‘Did you bring a ball, Crawfie?’ asked Lilibet, who was cycling beside her.

‘I did,’ said one of the detectives. ‘Can’t have fun without a ball!’

‘Well done, Mr Brown,’ Lilibet said with approval.

‘Can I play?’ asked Margaret.

Lilibet frowned. ‘But you still can’t catch very well.’

‘But how can I practise if you don’t let me play?’ At this, Margaret looked as if she were on the brink of a tantrum, so the second detective, Mr Williams, nipped her tears in the bud. ‘You and I can be a team and we’ll beat the others.’

‘Hooray! We’re going to beat them, we’re going to beat them,’ Margaret sang.

Crawfie laughed.

‘In that case,’ said Mr Brown, pedalling harder, ‘last one to the Copper Horse gets a tickle!’

It was less than two miles to the statue of George III upon his Copper Horse, and they arrived panting and laughing with Mr Williams at the rear. The girls hopped off their bicycles and dropped them to the grass. Shouting ‘You are last!’ they jumped on top of the defenceless detective and began tickling him.

‘Help me, help me!’ he cried, laughing while Crawfie and Mr Brown got on with spreading two blankets and setting up the picnic.

‘Come on now, you three. Lunch is ready.’ Crawfie watched fondly as the girls peeled themselves off poor Mr Williams and wiped their sweaty hands on their dresses. ‘I expect you’re thirsty. Let’s all catch our breath for a minute.’

It didn’t take long before the two young girls, chatting away together, had abandoned their lemonades and meat paste sandwiches and were sitting amongst the grass in deep concentration, creating long daisy chains.

Crawfie sat a little apart from the detectives, who were keeping an eye on the girls from a distance and chatting quietly together.

‘So, Mrs Simpson is visiting tonight, then,’ Brown said, through a blade of grass he was chewing.

Crawfie, despite herself, pricked up her ears and listened.

‘Poor blighter doesn’t know what he’s getting into there, does he?’ replied Williams.

‘What do you make of her?’

‘I shouldn’t like to use the word my missus does, but with all those women he could choose, why has he gone for her?’

‘Maybe he feels sorry for her.’

‘I feel sorry for her husband.’

‘Which one? She’s had two.’ They sniggered like schoolboys.

‘The first one took her to China with him. He liked to take her to the bawdy houses to watch him with the, er …’ Williams looked up to check that Crawfie wasn’t listening and she sipped her lemonade, pretending to be occupied watching the girls as he lowered his voice. ‘With the working girls.’

‘Blimey.’

‘Rumour says she learned a few party tricks in the bedroom department.’ Both men chuckled.

‘No wonder she’s hooked the King.’ The two men laughed again. Then Brown said with fondness, ‘I liked Mrs Dudley Ward, though. She was always pleasant. Without her, Fort Belvedere would still be a broken-down ruin. She was the one who got the work in the house and garden done. She must kick herself now, introducing Mrs S to the King like she did.’