Kicking and screaming, then whining and sulking, I was wrenched out of bed and sent off to meet the Weymouth packet-boat and Father Tichborne, the practitioner recommended by John Dryden. I call him Father Tichborne, unfrocked though he had been, on the same reasoning that my grandmama would have called a ‘£50 cook’, however virginal, ‘Mrs’ out of courtesy. (Mind you, that was £50 a year and all found, which meant four or five gross meals a day washed down with ale and stout; bones-and-dripping money, backhanders from all the tradesmen, the privilege of offering hot mutton sandwiches to Police Constables; the right to persecute everyone below the rank of butler or governess: licence to get hopelessly pissed every six weeks (except in Methodist households of course); at least one kitchen-maid to do all the real work (£50 cooks never peeled potatoes) and often as much as seven days holiday a year if you could prove that at least one of your parents was dying. Today, no doubt, they would expect the use of a wireless set, too. You know, those people were happier before we started spoiling them.)

Yes, well, there I was on Albert Quay, awaiting the M.V. Falaise and Father Tichborne. (Albert Quay, imagine! Did you know that both Edward VII and George VI were really called Albert but the Family wouldn’t let them use it on the throne out of reverence for Queen Victoria’s Consort and the Privy Council wouldn’t, either, because it sounded so common. ‘Albert’ I mean, not the Privy Council. Both right, of course.) (‘This is the last and greatest treason: To do the wrong thing for the right reason’ sings Alfred Prufrock, if that’s the right way round. And if it matters.)

Yes, well, there on Albert Quay I stood, snuffing the sea breezes until the smell of used beer and vomit and package-tour operators presaged the advent of the Falaise.

I spotted him at once, a great rangy buck-priest in a silk soutane. Evil eyes burned from an ascetic face oddly marred by soft and sensual lips, which were just then snarling at the Customs man.

‘Hello,’ I said, offering a hand, ‘my name’s Mortdecai.’

He gave me a slow leer, disclosing an assortment of teeth which, had they been cleaner, would have done credit to an alligator.

‘And I suppose your friends call you “cheeky”,’ he retorted, sweeping past me to where a group of saucy-looking lads awaited him. He whispered to them and they all eyed me.

‘Isn’t he bold?’ one of them tittered.