Chapter Four

Towards Zero

The man with the coat barely glanced up as they approached him again. "You said you wouldn't bother me again," he snapped.

The Doctor tilted his head ever-so-slightly. "We lie occasionally. It's an occupational hazard of our job. We just wanted to ask you... do you happen to wear glasses?"

He frowned. "What kinda stupid question is that? Of course I need glasses. I'm practically blind without them."

Ace bunched her hand into a fist in her jacket pocket. Gotcha. "Then why aren't you wearing them?"

He opened his mouth for a moment, and then shut it. "Uh. I dropped them on the station. Look, why are you interrogating me?"

The Doctor put his hands casually in his pockets, and looked up at the taller man serenely. "Because my friend saw shards of glass on the ground near the girl's body. And, hypothetically of course, if you had been the one to push that poor woman off the platform, and you broke your glasses doing it, it would be a simple matter to match the brand of glasses you wear to the fragments that you left behind." He let that linger for a second. "All completely hypothetical, of course," he added pleasantly.

"I just dropped my glasses," protested the man. "Why should that be an instant link to me murdering someone?"

"It probably wouldn't be," agreed the Doctor. "Except, this compartment is nearly empty."

The man looked around. There were only eight people in total in the train compartment. "And?"

"And you're the only one standing up."

If the man had really pushed the girl onto the tracks, then he would've hopped onto the first train that he could find. He would've needed to hide any sort of evidence that he had, maybe even destroy it, which could only be accomplished at the next stop, where he could find some sort of rubbish bin.

"Can I have a look at your coat?" Ace asked, all innocence and smiles. He scowled, and pulled it away from her.

"Mind your own business, girlie."

Ace inwardly raged at him, but kept up the polite act. "But it would really help both of us if we could just look at your coat. If you really didn't do it-"

The Doctor snatched the beige coat from him before he could react. Ace looked at the strap that ran around the stomach to keep it in place. Or, rather, she looked at the conspicuous absence of a strap. "Hey, the piece that should be there was lying on top of the girl's body!" she said brightly, relishing every moment of this.

"What?" the man exclaimed, almost ferally.

The Doctor tucked the coat over his arm, and smiled benignly. "You see, if the girl had been holding onto your coat strap while she was pushed, you wouldn't be able to retrieve it, and would have to dispose of the evidence as quickly as possible so the police couldn't match the strap to your coat."

"Are we still talking hypothetically, Professor?" Ace asked, glancing up at the clock, which read 'Three minutes'.

"You're police, aren't you?" the man said with something like sudden realisation. "Well, you can't arrest me. You can't. Because I wasn't here when she died. I only came into the station a minute before this train left. I couldn't have done it."

The man with the mobile phone looked up from his texting. "Liar."

The man Ace had now dubbed the murderer spun around to glare at him. "Whaddya mean-"

"He means," interrupted the Doctor, cutting off the brewing argument. "That you're quite obviously not telling the truth. Anyone here can see that."

Ace got it immediately. Two of the three woman were wearing dripping rain jackets. The other one had a transparent bubble umbrella lying next to her on the seat. One man had dripping wet hair, and the other's coat was soaked. She and the Doctor had used his brolly, but the remaining bloke wasn't in the least bit damp. The Doctor held up his coat. "Does this seem wet to you?"

He spluttered a bit.

"If you had got here a few minutes ago," Ace said triumphantly. "You'd know that it was raining outside. But if you'd got here before the rain started..."

"He'd have had to been here for at least half an hour," said the woman with the umbrella. The Doctor had that inexplicable look of pride and smugness that Ace often saw on his face when he finally worked something out. It was only now that she realised exactly how it must feel for him. She felt just as proud and smug as him because she had helped him work it out as well-

-and suddenly someone had just grabbed her around her wast and was holding a knife to her throat. She struggled as violently as she could- but soon stopped when the knife bit into her flesh and drew two perfect little droplets of blood.

Ow.

"Don't move, or I'll kill her," the murderer warned, and the vicious gleam in his eye left everyone with no doubt that he was telling the truth.

To be concluded...