after dropping Danielle off in the city, but I couldn’t grab more than a cup of coffee. A lot was happening. My secretary/assistant/confidante, Rachel Carlotti, a computer-efficient, ex-school headmistress of forty-five, had a daunting list of messages for me. It was important to speak with Farrar and Dr Morris. Rachel said I had better also call Detective Benns, who had made four calls. I had told Rachel not to use the car phone because I didn’t want to be burdened with ‘urgent’ messages while trying to see Farrar and attend Martine’s funeral. At the top of a five-billion-dollar-a-year organisation like Benepharm there is a never-ending stream of decisions to make, things to sign, reports to review, people who wish to see the boss and so on, and no matter how much I delegated, many things somehow managed to seep through to me. On a bad day I was at my desk at seven a.m. and on a good day six thirty-five a.m. That had allowed me to work a hundred hours a week and to keep on top of things for fifteen years.
