I Shall Wear Midnight

Wee Mad Arthur looked down at his boots. ‘My dad made me these boots,’ he said. ‘I couldnae bring mesel’ to tell him I didnae like boots on my feet. The whole family had been making and repairing shoes for hundreds of years, ye ken, and I wasnae good at the cobbling at all, and then one day all the elders of the tribe called me together and told me I was a lost foundling. They was moving to a new camp, and they ha’ found me, a tiny wee bairn, greeting by the road, right next to a sparrowhawk that I had strangled to death after it had snatched me from me cradle; they reckoned it was taking me home to feed me tae its chicks. And the old gnomes put their hats together, and said that while they were very happy to let me stay, what with being able to bite foxes to death and everything, it might be time for me to go out into the big world and find out who my people were.’

‘Well, laddie, ye have found them,’ said Rob Anybody, slapping him on the back. ‘Ye did well to listen to a load of old cobblers. That was wisdom they told you, sure enough.’

He hesitated for a moment, and then went on, ‘However, it’s a wee bitty difficult that ye are – no offence meant – a policeman.’ He jumped back slightly, just in case.

‘Granted,’ said Wee Mad Arthur with satisfaction. ‘Whereas ye are a bunch of thieving drunken reprobates and scoff-laws with no respect for the law whatsoever!’

The Feegles nodded happily, although Rob Anybody said, ‘Would you no’ mind adding the words drunk and disorderly? We wouldnae want to be sold short here.’

‘And what about the snail-rustling, Rob?’ said Daft Wullie happily.

‘Weel,’ said Rob Anybody, ‘in actual point of fact, the snailrustling is still in the early stages of development at this time.’

‘Have you no good points?’ said Wee Mad Arthur desperately.

Rob Anybody looked puzzled. ‘We kind of thought them is our good points, but if you want to get picky, we never steal from them as has nae money, we has hearts of gold, although maybe – OK, mostly – somebody else’s gold, and we did invent the deep-fried stoat. That must count for something.’

‘How is that a good point?’ said Arthur.

‘Weel, it saves some other poor devil having tae do it. It’s what ye might call a taste explosion; ye take a mouthful, taste it, and then there is an explosion.’

Despite himself, Wee Mad Arthur was grinning. ‘Have you boys got no shame?’

Rob Anybody matched him grin for grin. ‘I couldnae say,’ he replied, ‘but if we have, it probably belonged tae somebody else.’

‘And what about the poor wee big lassie locked up and down in the Watch House?’ said Wee Mad Arthur.

‘Oh, she’ll bide fine till the morning,’ said Rob Anybody, as loftily as he could in the circumstances. ‘She is a hag o’ considerable resource.’

‘Ye think so? You wee scunners punched an entire pub to death! How can anyone put that right?’

This time Rob Anybody gave him a longer, more thoughtful look before saying, ‘Well, Mr Policeman, it seems ye are a Feegle and a copper. Well, that’s the way the world spins. But the big question for the pair of ye is: are you a sneak and a snitch?’

In the Watch House the shift was changing. Somebody came in and shyly handed Mrs Proust quite a large plate of cold meats and pickles, and a bottle of wine with two glasses. After a nervous look at Tiffany, the watchman whispered something to Mrs Proust, and in one movement she’d taken a small packet out of her pocket and shoved it into his hand. Then she came back and sat down on the straw again.

‘And I see he’s had the decency to open the bottle and let the wine breathe for a while,’ she said, and added, when she saw Tiffany’s glance, ‘Lance Constable Hopkins has a little problem that he’d rather his mother never found out about and I make a rather helpful ointment. I don’t charge him, of course. One hand washes the other, although in the case of young Hopkins I hope he scrubs it first.’

Tiffany had never drunk wine before; at home you drank small beer or small cider, which had just enough alcohol to kill off the nasty invisible tiny biting things, but not enough alcohol to make you more than a bit silly.

‘Well,’ she said, ‘I never thought prison would be like this!’