She had her best bone-china cups out for the tea that she was serving with fancy biscuits and a Madeira cake on display on her coffee table. Had she known how today was going to unfold, she would have moved her cut-and-colour to the morning so that she looked her best: in case the paper wanted to take a photo of her. “More tea?” Mary asked the young man sitting opposite her. Mary had taken an instant shine to Terry James. He was nicer than the other reporters who had been hanging around outside in the street. A right bolshie lot they were, as they tried to ply information from the local residents about the past few days’ events. They had all but bombarded her as she had tried to make her way to the shops. Mary had tried to push through the group who were standing at the end of her front path, blocking it. The rowdy reporters had been shouting at her and Mary had found them to be not only very rude but also quite intimidating. She could see why some of the other neighbours had nicknamed them all vultures.
