‘Does she? I can see where you’re coming from, but I rather like that aspect of her character. But then I’ve always enjoyed an intimidating woman. I felt the same way towards Mrs Thatcher herself.’ The lift doors opened again and they made their way down the corridor.

‘Dead men walking,’ whispered Ben.

‘I had her on the show several times, of course,’ continued George. ‘Mrs T, I mean. You’d have been just a boy back then, discovering your nascent sexuality and holding tea parties in your back garden.’

‘I never—’

‘Anyway, we knew each other a little socially, Margaret and me. Beverley and I had her over to dinner a few times. She was always terribly good with the children, which surprised me, and insisted on helping with the washing-up afterwards too, which was really unnecessary. She didn’t want to leave, particularly on that final occasion. She just wanted to drink whisky and growl about how all these terribly wet men had stabbed her in the back. I told her that she could probably have her own political show if she wanted, and she shook her head, placed a hand on my arm, and said, “But George, one shall never leave office. One must go on and on and on.” Of course, this was ten years into her retirement, when she was starting to go a bit doolally. She didn’t even remember that she’d been put out to pasture a long time before.’

‘Well, here we are,’ said Ben as they approached the receptionist’s desk, glad that this particular trot down memory lane would be forced to come to an end.

‘I always felt a little sorry for her afterwards, to be honest,’ continued George with a sigh. ‘After all, without work, without an audience, what is there?’

‘George Cleverley and Ben Bimbaum for Margaret Roberts,’ said Ben, addressing the receptionist, who barely looked up before reaching for the phone.

‘Good morning, young man,’ said George in an unnecessarily loud voice.

‘Good morning,’ he replied, looking a little shaken by the exuberance of the greeting.

‘And just to be clear, you are a young man, aren’t you?’

‘My name is Dennis,’ he said uncertainly, turning to Ben, who smiled reassuringly.

‘Dennis, Denise, you tell me what you want me to say,’ said George, ‘and I will most cheerfully say it.’

He offered a half-bow from the waist and went over to sit on a sofa while Dennis, bewildered, made the call.

‘There’s no one in there with her, of course,’ said George when Ben joined him after checking that the boy wasn’t going to call Human Resources to issue a complaint. ‘But she’ll keep us waiting for a few minutes, just to prove a point.’

‘What point is that?’

‘That she’s more important than us.’

‘She is more important than us,’ said Ben.

‘Than you, yes,’ admitted George. ‘But not me. She is senior in the organization, certainly. She outranks me. But Heads of Entertainment come and go. The talent, on the other hand, stays. We go on and on and on.’