In Royalty's Presence

Then the duke of Edinburgh appeared, having spent much of the past hour listening intently to a presentation by two neuroscientists about research on Down syndrome and autism. He was shown a movie of a neuron making its way through the brain of a tiny mouse fetus.

Prince Philip asked penetrating questions, the neuroscientists said, quizzing them about what life stage doctors hope to intercede with future treatments.

"I didn't know what to expect. I'd never met a duke before," said neuroscientist Joshua Corbin. "But he was actually quite fun to talk to."

Before the royals departed for their next event, the duke stopped to speak to Sharelle Langaigne, 14, a Pasadena resident who has been hospitalized since March with an infected hip fracture.

"He asked me if I pushed my wheelchair myself or if had a motor on it," she said afterward. "I said I pushed it myself, and he said if he ever saw me coming, he'd get out of the way."

"They were so natural and simple, not stuck up at all," concluded her mother, Mercia. "They made us feel comfortable."

-- Annie Gowen and Neely Tucker

Betty Yendell was wearing her old, brown British Army service cap and carrying her heavy wool battle jacket with the "Defense of London" patch on the sleeve, in the hopes that the queen might notice.

You never knew.

Sure, the queen's stop at the National World War II Memorial on the Mall came at the end of the day, and she would be with Prince Philip and former president George H.W. Bush and his wife, Barbara, and other World War II veterans.

But it was May 8 -- V-E Day -- that never-to-be-forgotten day that marked the end of the war in Europe. And Yendell, 86, of Twin Brook, and Elizabeth II had once been comrades of sorts.