“How do you do.” She held out a hand, giving him a “we are not amused” stare that would have rivaled one from my great-grandmother.

He took the hand and to my amazement brought it to his lips to kiss it. “Enchanté, Countess,” he said.

After that he had her eating out of his hand and I could witness the charm that had attracted me to him in the first place. Because the princess wasn’t present, the dinner was solid family food—not as bad as toad in the hole but steak and kidney pie and cabbage followed by spotted dick. Irmtraut poked at it with her fork.

“And what is this?” she demanded.

“Spotted dick,” I said.

She peered at it. “Who or what is a dick and why is he spotted?”

Darcy and I stared hard at our plates to stop us from bursting out laughing.

“You certainly charmed the countess,” I commented when I escorted him to the front door after coffee.

He grinned. “Occasionally I need to prove that I still have what it takes. Perhaps she’ll be nicer to you from now on.”

Then he gave me a suitably chaste kiss before departing.

“Your young man is charming,” Irmtraut said when I returned to the drawing room. “And he is Irish, did you say?”

“Half Irish, half English,” I said.

“He is Catholic then?”

“Yes, he is.”

“But surely you will not be able to marry him, I think. Does the law of England not say that members of the royal family must marry Protestants? Marina told me that she must give up her Greek Orthodox religion and convert to the Church of England when she marries George or the marriage will not be allowed.”

“That’s true. But I’m so far from the throne that I’d be willing to renounce my place in the line of succession.”

“And if the king will not allow this?”

Oh golly. I wish she hadn’t started down that path. “I’m sure he will,” I said with more conviction than I felt.

She looked smug and I suspected she was pleased to have thrown another spoke into another wheel. It was probably the highlight of her day.

ON SUNDAY I had a lazy morning with only a slight twinge of guilt that I was not joining the others at church. I ate only a small breakfast of kippers and poached egg, knowing that the full traditional English Sunday lunch lay ahead of me. The churchgoers returned and we sat over coffee in the morning room until it was time to make our way to Princess Alice’s apartment. The delicious smell of roasting beef wafted toward us as the front door was opened. We arrived at the same time as the major, who was looking absolutely splendid in his dress uniform. The four elderly ladies certainly made a fuss of him as we were led through to a charmingly furnished sitting room.