Low life | 28 June 2018

I heard the last and final call for flight 6114 to Nice while shuffling forward in the unexpectedly long queue for security. My chances of catching it now looked slim. They looked slimmer still when my bag was nudged into the line of those needing to be searched, and I despaired at my rotten luck. Eventually, my bag was placed on the metal search table and I presented myself as the owner. Across the table, I faced two women, both aged about 60. One was in command, the other subordinate. The commanding one had a smoker’s face with a touch of the eldritch about it that wouldn’t have looked out of place in a Richard Dadd fairy painting.

It was immediately clear, however, that this woman dealt only in material realities and that she took no prisoners. If I had told her that the last call for my flight had been broadcast ten minutes earlier, and any further delay would scupper me, I would have got short shrift.