So when I say that my education as a horsewoman began with Celine it is true – because all Sebastian taught me was how to jump off very quickly to avoid being squashed.

Celine is the opposite of Sebastian. You could not find a horse more even tempered, sweeter or more compliant. She’s almost twenty now – when we first got her she was nine years old, a mare in her prime. Celine is very beautiful, and I know that shouldn’t matter, but it does with horses. She’s a rich russet chestnut, with a blond mane and tail, deep-brown eyes and clean, slender legs. Her face has a perfect dish – a little Arabian blood saw to that. And the four white socks and the star on her forehead stand out like snow against the burnish of her coat. I have so many drawings of her in my sketch book. She is good at posing. She always pricks her ears forward and arches her neck for me.

When people say that they prefer geldings because mares are moody and ill-tempered, I think to myself – well, you clearly never met my horses. Or me! I am a girl, after all, just like Celine, and I’m always cheerful and in good spirits and both my brothers, Philippe and Dorian, can be very sulky boys indeed! I am a better rider than either of them too, and a better painter. Not that I’m boastful – no one likes it when girls are proud. Papa warns me constantly about that. And I reply that no one seems to like it much when girls do anything at all. I am working on solutions to this problem.