‘But without all the television cameras trained on you.’ Bobo shook her head in incomprehension. ‘How our Lilibet is going to cope with the whole world watching, I don’t know.’

‘I do.’ Crawfie smiled. ‘She will see Philip waiting for her and he will be all she needs. That’s how I felt.’

‘Well, I am happy for you.’ Bobo raised her cup. ‘To happiness! If Alah were here, she’d open up the sherry.’

Later, Crawfie found her old Palace bedroom totally unchanged. She’d been away such a short time and yet her whole life had changed since she’d last been here.

She put her small bag, packed with minimal essentials, on to the dressing table and sat down. She missed George already. She had grown used to being apart from him during all the long years of their engagement, but now that they were man and wife, it felt wrong not to be together.

She had filled the larder of Nottingham Cottage with everything she could get hold off, using up most of his rations and all of hers to do so. At least she knew he would not starve until she got back on Friday evening. Apart from that first night when he had come home in a difficult mood – she blamed the whisky – he had been so attentive and kind since their wedding day.

He didn’t mind that she would be away from Nottingham Cottage during the week – indeed, he had encouraged her. He himself would be busy at the Drummonds branch in London, working as a manager, now that a suitable position had finally come up.

‘While we both work,’ George had said, ‘we can save for a little car, perhaps? Now you are married, you should ask for a pay rise. And how much is your pension worth?’

‘Gosh,’ she said, ‘I have no idea. I haven’t thought of retiring just yet.’

‘Marion, these are serious things you ought to be thinking about. You need to ask someone.’

She didn’t quite know who to ask about that. Before his extraordinary outburst in the car to Windsor, she would have asked Tommy, but that option was now closed to her. She tried to avoid him around the Palace wherever possible. Her anger would not allow her to put herself in a position where he thought she needed him. Absolutely not.

She caught her reflection in the dressing-table mirror. With Lilibet and Margaret no longer tied to the schoolroom, what exactly was her position? Margaret was still having some lessons, but they were becoming fewer and further between. Still, she would be helpful in the run up to Lilibet’s wedding, and there was plenty to help Bobo with, and she could assist with any of the Princesses’ personal arrangements without getting in the way of the new ladies-in-waiting.

She realized that she had had vague, imagined thoughts of carrying on as governess to Lilibet and Margaret’s children – the reliable, loyal, trusted and much loved retainer.