FADE IN
An expensively dressed lady in black attire and a veiled hat which partially obscures her face is sitting in a small room smoking a cigarette. A cheap table is in front of her, and a tired-looking middle-aged man is standing facing her. The walls are covered with Met Police posters about community officers and anti-crime initiatives.


COP
You need that cigarette, lady?

MYSTERIOUS LADY
No, I want it.

COP (taking off blazer and hanging it on his chair)
You know, I used to smoke. This job, it gets to you, gives you the shakes. I needed an outlet, right? I kicked that shit, though. Used those patch things. You should look into them.

MYSTERIOUS LADY (blows a smoke ring)
You gave up.

COP
Pardon me?

MYSTERIOUS LADY (leaning back in chair and smiling)
You gave up, dahling. You capitulated. Like a panting dog, eager to please its mistress. You lapped up accepted normality, and now you're breathing it in my face.

COP (frowning)
I beat a nasty habit, lady. That's what I did.

MYSTERIOUS LADY
And replaced it with a worse one. Now please stop wasting my time, detective. What do you really want to talk about?

COP (braces hands down on table)
Where were you the night your husband was killed?

MYSTERIOUS LADY (gives cop shrewd look)
At home. I was watching a film.

COP
Can anyone back you up on that?

MYSTERIOUS LADY
It was one of those 'film noir' affairs, all about a black widow who manipulates a cop into killing her abusive husband. It was fabulous, dahling.

COP (stands up again, exasperated)
Were you born speaking like that?

MYSTERIOUS LADY
I screamed down my nose at the midwife, detective.

COP
Are you going to answer my question, or be sarcastic?

MYSTERIOUS LADY
Sarcasm is far more fun than interrogation, don't you think? Do you still use the patch things, as you so artfully put it?

COP
Right-

MYSTERIOUS LADY
Yes, somebody can back me up. My dog Archie was with me all night.

COP (face going red)
Well, I'll just go call Inspector Dolittle then, shall I? He can clear the case right up for us.

MYSTERIOUS LADY
See? You can do it too, when you put your mind to it.

COP
WHAT?

MYSTERIOUS LADY
My sarcasm, dahling. It seems to be catching. Do keep up.

COP (slams hand on table)
Don't piss me about, lady. We got a body in the morgue with half its face missing, no suspects, no murder weapon, and no motive other than the hefty life insurance cheque you'll shortly be receiving.

MYSTERIOUS LADY
I never lie, detective. It's too much like hard work, remembering what everyone thinks they know. He used to beat me, my husband; he was a violent bastard. Does that help your investigation?

COP (pushes face close to lady's)
Are you trying to get yourself sent down, lady?

MYSTERIOUS LADY (offers him a cigarette from the open packet, blows smoke gently into his face)
You look like you need one.

COP (slams hand on table again, stalks from room)
I'll be back in a minute.

MYSTERIOUS LADY (small smile at corner of mouth)
Tootles, dahling.


*****


(cop re-enters room, cup of coffee in hand, sits opposite lady)

COP
I apologise for losing my rag earlier.

MYSTERIOUS LADY (smirks)
Oh, you are just a walking cliche aren't you, detective?

COP
Can we please stick to the subject at hand? We are discussing the night of your husband's murder.

MYSTERIOUS LADY (lights a fresh cigarette)
He was an odious man, detective. Every week a new mistress, every night a new excuse, every argument a new way to hit me. The doors in my house have teeth, and the stairs knuckles, if you follow.

COP
Sounds like you wanted rid of him.

MYSTERIOUS LADY (smlies and sighs)
I did. I'm glad he's dead. My life will be far better with him gone. Dahling, I'm positively rich!

COP
So you say you were at home that night.

MYSTERIOUS LADY
Yes. At home watching that wonderfully clever film. A girl could get ideas from a film like that. She could learn.

COP
Are you playing me, lady?

MYSTERIOUS LADY
But of course, detective. That doesn't mean I'm lying, though.

COP
I don't get you.

MYSTERIOUS LADY
Well, that's good. What a tedious life this would be, if everybody understood one another.

COP
Tell me one more time, just humour me. Where were you the night your husband was killed? I want to watch your eyes when you answer.

MYSTERIOUS LADY (looks at ceiling and blows a funnel of smoke)
Do you believe in karma, detective?

COP
What, poetic justice and all that? There's a certain appeal.

MYSTERIOUS LADY (still looking at ceiling)
What appeal?

COP (pauses before answering)
I'm a small-time angler, pitching a tiny line into an ocean of scumbags. I catch one every now and then, but at the end of the day it's a fart in a hurricane. And fate, destiny, poetic justice? Yeah, I hope it exists. It makes me think that the bastards I don't catch, well, they'll get their just reward eventually.

MYSTERIOUS LADY
A man of faith, as it were. But dahling, if karma truly flows, and poetic justice holds sway, then nothing you do, or that we're doing here, truly matters. We're all just toddlers, urinating in the swimming pool, and God's got a limitless chlorine supply.

COP
Were you really at home that night?

MYSTERIOUS LADY (looks directly at cop)
Yes, I was at home with my dog.

COP (long silence as he looks into lady's eyes)
I believe you. I spent most of my adult life watching people lie, I have an instinct for it.

MYSTERIOUS LADY (standing up)
Am I free to go, detective?

COP
You are. It was nice talking to you.


*****


(outside, Mysterious Lady gets into back of limosine.)

UNSEEN MAN
Well?

MYSTERIOUS LADY
We had a lovely chat, dahling. The detective was a very nice man. I even told him about my lying problem.

UNSEEN MAN
What lying problem?

MYSTERIOUS LADY
Why, the fact that I never do it, dahling. I was completely honest with the detective. Fortunately for me, he got very hung up on where I was the night my husband met his end.

(she blows a smoke ring)

He never thought to ask where my husband was.

FADE TO BLACK