I don't like lawyers, never have. Most of them are professional pessimists, where me, when the world is falling down on me, I tend to think ‘where can I sell this hardcore?’

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So, it's normal that sitting in the offices of Turnip Swede and Beetroot, or whatever Lance's firm is called, I feel nervous. It's normal, but I'm not sure quite why I'm here. I shouldn't need to be, today is completion of my purchase and sale, all done and dusted. Instead, I'm sitting in the reception area of Turnaround Stop and Brake, waiting, and wondering.

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It's a typical set-up. Large chairs which are supposed to be comfortable but where you slide off the leather, banging your knees on the glass coffee table and knocking the property and business magazines to the floor.

There's a receptionist sat on a high desk off to one side, he; very forward looking, Transom, Stern and Big End, looks and acts like Giselle's brother. He'd brought me a drink in one of those China cups which are designed to slurp the coffee into the saucer as soon as you pick it up, and I dripped some onto my trousers, well work-stained jeans, actually.

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Perhaps that's what he hadn't liked. That and the plaster on my shirt and, I'm pretty sure, some on my hair. Tough, I'm busy and I'm a sexy multitasker, though right now, I also feel a bit worn down.

"Tallboy, Sideboard and Basin, how may I direct your call?"

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I must have heard him say that thirty times so far, and always he makes it sound like he's just been interrupted doing something far more important, when it's his bloody job.

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The sound level increases for a moment, and Jennifer, Lance's assistant, appears at an open door down the corridor and starts walking towards me. Very Trainee Lawyer is Jennifer, knee-length dark skirt, smart white blouse and business jacket, trim dark hair and maybe nearly twenty-two. She makes me feel old, and I run my hand through my hair, picking a bit of plaster out of the back.

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"Mr Mellon," she smiles, and for the first time, I feel, if not welcome, at least as if I'm someone with a recognised part in this little three-act play. "Lance can see you now, do come on through."

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Solicitors seem to come in two sorts. Either their offices are stacked floor to ceiling with piles of papers, or they aren’t. Lance is one of the aren’ts.

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He has a single blue folder on his desk. The cover has a thin strip of white tape that has been stuck with precision to the front of it by someone proud of their OCD. Typed on the tape are the words "Tilsley-Mellon".

"Ah Charlie, good to see you, thanks for coming by." There is something about his voice, a slight whine to it, probably from perpetually saying, 'ah, that might be an issue'.

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"Oh, no problem," I say, "It's just a one-hundred-and-twenty-mile round trip, and it's not like I was up to my arms in half-made plaster moulds or anything important."

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"Good, good," he says. Clearly, he's not a partner in Sarcasm and Subtlety, and this goes straight over his smart blonde haircut.

"You see," he says, and for the first time, I notice that he appears to be sweating slightly, a few expensive beads of legal perspiration on his brow, and it's not warm in here. "We have hit a small snag."

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That's not my experience with solicitors. Firstly, it's never 'we', it very soon becomes ' you. In a bacon and egg breakfast, the client is always the pig, the solicitor always the hen.

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"Yes?" I say, maybe sounding calm, only it feels like I've just stepped off a ledge, and I'm not sure how far the fall is.

 

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