I went to ask Mrs McNulty whether she’d seen my cat. She was in the middle of vehement denial of any involvement in its disappearance, when I noticed a piece of paper pinned to a door off her hallway. On it was written “EXORCISE ROOM” in shaky felt-tip pen.

‘I didn’t know you had a gym, Mrs McNulty,’ I said, striding past her and following the steps down into her cellar.

And there was my cat, surrounded by candles on top of a wooden crucifix-shaped table. She was fast asleep and smelt of sage. Beside her was a book entitled Spiritual Warfare: A User’s Manual, with the pages open at some kind of prayer or incantation.

I picked up the cat, went back up the stairs and confronted Mrs McNulty.

‘What have you been doing to her?’

Mrs McNulty fiddled distractedly with the umbrella stand in her hallway.

‘MRS McNULTY!?’

‘Let’s just say she’ll be having no more problems with evil spirits,’ she declared, winking and tapping her nose, before proclaiming triumphantly: ‘There’ll be no more barking from her!’

I held onto the cat tightly and hurried out the door. If anyone was barking, it was Mrs McNulty.

Thursday July 19th

I have received six items of post today, all of them bills. Among them was a reminder from Bloomer’s about my outstanding payment for Robinson Crusoe and an invoice from the hotel in Saffron Walden for undeclared mini-bar items from my final evening there. I fail to understand how the invoice can be so big when the fridge had seemed so small.

I put the invoices under my bed in a box with all the other ones and got on instead with my party preparations.

Friday July 20th

Birthday Party, Alone

Wearing my most daring tank top,

I arrived downstairs fashionably late,

at a quarter to eight;

the invitations that I forgot to send out

some days before

clearly stated it was to begin at 7:34.

I put on ‘Russians’ by Sting.

It wasn’t long before the party

was in full swing.

Hanging out in the kitchen

with the Cheese Singles

I met the Pringles,

whom I thought delightful,

far better company than the rather nonchalant

wild mushroom vol-au-vents.

Six skittish tins of Fosters enticed me

to play a game of Hold the Parcel

(forty-two minutes – a new record),

Musical Statues (until I got cramp

attempting to out-statue a Victorian floor lamp),

and finally, Sardine,

in which I hid in the airing cupboard

for three days, on an inexpertly folded sheet

until I found myself.