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23:13

Saturday 31 October

For a blissful second Freddie thought she was in bed. Then the concerned face of Nasreen came into focus, haloed by a yellow ceiling stain.

‘Take your time, don’t rush up,’ she said.

‘Is she okay? Jesus this is all I need: the paperwork!’ Moast’s square head came between her and the overhead strip lighting. His cropped blonde hair glowing.

‘I’m okay.’ Freddie pushed against the floor. Sticky.

‘Someone should take a look at you,’ Nas said.

‘No.’ The shock of the accusation sharpened everything. Freddie took in the dirty white box of a room. The pitted table. The grey plastic chairs. ‘You can’t really think I’m a murderer?’

‘Where were you between 1am and 5am this morning, Miss Venton?’ Moast was leaning on the table, his knuckles white from the pressure.

‘Sir, I really think we should give her a minute.’

She looked up at Moast. ‘I’m fine. Let’s get this sorted,’ Freddie adopted her customer service voice: the one she used when she was at a job interview or trying to get a doctor’s appointment. How Changing Your Tone Can Change Your Life.

‘Miss Venton says she’s fine. And I for one am really looking forward to how she’s going to explain all this!’ Moast said.

‘Explain what? There’s nothing to explain.’ Freddie stood, a little shakily, opposite him. She wouldn’t sit first, Lego man.

‘Answer the question: where were you between 1am and 5am today?’ he said.

‘I was working the night shift at Espress-oh’s.’ She had to keep calm. ‘Except for when I was talking to Nasreen in St Pancras station. You were there.’

‘Sit down!’ he barked.

She sat. Her cheeks burning. ‘This is harassment!’

‘Freddie, look, I don’t know who you’ve got yourself involved with, life has clearly not gone the way you planned it,’ Nasreen nodded at her Espress-oh’s shirt.

‘I’m a journalist!’ She had to make them understand.

Moast scoffed, ‘You just told us you work at Espress-oh’s? Now you’re claiming you’re a journalist?’

‘I am a bloody journalist,’ Freddie said.

‘Don’t take that tone with me, Missy,’ he snarled. ‘You’re giving it all that about calling you Ms. What kind of a name is Freddie for a girl, anyway? Do you have a problem with men? Did you want to silence Alun Mardling?’

Freddie looked from Moast to Nas. ‘I didn’t even know who he was till this morning.’ Freddie tried to remember what she’d said in her voicemail.

‘Freddie, you’re entitled to legal advice. Are you sure you don’t want a lawyer present?’ Nas said. Moast glared at her.

‘I don’t need a lawyer, I’ve done nothing wrong!’ said Freddie.

‘We spoke to your manager.’ Moast pulled a notepad from his back pocket and flicked through it. ‘A Mr Daniel Peterson. He says you have some anger issues?’

Freddie’s mum always warned her daughter: one day that temper of yours will get you into real trouble. Pleading with her to think before she spoke. Unfortunately, the mention of her gossiping boss and the stone-cold reality of being arrested for murder meant Freddie returned to type. ‘The lying cunt!’

‘He said that you seemed very – and I quote – “agitated”.’

‘A word with four syllables! I’m surprised he managed it.’ Freddie could just imagine how much Dan relished dishing the dirt on her.

‘Mr Peterson said you left early.’

This was getting ridiculous. ‘I did: to follow you guys. Tell him why I was there, Nas! Tell him about the paper!’

‘You didn’t say anything about any paper, Freddie.’ Nasreen looked at her hands. How My Best Friend Became My Best Frenemy.

‘The suspected murder weapon is visible in the photo you sent Sergeant Cudmore.’ Moast slapped an enlarged version of the screenshot onto the table.

Winded from the blood, Freddie turned away.

‘The knife is no longer at the scene, because you took it with you after taking this photo,’ he said

‘No. You’ve got it all wrong.’ She had to make them listen. This was insane.

‘Did it make you feel good cutting him?’

Her stomach turned. ‘Stop it! Listen! I know about the murder weapon. I mean, about it being in the photo. That’s why when I saw it on Twitter I sent it to Nas.’

‘On Twitter? The photo was on Twitter?’ Nas cut in.

‘Lies!’ Moast slammed his hand down on the table. The cup of cold coffee spluttered. ‘Mr Peterson said you take antidepressants.’

‘What the hell! That’s private. They’re for anxiety!’ Horrible Bosses: The Reality.

‘I think you’re a fantasist, Ms Venton.’ Moast leant toward her. ‘Built this whole thing up in your head. Mardling came to your cafe. You took a dislike to him. Found him and killed him. This Twitter rubbish is a distraction. You screwed up: you got cocky, sent this photo to Sergeant Cudmore. And now we’ve got you.’

‘Wait…wait…’ Freddie tried to sort things in her head. ‘You’ve had me in here all this time, and you haven’t been looking for the sick freak who put that up online?’

‘Stop it with the lies, Venton.’ Moast stood, slamming his chair into the wall. Nas and Freddie jumped. Bully-boy tactics. There was a knock at the door, which broke the tension in the room. Freddie heard Nas exhale.

Moast stormed across and swung the door open to reveal the nervous-looking copper who’d been sick at the crime scene. ‘I’m trying to conduct an interview in here, PC Thomas!’ Freddie’s heartbeat roared through her body.

‘Sorry, guv,’ the copper stuttered. ‘I need a word.’ He glanced at Freddie. ‘It’s about the case.’

‘Interview suspended at eleven forty-seven pm. Cudmore, outside. Now!’ Moast’s voice shook the room.

Nas clicked the tape recorder off and jumped up and all three of them disappeared behind the slamming door. Freddie looked at the dent the door handle had made in the wall and realised she was gripping her chair so hard her nails were cutting into the plastic underside. She didn’t realise she was so easily intimidated. This guy was a prick.

There was the noise of squeaking footsteps and a very audible ‘Fuck’ from outside. The door opened and Freddie tried to see out into the hallway, but only caught sight of another grubby, once white wall. Nasreen and Moast came back in, he running his hand over his cropped hair, she carrying a newspaper.

‘Give me that.’ He took the paper from Nasreen. ‘Interview with Freddie Venton, Thirty-first of October, continuing at eleven fifty-two pm.’ Moast tapped the tape recorder. ‘It seems you weren’t lying about being a journalist.’

The Post, still folded, thudded onto the table between them. Emblazoned across the front was: ‘#Murder: Troll Hunter Death Link to Twitter.’

‘The splash!’ Freddie reached for it.

Moast pulled it away. ‘This changes nothing. You’re not off the hook.’

‘You think I bumped off some guy for the story?’ Seriously, where did this guy get off?

‘Do you deny you entered an active crime scene under false pretences?’ Moast stabbed at the newspaper, threatening to tear a hole in it.

‘No, but…’

‘And while you were there you impersonated a policeman?’ Stab, stab, stab.

‘I never said I was a copper, I just showed up in one of those CSI suits and your bloke let me in.’ She couldn’t keep her eyes from the newspaper. This should have been one of the happiest moments of her life. ‘Don’t you think the public have the right to know if there’s a crazed killer going around bumping off trolls and posting pictures of it online?’

‘What picture?’ Moast’s finger stayed ground into the paper.

‘The one you’ve been waving in my face for the last hour!’

Nas dropped into a chair and shuffled forwards. Dipping her chin like Princess Diana, looking up through her dark lashes. ‘Tell me about the photo you sent me, Freddie? You’re saying you didn’t take it?’

‘That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you: some freakazoid has set up an account under the name of Apollyon…’

‘Apol-what?’ Moast interrupted.

Freddie kept eye contact with Nas. Believe me. ‘…and posted the photo of that guy’s body online. Nas, you must find this twisted freak.’

Nas looked up at Moast. ‘Sir, I think we should at least take a look.’

Moast slumped into the chair and pushed his hand up over his face. ‘Okay. So you’re saying that there’s someone who has put this photo on Twitter.’

‘Yes,’ nodded Freddie. Finally.

Moast looked at Nas. Something passed between them.

Nas leant forward and pressed a button on the tape recorder: ‘Interview suspended at twelve oh one am. 1st November.’

‘Pinch punch first of the month,’ Freddie said. What a way to start November.

Moast leant toward Nas, speaking quietly, ‘Do you have a phone with Twitter?’

‘No, sir. Of course not. The guv actively discourages us from using social media.’

‘Me either. It’s blocked on all the station machines. And we won’t be able to get anyone from computer services in until the morning and the paperwork’s been completed. I’ve seen my nephew’s Facebook. It can’t be that different.’

‘In case you two forgot, I’m still here. Being held under false pretences.’ Freddie waved at them.

Moast glared at her.

Freddie held up her hands in surrender. ‘Just trying to help. If you give me my phone, I can show you Twitter and the account straight away.’

‘It’s worth a shot, sir. She did alert us to the photo, and having seen this site at the crime scene I’m not confident I could navigate it,’ said Nas. Thank you, thought Freddie.

Moast exhaled. ‘Fine, get PC Thomas to fetch it from the Duty Sergeant.’

When Nas opened the door, Freddie heard voices. Chatter. Laughter. A guy in uniform walked past clutching a copy of The Post. Her copy of The Post. ‘Don’t suppose I could…’ she pointed at the newspaper.

Moast slapped a hand on it and pulled it toward him.

‘Fine. Just asking.’ This was ridiculous. They’d arrested and falsely accused her of murder, almost certainly got her fired from Espress-oh’s, and now they wouldn’t even let her look at her first ever front page national scoop. ‘Can I get something to eat or is that not allowed either?’

Moast ignored her as Nas came back carrying Freddie’s phone in a plastic bag. Relief flooded through Freddie as she took hold of her phone. She was in control again. She could call someone. Text. Read the news. Work out precisely where she was. Could You Last Twenty-Four Hours Without Your Mobile? Nas coughed.

‘Can I take it out – the touch screen won’t work through this?’ Freddie said.

Moast nodded.

Unlocking her phone, Freddie stopped: that was odd. The front flickered with Twitter updates. Had something she posted gone viral? An angry red spot denoting eleven missed calls pulsed on her phone icon. ‘19% battery – guys, you could’ve plugged it in.’

‘Just show us the Twitter,’ Moast said.

Five thousand six hundred and fifty-seven notifications – must be a glitch. She searched for Apollyon’s account. The thumbnail image of the body was easier to bear. Wait…that can’t be right: ‘He has over 10,000 followers already?’

They huddled round the phone like smokers round a match. ‘Is that unusual?’ Nas asked.

‘Yes, unless he’s famous or gone viral. This morning he had no followers, what happened?’ She pulled the newspaper from under Moast’s arm. ‘I’m sure I didn’t.’ She speed-read her copy. Virtually word for word hers. ‘I didn’t mention @Apollyon at all…how’d all these people find out about him?’

‘You keep saying “he”,’ Nas said.

‘Yeah, yeah, gender neutrality, et cetera, et cetera. Slip of the tongue.’ She hit notifications. The screen blurred: there were tens of them. Hundreds. Thousands.

‘PC Cudmore is insinuating you know who this Apollyon is?’ Moast peered over her phone.

‘You idiots.’ She looked up.

‘What?’

It was right there, the same tweet from the Jubilee Police, retweeted, shared over and over:

We can neither confirm nor deny that @Apollyon is the #Murderer or the #TrollHunter as mentioned in @ReadyFreddieGo’s article.

‘You tweeted it! Here: see, this is a message from the Jubilee Police. You tagged @Apollyon, and me, and hashtagged murderer and troll hunter. You just told the world @Apollyon is the one who posted the gruesome photo online. It means everyone knows he’s the one I referred to as the troll hunter. It means you just called him The Hashtag Murderer. Whoever wrote this tweet has told the world this guy exists. It’s gone mental. The cat’s out of the bag. The genie’s out of the bloody bottle. Who wrote this?’

Moast looked flustered. ‘Sergeant?’

‘We outsource our PR accounts. There was a social media advisor at that training course, Jackie Whitley,’ Nas said. ‘She’s something big in PR, described herself as a thought leader. I remember that. They run all station campaigns and accounts, sir.’ Nas bit her bottom lip.

‘Nobody cares about this kind of nonsense. It’s not important,’ Moast said.

‘Not important? Mate, you’re trending.’ Freddie couldn’t believe they’d be so stupid. ‘It’s showing up as one of the most talked about things on Twitter right now.’

‘A load of stupid kids pissing around online…’ Moast tapped his fingers on the table.

‘Try fifteen million users in the UK. You don’t get it. This is big. Look here – this is Mari Blagg from the Guardian, this is Charlie Webdale from the Indy. This is going to be all over the nationals – they want to talk to me.’ Freddie couldn’t keep the excitement from her voice. Sorry, dead dude.

‘Press? Why do they want to talk to you – it’s my case. I should contact them. Send a message to all the journalists saying I will host a press conference.’ Moast’s chest puffed up. ‘I’m investigating the Hashtag Murderer.’

The word murderer reverberated through Freddie. An unease flowered in her stomach and spread through her body. ‘You haven’t only told the world that @Apollyon is the hashtag Murderer,’ she swallowed.

Nas heard the apprehension in her voice. She placed a hand on Moast’s arm, a gentle silencer. ‘Freddie – what is it?’

‘You’ve also told @Apollyon the world knows he’s the hashtag Murderer.’ She could be wrong. @Apollyon might not care – but then why post the photo? Why the dark connotation of his name? They obviously wanted to be noticed. She took in Moast’s puffed chest – why the bravado? Reach. Klout. Impact. People fed off that. Notoriety. People acted up for attention. The performance was part of the game; she shivered. What would someone who’d killed Mardling like that – so brutally – do if they knew people were watching? They’d already posted a photo of a dead man. What else would they be capable of? Dread pooled in her gut: ‘You’ve given the murderer an audience.’