We stayed in Cannes for two months and then went to Stuttgart for a lengthy stay with Papa’s Württemberg relations. While we were there, Aunt Queen conferred a dukedom on Georgie, just as she did on Eddy when he was second in line to the throne, and so Georgie is now His Royal Highness the Duke of York, Earl of Inverness and Baron Killarney.

Three days ago we finally returned to England – something I did reluctantly, owing to all the speculation about Georgie and me.

I now have to settle back into my former lifestyle, helping Mama with her many charities and caring for Papa who, since his stroke, is quite an invalid. It is, of course, nothing like the life I thought I was about to embark upon, or like the life that, immediately before Eddy’s proposal, I had been planning privately (which was a life for myself in Florence). Even before my engagement, that project would have been difficult to achieve, but as darling Eddy’s bereaved fiancée, it is now not even remotely possible.

So there you are. I have brought you quite up to date and I hope you will keep me up to date with all that is happening in your life and in dear little Darmstadt.

All my love, May

She put the pen down and reached for an envelope and then, before putting the letter inside it, reached for her pen once again and wrote:

PS: I forgot to tell you that in the days after Eddy’s death, Willy sent me a very tender letter of condolence, quite out of keeping with his usual bombastic and brash style. There are times when I don’t mind at all our once having regarded him as a Kindred Spirit. xxx

In September, Georgie received a letter from his grandmother saying she wished to see him before she left for her autumn stay at Balmoral. He didn’t need to speculate on what it was that she wanted to see him about. He knew what it would be about. It would be about how nice it would be if he were to ask May to marry him.

In any other set of circumstances, he would not have found the suggestion objectionable. Even when he had been much younger he had always had a secret pash on May, but her reserved manner, coupled with his own crippling shyness, had ensured that the only way he’d felt safe in attracting her attention had been by playing practical jokes on her.

Those days, of course, were back in the days of their childhood, but his admiration of her had continued, and it had increased a hundredfold during the harrowing week of Eddy’s illness and death.