I was pretty sure he’d come in at the low end of his budget, but you couldn’t blame a guy for trying, and actually money had been the last thing on my mind. I ran my fingers through my sticky-up morning hair, which was all too often still my afternoon and evening hair, and despite the early hour, I had a gnawing deep down in my soul for some meaningless company and conversation down at the pub.

I stared out through the door, turning Pete’s words over in my head. Could I really be the sign someone had been waiting for? Was it possible I actually might have something worthwhile to say? Could a pig, in fact, learn to fly?

Outside, the sky was shaping up a brilliant blue and the downstairs bedroom curtains still hadn’t moved. I thought about my sister lying there looking out at a tiny sliver of that blue, blue sky, and felt a tug from a ghost at my elbow as a small, brown-haired girl looked up at me like I was the smartest guy in the room. Like I knew every damn thing in the world.

So then, with Pete sitting there waiting hopefully for an answer, I wasn’t thinking about the people who wrote those letters, or him losing his job, or how early was too early to head down the Lamb for a two-pound pint. I wasn’t even thinking about the time my mother went on a drive to Brighton and never came back. I was thinking about the day I met my sister, the first girl who ever rocked my world.

I squinted up into the perfect sky.

‘Three hundred and you’re on, Pete.’

Buzz Lightyear laughed and the little bulldog-clipped bundle of letters crackled as Pete fist-pumped the air and nearly knocked the roof off the shed.

He looked positively galvanised.

Cats, Kings, and the Dawn Arrest of a Spiritual Guru

By staff reporter Pete Barker

A reclusive Belsize Park man was arrested this week for defacing the pavement outside his own house. Police say 42-year-old Danny Mulberry offered no defence when initially questioned about the intriguing graffiti, which read: ‘A cat may look at a king.’ While Mulberry was arrested without incident (except for an expressive hand gesture: see photo above), he gave no indication that he was actually resident at the property, and police were unable to explain his apparent willingness to be taken into custody, beyond suggesting he may have been trying to gain some publicity.

Constable Maria Hanley, of the Metropolitan Police, said Mr Mulberry was entirely cooperative and was later released without charge on the condition he remove the graffiti. However, multiple sources who spoke on the proviso of anonymity suggest there could be much more to this seemingly innocuous eccentric’s story than meets the eye – including rumours Mr Mulberry had won big on the EuroMillions, with reports his prize money was as much as ten million pounds.

With no online presence and a shadowy employment history, it appears Mr Mulberry has taken the unusual step of renting out his luxury house and setting himself up in the property’s garden shed. According to neighbours, he lives extremely basically, scavenging furniture from council waste collections and often using the garden for his ablutions. One neighbour claims to have heard unusual noises coming from the shed at odd hours, although he’s never seen anyone bar Mr Mulberry and his dog go in or out.