I smiled when he said that, and looked up at the video cameras. Full-vampires have peculiar atoms, which make it impossible for them to be captured on film. The police could take snaps of Mr Crepsley from every angle they could dream of, with the best cameras available - to no visible effect.
"Look at the grin on him!" Con snapped. "He thinks this is funny!"
"No," I said, wiping the smile from my face. "I don't."
"Then why are you laughing?"
I shrugged. "I was thinking of something else."
Ivan slumped back in his chair, disappointed by my answers. "We've taken a blood sample from Crepsley," he said. "From the thing called Harkat Mulds too. We'll find out what they are when the results come back. It would be to your advantage to tell us now."
I didn't reply. Ivan waited a moment, then ran a hand through his grey hair. He sighed despondently, and began with the questions again. "What's your real name? What's your relationship to the others? Where ?"
More time passed. I wasn't able to judge exactly how long I'd been imprisoned. It felt like a day or more, but realistically it was probably only four or five hours, maybe less. The sun was most likely still shining outside.
I thought about Mr Crepsley and wondered how he was faring. If he was in a cell like mine, he'd nothing to worry about. But if they'd put him in a cell with windows ?
"Where are my friends?" I asked.
Con and Ivan had been discussing something under their breath. Now they looked at me, expressions guarded.
"You'd like to see them?" Ivan asked.
"I just want to know where they are," I said.
"If you answer our questions, a meeting can be arranged," Ivan promised.
"I just want to know where they are," I repeated.
"They're close," Con grunted. "Locked away nice and tight like you."
"In cells like this?" I asked.
"Exactly the same," Con said, then looked around at the walls and smiled as he realized why I was concerned. "Cells without windows," he chuckled, then nudged his partner in the ribs. "But that can be changed, can't it, Ivan? What say we move the 'vampire' to a cell with lovely round windows? A cell with a view of the outside - the sky - thesun ."
I said nothing, but locked gazes with Con and stared back angrily.
"You don't like the sound of that, do you?" Con hissed. "The thought of us sticking Crepsley in a room with windows terrifies you, doesn't it?"
I shrugged indifferently and averted my eyes. "I want to speak to a lawyer," I said.
Con burst out laughing. Ivan hid a smile behind a hand. Even the guard with the rifle smirked, as though I'd cracked the best joke ever.
"What's so funny?" I snapped. "I know my rights. I'm entitled to a phonecall and a lawyer."
"Of course," Con crowed. "Even killers have rights." He rapped the table with his knuckles, then turned off the tape recorder. "But guess what - we're withholding those rights. We'll catch hell for it later, but we don't care. We've got you walled up here and we won't let you take advantage of your rights until you give with some answers."
"That's illegal," I growled. "You can't do that."
"Normally, no," he agreed. "Normally our Chief Inspector would barge in and kick up a storm if she heard about something like this. But our Chief isn't here, is she? She's been abducted by your fellow killer, Vancha March."
I went white-lipped when I heard that and realized what it meant. With their Chief out of the way, they'd taken the law into their own hands, and were prepared to do whatever it took to find out where she was and get her back. It might cost their them careers, but they didn't care. This was personal.
"You'll have to torture me to make me talk," I said stiffly, testing them to see how far they were willing to go.
"Torture's not our way," Ivan said immediately. "We don't do things like that."
"Unlike some people we could mention," Con added, then tossed a photo across the table at me. I tried to ignore it, but my eyes flicked automatically to the figure in it. I saw that it was the vampet we'd taken hostage earlier that morning in the tunnels, the one called Mark Ryter - the one Vancha had tortured and killed.
"We're not evil," I said quietly. But I could see things from their point of view and understood how monstrous we must look. "There are sides to this you don't know about. We're not the killers you seek. We're trying to stop them, the same as you."
Con barked a laugh.
"It's true," I insisted. "Mark Ryter was one of the bad guys. We had to hurt him to find out about the others. We're not your enemies. You and I are on the same side."
"That's the weakest lie I've ever heard," Con snapped. "How dumb do you think we are?"
"I don't think you're dumb at all," I said. "But you're misguided. You've been tricked. You ?" I leant forward eagerly. "Who told you where to find us? Who told you our names, that we were vampires, that we were your killers?"
The policemen shared an uneasy glance, then Ivan said, "It was an anonymous tip-off. The caller rang from a public phone booth, left no name, and was gone when we arrived."
"Doesn't that sound fishy to you?" I asked.
"We receive anonymous tips all the time," Ivan said, but he looked fidgety and I knew he had his doubts. If he'd been alone, maybe I could have talked him round to my way of thinking, and persuaded him to grant me the benefit of the doubt. But before I could say anything more, Con tossed another photo across the table at me, then another. Close-ups of Mark Ryter, capturing even more of the grisly details than the first.
"People onour side don't kill other people," he said coldly. "Even when they'd like to," he added meaningfully, pointing a finger at me.
I sighed and let it drop, knowing I couldn't convince them of my innocence. A few seconds of silence passed, while they settled down after the exchange and composed themselves. Then they switched the tape recorder on and the questions started again. Who was I? Where had I come from? Where did Vancha March go? How many people had we killed? On and on and on and ?
The police were getting nowhere with me, and it was frustrating them. Ivan and Con had been joined by another officer called Morgan, who had pinpoint eyes and dark brown hair. He sat stiff-backed, his hands flat on the table, subjecting me to a cool, unbreaking gaze. I had the feeling that Morgan was here to get nasty, although so far he'd made no violent moves against me.