The King was idling in his sitting room, surrounded by signs that he had recently breakfasted, when a knock came at the door.

'Come in!' he called.

Blackadder stepped gracefully into the room with a handful of papers.

'Ah, good morning, Blackadder,' the King said cheerily.

'Good morning, sire,' Blackadder answered grimly. 'I have a few papers for you to sign.'

'Right-o,' said the King, and he sat down on a sofa; Blackadder brought over the papers and a pen, looked distastefully at the King's breakfast things on the coffee table, and then moved some aside to make room for the papers.

'You could pop all that back down to the kitchen if you've got a moment, Blackadder,' said the King, as he put his signature to the first piece of paper.

Blackadder curled his lip. 'Certainly, Your Majesty,' and he began piling silverware onto the empty tray in front of him.

'Don't forget the asparagus serving set,' said the King. 'It's over on the desk.'

'Of course, Your Majesty.' Blackadder crossed the room, saying offhandedly as he went, 'Won't you miss such things when you abdicate, sire?'

'Oh, don't be silly, Blackadder,' said the King. 'Wallis and I will have means for an asparagus serving set.'

'That may be, Your Majesty,' gathering up the little silver tray, shovel-like implement and sauce jug, 'but who will serve the asparagus with it?'

'That's enough of that, Blackadder.' The King finished the last signature with a flourish and then sat back on the sofa. 'How are things with you? I hear you've been seeing quite a lot of Mrs Miggins' new helper.'

'Quite a lot, Your Majesty, yes,' said Blackadder. 'Certainly more than Mrs Miggins has.'

'So you've come around to her, then, eh?' said the King. 'Realised she's a nice girl after all?'

'Well...' Blackadder spied the morning paper draped over the arm of the empty sofa, and went to pick it up. 'She isn't quite what she seems, sire.' He folded the paper neatly and put it on the breakfast tray.

Another knock came at the door.

'Gosh, I am popular this morning,' said the King, grinning at a disdainful Blackadder. 'Come in!'

The doors opened and Baldrick entered, in a manner noticeably less graceful and dignified than Blackadder's had been.

'Ah, Baldrick!' the King said jovially. 'What brings you here? Everything all right, I hope?'

'Your Majesty,' said Baldrick, 'I have reason to be very alarmed indeed, following the job Mr Blackadder gave me yesterday.'

'Oh yes?' said the King. 'And what was that?'

'He asked me to find out if Mrs Miggins' new assistant, Amy, had an interior native.'

'Yes, thank you, Baldrick,' Blackadder said irritably. 'That was supposed to be in confidence.'

'You never said so, Mr Blackadder.'

'Didn't I? How remiss of me.'

'But even if you had said that,' Baldrick went on, 'I think the King ought to hear this because it concerns his very life.'

'Good heavens, does it?' said the King. 'Well, I don't know what you're on about, Baldrick, but you'd better spit it out, sharpish.'

'Mr Blackadder wanted me to find out what Miss Amy's game really is, sire,' said Baldrick.

The King looked reprovingly at Blackadder. 'Oh, Blackadder, you didn't. Honestly, you're so suspicious!'

'Let's hear him, shall we, Your Majesty?' said Blackadder. 'Go on, Baldrick.'

'Well, Your Majesty,' said Baldrick, looking at the King, 'she has an interior native all right. It turns out...' He paused for effect, then finished dramatically, 'She's an arrow maker.'

There was a moment's silence, in which the King looked puzzled and Blackadder contemptuous. Then finally, with a note of weary resignation, Blackadder echoed, 'An arrow maker.'

'Yes, Mr Blackadder,' said Baldrick. 'Amy Fletcher.'

Blackadder perked up a little at this, and raised an eyebrow. 'Amy Fletcher, eh?'

'That's right,' said Baldrick, 'and since she's a manufacturer of weapons, I have come to the inescapable conclusion that she's out to assassinate the King.'

The King laughed at that. 'Oh, poppycock!'

'Then why has she gone undercover, Your Majesty?' said Baldrick.

'Yes, Baldrick,' said Blackadder, 'why has she? If she wanted to gain Mrs Miggins' trust in order to assassinate the King, why hasn't she already struck? Why is she wasting time, snooping about the palace trying to make everyone sick?'

Baldrick answered this question confidently with, 'She's making sure of her ground before she goes in for the kill.'

'Now, Baldrick,' said the King, in patronising tones, 'I think you might possibly have got just a tad confused about all this. If a person's surname is Fletcher, that means they had ancestors who made arrows, but there's a really very good chance they don't do it now. Take your surname, for instance: Baldrick. But you don't make shoulder-belts for a living, do you? And Blackadder doesn't... well... I say, Blackadder, where does that name come from? It's very unusual, isn't it?'

'I haven't the first idea, sire,' said Blackadder. 'Now, Baldrick, if that's all...' and he made a move towards the door.

'But it isn't all, Mr Blackadder,' said Baldrick. 'Just say I'm right...'

'Baldrick,' said Blackadder, 'you're never right.'

'But suppose I am this time,' said Baldrick. 'I have a cunning plan to stop Amy from wanting to assassinate the King. Come to that, it'll stop anybody from wanting to.'

'No one wants to assassinate His Majesty, Baldrick,' Blackadder said wearily.

'Now, hold on a moment, Blackadder,' said the King. 'You can never be too careful, you know, and even if we don't need Baldrick's plan, it can't hurt to hear what it is, now, can it?'

'Yes, Your Majesty, it can,' said Blackadder. 'As I've told you before, Baldrick's plans are the worst kind of drivel.'

The King waved his hand dismissively. 'Oh, that's what you said about the revue we went to see last week, and I thought it was ripping!'

Blackadder curled his lip at the memory.

'Come on, Baldrick,' the King went on, 'let's have it.'

'My plan is,' said Baldrick, 'that you announce your abdication, Your Majesty.'

The King's face lit up at this idea. 'Oh, I say, Blackadder, that's just what I've been wanting to do!'

'I most ardently advise against it, Your Majesty,' said Blackadder, glaring at Baldrick.

'But, Mr Blackadder,' said Baldrick, 'if Amy knows His Majesty isn't going to be king for much longer, she won't want to assassinate him anymore. It'd just be a waste of time.'

'How about it, Blackadder?' said the King. 'I keep saying, you know, it's got to be done some time.'

'Absolutely not!' said Blackadder. 'Neither one of you is to say a word to anybody about it, least of all Miss Amy Fletcher. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have urgent business to attend to,' and with that, he swept from the room.

Amy was standing in a red London phone box, speaking to someone in crisp and confident tones. Her shapeless dress had now been replaced with a fitted jacket and flowing, calf-length skirt, and her short hair had been curled into finger waves.

'Trust me, Mike, something is definitely happening,' she was saying. 'They've hardly mentioned Mrs Simpson, so it's obvious they have something to hide.' A pause, and then, 'Mike, darling, when have I ever brought you the same old trite stories? Trust me.' Another pause. 'Yes, I am doing another stupid tea round this afternoon, but that isn't my only in. I've become good friends with someone who's incredibly close to the King... very good friends.'

As if on cue, the door of the telephone box opened and there stood Blackadder, in his trench coat and fedora.

'Ah, there you are,' he said. 'You're late with the tea, Amy.'

Amy looked warily at Blackadder for a moment, then said, 'I have to go now, Mike,' and hung up the phone. She then leaned casually against the side of the phone box, smiled confidentially and said, 'You're far too important a man to come looking for the tea lady's assistant, Edmund. So, what is this really about?'

'I know who you are,' said Blackadder.

'Oh yes? And who is that?'

'A snake in the grass. A vile pustule on the face of society. A sneaking, conniving, two-faced trickster. To put it very frankly, madam, a journalist.'

'Well,' said Amy, her smile wavering a little, 'it was nice while it lasted. I must say, though, I didn't think you'd find out quite so soon as this.'

'It wasn't difficult,' said Blackadder. 'All I had to do was send Baldrick snooping round after you.'

'Baldrick?' Amy looked surprised, then she laughed. 'Well, I'm almost insulted. Don't say he found me out!'

'Young woman,' said Blackadder, 'Baldrick couldn't find out the main ingredient of an apple crumble if somebody gave him a bowlful of it without the crumble. No, all I had to do was see what he brought back, and then sort the wheat from the chaff. As it turned out, one grain of wheat was all I needed; by an extraordinary stroke of luck, he actually managed to find out your real name.'

'Oh, I see,' said Amy. 'Well, Mr Blackadder, you did say I was full of surprises.'

'I wasn't surprised,' said Blackadder.

Amy frowned. 'Weren't you?'

'No. Baldrick's little discovery was merely the last piece of the puzzle, but I knew all along there was something wrong about you.'

'You mean when we...?'

'Yes,' said Blackadder. 'Well, I was suspicious of you, certainly. And by the time we were onto the coffee and cigarettes, I knew you had to be either a journalist, a revolutionary or a sad, insane nobody with a royal family obsession. You know: the kind who keeps a scrapbook full of newspaper cuttings from every time the Duke of York shakes hands with a country fop, or the Princess Margaret Rose throws up a rich dinner over somebody's priceless Turkish rug.'

By this time, a timid young businessman was hanging about outside the phone box, and Amy was seething with fury.

'Then there was nothing real in it,' she said coldly.

'Not on my side,' said Blackadder. 'Was there on yours?'

She dropped her eyes. 'Well...'

'If there was,' said Blackadder, 'then more fool you, if you planned to print whatever vile gossip you hoped to entice out of me.'

Amy looked up, meeting his eye once again, and said, 'It isn't easy, you know. There are only so many ways a woman can earn a living.'

'Well, indeed,' said Blackadder. 'You have my sympathies, madam. It must have been a very hard fall for you, right onto a high rung of the glamorous and well paid career ladder.'

Amy had no answer to this, and the timid businessman took advantage of the silence to say, 'Um... excuse me...'

'Go away,' said Blackadder, barely looking round. Then, to Amy, 'Now, understand this: if I ever see you near the palace again, I will end your career so fast, it'll make your ears go pop. Permanently! Now, I suggest you make yourself scarce.'

He stepped aside, and Amy fixed him with a moment's furious stare before making a dignified exit from the phone box. Once she had done so, the young businessman stepped hopefully forward; Blackadder, clearly even more irked by events than usual, gave him a haughty look, stepped into the phone box himself and picked up the receiver.

'Hello, operator?' he said. 'Put me through to the speaking clock, please. I understand it's a quite splendid innovation... well worth a long listen,' and he directed a facetious look through the glass at the timid businessman.

Amy was alone in Blackadder's office, her face a mask of fury as she searched frantically through the papers on his desk. A moment later, the door opened, and she whirled round in alarm. When she saw that it was Baldrick standing on the threshold, however, she relaxed a bit.

'Ooh, look at that!' Baldrick said accusingly. 'You've made a terrible mess of his papers, Miss Fletcher, if that is your real name.'

Amy cocked an eyebrow. 'It must be, mustn't it, since it's the name you had to uncover by surreptitious methods?'

'Now, don't you go trying to confuse me,' said Baldrick, sitting down at his desk. 'I know your game.'

'Do you?' said Amy. 'And what might that be?'

'Well,' Baldrick said, in oddly conversational tones, 'at first I thought you were an assassin...'

'An assassin?' Amy said in surprise.

'That's what I thought,' said Baldrick, with the air of one not to be outsmarted, 'but then I realised, that was just a clever ruse to throw us off the scent.'

'Yes, I see,' said Amy, clearly confident that Baldrick hadn't really guessed her secret. 'But you picked up the scent anyway, didn't you, you clever little darling?'

Baldrick giggled bashfully.

'And,' Amy went on, crossing her ankles and leaning against Blackadder's desk, 'it led you to...?'

'Vegetables!' Baldrick said triumphantly.

Whatever Amy had been expecting, it clearly was not this. She stared at him a moment, then said with Blackadder-like flatness, 'Vegetables.'

'That's right,' said Baldrick. 'I haven't worked it out exactly, but you're something to do with vegetables... possibly some rival of our current supplier, hoping to undercut them.'

'So,' said Amy, seemingly at ease once again, 'you've worked it all out, you cunning devil. I must not be nearly as clever as I thought I was.'

'Not to worry, Miss Fletcher,' said Baldrick. 'There's more to life than being clever.'

'Well,' said Amy, smiling, 'that's very easy for you to say.'

'Not so easy as you might think,' said Baldrick.

'Mr Blackadder doesn't think you're so terribly clever, does he?' said Amy. 'But you found me out all right! So then, how did you do it?'

'Well,' said Baldrick, leaning forward in a confidential manner, 'I've heard a rumour that the King might no longer have a use for his asparagus serving set,' and he winked to underline the significance of this.

'Oh yes, I see!' said Amy. 'Asparagus is very expensive; I don't know that even my people can agree a satisfactory price on that. Then...' She considered a moment. 'There's financial trouble, is there? The King's spending too much money on Mrs Simpson, or something like that?'

'Only from the vegetable budget,' said Baldrick, 'so far as I can tell.'

'Are you sure?' said Amy. 'I mean, this business with the asparagus... is that all? You did say it was only a rumour.'

'There's no smoke without fire, Miss Fletcher,' Baldrick said significantly.

'Oh, of course,' Amy agreed.

'But no,' Baldrick went on, 'that isn't the only thing. My suspicions were first aroused when Mr Blackadder told me that we couldn't afford a leek.'

Amy's whole face twitched with excitement, but she managed to keep her composure. 'He said that, did he?'

'Yes, he did,' said Baldrick, 'and I said we should stop buying asparagus first, but now I realise: we can't afford asparagus or leeks. It must be serious.'

'Yes, yes, it must be,' said Amy, beginning to get a little impatient, but not enough so that Baldrick would notice.

'Of course,' said Baldrick, 'the obvious answer doesn't seem to have occurred to anyone.'

Amy smiled disarmingly at him. 'Only to you, of course.'

'Can't you think of it yourself, Miss Fletcher?'

'No, of course not, Mr Baldrick – I'm only a silly woman.'

'Well,' said Baldrick, 'that asparagus serving set is solid silver. If the King sold that, the money would keep him in leeks at least up until he marries Mrs Simpson.'

Amy started at this, standing up and transferring all of her weight onto her high-heeled Mary Jane pumps. 'Marries her?'

'That's right,' said Baldrick, 'because... and this is the really cunning part... without the serving set, he wouldn't be tempted to spend any of the money on asparagus!'

'Oh... yes...' said Amy, rather flustered now as she tried to get the conversation back on track. 'But... dear, clever Mr Baldrick...'

Baldrick looked pleased with this.

'You'll have to forgive me,' she said, sliding a very small notebook and pen out of her jacket pocket. 'I'm just a shameless gossip, really, but... is the King really going to marry Mrs Simpson?'

'Oh, yes,' said Baldrick. 'Didn't Mrs Miggins tell you?'

'No... that is, not in so many words,' said Amy. 'I should think it's a delicate subject. Isn't it all, perhaps, just a teensy bit complicated?'

At this, Baldrick sat back in his chair and hooted with laughter. 'Complicated! Cor, yes, I should say so!'

'Really?' Amy leaned against the desk once again, notebook and pen poised in her hand before the oblivious Baldrick. 'I do wish you'd tell me all about it, Mr Baldrick.'

'Well,' said Baldrick, considering, 'I will, if you'll tell me something first.'

Amy raised a cautious eyebrow. 'Certainly... if I can.'

'What,' said Baldrick, leaning forward again and adopting a deadly serious tone of voice, 'is your best price on a really first-rate turnip?'

The next morning, the King was reading a newspaper on the sofa, surrounded by the remains of his breakfast. Just as on the previous morning, a knock came at the door and he called, 'Come in!'

Blackadder entered with another handful of papers.

'Ah, so it's you again,' the King said jovially, as he put down his newspaper. 'You really shouldn't come at this time, Blackadder, if you don't want to clear up my breakfast things.'

'Your breakfast things can wait, sire,' said Blackadder. 'I've brought you a proposal; I think it's high time we discussed the subject of how to announce your abdication.'

'Oh, you do, do you?' said the King. 'I've been saying that for weeks, you silly sausage – now, haven't I?'

'It was too soon then, Your Majesty,' said Blackadder. 'But now, the time has come.'

'Well, hurrah with knobs on!'

'Quite so, sire, but try not to get too excited. This will require delicate handling.'

'That may be,' said the King, settling against the back of the sofa and picking up his newspaper, 'but who can concentrate with cups and plates and toast racks and asparagus serving sets lying around? See to it, Blackadder, and then we can talk about the abdication.'

Blackadder bowed stiffly, then began tidying up the breakfast things with an expression of extreme distaste while the King looked at the paper. He folded it over to the front page, then said in amazement, 'Oh, I say, Blackadder, it looks like we won't have to announce the abdication after all!'

Blackadder looked up from his work. 'What can you mean, sire? Have you come to your senses at last?'

'I came to my senses long ago, Blackadder,' said the King, 'as you are very well aware. No, what I mean is, we won't have to bother announcing it because it's in the paper.'

'What?' cried Blackadder, dropping both his air of dignity and the asparagus serving set with a clatter.

'It's here on the front page,' said the King, scanning the story with an inane grin on his face. 'Funny I didn't notice it before I turned to the cricket scores.'

'Who wrote it?' Blackadder asked icily.

'Oh, just the usual sports chappy.'

'I mean the front page story, Your Majesty.'

'Oh, I see,' said the King. 'Let's have a look... Oh, well, we could have guessed that if we'd thought about it for a bit. Or have you guessed already, you clever dog?'

'It was Amy Fletcher, wasn't it?' said Blackadder.

'Got it in one,' said the King, grinning. 'I wonder how she found out. Ah, here it is... she writes that her source is the secretary of somebody very close to me... probably don't need three guesses for who that is, either, eh?' he added, with a good-natured chuckle.

Blackadder stalked over to the desk and picked up the phone.

'Well, I must say,' the King went on, 'this is a relief. I feel as if a huge weight has been lifted off my shoulders... and so will you, Blackadder, when you've thought about it for a bit.'

Blackadder did not dignify this with an answer, instead saying into the phone, 'Send up Mr Baldrick, please.' Then he turned back to the King and approached him with an outstretched hand. 'May I see that, Your Majesty?'

'What?' said the King. 'Oh, yes, certainly,' and he handed Blackadder the newspaper with a casual air. 'Well, Blackadder, I won't say I told you so.'

'You didn't say it would get into the papers, Your Majesty,' said Blackadder, scowling as his eyes skimmed over the story.

'No,' said the King, 'but I did say we should get on and make the announcement. You can take that if you want to show it to Baldrick – there's no need to make him walk all the way up here.'

'I don't want to show it to Baldrick, sire,' said Blackadder, and he began tearing the page into strips.

'I suppose I ought to thank him, really,' said the King. 'You know this had to happen at some time, Blackadder, and now the really hard part's out of the way, isn't it?'

'No, sire,' Blackadder said darkly.

'I'd better give Wallis a ring,' said the King, jumping to his feet. 'She'll be as pleased as a dog with two tails that's just been given every tennis ball from last year's Wimbledon tournament, and is setting off on a walk three times round the grounds.' He then went over to the desk, stopping for a moment to answer a knock at the door with, 'Come in!'

The double doors opened and Baldrick sauntered casually into the room.

'Ah, Baldrick, there you are,' said the King, grinning. 'Marvellous bit of news we've got up here. Blackadder will fill you in,' and so saying, he picked up the telephone.

Blackadder tore the last bit of the front page story into strips, then turned to Baldrick and said, 'Breakfast time, Baldrick.'

Baldrick's expression was sour yet resigned as Blackadder fed him the first strip of newspaper.