We drank to that with a light red wine; Billie swallowed bravely, the Princess looked at me, tasted it and said, ‘I don’t really like red wine. But if the late Monsieur Bordeaux ever got to hear of it . . .’ We talked about Zurich again and about the little creature, and Billie became animated, probably from watching us drinking. The Princess looked at her from the corner of her eye, well pleased.

I stifled a yawn. ‘Are you sending everyone to bed, then?’ asked the Princess.

‘No, I’ll write a letter to the woman first. You go on with your crossword!’ They did. I wrote.

What was the matter with the typewriter tonight! Sometimes it has its little moods and the levers get caught up, the keys don’t work, the ribbon sticks and I feel like thumping it with my first . . .

‘Ha-hey!’ called the Princess from next door. She was familiar with these developments, and I wrote on more quietly and a little ashamed of myself. There, it was done. Perhaps the letter was overweight . . . Haven’t we got any scales?

‘I’ll take it to the post now!’

It was raining. I enjoy walking in a cool rain like that . . . How does the saying go? There’s no such thing as bad weather, there are only good clothes. Well, there is such a thing as bad weather; there is unsuccessful weather, empty weather, and sometimes no weather at all. The rain moistened my lips; I tasted it and took a deep breath: there’s nothing to it, holidays, Sweden, the Princess and Billie – but it’s one of the moments you’ll remember later, and say to yourself: yes, you were happy then. I was, and I was grateful for it.

Back again.

‘Well, did you solve it?’ No, they were still working at it, and a bitter quarrel had just erupted between them. ‘The father of church history’ . . . they must have done something silly, because for this one clue they still had eight syllables left, among them e-di-son, who, although he had done much else in his life, and had transformed his time, surely hadn’t fathered church history . . .

‘Do that one later!’ I said.

‘When later?’ asked Billie. ‘We’re sleeping later.’

‘Billie’s sleeping with me tonight anyway,’ said the Princess. ‘You can sleep next door in the ladies’ boudoir.’

‘Hurray!’ the two shouted.

‘Do you mind very much?’ asked Billie.

‘But . . .!’

She ran off to fetch her things, all those little bits and pieces every woman needs to keep her happy.

‘She likes you, my son,’ said the Princess. ‘I know her. Isn’t she a really nice person?’ The Princess began to move things around and to arrange Billie’s room. There was great excitement.

‘What shall we do with the flowers?’

‘Put them on the dressing-table!’