Suddenly, there’s an electric click. The main doors are locked, but there’s a night door to the left and the guard has just buzzed it open. A woman with a blonde ponytail and a figure-hugging white top skips in, the rubber of her tennis shoes squeaking on the granite floor. She walks past the security guard behind his desk, scans her pass, and comes through the revolving turnstile. She’s got her Walkman headphones on and is oblivious to me. It’s only when she’s through that she spots us. And – thank goodness – smiles warmly at me.

She takes off the headphones. ‘Gil?’ She is surprised to see me, as well she might be.

‘Ange, darling.’

She’s Ange Levinson, the Globe’s royal editor. More relevantly, she was on the same journalism course as me at Cardiff, after I left Oxford. I’ve never been happier to see anyone.

The two minders edge away. If they are escorting me on my last ever journey, they are smart enough not to want anyone to remember them being here with me.

‘What are you doing here?’ she asks.

‘I might just as well ask you the same question.’

‘Princess Di story. Just got some new snaps of her leaving that Chelsea gym with someone we don’t recognise. The editor wants me to find out everything I can before conference tomorrow. And you know me, I was never one for sleep.’

I move closer to her. Closer to the barriers. I think she may be flirting with me, and I’ve never been so grateful. The thing about Ange is she was always a brilliant, instinctive journalist, the best in our year. She gives me a quizzical look and I am pretty sure she knows something is up. She’s taken in the minders and can see Streatham loitering in the shadows near the lifts. I assume she recognises him. Everyone in our trade does.

‘What did you say you were doing here?’

‘I’ve been working on a project with Kevin Wilkinson. It’s an interesting story. I’d love to tell you about it.’ I’ve noticed that the guard on the reception desk – not a young man from the special services, but a paunchy bloke in his fifties, probably an ex-copper gone to seed – has moved and is standing by the night door. He’s left it open, having clocked that we are leaving.