Everyone will have met Basil and Sybil Fawlty in real life — the would-be genteel types who, in running a provincial hotel, have condemned themselves to quite the wrong vocation, who are convinced their clientele are riff-raff and by whom the most modest request is interpreted as an unforgivable imposition. I encountered a classic couple only the other day — the virago muttering behind the desk, pen poised, and her lanky, put-upon husband sighing to me as he emerged from the cellar and lifted (quite violently) the grille at the bar, ‘Has the Gestapo given you the wine list?’ Such people loathe the idea of service — like those antique dealers and gallery owners who’ll kill you if they get mistaken for shopkeepers.

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