Wandering aimlessly back from work on Thursday afternoon past the shops in Trustafaria that I can't afford to go into when, just before I press my nose against the window of Ottolenghi like Holly Golightly (I eat my Marks and Spencer sausage roll from a bag while marvelling at their £3.50 cup cakes) I hear a voice behind me.
This is unusual as I am not often hailed in the street unless it is to be slapped with a copy of London Lite or asked for money. Since I wasn't standing outside a tube station I guessed the free paper wasn't an option. Damn it - how can you tell a beggar that you don't have any dosh when you're standing outside an emporium of vastly inflated conspicuous consumption, eating? Wave the M& S wrapper under their nose and say you're only sightseeing? Fearing the worst I turned with heavy heart.
And then, relaxed: It was just a girl holding a gift-wrapped parcel and pushing an infant in a stroller with a pair of expensive party-focked toddlers welded to each side of the handle, from which floated a large balloon with a number 5 on it.
'Excuse me Lady, I need help.' she said in a heavily accented voice, obviously not from around these parts, and definitely not the children's mother who was more likely to be sitting inside Ottolenghi pushing a quinoa salad round the plate.
'I am looking for number one hund-er-ed and nine-tee sith, and it no here.' There was a hint of panic in her voice as she looked around her, as though she had wandered unwittingly into some sort of incomprehensible parallel universe, which was probably about right.
'A hundred and ninety-six?' I asked, just to be clear.
'Si, Lady, but it no here.' The children stood like contented cows, staring into open mouthed space, but the girl was obviously distressed, desperate to get her charges to some little Camilla's birthday party.
I looked up at the picture framers where I was standing and, this being Trusafaria, of course there was no ruddy number. Across the street there was a church that sold fancy blouses of the sort worn by Italian hookers, and a drop-in centre for the homeless. Again, no number. I could see her problem. I glanced further up the road where there was the candle shop - yes, I kid you not - a whole store devoted to scented candles where, for £35.00 you can perfume your rooms with 'woodsmoke' - something we achieve at home simply by having a charred pine log that won't burn sitting in the grate.
Anyway, I digress, there was at least a number: 195. This made everything clearer. For all of two seconds. Then I realised I would have to find another number to see which way they were running. I squinted over at Emma Hope where you can buy velvet baseball boots at £205 a pair. 207. Eureka.
'It's going to be on the other side of the road somewhere - the numbers are going that way.' I pointed up towards the Emerald Isle, architect designed public toilets.
'But, how? Look this is one hund-er-ed and nine-tee five but one hund-er-ed and nine-tee seth, it no here.' The girl looked as though she was going to cry. 'I no understand...' she said but, finally, I did...
'In England we have odd numbers on one side of the road - on this side 195, so this will be 197, then 199 and so on, while on the other side there will be the even numbers, so you just have to cross over the street and look there.'
The girl's face cleared in relief tinged with embarrasment as the parallel universe made just a little more sense to her, and set off at top speed across the zebra crossing. Problem solved. Now if someone can just tell me what the point of velvet baseball boots is, we'll all be a lot wiser.
