So this, apparently, is Britain, in 2018. A faded former film star barking, “Don’t you know who I am?” – only for the impassive doorman to reply, “No, madam, I’m afraid not. Would you mind moving along?”

That, at any rate, is how the EU seems to see it, to judge from the way it treated Theresa May at the Brussels summit. She arrived demanding extra “assurances” about the Irish backstop in the Brexit deal. Not only did the EU refuse to give her them. It deleted the paragraph about “assurances” that was already there.

This afternoon the Prime Minister trudged out to face the press. Perhaps we shouldn’t read too much into the way she looked: after all, she’d been working late into the night. But sometimes adversity brings out the best in her: she hardens, grits her teeth, and powers on through it. On this occasion, though, she looked faintly manic. Her mouth kept doing that thing it does when she’s nervous: twisting and squirming and writhing, as if it’s trying to escape from her face.

There were two ways Mrs May could have approached this press conference. Either announce that she’d had enough of being pushed around – or carry on as if it had all gone swimmingly.