Apparently her correspondent had something to say about my writing generally and, in particular, about my recent comments on the murders in Jerusalem.

I was enthralled and stood over the fax machine until the letter arrived. Unfortunately, it was not a recommendation for the Pullitzer Prize. It contained no suggestion I be allowed a thousand words a week, in place of my customary 500, or my fee ought to be increased. In fact, the only encouraging thing it said was that the author had read my column every week for the past few months. For a writer, that is at least something.

Apart from that, it was just a little negative. To be exact, it said my writing is extreme, reactionary, crude, inflammatory, poorly written and poorly researched. And, to put the icing on the cake, the author castigated my Jerusalem column as having "fallen off a cliff in terms of responsible comment".

Even worse, the letter was well written, calm, thoughtful and entirely lacking in that hysterical, green ink quality that enables one to be dismissive. This was a serious letter, from a serious Sabden resident and it deserved serious thought.

All indications to the contrary notwithstanding, I am a sensitive soul and, over the weekend, read and reread the letter obsessively. I did not really know what I was looking for, but I knew I was looking for something. And then, all of a sudden, I found it or, to put it more precisely, I found what was missing.

In an otherwise excellent letter, there was not a single example of an error of fact or literary infelicity in my writing or, indeed, any indication at all of why some other approach might be preferred to the one I generally take in the column. The author was clearly annoyed by my general approach. He evidently disagreed with it. He would have preferred it not to be printed, but he was not prepared or – dare I say it? – was unable to show it was wrong.

Frequently facts are so uncomfortable that some people prefer not to hear them. They cannot disprove them. They cannot even argue against them. So they just try to silence them.

I was at the supermarket the other day when I noticed a woman of a certain age whom I had seen there before. Her hair was black and of a delightfully severe cut. She wore stiletto heeled shoes and jeans with rhinestones sewn all over them and her pullover was definitely not too large for her. I was all of a flutter and, when I asked my wife whether I was turning into a dirty old man, she told me, in her knowing way, "all old men are dirty old men". I must try to silence her.