I took the card to my study, where I discovered two new emails had recently arrived. I tossed the card on the desk while I read the messages. I replied to one of them, then picked up the card again.

My desktop computer, which I had purchased the previous year, had a card reader built into it. Never having found a need for it I had never investigated it. The longest slot was designed to take a card of five and a half centimetres, the standard width of debit and credit cards. Out of idle interest I took the hotel card and pressed it into the reader.

Nothing happened for a few seconds, but the signal light for the solid state disc drive indicated it was in use.

The screen changed to a pleasant pale blue, with the message: Enter preferred language. The first choice was Archipelagian Demotic. I clicked on it.

Next: Enter your Social Level.

I frowned, made a growling noise, rapped my fingers on the desk. I was tempted to pull the card out of the reader then and there. This was the enquiry I was habitually unwilling to answer. Who needs to know that, and why? What difference does it make to any damned software program? It was one of those intermittent reminders of the archaic and undemocratic social system which ruled our lives, and which most people ignored.

I pressed Return, to see if I could bypass the query. It returned.

There was a list of ‘social level’ options, the twelve familiar ones that allegedly defined the hierarchy of the Archipelagian society:

Serf, Citizen Serf, Villein, Squire, Vassal, Corvée Provider, Cartage Provider, Demesne Landed, Knight, Manorial Landed, Baron, Seignior.

In the anonymity of my office, and still grumbling, I was briefly tempted to pick one of the higher levels. I let the highlight bar hover over Manorial Landed, curious to find out what if any privileges would be given to those of such an elevated position. But then years of what I grudgingly admit must have been social conditioning kicked back in, and I clicked on Citizen Serf.

I knew my place. I never gave it a moment’s thought, but I clearly knew what I was and where I was ranked. Forever a citizen serf! A writer, a humble scribe!

Another screen appeared. Enter Password.

This was the moment when, with hindsight, I should have ejected the card from the reader and rebooted the computer. Getting beyond a password was always an irritant, even though in practice most corporate passwords are banal and simple to guess. That evening it merely added to the aggravation and annoyance.

Staring at the screen I typed: plaza

The password was demanded a second time. I typed plazahotel

The password was demanded a third time. I typed dearthplaza

I was in.

Enter numerical location within ‘dearthplaza’. After a moment’s wondering, then some thinking, I typed my former room number: 627