You're sure of a big surprise.

The Archibalds stole my daughter’s teddy bear.

That’s all there was to it. That is all I need to say. I do not take the fifth, your honour. My barrister has offered me no advice, my lord. They took her teddy, and I decided I would take it back and make them pay for their impudence.

My daughter had screamed and wept all morning. “Teddy!” The banshee yowl had echoed around the campsite. All the signs of the apocalypse were there. Lightning cut the sky. Dogs fled howling into the forest. Mothers collapsed. Fathers fainted. My wife blamed me. Our problem lay in the fact that the teddy was unique, the last of a lot made by a now bankrupt company, which we had bought from a post office in our hometown.

I searched our campervan. I quested along the trails we’d followed the previous day. Nothing. Rain pummelled me: despair took hold. Oh Jesus! What would we do?

I walked back dejected. The sun rolled out from behind the clouds and there it was: in the grip of a JoJo Maman Bébé swaddled nightmare: 2-year-old Portia Archibald. Blue eyed, blonde ringleted hair, smiling, effortlessly born in a warm water pool to a wealthy, caring cardiothoracic surgeon father and a child psychologist mother.

Inspiration came to me like a fart in the night: disturbing at first, but then warm and oddly comforting. Cry havoc, I thought. Vengeance, I schemed. Barbeque, I decided.

“Have you found the teddy?” my darling wife asked. The tone of an angry Northern Irish accent can cut glass.

“I know where it is. I need you to get me stuff from the shop.” I had written a list, which I handed to her. She looked at it. Her brow furrowed at the last item before she looked at me, bewildered.

“I need it,” I said. “Exactly as it is written there. Don’t worry: the shop has it. I saw it in the window when you used their facilities a couple of days ago.”

She rolled her eyes and left with our bawling infant. I walked quickly to the Archibalds’s RV and knocked the portcullis of their driveable palace. It housed a sports car in its undercarriage. Sweet Jesus.

“Barbeque this evening?” I asked, brimming with bonhomie.

“Sure!” Alastair said.

“Love to!” Eugenie said.

“Vegan options?” they asked.

“All taken care of!” I assured.

“We’ll be over after our afternoon tennis.”

I nodded, choking back a mouthful of metaphorical vomit before speed-walking back to our camper.

The next part was truly dastardly. Years before we were married, when my wife-to-be and I were “courting”, she had bought me a handmade keepsake box. It is beautiful. I love it. I did, and still do, take it everywhere with me so that I can keep safe and sound other little mathoms she has given me over the years.

I emptied the box and stowed my keepsakes away. After, I lit two of our disposable barbeques and waited for my wife to return.

“Here’s your stuff. Hey, guess what the shop ha…”

“Never mind that!” I snapped. I told her about the barbeque and said if she wanted to cry off later with a headache, that would be fine. She nodded vigorously, and retreated into the camper with our daughter, who was now somehow blissfully asleep. Seeing the three Archibalds approach, mother and father still resplendent in their white tennis wear, I grabbed the final listed item from the bag, ripped the packaging and emptied the contents into my box.

My wife came back just as I was laying the vegan foodstuffs out on the barbeque. When the Archibalds arrived, we began to talk in that way married couples do.

It did not take long before everyone was at ease. One of my truly great talents is for entertaining. I’m from Dublin originally, and have a natural ability to set others at ease by spinning a good yarn. My other ability is an unerringly accurate back heel.

Food over, and my wife having retreated with her “headache”, the Archibalds and I chatted. Despite everything, I had started to like the Archibalds… but a plan is a plan. I produced the box and opened it.

Inside was a mound of sugar-free Gummy bears. Initially the Archibalds refused: “Not vegan: additives etc”. I waved their protests away. These were a rare indulgence for my wife and me, I told them. Truly vegan: no gelatine was involved. A new process. All natural. The box was the original container.

That sold it. Self-denied treats can be like crack to an addict. Watch some vegetarians catch the scent of frying bacon. The Archibalds began to snake gummies from the box. One or two at first, before a more tentative “Are you sure?” and one or two became handfuls. As they indulged, I stood, stretched, sidled to the dropped teddy and backheeled it into a bush when my guests weren’t looking.

Several minutes later, the sleeping child sensed something. She moaned. Her parents stood to take her home… and two distinct volcanic burbles cut the cool night air. Panicked glances were exchanged. They retreated, increasing speed with every step. The last thing I saw before they disappeared into their RV was Eugenie Archibald yank her daughter’s bib from around the child’s throat and use it to try and conceal the blooming brown stain in the cleft of her white tennis shorts.

*

“What did you do?”

To this day I find it amazing how some questions can cause a husband’s testicles to retreat upwards quite so quickly.

My mistake had been to enter the camper wearing a smug smile.

I pulled out the liberated teddy and handed it to my wife.

“Where did you get that?” she asked.

I explained.

She beckoned me to the child’s cot. There lay our daughter and her bear.

“You found it?” I asked.

She shook her head. “No, my love. They sell the same bear at the shop down the road.”