Prince Harry was about to be presented to the public dressed in a suit covered in tiny silvery footprints up the right leg – and it was all my fault. I’d left his suit lying across my bed, then let a five year-old, who had been foot-painting, run across it. The only way to put this right was for me to hold Prince Harry still as I peeled the prints away from the cloth.

A little later, I noticed that our hosts had placed Prince Harry on the top tier of the small stadium. There he was, joking and taking selfies with my father-in-law – and a perfect target for snipers. I needed to relay a message as fast as possible to the organisers: that they needed to move our guest of honour down the stadium, or risk an assassination attempt.