To May, he said, ‘Beatrice and Aunt Marie are in the drawing room with Aunt Alix, Toria and Looloo. Maudie is en route. Irène and Heinrich have gone for a walk. Marie-Louise is here, as is Thora, and all three Connaught grandchildren are here. Ducky isn’t here as she’s caught tonsillitis. Ernie is on his way.’

All May wanted to do was rest from the rough crossing. Pleading a headache, she went immediately to the bedroom that she and George always occupied at Osborne, then wrote a short note to Louise asking when she could spend a precious few minutes with the Queen and gave it to a footman to deliver.

She’d no sooner done so than George burst in on her, his face flushed with temper.

‘Bloody Willy!’ he said vehemently. ‘He’s going to rub everyone up the wrong way with his theatrical posturing and, as if that isn’t bad enough, Papa has asked me to accompany him back to London so that Willy can be given an appropriate royal greeting.’

‘It would be disgraceful if he wasn’t greeted by the two of you,’ she said reasonably. ‘And remember that Willy will be very, very upset. Granny Queen has always been the most important person in the world to him.’

‘Bosh!’ George said and, still wearing his hat and overcoat, left the room to face another stormy crossing of the Solent.

May found Willy energizing and, unlike many members of the family, always looked forward to meeting up with him. Under normal circumstances George, too, got on with Willy. On one of their visits to Berlin, Willy had bestowed on George Germany’s highest honour, the Order of the Black Eagle. Last year Willy had stood as godfather to her and George’s third son, Henry, and not long afterwards she and George had attended Willy’s eldest son’s coming-of-age celebrations in Berlin. It wasn’t the thought of Willy that was the cause of George’s bad temper. It was the thought of having to cross the Solent again – and not once, but twice.

Her thoughts were interrupted by Beatrice. ‘Louise says now would be a good time to sit with Mama for a few minutes, May. Lenchen is catching up on some sleep. She and Aunt Marie sat with Mama all through the night, last night.’

May had never before been in the Queen’s bedroom. Over the fireplace hung a painting of the Entombment of Christ, and the room was full of portraits and photographs of Albert. A large framed portrait of him hung over the canopied bedhead and, on the other side of the bed, looking pathetically small and fragile, the eighty-one-year-old Queen was lying with closed eyes against a bank of pillows, a shawl around her shoulders, a lace cap covering her wispy white hair.