Kurinji Flowers

I was due to be presented at Court in a couple of weeks and, for some reason, the new king had decided the presentations would be made in daytime in the palace gardens. Choosing to break with tradition and forego the solemn dignity of evening Courts in the staterooms was perverse anyway, but doing so in that dreary summer seemed like sheer bloody-mindedness. I was sure I'd have to endure the whole tedious process in the pouring rain. As it happened, it did rain: a torrential downpour. King Edward was safely sheltered under a canopy while the debutantes paraded in front of him, their coiffures flattened or frizzed and their dripping party frocks clinging to their calves like seaweed. But I was not among them. By then, I was in disgrace and exiled from London.