Now he is here. He wrote to her from Portsmouth ten days ago. Elizabeth went straight to her parents and asked if she could invite Philip to a private supper. She could tell her mother was displeased and her father unenthusiastic. They have been hoping she would forget Philip.

‘He can come as long as Margaret is there too,’ the Queen said. ‘We don’t want to give the wrong impression.’

Elizabeth sighs and turns back to the room. She has her own sitting room now, with pink and cream armchairs and a selection of pastoral paintings on the walls. The mantelpiece holds Philip’s photograph and one of the palace’s vast collection of clocks. There’s an electric fire in the grate and Susan is curled in a basket nearby.

Margaret rushes into the room making Susan lift her head. ‘Lil, I think he’s here!’

‘How can you tell?’ Elizabeth asks. Her heart is beating very fast. ‘I can’t hear anything.’

‘Well, there’s a commotion downstairs,’ says Margaret. She studies her sister, head on one side. ‘Are you excited?’

‘I’m nervous,’ Elizabeth confesses with a shaky smile as she smooths down her dress.

‘You look very nice. That blue suits you.’

Blue becomes you, ma’am.

‘Thank you, Margaret.’

‘It’s freezing in here, though.’ Margaret hugs her arms together. ‘Can’t we have another bar on the fire?’

‘You know we’re supposed to be saving energy. I’m lucky to have an electric fire in my sitting room at all.’

‘Susan would like it warmer, wouldn’t you, Sue?’ Margaret asks the dog, who has rested her nose back on her paws and ignores her.

‘Margaret, no.’

‘Lilibet, don’t you ever get tired of being good and dutiful?’ Exasperation threads Margaret’s voice. ‘An extra bar for an hour or two to make the room more welcoming won’t bring the country to its knees!’

‘It’s a matter of principle. Besides, I’m not cold.’

Which was true. She was too nervous to feel anything except the churning in her belly.

Elizabeth had been inclined to be resentful when her parents had insisted that Margaret be present at her first meeting with Philip. Margaret is livelier and prettier and funnier than she is, and she is not good at sharing the limelight.

But now Elizabeth is glad. There will be no shortage of conversation if Margaret is there, and it will give Elizabeth a chance to observe Philip and decide if she really does like him or whether she has built him up to be something he is not. She doesn’t think so, but how can she be sure? People can change, although she doesn’t feel that she ever does. She never has a reason to change, while Philip has done so much more and seen so much more than she has. He might be different.

Both sisters swing round as the door to Elizabeth’s sitting room opens. ‘His Royal Highness Prince Philip of Greece,’ Cyril says in fatherly tones. He has been the princesses’ footman since their nursery days at Windsor and is a comfortingly familiar figure at Buckingham Palace.