That evening there was another grand state banquet. Willy, wearing the full dress uniform of an English Royal Dragoon, and with the Russian Order of St Andrew emblazoned across his breast, led May into dinner, while Georgie, wearing the uniform of the Prussian Dragoons, escorted Dona, and Nicky escorted Willy’s elderly aunt, the Dowager Grand Duchess of Baden.

For May, dressed in a shimmering white gown beaded with diamonds, with more diamonds at her ears, throat and wrists, and wearing Queen Victoria’s spectacular wedding tiara, it was a never-to-be-forgotten moment. One that in those long-ago days in Florence and after Eddy’s death, she could not even have imagined.

Out of the corner of her eye she saw Looloo and Toria. Looloo was looking at her with a slightly dazed, bewildered expression. The look in Toria’s eyes would have curdled new milk, and May knew why. As a girl, Toria had always taken it for granted that she would one day be a queen and that she, May – being only a Serene Highness – would remain an unmarriageable spinster. That it had turned out so very differently was something Toria bitterly resented, but her jealousy and animosity May had long ago come to terms with.

She caught a glimpse of Maudie, who not only gave her a matey wink, but also, at waist level, a thumbs-up sign. The corners of May’s mouth twitched. Although she had drawn a short straw where two of her sisters-in-law were concerned, Maudie was pure gold and always had been.

Later that evening she would catch up with Maudie, and with the other members of the extended Royal Mob to whom she had always been closest: Vicky and Louis; Irène and Heinrich; Russian Aunt Marie; Marie-Louise and Ducky. And she would get over her disappointment that the two people she would have most liked to spend time with – Alicky and Ella – were absent.

‘Alix sends you her love,’ Nicky said in his quiet, gentle manner when they had a few minutes’ conversation together. He always called her Alix, never Alicky. ‘Her health isn’t good, as I believe you know – and she doesn’t enjoy this kind of event. She is much happier when the family group is small and intimate – as it was last year when we visited you and Georgie at Balmoral with the girls and Alexei.’

‘George tells me we may well see you in August, at Cowes?’

It was polite small talk, and not at all what May wanted to say to him. She wanted to ask about Alexei’s health, but knew that, even coming from her, it was a question Nicky would find quite unacceptable. Equally unacceptable would have been the riveting subject of Rasputin.