I must have been heroically drunk, for I can remember her face swimming in and out of focus; she had a diamond circlet in her dark hair, and the lights from the chandelier made it glitter dazzlingly. She said something, I don’t recall what, and I mumbled:

“Let’s go to bed, Lola. You an’ me.”

“You should lie down, Harry,” says she. “You’re very tired.”

“Not too tired,” says I. “But I’m damned hot. Come on, Lola, Rosanna, let’s go to bed.”

“Very well. Come along, then.” I’m sure she said that, and then she turned away, and I followed her out of the din and stuffiness of the banqueting chamber into a corridor; I was weaving pretty recklessly, for I walked into the wall once, but she waited for me, and guided me to a doorway, which she opened.

“In here,” she said.

I stumbled past her, and caught the musky sweetness of her perfume; I grabbed at her, and dragged her to me in the darkness. She was soft and thrilling against me, and for a moment her open mouth was under mine; then she slipped away and I lost my balance and half-fell on to a couch. I called out to her to come back, and heard her say, “A moment; just in a moment,” and then the door shut softly.

I half-lay on the couch, my head swimming with drink and my mind full of lustful thoughts and I believe I must have passed into a brief stupor, for suddenly I was aware of dim light in the room, and a soft hand was stroking my cheek.

“Lola,” says I, like a moon-calf, and then there were arms round my neck and a soft voice murmuring in my ear, but it was not Lola. I blinked at the face before me, and my hands came in contact with bare, plump flesh—any amount of it. My visitor was Baroness Pechman, and she was stark naked.

I tried to shove her off, but she was too heavy; she clung to me like a leech, murmuring endearments in German, and pushing me back on the couch.

“Go away, you fat slut,” says I, heaving at her. “Gehen Sie weg, dammit. Don’t want you: want Lola.”

I might as well have tried to move St Paul’s; she was all over me, trying to kiss me, and succeeding, her fat face against mine. I cursed and struggled and she giggled idiotically and began clawing at my breeches.

“No, you don’t,” says I, seizing her wrist, but I was too tipsy to be able to defend myself properly, or else she was strong for all her blubber. She pinned me down, calling me her duckling, of all things and her chicken, and then before I knew it she had suddenly hauled me upright and had my fine Cherrypicker pants round my knees, and was squirming her fat backside against me.

“Oh, eine hammelkeule!” she squeaked. “Kolossal!”