Beware the hobby bobby

‘Anything you say may be given in evidence. Do you have anything to say?’

I looked at the baby-faced police officer and tried to think of an appropriate response.

I had been driving to Guildford station to meet a friend who every now and then comes from his nearby home on the train. I park in the station car park and together we walk to a kebab shop, order some food, eat it where we can perch, and cheer ourselves up.

Running low on diesel, I pulled into a filling station on the way. After pulling back out, I noticed a police car close behind. I turned into the railway station and its lights flashed.

Readying myself to explain the Covid-compliant kebab, I wound down my window. The officer, who looked like a young Tom Cruise, said: ‘Are you aware you just turned the wrong way out of a filling station?’

I said I wasn’t, and I was sorry. He went on: ‘That brought you to our attention. We ran your vehicle through our system and it seems your MOT expired last month.’

Darn it! I had given up nagging the builder boyfriend about it because he was so tired and snowed under with work.

I apologised again and asked if I could phone home because ‘my husband’ might have booked it in. He said I could. The BB said to tell the officer he would book it in the next morning and if they would allow me to drive straight home we would park it off road at the farm.

I repeated that word for word, but the officer suddenly snapped: ‘You think that makes it all right, do you?’

‘Er, yes? I mean, no? Oh dear. What would you like us to do?’ It was turning into one of those ‘Just tell me what to say and I’ll say it’ episodes that seem to be happening increasingly during lockdown as the police get more bored.