It Wasn't Me, Officer!

It was a long hot day in a long hot city room.  The meeting started at 10am.  At 4pm we’re back into the light.  There’s a message for me.  No details.  The police are on my tail!  Thinking quickly, I leave my mobile number and make like the wind.

Later, much later, the phone rings.  It’s PC Sherlock from London Police.  My luck has run out….I’m cornered!  He checks my identity.  But I know who I am alright, always have, always will.  A patsy from the local hotel has tipped him the wink.  I have reported the theft of a “personal organiser”.  She called in the cops.  And now my number is up.

But wait!  I am who I am and I have NOT lost a personal organiser.  And I’ve got eight witnesses who put me in the Westminster Academy all day.  PC Sherlock sounds suspicious.  He checks my movements.  My means, my motive, my opportunity.  He’ll make further enquiries.  He’ll get to the bottom of this.  He’ll get back to me.  He sounds like….a man about to go off duty.

Hours pass.  Nothing.  Just the fizz of neon above my lonely room and the smell of despair.  I stare at the phone.  The phone stares back.  Nothing.  The city sleeps but there’s no rest for me.  It ain’t every day the Feds are watching your back.

Next morning I wake with a start, kicking over the empty Scotch bottle.  The room is cold and there’s a thumping in my head.  I check my messages.  Nothing.

Mid afternoon, PC Sherlock gives me the nod.  The patsy has disappeared.  Can’t be found.  Won’t return his calls or take his messages.  Now TWO organisers missing!  So I tell him my theory.  He uses the word “possibly”.  He ain’t impressed with this amateur ‘tec.  I’m still on the victim register, he says.  They won’t let me go without good reason.  They got their hook in me.  I’m wriggling.

Evening falls.  The telephone rings.  Turns out I was right (although PC Sherlock feeds me the tale like he got it himself all along).  Someone gave in MY business card instead of their own.  Sherlock will “track it back”.   I’ll cancel the ticket to South America.  But, hey, I’m still laying low.  The trap’s been sprung.  Next time, Lady Luck may not come a-calling!

So was it you?  Identity theft, they call it these days.  Gee, I’m real sorry you lost your organiser.  But I ain’t you….and you ain’t me.  We gotta get this sorted.

A punk stopped me in the street.  He said:  “Have you got a light, Mac?”

I said:  “No, but I’ve got a dark brown overcoat”.