It had spotted him a few yards back and instinctively homed in on its prey, recognising that look in his eye and reacting without mercy. Some kind of sixth sense told cats which person in any given room most detested or was allergic to their species, so that they knew precisely whose lap to leap upon. A similar prescience had been visited upon spoilt Oxbridge undergrad hoorays in stupid costumes dispensing fliers for their dismal plays and revues. It was for this reason that a phenomenon such as the Fringe could never have thrived in Glasgow. In Edinburgh, most locals were stoically, if wearily, tolerant of such impositions; through in the west, dressing up as a giant lizard and deliberately getting in people’s way would constitute reckless endangerment of the self. ‘There’s no getting past me, I’m afraid!’ the iguana chirped brightly in a stagey, let’s-be-friends, happy-cheery, go on, please stab me, you know it’ll make you feel better tone of voice. ‘Not without taking one of these!’ it continued, thrusting a handful of leaflets at him.
