When my fears hammer in the small hours, I give up trying to do anything but work. I creep, wick-led, to the kitchen to smooth sugar-crusts and lay acres of goldleaf. Then, sometimes, morning is up and running before I've quite noticed, and I wonder if I have, somehow, slept. Richard is careful to follow my cue and talk about nothing but work. Not difficult: there's so much of it; the kitchen is padded, barricaded, with it. Moulds, jars, pans, braziers, stack of sugar-shapes. And, fittingly, in the middle, emerging, soaring above it all, our centrepiece. This is a royal wedding banquet, no less, in preparation.