I have never described that half-second to anybody who understood what I was describing.

In the car afterward she did not say well done.

She said: “Devereaux.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“You knew his name.”

“I learned the front four rows.”

She looked out of the window for about a mile and then she said, “There are people on my executive team who have not learned the front four rows in six years.”

I want to be honest about what that did to me, because this is the part of the account where I have to stop being the reasonable narrator.