Niobe's drink came and she bumped her glass against his in a little toast.

"I bet," she agreed.  "Cheers."

She tidied up the stack of work, nudging it out of sight and out of mind for the moment.

"You must not have been there yet," she concluded for him. "A massive rampaging evil serpent, breaking windows, chomping on reporters. You'd remember."  She paused then started again.

"Right, so, Liam. Getting worried about all these break-ins?"

He took a deep breath.

"Not really, I mean I've heard rumors, but no one wants a bunch of old junk and I keep all my rare and expensive books in my vault, so there's nothing really worrying for me going on."

Liam turned to look at her, "Any ideas what's going on?"

Niobe took another drink.

"The only thing that seems to connect them is that they all happened," she said wryly. "If they hadn't happened all near the same time, I don't think they'd be news. I mean, as far as I know that's all to connect them."

She smiled a little wink. She was a reporter, not an Auror. Her only advantage over the the public in cases like these was that a) she had a few friends on Level Two, and b) she was paid to spend all day connecting the dots.

"So, erm, you see anything fishy that night, Liam?" she asked.

He listened to her talk about how the fact that the only thing she could think connected everything was that they all happened and he nodded in all the right places.

He couldn't really help out in that area, if he wasn't inside his shop or his flat, he frequented muggle London or a random pub. 

"I'm afraid I can't help you love, the only fishy thing I saw that night was the salmon I cooked myself for dinner."

"Psh, useless," Niobe said without malice. Then she turned in her seat to face him, holding her glass as she gestured.

"Actually, that's the wrong question. I shouldn't have asked that. Look, I asked you to make a judgement about what you saw. I said, did you see anything 'fishy'. I should've said, what did you see that day."

She thought for a second.

"No. Not yet. First thing I should ask is what a typical day is like at the Screaming Sextant. Then I ask about the actual day. So. Mr. Darrow. What's a typical day at the Wailing, um, Wayfinder?"

Briefly he wondered if he should be straight with her, or should play with her a bit and then just started talking without thinking much at all.

"Well a typical day in the Yelling Compass starts when I wake up in the morning a make myself breakfast.  Usually I'll go for a quick pastry and some coffee, but sometimes I'll make a full breakfast with sausages and toast and the works.  I'll still have to have my coffee though."

He took a drink.

"Then of course I go and get dressed, because what's the point of getting dressed for breakfast when I live alone."  He turned towards her, "That doesn't take very long, so I fix myself another cup of coffee and go downstairs to open the shop. Is that what you want to hear?"

"About your breakfast!?" Niobe laughed and kicked his stool.

"No, unless your full sausage noticed a shadowy figure casing the joint from across the street, no Liam, your breakfast is not newsworthy."

She snapped her fingers at him, grinning through grit teeth. "See, now if you were being like this, I'd change tacks. I'd ask more specific questions like, what kind of customers you normally get, or if anyone ever comes in asking for something in particular. I'd ask, maybe, is there much money in owning a junk shop?"

Liam took a deep breath, "It's not really about the money.  I like books, old books, rare books.  The junk part of the store just has some interesting surprises in it.  Nothing that would hurt anybody though."

He looked at her, "What about you?  Much money in the newspaper business?" he asked.

"Oh, loads. I don't get any of it, of course," Niobe replied. She paused, considered then raised a hand to qualify.

"Just to say, I do just fine. People know me, is all I'm telling you. Don't worry about Ni-Ni."

Niobe drummed her fingers on the bartop again. "What kind of protection do you have? Locks? Wards? Curses? Trapdoor?"