“This is unfair,” I said to the old army surplus filing cabinet in the corner of the room. “There’s no justice.”

The filing cabinet didn’t say anything but, as I addressed it, I remembered that I had a copy of the Commercial Agents and Private Enquiry Agents Act of 1963 some-where inside it. So perhaps it was talking to me. Sometimes I think I’m becoming more of a mystic as I get older. I put this to my friend Harry Tickener in the bar of the Journalists’ Club recently and he said it was just age and loneliness. “Get a girlfriend,” Harry said, “get a tenant.”

“I’ve had both,” I said. “They…”

“Don’t last. I know. Have another drink. I’d sooner see you drunk than mystical.”

Certainly, I’d ended up more drunk than mystical that night and good few other nights lately. “Time to open new files,” I said to the cabinet, “new windows on the world.” I remembered that there was a bottle of red wine in the cabinet as well as the Commercial Agents and Private Inquiry Agents Act of 1963, the instrument that ruled my life. I got up to commune with both. The office was gloomy but it was bright outside-an open window would be a good idea, too. I was halfway across the room when a firm knock came on the door. I turned, took two steps and opened the door. “Come in,” I said.

The woman who stood in the doorway was close to six feet tall and strongly built. She wore a tailored blue overall with a red sweater underneath it and shoes with low heels. Her face would have been described in some quarters as “weather-beaten”. In fact she had good features, thick dark hair with some grey in it, and if her brown skin had a few more lines and grooves in it than Vogue recommends, bad luck for Vogue.

“You couldn’t have made it from the desk to the door in that time,” she said. “Not possible.”