My head had a pleasant buzz thing happening as the wine kicked in and its warmth softened the edges of the frozen ball in the pit of my stomach. My state of mellowness dissipated pretty quickly, however, when it was my turn to attend to the drinks. One of the pitfalls of being a bit on the short side is that people tend to overlook you. The situation wasn’t helped by bloody great lug-heads who pushed in front of me at the bar. By the time the bar-chick noticed me, which was an eternity – amazing how all the guys got served first – I was more than a little septic. I bit back the urge to point out her shortcomings. It was probably wasted on someone who wore one of those god-awful studs below her lower lip. I hated to think what it did to her teeth. But I almost forgave all when she filled the glasses to a generous level.

I turned around and made my way gingerly back through the throng. The place had filled up considerably and the volume had escalated with it. I had a couple of close calls as I made my way towards the back and had almost reached safety when a hand plonked onto my shoulder, near giving me a coronary. I held my breath as the wine sloshed to the rim of the glass.

‘Fancy seeing you here. So, you decided to come out, after all – and you didn’t even invite me.’ I half turned and there was Paul Frost with some stupid, mocked-up hurt look on his face. My eyes darted over to where Maggie was sitting and the cow gave me a wink.

‘Oh, spare me the pathetic looks, why don’t you. Are you stalking me, Paul? And don’t give me your cute “I’m-a-detective” line again.’