The Duchess strung together two triumphant days in New York City after the release of invasive topless photos. Critics of the royal couple warn that allowing the sum of the tour’s parts to negate the scandal might be shortsighted.
“Yes, the drone was illegal, but they were not on private property,” an insider points out. “Their immaturity is a concern, and shouldn’t be rewarded.”
The Queen reportedly accepted the explanation that the Duke and Duchess—who otherwise made no public errors—believed they were safely alone, and encouraged them to make the Chicago detour that even detractors admit got solid reviews. Comments on royal social media pages praised the pair for demanding no special favors, and one analyst suggested it was a stroke of genius to frame them as regular people who, ergo, make regular mistakes.
“The more relatable and human they look, the more people think, ‘Well, we’ve all done silly, risky things in our lives,’” said the source. “Whoever is pulling the strings over there knows what they’re doing.”
“I think this is the first good review I’ve ever gotten from Xandra Deane,” I said, folding the Mail in half and setting it down next to the toast rack on our antique dining table. “Although, really, it’s a good review of you, Puppetmaster Nick.”
“I swear to you, I didn’t think about anything when I bought those tickets except that it would make us both happy,” he said. “But Xandra may have nailed the reason it did not give Bea an aneurysm.”
“I just thought she was too busy back here to fight you,” I said.
“Bea,” said Nick, “is never too busy to fight anything.”
But Bea’s hands had been full in our absence. Several crews had swarmed Apartment 1A and done large-scale renovations—putting in new floors, pulling down wallpaper, putting up wallpaper, and doing wiring and plumbing upgrades, most of which had been her suggestion in the first place. Marj, as her last act, shuffled the decks at a few of the royal households and cherry-picked some experienced staff for us, including—to Bea’s massive relief—a fiftyish butler named Greevey whose presence meant I would no longer open my own front door, at least during the week.
I had insisted we keep a few major relics from Georgina’s life. My new office used her heavy oak desk as its centerpiece. We’d snagged a beautiful dark wood bedframe for our master, and of course we’d made it clear that no one was to touch the wardrobe that was the access point to our Narnia sex den, on pain of death. I’d also put my foot down and insisted we keep the G monogram in the entryway, as a tribute. But everything else was spruced up and reorganized and minimized to a few key pieces that stood out instead of getting buried underneath seventy-five weird trinkets. I missed 1A’s flea-market uniqueness, but it was undeniably better this way. A fresh start, for our fresh start.
But we had a Conclave in an hour, and I was nervous to face Richard. He had been incommunicado since we returned to London, and in the absence of compliments on our performance, I was concerned he was waiting to lay out a scolding in person. Which would complicate Nick’s and my own plan for the meeting, for which we arrived early and immaculately pressed, carrying a repurposed tour binder—Saskatchewan: Just In Case—full of press clippings and printouts and notes.
“Duchess of Clarence: Conclave, July 2016,” Nick read as I dropped it onto Richard’s conference table. “Bea is going to have notes on that title.”
“Welcome back, darlings! A gondola. Who knew you two had the nerve!” Lady Elizabeth trilled, sailing into the room gaily, smelling like jasmine. If Bea’s every movement was like a dire weather forecast—thunderous, storming—then Lady Elizabeth’s felt more like a yacht gliding off the Saint-Tropez shore.
Nick and I exchanged glances. “That bit was perhaps not our finest hour,” he said.
“It could’ve happened to any of us,” Elizabeth said, dumping her Chanel bag onto the ground and heading straight for the gleaming chrome coffeepot on a carved side table. “Do you know how many times Eddybear and I might have been caught out? One of our children was conceived at the Windsor Horse Show. I feel pregnant again even thinking about that day.”
“Heaven save us all,” Agatha grumbled from behind her copy of Horse and Rider. Nick’s old friend Annabelle Farthing was on the cover of this magazine, too, in jodhpurs and hanging on to the reins