“Keep an eye on it.”
“Yes, sir.”
Dinner that evening was a formal affair and Maggie got dressed with Polly and Louisa. In Louisa’s rooms in Victoria Tower, with Irving presiding from his glass container, Maggie pulled out her blue dress with the black velvet-tipped flowers.
“Oh, you’re not wearing that, are you?” Louisa asked.
“Why not?” Maggie asked.
“Well, not only have we all seen it ad nauseam, but the Queen most likely will be in light blue. She almost always wears light blue. It’s an unwritten rule of sorts that no other woman in the castle may wear light blue around Her Majesty.”
“It is a lovely gown, though,” Polly piped in.
“Thank you,” Maggie said to her. “And it’s the only one I have with me. As Louisa pointed out.”
Louisa began to rummage through her closet. “I might have something from a few years ago that might fit—it was Lily’s. You don’t mind, do you? You’re about her size.” She pulled out a green silk dress and threw it to Maggie. “Not the best color for a redhead, but beggars can’t be choosers, yes?”
“Lovely,” Maggie said, gritting her teeth. “Thank you.”
Polly pulled out a bottle of gin and Angostura Bitters. “And while we get ready, who’d like some Pinks?”
The bagpipers, dressed in traditional doublets with gold buttons and a drape of plaid held by a golden brooch on the shoulder, pleated kilts, and horsehair sporrans, were sounding the fifteen-minute call to dinner as the three young women made their way down to the Waterloo Chamber for cocktails.
“Ladies, may I say, you look magnificent,” Gregory declared, catching sight of them. He did a double-take when he saw Maggie and blanched and seemed to sway a bit.
“Are you all right?” Maggie asked.
“Are you mad?” Gregory cried, voice rising. People turned to look. “That belongs—belonged—to Lily! How dare you?”
“I’m—I’m sorry,” Maggie stammered, taken aback. “I didn’t realize it would cause any upset.” She looked at Gregory, who was pale and shaking, then at Louisa and Polly, who were smirking. Obviously they’d known the sight of her in the dress would cause upset. “I can change into something else—it’s all right,” she said. Slowly, the guests turned back to their own conversations.
“Steady, there, old man,” David said, pressing a hand against Gregory’s back. “It’s just a dress.”
“Of—of course,” Gregory said, recovering. “Just haven’t seen it in a while is all,” he said, struggling to smile. “You look ravishing in it, Maggie. Lily would be so pleased. I’m sorry for my reaction. Completely out of proportion.”
“Not at all,” Maggie replied, glad to see him pull himself together. “And you two look wonderful, as well.” And indeed, the men were resplendent in their full evening dress: white ties, starched wing collar shirts and waistcoats, black trousers, and tailcoats with grosgrain facings.
The bagpipers played Robert Burns’s “Brose and Butter,” the interplay of the guests’ chatter juxtaposed against the steady reedy sound of the drones.
“I see you’ve found the martinis,” Louisa said, looking at the nearly empty glasses in the men’s white gloved hands, “but is there champagne?” She and Polly set out in search of a servant with a silver tray of glasses.
“Dinner is served,” announced the King, in his RAF dress uniform.
As the pipers began to play again, the glittering guests proceeded into St. George’s Hall, its arched ceiling studded with hundreds of shields, glowing with the light of the fire in the fireplace and the light of long tapered beeswax candles in six-foot-tall candelabras, showing multiple St. Georges battling countless incarnations of the infamous dragon.
The hundred and fifty guests were to be seated at one lengthy Cuban mahogany table, polished to a high sheen, reflecting the glow of the candles. Huge bouquets of velvety red roses, spiky orchids, crimson amaryllis, and creamy white Casablanca lilies in golden bowls dotted the table. Yeomen of the Guard, in their red ruffed-collar Elizabethan costumes, red stockings, and red, white, and blue rosette-decorated shoes, stood at attention against the walls, alternating with wig-wearing footmen, in state livery of scarlet with gold braid.
Maggie found her gold chair near the bottom of the table, her name on a small engraved card held in a gilded holder, which glinted in the candlelight. She was to be seated next to a retired Admiral. Between them was a menu, written in calligraphy, on heavy white stock embossed with the golden initials GR at the top.