I looked past the small man to where there were perhaps thirty other people who had also replied to the advert. They all smiled cheerily and waved a copy of the paper at me. I looked back at the small man, who raised an eyebrow quizzically.

‘You’re hired,’ I snapped. ‘First job, get rid of this little lot.’ I jerked my head in the direction of the wannabe apprentices and went inside. I shut the door and wondered quite what to do next. On an impulse I called Mother Zenobia. She seemed even more pleased to hear from me than usual.

‘Jennifer, darling!’ she gushed. ‘I’ve just heard the news and we are so proud! Just think, a daughter of the Great Lobster becoming a Dragonslayer!’

I was slightly suspicious.

‘How did you hear, Mother?’

‘We’ve had some charming people around here asking all kinds of questions about you!’

‘You didn’t tell them anything, did you?’

I had no real desire to have my rather dull childhood splashed all over the tabloids. There was a pause on the other end of the phone, which answered my question.

‘Was that wrong?’ asked Mother Zenobia at length.

I sighed. Mother Zenobia had taken over the role of my real mother almost perfectly, even that unique motherly quality of being able to acutely embarrass me.

‘It doesn’t matter,’ I replied with a trace of annoyance in my voice, a trace that she obviously didn’t pick up.

‘Jolly good!’ she said brightly. ‘If you get the offer to appear on the Yogi Baird Radio Show don’t turn it down, and if I may say so, I think Fizzi-Pop is a fine product. I have a jolly pleasant young man who is very keen to talk to you.’

I thanked her and rang off. The doors to the garage opened and the small man in the brown suit expertly reversed in the Rolls-Royce. He hopped down from the armoured car, put the sword and lance away – he could without being vaporised, since I had employed him – and offered me a small hand to shake.

‘Gordon’s the name,’ he said brightly, pumping my arm vigorously. ‘Gordon van Gordon.’

‘That means “Son of Gordon”, doesn’t it?’

He nodded enthusiastically.

‘I come from a long line of Gordons. My full name is: Gordon van Gordon Gordon-son ap Gordon-Gordon the IV.’

‘I’ll stick to “Gordon”,’ I said.

‘It may save some time.’

‘Jennifer Strange,’ I announced, ‘pleased to meet you.’

‘And you.’

He didn’t stop shaking my hand. He seemed so happy to be here he wanted everything he did to last as long as possible so he could savour it to the full.

‘I don’t know who put the ad in the paper but it wasn’t me,’ I told him.

‘That’s easily explained,’ he said with a grin. ‘It was me!’

‘You? Why?’