‘And the meeting with him is at four thirty tomorrow afternoon at the Hilton? On a Sunday? Are you sure?’ she asked doubtfully. A meeting on a Sunday didn’t seem right to her.

Julian checked his notebook, running his pen down the indecipherable scrawls until he found what he was looking for. ‘That’s right. Sunday. He’s a busy man, our Rory. They don’t work nine to five, you know, these television executives. Just go to the hotel reception and ask for him and they will direct you. Now, off you scamper. I do have other clients apart from you!’ He fluttered a hand to shoo her away.

Evelyn stood up, rushed round to the other side of the desk, bent down and planted a kiss on Julian’s cheek. ‘Thank you, Julian,’ she said breathlessly.

‘I’m just looking out for my ten per cent,’ he said in a matter-of-fact tone, but he was grinning at her. ‘And Evelyn,’ he added as she reached for the door handle, his voice a little more serious now, ‘don’t blow it.’

Sunday arrived and Evelyn dressed carefully in a skirt and blouse and a pair of unladdered tights that she’d stolen from Brenda’s room, fully intending to replace them the following day. The doorman opened the door for her as she approached the hotel and then smiled at her as she passed by him.

‘Good afternoon, miss,’ he said.

‘Good afternoon,’ she replied. She sounded like a schoolma’am. Or a policewoman. The thought made her smile.

She walked straight to the reception desk, feeling as if every eye in the place was on her. She was going to have to get used to that, she thought. The turned heads, the nudging and whispering as she walked into a room.

‘I’m here to see Mr MacMillan,’ she said, hoping that the slight shake in her voice was only audible to her.

The receptionist looked at the book in front of her, running a manicured finger down the columns. ‘Mr MacMillan is in suite 507,’ she said. ‘Fifth floor,’ she added, pointing to the lift.

‘Thank you,’ replied Evelyn, and set off in the direction of the lift hoping that she looked nonchalant and as if she went to meetings in hotel suites every day of the week, but inside her stomach was churning with nerves. She was so close to this that she could almost taste her success. And this final part of the process would surely be easy. The casting panel liked her and she had already impressed Rory MacMillan at the New Year’s Eve party. Talking to him now was just a formality, a getting to know each other a little better.

She wondered who else would be there. The quietly spoken director from her audition, she imagined, and maybe whoever they had cast as the inspector. Evelyn ran through a list of possible actresses in her head, hoping that whoever it was was already famous. But even if they weren’t yet, she supposed they soon would be. They both would be.