| Details for After the Knife |
| Summary: | Gideon and Elijah pick up the investigation of Elly's stabbing, and put Edwin in a difficult position. |
| Date: | October 22, 1937 |
| Location: | Law Enforcement, MoM |
| Related: | Elly Gets Hurt |
| Characters |
    |
Morning. Too much not-sleeping. Not enough coffee. Inspector Adamantus Gideon — otherwise known as "That Grumpy Hit Wizard," "The Hammer," or "Go $#%! Yourself" — stalks through the M.L.E.S. office toward his desk.
Inspector Clarence sifts through the new crime reports, shaking his head and muttering to the case manager, "Can you believe this? That pretty girl from the Cauldron got stabbed last night." Gideon suddenly comes to life, taking two steps back and snatching report from Clarence's hands, who exclaims, "Hey! Go $#%! yourself!" Gideon ignores the other Hit Wizard, hurrying his steps toward his desk as he looks over the file. Upon arrival, he slaps the report open in front of his partner, Inspector Elijah Lovegood. "Get your coat. Report from St. Mungo's. Elly was stabbed in the arm with a butcher's knife."
Elijah is sitting at his desk, a cigarette hanging out of his mouth as he scribbles away at a report with his quill. He looks up at Gideon as he addresses him and sets his quill down, sliding the cig out of his mouth and furrowing his brow, "A butcher knife? Where was she at the time of the attack?" He stands as he asks the questions, sliding his seat back under the desk and moving to take his suit jacket from the coat-rack next to their desks.
Gideon hasn't even taken his own coat off yet. So he just collects up the file again, tucking it under his arm. "The Cauldron. She's at the hospital now." He's already moving to head out. His usual steely countenance wavers with a touch of genuine worry.
Elijah is for once the rugged, stone-cold cop. The potions tend to sober him up and make him all-around less pleasant and rigid (not to mention elitist). He buttons his coat and catches up to Gideon easily, saying, "Any witnesses?"
Gideon growls. "One…and he's a possible suspect."
The night had turned into morning and Edwin was still just sitting on the couch. With no news from the hospital he got up and walked out of his home and made his way to the hospital. Once he found where Elly he peeked from the corner to look at her and seeing she was better was a little more together. He looks down at his clothes and then suddenly looks very self conscious and begins to head out of the hospital to at least change.
Elijah rounds the corner and begins walking down the hall, leading Inspector Gideon. He raises a hand and presses it to Edwin's chest as he and Gideon approach him, saying quite harshly "Going somewhere, Mister Collins?"
Elly with her sleeves rolled up, one can see the neat bandage around her forearm. But other than that she looks as she always does, glowing with sweet harmony and tenderness as she cuddles one of the babies against her chest and is working on burping what must be a baby girl for the bright pink and purple polka-dotted blanket wrapped around her and the little pink knitted pointed cap on her fuzzy but mostly bald head. She goes between singing and humming to the babies in their little cribs around her.
Gideon gives Edwin a rather harsh glare as he storms past. "Watch him." As if Elijah was going to just let him go? It sounded tough and official, anyhow. He speeds along toward the nursery, pausing in the doorway as soon as he sees her. "Elly?"
Edwin looks to Elijah and Gideon, "Sirs." He speaks, the man looks exhausted as his eyes look back and forth and then down to the hand pressed into his chest. His eyes look to Elly for a moment and then back to the two men. His whole demeanor changes to defensive and he swallows so hard.
Elijah takes Edwin by the arm and leads him over to a chair in the hallway, "Have a seat, Mister Collins. Inspector Gideon and I are going to have a few questions for you." There's no joy in Elijah's tone, as the clarity potions have seemingly taken all of that and replaced it with hard-boiled detective.
Elly blinks as she looks up and finds Gideon in the nursery of all things. She just gives him a warm smile after it dawns on her that the hospital must have contacted the MLE. "Knight in Shinin' armah." She coos and shakes her head. "I'm fine Giddy." She doesn't realize there's anyone with him or behind him. The man can fill a space!
The set of Gideon's shoulders is all business, but that worry still plays in his eyes. "You know how this goes, Elly. We need to ask you some questions." His tone is shockingly soft for the hard-nosed Inspector, and now and then, his eyes drift to the newborns around him. There is something wistful about the way he looks at them.
Edwin looks to them both and almost in a trance he just moves over and sits down. He's pale and starting to sweat a little. His eyes still flash over to where Elly is and he slowly shakes his head before he places his head in his hands. He lets out a low sigh and looks back up to Elijah, "Yes, Sir."
Elijah stands next to Edwin, his arms crossed and looking all-around imposing. He whistles to Gideon and says, "Get on with it, Adamantus. It's not the time for idle conversation."
Elly gives the baby a soft kiss and then turns to rest her down back into her crib and the baby barely stirs falling off into sweet slumber. Elly with her back to Gideon rolls down her sleeves and once they are down does she turn to skirt towards the door. Her hand lifts to rest on Gideon's chest. "Aye, I know…is that Eli?" She hears him but again can't see past Gideon into the hallway.
Gideon steps back to permit Elly to exit the nursery. No need to have this conversation in front of the babies. "Aye. Tell us what happened, Elly." He tosses a suspicious glance at Edwin. "In detail."
Edwin looks up as Elly comes from the nursery and quickly looks away from her and down the hallway. He's incredibly guilty and it shows. He rubs a hand over his face and as Gideon speaks to him he sits back on the bench and sighs.
But guilty of what? Elijah wonders as he can see the obvious signs on Edwin's face. Elijah looks over to Elly as she walks out into the hallway and gives her a polite not, refraining from speaking at the moment.
Elly steps out of the Nursery, closes the door and then stills when she sees Edwin. "Ye didn't have to drag 'im all the way down 'ere. It was nothin' Gid, an' Eli. He just came back into the kitchen. Mumsie 'ad the security spell on. It went off, I tried to dispel it but was a smidge too late. That's all."
Gideon sighs, sensing Elly slipping into her everything-is-alright mode. "Alright, we'll do this the longer way. What was Mr. Collins doing in the kitchen while the security spell was active?"
Since no question was asked to Edwin he simply sits there and tries to not look at Elly at all. Still, when she speaks he does look to her, searching her eyes for a bit as she explains.
Elijah reaches down and puts a hand on Edwin's shoulder, though it's not out of consolation so much as Elijah just felt like leaning a bit. His eyes remain on Elly, watching her face for any obvious fibs she may be telling.
A nurse walks up to Elijah and offers him a lightly wrapped chef…or butcher's knife to him. It's still tacky with blood. "The evidence you asked for Inspector." She then bobs a curtsy and heads off to get back to work.
Elly sighs and looks a little wounded as Gideon is making her relive every detail. She doesn't dare look in the direction of the knife that was given over to Elijah. "'E was just calling on me. 'E din't know the alarm was activated."
Gideon scowls. "Elly. I know bloody well how the alarm works. Those knives don't start flying right off. Look, we can do this here, or all four of us can go down at the Squad office. It's up to you."
Edwin sees the knife and all the nerves of the previous night. When the knife comes into the scene he looks down to the floor. He looks between them all and opens his mouth to speak but then closes it as he knows that to speak could make things even worse for himself.
Elijah takes the knife and looks it over in his hands, his eyes examining every square inch of it. He interrupts whatever conversation may be going on at the moment and says to Gideon, "It's not him, Adamantus. The Butcher, I mean." He does pause for a moment and says, "Unless…" Elijah seemingly freezes in time, but there's something going on in that head of his.
Elly looks up a Gideon in tears. "Please, I told ye wha 'appened. He came in an' I stopped'm one got pass…" Then Elijah's going on about Edwin being The Butcher and Elly's eyes go wide. "Eli! Cooor! Course 'e's nah The Butchah! Just Mumsie's Kitchen Protection spell got over zealous."
Gideon sets his jaw. He hates seeing her like this, but this is an investigation, and it's time to be the hard-boiled cop. "Spells don't get overzealous. People do." He tosses a meaningful stare at Edwin, then shifts his gaze to Elijah. "I think we need to question these two separately. You take him. Elly, let's find somewhere private to speak."
As those tears come up in Elly's eyes, Edwin looks even more guilty. And at being called the Butcher he rises to his feet and looks towards the man, "I never." He says as he finds it a personal affront. And then as Gideon wants to separate them the words just come out, "I was worried about my feelings for Elly. Worried that I was going to push her away. I said some things that really hurt her and I wanted to hold her… the knives went off and she tried to protect me. One sliced into her arm. I was worried and cared more about making sure she was all right than those knives and she got hurt. It's my fault. Leave her alone."
Elijah cuts his eyes at Edwin as he stands up and growls, "Sit down." He presses his hand against the man's chest again, urging to find his seat once more. He looks back over his shoulder at Elly and says, "Is he telling the truth?" Boop. Human lie-detector mode activated.
Elly opens her mouth to protest them getting split up and this turning into an interrogation. But then Edwin is finding his voice just as she's losing hers. Her eyes go wide as he confesses everything that happened and much like she did last night, she steps between as much as possible the inspectors and Edwin - mostly between Gideon and Edwin. "Aye, it's true." Elly doesn't lie, she couldn't if she tried. More teary eyes plead with Gideon, "Please don' make this any worse than it is Gid. Please."
Gideon narrows his gaze at Edwin in the infamously dubbed Cruciatus Glare. "What's made this worse is this laddie's obsession with you. Those knives give plenty of warning before they fly," he growls low, barely containing the urge to shout angrily. There's sleeping babies nearby! But, quiet or not, he half-steps around Elly, jabbing an accusing finger at Edwin. "You bloody daft idiot. You think this is love? You dinnae have a clue what love is. If I were you, boy, I'd stay far, far away from her." He whirls a finger at Elly, "That goes for you as well. This laddie's crossed a line. It's time you learned to recognize that you cannae trust everyone."
Edwin grinds his teeth and looks to Gideon. He slowly begins to shake his head and he looks right to Gideon, "No." He simply says. "I won't take something like that from you." He looks to Elly, "It's her decision to do what she wants to do." The hand on his chest from Elijah is given a look and he doesn't sit down. "It was a quarrel between two people and a charm went wrong. Even I can see that there's not more to it that you should be involved in. What happened is between me and her so bugger off!"
Elijah is getting fragile once again as all of the people start with their accusatory jabs and such. Then bam, breaking point. Elijah shoves Edwin back down into the chair and says, "I said sit down!" Then he turns and looks at Gideon, still in bad spirits and says, "This is not a case about who loves who, Adamantus. We're trying to figure out who's to blame here, and it looks like Edwin's the one, so shut up with your diatribe and save the sappy crap for The Dog and Bone!"
Elly's breaking heart is near audible as she looks past the finger pointing at her and into Gideon's eyes. His words cut her open worse than the knife ever did and she then cuts a look over to Edwin. In her stormy blue eyes is utter disappointment that he once again is proving to just not listen and chug onwards despite the safety and health of anyone. "There's no charges. Leave us alone. I have to get back to work." She sobs and clutching her stomach like she could be sick she heads for the closed door to the nursery again.
Gideon pointedly ignores Elijah, his focus fixing firmly on Edwin. "I was trying to give you a chance to walk away from this laddie. But you just keep showin' me you dinnae have a lick of sense, and it's made you dangerous. You were trespassing, and someone got hurt because of it." He glance to Elly, "I dinnae need you to press charges. He's broken the law." He whirls back on Edwin, "And you've had the bad luck to hurt someone I happen to care a great deal about. Get up. We'll finish this downtown." Of course, when a Hit Wizard says downtown, he actually means down under the town, in the underground Ministry building. It's doubtful that Edwin will be held for long, but Gideon's fired up, and ready to make a point.
Edwin watches as Elly shows every emotion on his face and he looks to her even as he is shoved down to his seat. He looks up to the two men, "I care for her too and obviously I keep hurting her." He buries his head in his hands for a little bit and shakes his head, "I don't want this… I keep messing it up." He looks up to Gideon. "Let's go…"
Elijah just stands there, in an all-around bad mood. He peers at Gideon and says, "Have fun on your date. I'm going for a walk." He gives the knife to Gideon and turns around, marching off down the hall.
Elly stops, and gets the Elly scolding voice. "Elijah Lovegood, don't ye dare walk away and leave this sort of impartiality to fly. Ye stay with Edwin and make sure that he gets the fair, level headed end of the law." She glares at Gideon and then for the barest moment makes eye contact with Edwin and more little sounds of heart shattering can nearly be heard before she opens up the door to slip inside of the nursery to return to her work. This time it's a little boy she picks up and fetches a bottle. She rocks him as she feeds him and she tries to sing him the same song, but it's filled with hiccups and soft little sobs and sniffles.
Gideon glares after Elijah, but keeps his silence. Edwin is his concern right now. He nods to the man, and once Edwin rises, hooks his hand onto the man's inner elbow in a controlling gesture, keeping his wand hand free. Standard escorting procedure. Elly get an even stare, but he doesn't rise to her taunt. Without a word, he leads Edwin out, with or without Elijah.