The newsroom reverberated like the engine room of an ocean liner at full steam. Will had been taken up in the terrible din and was working faster and surer than he ever had before. His fingers could not stop typing long enough to open the style guide and he felt he was claiming his seat as he asked Jeremy and Max the questions he would earlier in the day have checked himself: ‘Focussed, one s or two?’; ‘The Bible, capital t?’ And Jeremy or Max shot back, ‘One s’, ‘No cap’, and their togetherness was palpable.

Jeremy was in a state of near-magical alertness and dexterity. Style questions from Will; map questions from Graphics; copy questions from Max; and always him with the answer. He shot each question down the instant it popped up. He was headshot Jez, the deadshot kid.

It was in this moment that Rosie’s reporter called her back about the blind woman. The phone rang amid the noise and, as Rosie answered, she felt her body seize. The import of what the reporter said struck her, and she was stricken. But she managed to say ‘Thanks’ and then: ‘Max, the blind woman. She’s not blind.’

That was serious enough for Max to disengage his concentration from the splash. He said, ‘What do you mean, she’s not blind?’

It was all that Rosie could do to speak. ‘She’s partially sighted. And registered, I mean, she gets disability benefit. She’s legally blind, I mean partially.’

‘OK, so that’s fudge-able. But the money. The whole point of this story is that she didn’t see him take the money out of her purse. Did any of this actually fucking happen?’

‘Apparently he did take the money, the money from her purse. She saw him do it, but she was too shocked to say anything.’

‘But we had quotes from her hours ago. We’ve got her saying she forgives him. How the fuck did this blind old bitch not mention this then?’

Rosie cowered. ‘I don’t know.’

‘Fuck,’ said Max. Not even having time to look down at his watch, his eyes flicked to the wall clock. Seven minutes past nine. He was close to the abyss. He kept himself together. ‘OK,’ he said, and unmarked the page as ready to send, while calling across to the pairers’ desk: ‘Hold twenty-two.’ They shouted back, ‘Hold twenty-two.’

‘So, she was too scared to stop him when he took her money, is that fair?’

‘Umm, yes.’

Max looked at the headline:

BLIND GRANNY ROBBED

BY BIG ISSUE-SELLING

BULGARIAN WHILE SHE

GAVE HIM A DONATION

‘So the headline can stand. She’s legally blind, that’s true, isn’t it?’

‘Partially.’

‘Partially blind is still blind. Or it’s blind enough for now. We’ll clarify in the copy. And he thought she was blind, is that right?’

‘As far as we know.’