In the kitchen of the Cottage Inn, Upper Bucklebury, Adrian and Gavin were interviewing a local Muslim for the Echo. It wasn’t going well. As he pulled warm pint glasses out of a dishwasher and stacked them screakily on a metal counter, Ayub Benjelloun, a slight, fluid man in his early twenties, with curly hair, wispy sideburns and a strong Thatcham accent, told them, ‘My family’s from Morocco. What have a bunch of inbred Pakis got to do with me?’

Adrian considered that while a waft of salty steam from inside the dishwasher drifted on to him. ‘Fair point,’ he said. ‘But the coverage talks about British Muslims, not British Pakistanis. How do you feel about that?’

‘Could you not find any Pakis in Bucklebury, is that why you’re asking me? What about the guy who runs Costcutter?’

Adrian had already thought of that, but it had turned out Mr Agrawal was a Hindu. ‘So you don’t like being lumped together by the Press? How do you feel about the Beast being just down the road?’

Benjelloun pushed past him to fetch a tray of dirty glasses. ‘Aren’t you meant to be on their side? Or are you a different kind of journalist?’

‘We’re from the Echo, the—’

‘I know. The one with all the adverts in the back.’

Adrian suppressed his thoughts about that and said, ‘Yes, that’s the one.’

‘Can you sell anything you want in there?’

Adrian said with dignity, ‘You’d have to ask the ad-sales team. I can give you his number.’

‘But does anyone actually sell anything that way? Why wouldn’t you just put it on eBay?’

Adrian stared very briefly at a fixed point. ‘I suppose it’s because it’s local. Then you don’t have the postage problem you do if you sell something to someone who lives further away.’

‘Hmm.’ Benjelloun went to push past him again, but said, ‘Do you want to just pass me those glasses?’

Adrian looked at Gavin, who was supposed to be taking all this down to practise his shorthand. Adrian could see that on his spiral notepad he’d written, not in shorthand:

Zante flights x 2   = £400

flat for ten days    = £300

food and drink     = £50 a day = £500

= £1200

FUUUUUCK!!

get suit money

from Adrian?

‘Gavin!’ he snapped. ‘Pass Mr Benjelloum those dirty glasses.’

‘It’s Benjelloun. With an n.’

‘Sorry. Mr Benjelloun. Can you pass him the glasses, Gavin?’

With a dolorous sigh, Gavin closed his notebook, laid it on the counter and began to move stacks of dirty glasses across to where Benjelloun could reach them. Feeling Adrian’s glare, he muttered, ‘This isn’t what I thought journalism would be like.’

‘To me,’ said Benjelloun, ‘it looks a lot like working in a kitchen.’

And to Adrian’s dismay, they both sniggered.

*