Shadows of a Princess

‘Can I help you, PJ?’ asked the girl with the eyes that laughed the most. Jo had already been introduced as my secretary and was thus a crucial partner in the adventure that was about to begin. I explained my predicament and she rummaged in a filing cabinet that I could not help noticing seemed to act as an overflow for her handbag as well as secure storage for sensitive papers.

‘We’ve got some examples here somewhere which you could copy …’ With a triumphant toss of chestnut hair and a jangle of bracelets, she handed me some files in the distinctive dark red of the Wales office. ‘When you’ve drafted it, I’ll type it for you. But we’d better get a move on. The Bag closes in half an hour.’

This was obviously an important piece of information. I checked the instinct to rush back to my desk and instead asked what the ‘Bag’ was. The girls looked at each other significantly. ‘That is the Bag.’ A manicured nail indicated a red plastic pouch the size of a small pillowcase. It sat in isolation on one of the less cluttered shelves next to a basket of papers on which I could glimpse Anne’s distinctive writing.

The Bag came to rule my life. It was the main means of written communi-cation with KP and so carried the whole catalogue of information, advice, pleading, cajoling and obfuscation which seemed to comprise our output. It also carried our letters of petition, contrition and – occasionally – resignation. These were mixed with bills, pills, fan mail, hate mail, and any private mail that had not already gone directly to the KP breakfast tray. Those envelopes had to be delivered unopened on pain of death, but it was by no means obvious which were entreaties from ardent suitors and which were complaints about office incompetence from loyal subjects. A secretary who could sniff the difference (sometimes literally) was worth her weight in gold.

In return the Bag welcomed us each morning with the overnight products of the royal pen. Schoolday comparisons with waiting for prep to be marked were inescapable, especially when alternative programmes such as the one I was struggling to draw up for the day in the West Country had been submitted for consideration.

The art, I discovered, was to submit the options in a way which led the Princess imperceptibly to the desired choice. The quickest way to learn that art was to watch what happened at the receiving end. Often, when I had been out with her all day, the Princess would find the Bag waiting in the car that came to collect us. It could be a tense moment. If we had enjoyed a good day, a bad Bag could take the shine off it in a second; and it took a very good Bag indeed to restore shine to a day that had been lousy.

She would snap the little plastic seal, pull back the heavy zip and delve inside. Balancing the inner cardboard file on her lap, she quickly sorted the papers into piles. Fashion catalogues or designers’ bills were dealt with first; then press cuttings; then loose minutes from the secretaries about things like therapists’ appointments or school events for the boys; then personal mail – some of it saved for private reading later; then real work – memos from me that required a decision, outline programmes, draft speeches, invitations, suggested letters … the list was endless.

She would hold out her hand for my pen, then go to work. She was quick and decisive – and expected me to be the same. This was at least partly to draw a distinction between herself and the Prince, whose capacity to sit on paperwork was legendary.

What worked best was to reduce a complicated question to a few important points – the bits she really had to know – and then offer two alternative answers. It was pretty basic staffwork, but quite intellectually satisfying. Soon I could anticipate fairly accurately her reaction to most questions. If I expected her to go for option A (‘Yes please’) but for reasons too complicated to explain I wanted her instead to pick option B (‘No thanks’), all I had to do was explain that A, while superficially attractive, risked controversy/conflict with another member of the royal family/bad press. ‘We don’t want to do that, do we, Patrick?’ she would say and I would look judicious, as if weighing up the pros and cons, and then agree with her. The pen would mark a big tick next to option B and everybody would be happy.

Mind you, she would not have been the Princess of Wales if there had not also been times when she would do the exact opposite out of spite. It seldom had anything to do with the pros and cons then. Eventually, however, I could sometimes predict these moods too. Then the procedure was reversed: all I had to do was extol the virtues of option A and she would automatically tick option B. It was a great game.

Much later, the game became less fun. The Princess bought a shredder and would unblushingly destroy papers that displeased her, then accuse me of not showing them to her in the first place. This enabled her to claim that she was not being supported, that her office (me) was incompetent, etc., etc. After a few such happy experiences, I learned to keep duplicates of anything that might end up in her shredder. I would then produce them when the original mysteriously ‘disappeared’. She hated that.

On my first day, of course, I knew none of this. Back at my temporary desk, I perused the files Jo had given me. One, labelled simply with ‘Merseyside’ and a date, was thick with papers and looked as if it had already made several arduous journeys to Liverpool in the rain. The other was pristine, contained two small sheets of pink paper and was labelled ‘Savoy lunch’.

‘Merseyside’ looked more promising, so, ignoring the background sounds of efficient equerries at work, I delved into its dog-eared contents. These read rather like a story whose plot assembles only gradually. Some characters – such as the Prince and Princess – we already know from previous novels in the series. Others we know by title if not yet as distinct personalities – the Lord Lieutenant, the Chief Constable, the local director of the Central Office of Information. Others again are complete new-comers whose place in the coming narrative is tantalizingly obscure. Will the leader of the Acorns Playgroup outbid the chairperson of the Drug Awareness workshop in the competition for the selector’s eye? Are the patronages they represent in or out of favour and will this affect their chances? Or will all be bulldozed aside by the requirement to fête the opening of a semiconductor factory whose oriental masters might repeat their largesse in another unemployment blackspot if given sufficient royal ‘face’?

Such musings crowded into my mind as I composed my first memo for the Bag. What style would be best? I had already seen a document addressed to the Queen in which, as precedent demands, the writer opened with the sonorous ‘Madam, With my humble duty …’ and, although I relished such verbal quaintness, it did not seem right for the lively Princess who had given me lunch. The examples I found in the ‘Merseyside’ file were more reassuring, opening with a simple ‘Sir’ or ‘Ma’am’ and proceeding to describe complex choices in simple, straightforward English. The only peculiarities I noticed were neat abbreviations for unwieldy royal titles (‘YRHes’ for ‘Your Royal Highnesses’) and a brisk respectfulness (‘As YRH will recall …’).

Eventually Jo forced me to hand over my meagre draft. Once printed on thick office stationery, its tentative phrases took on an air of authority which quite had me fooled until I saw my signature at the bottom. Early days, I thought to myself, as I saw it committed to the Bag which was then promptly sealed. ‘I’m going to the High Street during lunch so I can drop the Bag at KP nice and early. You never know, we might get it back this afternoon,’ said Jo, making for the door.

I returned to my corner and sought comfort in thoughts of lunch. Suddenly the phone on my desk rang. I went into shock. It had not rung before. What should I do now? Everybody else was already talking on their own phones, so this one was down to me.

It rang again, sounding louder. In my nervous, beginner’s state it even sounded royal. I picked up the receiver. ‘Hello?’ I said, clearing my throat. That didn’t sound very pukka, I thought.

‘Hello?’ said a man’s voice. It was crackly and faint, but vaguely familiar. ‘Who’s that?’ The voice sounded rather tetchy.

‘Who’s calling?’ I asked, trying to sound as if I was getting a grip.

‘It’s the Prince of Wales speaking,’ said the voice. Definitely tetchy. Panic.

‘Oh … sorry Sir. Um …’

Richard had finished his call and, from the far side of the room, his antennae had already picked up my plight. Dabbing a key on his fiercely complicated-looking phone, he cut in smoothly. ‘It’s Richard here, Sir …’

I imagined I could hear the relief in His Master’s Voice. What a great start, I thought.

The phone came to rule my life just as much as the Bag and, by its nature, it proved a shrill and insistent mistress. I admit now that I was too often ready to allow my patient secretaries to screen calls, so I was left at the end of the day with a callback list which reproachfully catalogued awkward conversations shirked and good news still untold.

My excuse – and it seemed a good one – was that I was fully occupied with priority calls, mostly from the Princess. She was a virtuoso with the instrument and I quickly came to measure the mood of the day by the first syllable of her morning greeting. It might have been telepathy, but I sometimes felt as if I knew just from the sound of the ringing tone that it was her. Taking a deep breath, I would pick up the receiver. Sometimes she would come straight through, calling from the car or her mobile. At other times she would be connected by the Palace switchboard.

The familiar voices of the imperturbable operators could spark a reply in neat adrenaline. I became quite good at interpreting the subtle nuances of their voices too. Some are indelibly linked in my mind to traumatic events of which they were the first harbingers. Invariably kind, often humorous, sometimes wonderfully motherly, they must have assisted unwittingly at many executions. On a shamefully rare visit to their subterranean den, I was not surprised to see knitting in progress.

The background noises could be a clue to how much you were going to enjoy the call that followed. Silence meant she was at her desk, probably perusing the Bag and about to ask an awkward question. If she was in the car and it was early morning, she was most likely on her way back from her morning swim and anxious to resolve a nagging problem that had surfaced during her 50 lengths.

Later in the day it probably meant she was shopping, so expect to be quizzed on men’s taste in cashmere sweaters. The sound of a Harrier jet in the background meant she was under the hairdryer, so expect either the hairdresser’s latest filthy joke or a piece of gossip which the Princess had picked up earlier in the day (‘Did you know the Duchess of Blank’s aromatherapist was having a raging affair with your neighbour?’). The sound of running bathwater meant we were in for a playful 10 minutes during which I was supposed to imagine the saintly form up to its neck in bubbles. The distinctive sound of a dress being unzipped meant she was having a fitting with her current designer … or something.

That first syllable was crucial. It could be warm and conspiratorial: ‘Patrick! Have you seen the papers?’ This induced a cautious relief at being singled out for speculation about the morning’s unfortunate tabloid target, usually another member of the royal family.

Or it could be flat and accusatory: ‘Patrick … have you seen the papers?’ (The ‘yet’ was silent.) This produced a state of high alert. Good preparation was vital – I always tried to have an answer ready for every current subject of her potential displeasure. She was often working from a different list, however.

Or it could be light and carefree: ‘Patrick, have you seen the papers?’ This might be an invitation to share joy at a prominent story showing her in a good light. Anything that described her as ‘serious’, ‘independent’ or ‘caring’ would have this effect. Descriptions of her beauty or fashion genius got a similar but less fulsome reaction. A critical story, however – especially if she had predicted it – meant trouble. The light-hearted tone was designed to lower your guard, the better to deliver either a stinging rebuke or an invitation to join in the persecution of the perceived offender.

It was easy to be fooled, though. I quickly learned how misleading such judgements could be as I witnessed dramatically different moods being signalled to different listeners all in the space of one car journey. It was pointless to question such inconsistency. What mattered was the mood allocated to you and, until it changed, life was at least straightforward, if at times uncomfortable.

No less impressive was her use of the phone as scalpel and feather duster. Under the latter, the most recalcitrant member of the ‘old guard’ would wag his tail with pleasure, but under the former, discarded favourites dumbly suffered their excommunication. In severe cases, any subsequent wailing or gnashing of teeth could be neatly avoided simply with a change of number. The magic digits – the coveted code to personal access – would abruptly fail to connect.

The common denominator was her absolute command of the conversation. This she achieved with artfully presented moods and a surprising fluency which served as a reminder of her mental sharpness. Her sense of timing was sometimes uncanny. In my case she would usually ring when I was late coming back from lunch.

Ultimately, of course, there was the royal hang-up, which could lend unprecedented significance to a simple click. On the other hand, a good call could put a smile on your face for the rest of the day.

I had hardly finished congratulating myself on completing my first piece of written work in my new job when I noticed a lull in the hitherto ceaseless activity at the equerries’ desks. In unison, Richard and Christopher stretched and looked at their watches. It was 1.15, which my internal clock had already informed me was well past its customary lunch call.

‘Good heavens, look at the time, better go to lunch!’ said Richard.

‘Come on!’ said Christopher in a voice which would have galvanized his beloved Ghurkas, and I fell in behind the two veterans as we marched at speed down the stairs, across Ambassador’s Court and out into the sunshine of Green Park.

Approaching Buckingham Palace from St James’s, the great building seems less intimidating than when seen from the grand processional route of The Mall. Visiting heads of state, arriving by the more impressive route, can look up with relief from their open carriage as the Palace fills the horizon, knowing their horse-drawn ordeal is nearly over, while heedless tourists reverse suicidally into the traffic as they struggle to squeeze the whole building into their viewfinders. From Green Park the view is oblique, framed by leafy branches and altogether more human in scale.

The short walk between the Palaces became a well-worn route for me as I shuttled to and from the senior household offices with their Olympian denizens. Sometimes the journey was an opportunity for self-congratulatory reflection or garden party preening. At other times it was a true via dolorosa as the cares of the whole monarchy seemed to reach out at me from a hundred faceless windows on the monolithic facade.

When great events were in the offing, the international TV networks set up their outside broadcast studios among the trees, creating a media gypsy camp under a forest of aerial masts. From this cover, preoccupied courtiers could be ambushed as they hurried by, later to discover that they had become unwitting walk-on extras in the main feature. As additional entertainment, Lancaster House would occasionally lay on a G7 or NATO summit, allowing us the chance to peer at the visiting Presidents and Prime Ministers as they were conveyed past in their limousines.

Safely across the pedestrian crossing at the foot of Constitution Hill, our small detachment marched through the gates into the forecourt of Buckingham Palace, the focus of a hundred pairs of jaded tourist eyes. Were these men in the Simpson’s off-the-peg suits important? They did not look royal, that was certain (especially the one at the back who was explaining to the police that he had not yet got his security pass). But just in case, we had better take a photograph anyway – through the railings as if they were animals in a zoo; or inmates, I sometimes thought, at a secure institution.

Buckingham Palace has two main working entrances – one round the side near the kitchens and one at the front on the right as you look at it. Like everything else, use of each entrance is determined by your place in the hierarchy. Being ‘household’, we strode proprietorially up the steps to the Privy Purse Door, thus being spared the indignity of queuing up with the delivery men at the side gate.

A liveried doorman spared us the further indignity of having to open the door ourselves and, I noticed, greeted Richard and Christopher as if he really recognized them. This is the life, I thought, as my nostrils had their first sniff of the unique Palace smell: a mixture of polish and hot light bulbs with just a hint of mothballs. My feet at last felt qualified to pad across the red carpet as I followed my hungry guides into the bowels of the building.

It was as well that I stayed close to them, because the route from the door to the dining room was labyrinthine to the uninitiated. The entrance gave on to a stairwell, which gave on to a corridor, which jinked, climbed, narrowed and divided before at last turning into the great entrance hall from which the dining room debouched. Even after several months’ practice the journey could seem hazardous, though whether this was from fear of getting lost or getting found I was never quite sure. The latter was a real anxiety at moments of internal tension, as my route even to the nearest exit offered ample opportunity for unexpected encounters with the Palace’s most senior inhabitants.

Running this gauntlet was made slightly more pleasurable by detouring into the Queen’s Equerry’s Room for a preprandial drink. Every day without fail, it was full of courtiers intent on gin and gossip. While exploring the drinks tray on that first day I learned another lesson which time was to reinforce. In a way reminiscent of the tolerance extended by the Prince’s organization to his wife’s, the senior household played forbearant host to its subordinate satellites. Among these the Waleses’ organization constituted the most important – and certainly the largest – planet, but all down to the merest Pluto of royalty theoretically shared equal status as members of household. This entitled them to walk on red carpet, cruise the Royal Enclosure at Ascot and enjoy a number of other perks, one of whose daily rituals I was now experiencing.

The atmosphere reminded me of one of those better service messes where the members had not forgotten some basic rules of communal living, principally the endangered art of making polite conversation. This was not surprising given the preponderance of ex-military personnel, but the similarity began to fray when I listened to the shoptalk which, inevitably, dominated the conversation. Beneath the surface conviviality I slowly detected a lack of the kind of common purpose to be expected even in the least cohesive wardroom.

This was obviously a valuable clearing house for the various informal royal intelligence services. The principal members of the royal family were represented by their private staffs and the heads of the Palace’s great departments represented the behind-the-scenes support structure. This mixture of disparate interests genteelly fenced and bartered in a way that cannot have changed much, I supposed, since Victorian times. Then as now, representatives of lesser households might have felt themselves mere cousins admitted to the ancestral seat where the inner family carried on with its laundry, hiding its resentment that the visitors had the intrusiveness of kin without the discretion of polite guests. The soothing properties of civilized conversation were thus much needed – and were generously employed, not least in greeting the new boy, for which I was duly grateful.

The room quickly emptied in a general move towards lunch. I joined the throng feeling I was among friendly people whose friendship would nevertheless have carefully controlled limits. I would be accepted subject to certain constraints, most of which appeared reasonable to me. These would be imposed by my comparative youth, junior position, temporary appointment and membership of a subordinate organization, tenants of a property outside the pale. In short, we were tolerated. Politely, entertainingly and often warmly, but still only tolerated.

As senior staff, our ‘canteen’ was the Buckingham Palace Household Dining Room. In its scale, decor, portraiture and appointments it encouraged us to feel reassuringly exclusive. We helped ourselves from a sideboard and sat where we thought the best conversation could be found – or avoided.

On that first day I was surprised by the variety of my fellow lunchers. There were the Queen’s ladies-in-waiting – treated with universal respect – and the Queen’s private secretaries – also treated with respect, at least by me. But there were others further down the hierarchy who hinted at the bewildering diversity of the royal household. There was the captain of the Queen’s Flight looking smooth. There was the keeper of the Royal Collection, looking not at all like Anthony Blunt. There was the press secretary, wearing his poker-player’s face. And there was the senior policeman, looking surprised to find himself there at all.

I am sure I did too. My morale was soon boosted when, in a ceremony that beat all the majestic pomp and circumstance of the British Crown, the duty footman dymo-taped my name on to a napkin ring. I may only have been temporary, and I would often lunch somewhere else, but now I was a member of the club.

That first afternoon I strolled back across the park to St James’s feeling pretty pleased with myself. It was a sensation that soon became unfamiliar. The job often made me feel so anxious that the outward perks – even my own napkin ring – seemed like a bad joke. On some days I would have swapped them all for a friendly Portakabin somewhere, anywhere, else. As I returned to my new office that day, however, I was beginning to believe that I could act my part. From my temporary perch I felt the first stirrings of confidence as I measured Richard’s desk with my eye and contemplated a suitable fate for his Australian beer mat if he was careless enough to leave it behind when he moved along the corridor to his new post as comptroller.

The afternoon’s programme was intended to begin my education in Palace life. I was to meet two of the more significant Palace office-holders for ‘a chat’, and in their own way they neatly illustrated the latent tensions that I had detected at lunch. There was an old guard, almost literally. They were mostly ex-Guards Regiment, not very qualified in anything very much, but at least superficially friendly, if tending to be dogmatic about How Things Should Be Done. Then there was a younger guard, less overtly military, less dogmatic, no less friendly and arguably better qualified. As members of the heir’s office, we were usually grouped with this second category, not least by temperament.

The royal household is sometimes still caricatured as being made up of faceless courtiers drawn from public schools and the Army. During my time there, it was still quite true that both types were in the majority. Even those from a City or diplomatic background had mostly worn uniform at some stage, but despite a predictably establishment outlook – which I shared – most also had a very realistic attitude to the institution they served. They had inherited a hidebound, antique machine. To make it work they had to be highly effective in the real world of power and personalities which ran national life – but they also had to be sensitive to the hothouse family politics of the royal world. It was sometimes an impossible job. Failure was always headline news and any success had to be passed modestly upwards.