One Arcadian summer in Cambridgeshire’s idyllic Grantchester Meadows, about 25 years ago, I was taking part in a charity cricket match that pitted the local newspaper’s team against a smattering of local celebrities. The scene was exquisitely lyrical; more to the point, I was batting well. I middled a ball to the square leg boundary, confident of adding four more runs. But the man fielding there moved sharply to one side, and had the audacity to catch me.

Lord Archer of Weston-super-Mare, or plain Jeffrey Archer as he was then, intercepted me in the pavilion at tea. “That was a good catch,” he said of his admittedly impressive effort. “You were going well.” And the exchange stayed with me, for its sheer brazenness and slightly tactless tone of self-congratulation. But that was 25 years ago, and in truth, we hadn’t seen anything yet.