But he still stared straight ahead, refusing to look at me. My heart sank. I rarely mentioned my previous incarnation, and although sometimes they actually asked my advice at the Burford Chronicle, it was hard not to see how differently we had done things on the nationals. I was used to the pace of the major broadsheets, the fast-track of a story you had to turn around immediately. I was used to working alone, pushing on despite being told no, unrelenting when I was on the trail of a story. But in Burford they ran a polite ship – it was just that kind of operation. However welcoming they’d been since I’d joined their ranks a year ago, sometimes I felt they just suffered me because they were just – well, polite.

‘So, what now—’ I began as a shiny black Range Rover with partially-tinted windows swung into the small lane far too fast, ragga music pumping from it, narrowly missing our wing mirror. I ducked instinctively as Richard swerved into the hedgerow.

‘Blimey!’

An indignant crow flapped out with a rusty squawk.

‘Bloody idiots,’ Richard muttered. ‘Can’t even drive the bloody things. I don’t know why they bother.’

In the mirror I watched the Range Rover disappear round the bend. It was impossible to see who was driving.

‘Stupid poser,’ Richard muttered, reversing.

I thought of my husband’s big car and cringed.

‘It must be so annoying when you’ve lived here all your life,’ I murmured.

‘What?’

‘All these fake farmers driving round in Chelsea tractors.’

‘Or lived here since ‘ninety-eight, any road.’ Richard’s face finally relaxed into a smile. ‘Truth be told, I wouldn’t mind having a go in one of them myself. I bet they’re bloody powerful.’

We drove back to the office debating the finer points of Mrs Johnson’s twee front garden. In the end, the pissing boy won genitals-down.

* * *

I was packing up to leave when Tina called me over.

‘I have got one thing that might be more up your street. We want to do a kind of Homes & Gardens thing about the new guys up at Albion Manor. Bit of local glamour.’

‘Oh?’ I chucked my notebook into my bag, unenthused. It might be time to give up on the Chronicle. ‘Who’s that?’

‘Hadi Kattan.’ She stuck her pen behind her ear. ‘I want to approach them about a lifestyle piece. It’d be quite a coup, wouldn’t it? And I think they’ll be quite keen because he’s already involved with some community stuff. Word is he’s helping launch his son’s political career, so they’re getting stuck in all over the place. And you’re our big catch really, so he might buy it.’ She looked up at me. ‘Sound up your street?’