James walked the woman into the glaring light of the A and E, and soon as he explained the situation to the receptionist, matters were taken out of his hands as if the whole thing had been prearranged. Two women in scrubs took the lady away, walking her slowly and with care into an anteroom. Someone else immediately headed towards the room with a clipboard and a bag of medical equipment. A trolley rumbled by with an ancient, paper-white person on it, face covered by an oxygen mask. The receptionist asked James what relation he was, and James explained he didn’t even know the woman’s name – why hadn’t he asked her name? – and they said that it was all right, they could take care of it from here, and there was a coffee machine in the corner and he was welcome to take a seat if he wanted. But James had the sense that he was now surplus to the drama; in fact, it was almost like he’d dreamed it all, and was now waking to find he hadn’t really done anything at all. He walked out of the door and back into what was now a drizzle. It was ten o’clock, and someone shouted drunkenly from the entrance of the Old Oak pub across the road. James looked around and wondered how to get home. He couldn’t tell whether he had passed this strange little test, set by the universe with no warning, or failed it.

That unease had followed him around for the next week or so, especially as – of course – he never heard the end, never found out what happened to the woman. But there was something in the experience, when he reviewed it, that was useful; that was trying to teach him something. He realized that what he liked about doing the freelance computing job was helping people, contributing in some way to the giant network of humanity he’d originally tried to help build at the old start-up. The driver’s confidence in taking charge, his near-relish for the task of grappling with this strange human situation, was something James didn’t associate with himself. But the will was there. He’d like to be somebody who could see someone, a newcomer, approaching his car, and think: Let’s see how I can help. He looked up the firm the next day, and he was working there by the end of the month.

*