“Er, I suppose so,” said Dirk. “Um, can you still see the cab we’re supposed to be following?”

“Oh yeah, I’m following him okay. So, the only time you ever actually see the cabbie is when a fare says something to him. And when a fare says something to a cabbie in a drama, you know what it invariably is?”

“Let me guess,” said Dirk. “It’s ‘Follow that cab!’ ”

“Exactly my point. So if what you see on the telly is to be believed, all cabbies ever do,” continued the cabbie, “is follow other cabbies.”

“Hmmm,” said Dirk, doubtfully.

“Which leaves me in a very strange position, as being the one cabbie that never gets asked to follow another cabbie. Which leads me to the unmistakable conclusion that I must be the cabbie all the other cabbies are following . . .”

Dirk squinted out of the window, trying to spot if there was another cab he could switch to.

“Now, I’m not saying that’s what’s actually happening, but you can see how someone might get to thinking that way, can’t you? It’s the power of the media, innit?”

“There was,” said Dirk, “an entire television series about taxi drivers. It was called, as I recall, Taxi.”

“Yeah, well I’m not talking about that, am I?” said the cabbie, irrefutably, “I’m talking about the power of the media to selectively distort reality. That’s what I’m talking about. I mean, when it comes down to it, we all live in our own different reality, don’t we, I mean when it comes down to it.”

“Well, yes, I think you’re right as a matter of fact,” said Dirk, uneasily.

“I mean, you take these kangaroos they’re trying to teach language to. What does anyone think we’re going to talk about? What are we going to say, then, eh? ‘So—how’s the hopping life treating you then?’ ‘Oh fine, mustn’t grumble. This pocket down me front’s a bit of a pain, though, always full of fluff and paper clips.’ It isn’t going to be like that. These kangaroos have got brains the size of a walnut. They live in a different world, see. It would be like trying to talk to John Selwyn Gummer. You see what I’m saying?”

“Can you see the cab we’re following?”

“Clear as a bell. Probably be there before him.”

Dirk frowned.

“Be where before him?”

“Heathrow.”

“How on earth do you know he’s going to Heathrow?”

“Any cabbie can tell if another cabbie’s going to Heathrow.”

“What do you mean?”