Although the paintwork blessedly remained the same now, nothing else was as she had left it. All the furniture, every last little stick of it, had been rearranged. Pictures had been rehung – and not successfully. Framed photographs and objets d’art had been rearranged, and some of her most precious ornaments had been removed altogether.

She didn’t need to ask who was responsible. It was the same person who had been responsible for creating havoc when, without asking permission to do so, May now thirty-three, had had the temerity to have a small scented garden planted below her boudoir window.

No one she knew could keep control of her feelings as she did, but there were limits, and this was one of them. With all thoughts of Frank forgotten, she flung her muff down and, without even taking off her hat and her beaver-collared-and-cuffed coat, went in search of George.

‘Why’ she demanded when she found him, ‘was Motherdear allowed to take it upon herself to rearrange my furniture in my home?’

Under the pretext of tamping tobacco into his pipe, George avoided meeting her eyes. ‘She thinks it now looks much prettier, and thought it would be a nice surprise for you, darling. And it does look very pretty, don’t you think? Having the display cabinet in one of the alcoves, and the bureau placed nearer to the window, means there is full daylight on it, which will make letter-writing so much easier on the eyes?’

‘It does not look prettier than how it looked before, and the display cabinet loses its entire point when half-hidden in an alcove; and the bureau is exceedingly cumbersome so near to the window. And where have the things gone that have been removed from the room?’

‘I don’t know, May. I’m sure they’re somewhere safe. And there can be no question of rearranging the room, now that Motherdear has gone to such an effort to improve it.’

May was saved from saying words she might regret by the telephone on George’s desk ringing. It was there primarily for him to ring out on. Very few people, other than his father and Toria, ever had the temerity to ring him.

Grateful for any kind of an interruption to the present conversation, George snatched up the receiver. ‘Yes?’ he barked into it and then, seconds later, sat down so suddenly, and in such a state of shock, that May forgot all about the unwelcome changes to her drawing room.

He said numbly, ‘It’s Papa, May. He’s at Osborne. Granny Queen is dying.’

On the other end of the telephone line her father-in-law bellowed, ‘May? Pour Georgie a brandy, and then both of you need to leave for Osborne immediately. Do you understand?’