We got up and Don Carlo looked critically at the money I had left on the table. ‘That is too much. A mancia of two lire. The waiter will be dissatisfied with those who leave a smaller but more rational mancia.’ ‘You disapprove of generosity? Perhaps they will call me Don Quixote della mancia.’ Neither of them thought that funny.

When Sterling came round and picked us up in his car to run us out to Cellini's for tea, I was purring like an old tabby myself with a hot stove and saucer of cream guaranteed for the rest of her tabbyhood.

Nobody knew, at least we never did, whether it was from just acting the jennet or out of badness that he called Babs by that name.

Come on down! Breakfast is ready!