Mr. Eldridge looked nervous.

Matt had never seen Mr. Eldridge nervous. He had always seemed so sure of himself. He was an old man with white hair, who wore glasses perched far down on his nose so he could look over them at you when he said something clever. He was forever saying something clever. He hand-picked the smartest kids in each year and gave them special lessons, instilling in them a sense of superiority over the others. Matt was one of these smart kids, but he hated the special lessons. They seemed to have been set up purely as an opportunity for Mr. Eldridge to say clever things, and any learning that happened was a side-effect.

Perhaps it was the two policemen in his office that were making Mr Eldridge nervous. Or perhaps it was the man who was with them. The man in black. When Matt came in the younger policeman gave the man in black a questioning look, and he nodded back. Then they fell into a hushed conversation.

"Come in," Mr. Eldridge said, pushing the door closed behind Matt and shepherding him towards the waiting men. "Don't be afraid. These nice men just want to ask you some questions." That was the other thing about Mr. Eldridge: he spoke to you like you were five years old.

"I'm not afraid," Matt said, but he didn't look at the man in black.

"Hi mate," the older policeman said. He sat on the edge of Mr. Eldridge's desk (Mr. Eldridge squirmed visibly) and motioned towards a chair. Matt sat.

"I've got a son your age," the policeman went on. "His name's Callum."

Matt didn't care if his name was Rumplestiltskin. He was trying to hear what the other policeman and the man in black were talking about. But then Callum's dad was asking him questions, and he had to concentrate. At first they were easy questions, about school, and his parents, and his Brothers, but then, somehow, they had come round to the subject of the dead man.

"We need your help," the policeman said. "We don't know who this guy is. Had no ID on him. Nothing. You ever seen him before?"

Matt shook his head.

"Did he say anything to you? Anything at all?"

Matt shook his head without looking up. He didn't trust himself to say anything, or to look in the policeman's eyes. The policeman would know. He would know from Matt's voice that he was lying. He would see it in his eyes.

"When you saw this man's car," the policeman said, slowly and carefully now, pointing at the man in black but not looking at him, "how fast do you think it was going?"

"I don't know."

"Look at me please mate. How fast?"

Matt looked up at the policeman. He tried to tell him with his eyes. Too fast. But he could hardly say it when the man in black was right there, watching and listening closely.

"You're a smart lad," the policeman said. "Top of the class according to your principal here. You know how fast things go. You know how fast is too fast. Was it going too fast?"

"How the hell would he -" the man in black said.

The younger policeman whispered something to him and he shook his head, and Matt heard him say my father, and something about a lawyer.

The older policeman went on as if nothing had happened. "How fast would you say it was going?"

"About fifty-five," Matt said to his lap.

The policeman placed his big hands on his knees, but said nothing.

"See?" the man in black said. "Fifty-five. Walked right out in front of me."

"Did the man walk out in front of the car?" the policeman asked Matt.

"I guess."

"You guess?"

"I don't remember. It happened fast."

"Ahuh.

Then they played a game. It involved a pen and a piece of paper. The policeman helped Matt draw the scene of the accident, with arrows to show which direction everything was going in. Matt was a stick figure. When the policeman asked him to draw an arrow to show where the dead man had come from, Matt put the pen down. "I didn't see," he said. This wasn't hard to say, because it was true. He could look straight into the policeman's eyes when he said it.

"Anyone else there?" the younger policeman said then. "Apart from this man?" He meant the man in black, but didn't look at him, and Matt realised something: this policeman was afraid of the man in black. Matt didn't know how this could be. Policemen weren't meant to be afraid of anything.

"Ask him where his bag is," said the man in black, and Matt's stomach sank.

"I think we'll give our next child a traditional name. How about Rumpelstiltskin?"