What The Butler Saw

I was escorted home by a policeman this Hallowe'en. I was walking from the tube to my flat that evening after a day on shifts, having forgotten completely what day it was, and idly wondered why there were so many groups of youths wandering around menacingly. Then I realised they were wearing masks with their hoodies and remembered it was Hallowe'en. It was dark and as I made my way through the sprawling estate near Caledonian road, I saw the door of one house open and an old man cowering inside while his middle aged son leapt out and half-heartedly chased one of the gangs of hooded boys, then gave up. I wondered what exactly the gang had done to the old man and his son in their house? I was now alone walking up a dark street with the gang just ahead of me - about seven 16-year old males with hoodies and scary masks and a 'definitely not joking' air about them. Suddenly two of them peeled off from the group and started walking back towards me at pace, pulling their hoods close to their faces. I instinctively sensed I was in danger and turned around and started walking briskly back where I had come from. I heard them pursue me and they shouted 'Running away, ya fucking cunt'. I FREAKED and started running! Suddenly, like a mirage, I saw a policeman right there, on the other side of the main road. I have never ever ever seen a police officer anywhere on the estate before in the two years I've lived in the area. But when I needed one, he appeared, like a miracle. I sprinted towards him in tears and he said he'd thought the boys were shouting at him. He was wonderfully calm in that almost patronising way police officers do so well, where they talk to you as if you're two years old, and said 'Let's just walk up the street together then shall we - you and me, eh?' And so we did. The boys shouted at us some more from an alleyway, at which the policeman laughed in his jocular way, 'They're such big lads aren't they?' At the corner of my street, where the estate ends and the nice Islington townhouses start, I said I would be fine and he went on his way. Finding the policeman was wonderful in the same way sighting a rare breed of lion is exciting. It's not something you ever see, basically, and then when you do, it's like discovering some rare and powerful creature you've only heard about but never seen really does exist.

M&S's new organic parsley mash, much vaunted on TV, is my new addiction.