But actually we were celebrating my new book, Spring Breezes, which had quietly sneaked out wearing its hardback just before Christmas, as usual. Salubrious Press saved what little publicity budget they awarded me for the paperback in the new year.

At lunchtime, Lemonia tended to be full of youngish actors, pop stars, models and other minor celebs (and occasionally one or two major celebs) and you could tell immediately which were the waiters and which were famous because the waiters were all better dressed, taller and more handsome.

Everyone recognized Sergei, which was not surprising, what with his having enough personal magnetism to cure anyone rheumatic within twenty paces, not to mention the huge wolfskin collar pulled up around his pointy little ears, though thank goodness it was so flamboyant it looked fake, so no one actually ever complained about the exploitation of animals. The poor thing has been dead for centuries anyway, because an ancestor in Russia had actually shot it when it was chasing him …

Anyway, I was glad I was wearing something trendy without being mutton dressed as lamb, though I only discovered when I got home later (after the usual tube and train journey) that I still had two daisies (silk, but very realistic) tangled in my hair, and when I phoned Sergei to demand why he hadn’t told me, he simply said: ‘But they suited you, Tsarina!’ (Considering what happened to the last Tsarina, he could have chosen a pet name more auspicious.) So I couldn’t really say any more, could I? I just hoped it would be put down to eccentricity, which is allowable in an author.

When we came out of Lemonia, a photographer took our picture – Sergei just automatically falls into photogenic poses all the time – and when he was asked for the name of his companion he said very grandly that I was his dear friend Tina Devino, author of many, many famous novels, and he was surprised they didn’t know that. I must say that he had always seemed proud of me whenever we were out in public. It was just a pity we didn’t get out more often, but I wasn’t sure my body could stand seeing Sergei more than once a week, if that, and sometimes I was just happy to settle for the tea and fishy nibbles.

My picture was in one of the tabloids, and I didn’t look bad, if I say so myself, except for the slight rabbit-caught-in-the-headlights impression, with my eyes stretched wide open and a slightly drunken daisy over one ear.