for one. A bath. A change of clothes. A nice bunk for the night. You're going to be with us a long time, I fear, but it doesn't have to be an unpleasant stay."
"What do I have to do to make itpleasant ?" I asked cagily.
Dave shrugged and sipped the coffee. "Ouch! Too hot!" Fanning his lips with a hand to cool them down, he smiled. "Not much," he said in answer to my question. "Tell us your real name, where you're from, what you're doing here. That kind of stuff."
I shook my head wryly - new face, same old questions.
Dave saw I wasn't going to answer, so he changed tack. "That routine's stale, right? Let's try something else. Your friend, Harkat Mulds, says he needs his mask to survive, that he'll die if exposed to air for more than ten or twelve hours. Is that true?"
I nodded cautiously. "Yes."
Dave looked glum. "This is bad," he muttered. "Very, very bad."
"What do you mean?" I asked.
"This is a prison, Darren. You and your friends are murder suspects. There are rules - guidelines - things we must do. Taking objects like belts, ties andmasks from possible killers when they're admitted is one of the rules."