Diana's Nightmare - The Family (29 page)

(
above left
) Royal Star: Sir Cecil Beaton posed Princess Margaret in front of her Annigoni portrait to achieve this striking double-headed effect in February 1958 - two years before her engagement to Antony Armstrong-Jones. (
Camera Press
)

(
above right
) Theatre Lover: Scotch and Malvern water in hand and an ever-present cigarette in its holder, Margaret relaxes after a night at the Richmond Theatre in November 1991. Her health suffered badly from drinking and smoking. (
Today
)

(
above left
) Mortal Enemies: Fighting back the tears, the Duchess of Windsor leaves St George's Chapel after the funeral service for the Duke of Windsor in June 1972. The Queen Mother, who never forgave the then Wallis Simpson for marrying her brother-in-law, keeps a few respectful paces behind. The Royal Family refused all of the Duke's entreaties to have his wife recognised as Her Royal Highness. (
Press Association
)

(
above right
) Femme Fatale: As Wallis Simpson said herself no one ever called her beautiful, but her haughty, angular appearance and the sexual experience she gained in Chinese brothels made her so captivating to Edward VIII that he surrendered his throne to marry her. (
Press Association
)

Brolly Follies: Diana and the Duchess of York upset the Family by poking friends' bottoms with rolled-up umbrellas at Royal Ascot in June 1987. But this escapade signalled the beginning of the end of their friendship. (
Rex Features
)

(above left) Crying Shame: Diana sobs uncontrollably during a public engagement just after Andrew Morton revealed the true state of her loveless marriage in June 1992.

(above right) Sob Sister: Fergie breaks down and weeps during a visit to the Motor Neurone Disease Association's conference in Birmingham - her first public duty following the Daily Mirror's publication of the St Tropez pictures in August 1992. (
Press Association
)

Hey Dude: Steve Wyatt, Fergie's former Texan buddy, shelters from the rain with a friend at the Pavarotti concert in Hyde Park three months before holiday snaps of him and the Duchess of York were discovered at his former Chelsea apartment. (
Alan Davidson
)

Johnny Be Good: John Bryan, who replaced Wyatt in Fergie's affections, smiles through the drama of August 1992 when the St Tropez pictures revealed the true nature of his friendship with the Duchess of York. (
Nunn Syndication
)

Strained Relations: The Spencer family were briefly reunited when Diana received the Freedom of the City at a ceremony in London in July 1987. Watching proudly (from the left) are Raine, Countess Spencer (Diana's stepmother), Johnnie, Earl Spencer (her father), Charles, Viscount Althorp (her brother), Mrs Frances Shand Kydd (her mother) and Ruth, Lady Fermoy (her grandmother). (
Jim Bennett/Alpha
)

'I never served an apprenticeship'

Queen Elizabeth II

DIANA positively blossomed when she left Prince Charles three months after Squidgy. Contrary to popular belief, she accepted her new status outside the Family with more grace than many thought possible. This was partly because, in the words of John Major, 'there is no reason why the Princess of Wales should not be crowned Queen in due course'. In other words, she hadn't been sacked from the job - there was still a slim chance so long as she and Charles remained married. Although most people ridiculed the idea, queenship only ceased to be an option if she divorced Charles.

As the Prime Minister repeated his assertion in the New Year, he seemed to believe it. Relations between Diana and 10 Downing Street were, in fact, excellent. Far from being crushed and feeling rejected, the Princess shrewdly seized the opportunity to build some powerful new alliances. One of the people she courted was Baroness Chalker, the Foreign Office's Minister for Overseas Aid, who was only too willing to help promote the Work.

'I think she's quite happy not to be Queen - who needs to be Queen when you're Princess Diana and you've got the adulation and all the rest of it?' asked the titled Chelsea lady. 'You actually don't need to be Queen when you're the most famous woman in the world and Mother Teresa as well.'

Few people knew better than Diana that the Queen was saddened and resentful. With characteristic restraint, Her Majesty politely called her critics 'those whose task it is in life to offer instant opinions'. But privately she felt betrayed from within by those whose solemn duty it was to serve her. Only now, as the facade cracked around her, could she survey the full extent of the damage of which a burned-out Windsor Castle was but a symbol. Among the tiaras was a crown of thorns.

'Her Majesty could not look at the failed marriages of three of her children without looking at herself,' said the Palace insider, it made her realise she was as much a victim of the System as anyone else.'

The Queen also had to face the bleak prospect that her place in the world outside her immediate sovereign circle was threatened as never before. Victoria, her great- great-grandmother, had been Queen of Great Britain and Ireland, Empress of India and titular head of an empire so vast that the sun never set upon it. The decline that followed her death had been comparatively swift and, pressured by European federalism and Commonwealth nationalism, it had gathered a new momentum in the Nineties.

To calls for a cheaper, republican Britain, Palace strategists asserted frostily that Her Majesty was the Head of State of seventeen countries, the Commonwealth and a lot more besides. She was, they said, a true internationalist. An American-style Presidency would cost far more than the monarchy and, judging by the lack-lustre performance of Bill Clinton in the White House, the presidential alternative was hardly an attractive option.

The Palace refused to entertain the possibility that other Commonwealth countries, namely New Zealand and Canada, might follow Australia's lead along the road to a republic. Paul Keating, the Labour Prime Minister, had been re-elected after promising that his Government would hold a referendum on the question of establishing an Australian republic by 1 January, 2001. The Queen's profile would disappear from currency, all reference to her would be eliminated from the country's oath of allegiance and the Union Jack would vanish from the Australian flag.

Keating, fiercely proud of his Irish roots, stressed that none of this was personal. He was so fond of Her Majesty that he had once placed a guiding arm around her waist, a gesture he shared with Francois Mitterand and Robert Maxwell. His next move was to brief the Queen on the findings of the Republic Advisory Committee, which had been appointed to draft various options for amending the constitution.

'It would be fair to say that of the dwindling band of Australians who still support the monarchy, most of them are, in fact, Elizabethans rather than monarchists,' said Malcolm Turnbull, an avowed republican and the committee's chairman. 'If, Heaven forbid, the Queen tripped over one of her corgis and perished or simply abdicated, Australia would become a republic within twelve months.

'I don't think there is much confidence among Australians in the next generation. The Camillagate thing arguably did Charles an irreparable amount of damage. It's one of the great jokes of all time, someone aspiring to be a tampon. I think Diana is an attractive, well-meaning person but fits of suicidal depression and the bulimia problem do not inspire a great deal of confidence.

'There is, however, enormous affection for the Queen among republicans and I'm a great admirer of the way she has fulfilled her role,' said the advocate who had successfully defended
Spycatcher
in the celebrated case of Regina v Peter Wright. 'Nonetheless, I don't think she should be Head of State of Australia. The republican movement in Australia is unrelated to the marital problems of the Royal Family, Fergie's toe-sucking activities and so forth. It is really no more than an affirmation of the unique national identity of Australia. The original symbol, the Crown, had substance when Australia was a subordinate dominion of the British Empire and when Australians saw themselves, and were seen by others, as being Britons.