‘There’s no reason why you should know, but the agents are always the problem. They are absolute bastards who love to throw their weight around. The reason is that so often in their miserable lives people have failed to return their calls. And so when they have a very big beast like Daniel on their books, they tend to get way too big for their boots. Luckily I have some experience with these wretched people. Like undertakers, necessary, but not clubbable. See you tomorrow, Melinda.’

She looks around unobtrusively. She wonders who else has been laid off. She doesn’t know how to tell her parents. They were so pleased when she was given a six-month trainee contract after winning a competition. They are great believers in the theory that children should be allowed to develop their imagination rather than being measured solely by exams and tests. There may be something self-serving in this theory, as neither of them made it to college, but they are on the side of Blake and Rousseau: children are born with an innate goodness and infinite possibilities. In a way they are more childlike than she is, and she can’t bear telling them that she’s had the chop. Twelvetrees Media’s head office, somewhere in London, has decreed it. She knows that advertising revenue has fallen, but surely it will pick up when the crunch is finally over. The Cornish are pretty tight at the best of times; still, even they will be forced to spend on something. She will blog. Yes, she will. It’s the future. She’ll become famous. But is anybody going to care what she thinks? She decides to write a diary, with a few video clips and interviews, as a start.

‘I am a number,’ she writes. ‘I am a statistic. I am a sacrifice on the altar of the free market. I have no power, except the power of words.’