King'ori Mwangi, the retired police boss who took a final bow this week, was an affable man who trained as a scribe and used his skills to professionalise the service. We met once in his office, where he had invited me for lunch.

It was a rare entreaty that I decided to honour, and where I was joined by a handful of senior boys in blue to a meal of meat and ugali. There was no particular agenda for the meeting, King'ori revealed, save for the opportunity to get to know each other.

That was a reasonable request: police and scribes are always in search of information from the public. Scribes publish their findings; police file theirs in dossiers to help prosecute cases.