Cofidis! Banesto! Zucca MV!

‘Ah, Miss McCabe, your room is on the fifth floor. Number 50.’

When Cat arrived at the lifts she grinned, for there, as in all races, regardless of prestige, a list of the teams and their rooms was pinned unceremoniously.

Jesus – what a perfect, God-given sandwich I have become!

Temporarily flabbergasted, Cat scanned the list over and again, pinching herself that what she saw was correct.

It says so! Massimo Lipari and Gianni Fugallo directly below, Jose Maria Jimenez directly above. If Jimenez and Lipari want to vie for pin-up of the peloton, they can always meet half-way at room 50 and let me be the judge!

The fact that room 50 turned out to be rather small, with the teak veneer fittings and meagre chewing-gum-grey towels typical of a sub-2-star hotel, was of no consequence to Cat.

I’m here in France surrounded by the boys!

Wednesday. Hôtel Splendide, Delaunay Le Beau. 11.29 p.m.

Stefano Sassetta is delighted. Thanks to Rachel, his soigneur, he does not have to share a room. He had a great training ride this morning and is confident he will attain peak form during this first week, be invincible in the sprints and start hoovering up bonuses for the points in the green jersey competition. His thighs feel good and, after Rachel’s incomparable massage and Stefano’s lengthy scrutiny in the bathroom mirror, they look sublime to him. Stefano has been zapping through the television channels. His French is poor so he continues to flick the remote control, stopping awhile at MTV, enjoying a few minutes of boxing on Eurosport before it becomes tractor racing or dominoes, or some commensurately poor excuse for a sport. On he zaps. He is tired. He should sleep. But he is too psyched. If his manager came in and suggested a night ride, he’d be on his bike in a flash. He feels powerful and proud. And now he is delighted, for, two channels on from Eurosport, a porn movie is in its throes. Now he’ll be able to sleep. Masturbation is a great idea. Masturbation is better than sex – no energy wasted, as an ejaculation uses only sixty calories. No energy thrown away on pleasuring anyone but himself.

Thursday. Delaunay Le Beau. 10 a.m.

In the timescale of the Tour de France, Thursday is the dawn of two days of medicals for the riders, accreditation for the journalists and press conferences for both.

The previous evening, though Cat had tried valiantly to stay awake and recline demurely on her bed reading, neither Jose Maria Jimenez or Massimo Lipari had come to see her. She had woken in the early hours, dejected and still clothed.

As if they would have come to my bloody room.

Feeling a little foolish, she had crawled under the bedcovers, still clothed, for a few more hours of exhausted sleep.

Now, showered, changed twice, breakfasted and disappointed that there were no riders in sight, Cat left the hotel; the whirlwind of butterflies in her stomach at odds with the balmy climate outside. The trees, lampposts and road signs in the town of Delaunay Le Beau, which was hosting the Prologue and housing the Tour entourage, were bedecked with arrows pointing the colour-coded way for anyone who had anything to do with the Tour de France. For Cat, to follow the green pressé arrows was like being led on a treasure hunt.