It happened when I was peddling paper-clips and typewriter ribbons. I’d just dodged into a huge block of offices in Fleet Street, a building which canvassers weren’t allowed into, as a matter of fact, but I’d managed to give the lift attendant the impression that my bag of samples was merely an attaché case. I was walking along one of the corridors looking for the offices of a small toothpaste firm that I’d been recommended to try, when I saw that some very big bug was coming down the corridor in the other direction. I knew immediately that it was a big bug. You know how it is with these big business men, they seem to take up more room and walk more loudly than any ordinary person, and they give off a kind of wave of money that you can feel fifty yards away. When he got nearly up to me I saw that it was Sir Joseph Cheam. He was in civvies, of course, but I had no difficulty in recognising him. I suppose he’d been there for some business conference or other. A couple of clerks, or secretaries, or something, were following after him, not actually holding up his train, because he wasn’t wearing one, but you somehow felt that that was what they were doing. Of course I dodged aside instantly. But curiously enough he recognised me, though he hadn’t seen me for years. To my surprise he stopped and spoke to me.

“Hullo, you! I’ve seen you somewhere before. What’s your name? It’s on the tip of my tongue.”

“Bowling, sir. Used to be in the A.S.C.”

“Of course. The boy that said he wasn’t a gentleman. What are you doing here?”

I might have told him I was selling typewriter ribbons, and there perhaps the whole thing would have ended. But I had one of those sudden inspirations that you get occasionally—a feeling that I might make something out of this if I handled it properly. I said instead:

“Well, sir, as a matter of fact I’m looking for a job.”

“A job, eh? Hm. Not so easy, nowadays.”

He looked me up and down for a second. The two trainbearers had kind of wafted themselves a little distance away. I saw his rather good-looking old face, with the heavy grey eyebrows and the intelligent nose, looking me over and realised that he’d decided to help me. It’s queer, the power of these rich men. He’d been marching past me in his power and glory, with his underlings after him, and then on some whim or other he’d turned aside, like an emperor suddenly chucking a coin to a beggar.

“So you want a job? What can you do?”

Again the inspiration. No use, with a bloke like this, cracking up your own merits. Stick to the truth. I said: “Nothing, sir. But I want a job as a travelling salesman.”

“Salesman? Hm. Not sure that I’ve got anything for you at present. Let’s see.”