Part 2: Chapter 12 Summary and Analysis

The hemophilia in the Romanov prince is traced back to Queen Victoria, who was a carrier of the defective gene. Two of her daughters were also carriers, which is how their male children, born to the royal houses of Russia and Spain, had the disease. They believe that Queen Victoria had a spontaneous mutation that resulted in the gene since the disease was never in her family. Victoria's son, Leopold, had the disease and Victoria was very protective of him, just as Alexandra was of her son. Leopold was Alexandra's uncle and he and Alexandra's brother both died when Alexandra was too young to remember. Alexandra had a nephew that died of the disease a year before Alexis was born.

The genetic nature of hemophilia had been known for almost one hundred years so Alexandra should have suspected that...