Status Anxiety: My neighbour the vigilante

Sometimes, burglars really do mess with the Wrong Guy

At 4.20 a.m. last Friday, my friend and neighbour was awoken by the sound of breaking glass. It was one of the panels in his front door and when the noise had died away he could make out the voices of two young men intent on entering his house. Lying next to him was his wife and, in adjacent bedrooms, their three young daughters.

As he lay in bed wondering what to do, it occurred to him that the two men trying to break into his house had no reason to think it wasn’t occupied. On the contrary, his car was in the driveway and his bull terrier was in its basket in the hall. Whatever these men intended to do, they had clearly taken into account that the house was occupied by a young family. For the purposes of this story, let’s call my friend Bill.

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