His desk was in the middle of the room. Against it, on the side opposite to where he sat, was a sofa, covered with dark red plush, fringed round its feet, and adorned with several cushions embroidered by his mother in vaguely ecclesiastical designs. Beside the fire, with a painted screen behind it, was a more comfortable leather armchair. The fireplace itself was a small one suitable for burning coal; it was surrounded by painted tiles depicting trees and birds. In front of it was a tiger-skin, and in one corner of the room, beside a bookcase containing many bound volumes of the Badminton Library as well as Sir Ralph Payne Gallwey’s Letters to Young Shooters (the history and philosophy were on the other side of the fireplace), there stood a stuffed bear, six foot high and grimacing horribly, shot by Sir Randolph’s father in the Rocky Mountains in 1874 – he had been ADC to the Governor of Canada at the time.

The desk was a massive oak one, with a small polished brass rail round three sides of it. Though always neat it was usually crowded. For one thing, most of Sir Randolph’s boxes were kept on it. He had a great number of these of various sizes and made out of various woods; his known predeliction for them had for years made the choice of Christmas presents easier for his relations. Some were Indian, inlaid with ivory, some French, made of fruitwood, and one of the largest, which was made of mahogany, was inlaid on the top in a pattern of darker and lighter squares and diamonds in a variety of different woods, so many that the maker had included a diagram inside the box which specified which was which – pear or apple, rosewood, date or hog plum, dogwood, black cherry, tamarind or lime. In this one he kept all the letters Minnie had ever written to him. Their interest was not so much romantic – they had corresponded little in the early days, being usually together – as scandalous. She had written to him from London, from great houses, from spas, from palaces, on many occasions when for one reason or another (one excuse or another, perhaps, for he had never shared her social appetite), he had not been with her. She was a witty and irresponsible correspondent – though she usually broke into French when she was going to be really outrageous – and her letters could have caused a good deal of embarrassment had he ever shown them to anyone. ‘Missing you as ever my dear old friend’ they sometimes ended, or ‘Tomorrow, D.V., I set off for my dear home and husband’. Few would have guessed how sincerely she had meant it. Minnie had appeared very flighty as a young married woman.

In a smaller box, made of a pale mahogany striped with rosewood, he kept the letters he had received from the late King Edward VII, most of which were short, friendly and to the point, dealing with arrangements for sporting activities or technicalities which had been raised in discussions about such activities. He imagined that Minnie probably had a larger collection, revealing a more intimate side of the Royal nature; he had never asked her.