first three months at the forestry project and said she was hard-working and inventive, with really sound hands-on experience from her time in the Indian Ocean. The women’s pages were generally pleased when she chose a younger British designer, Flora Hedderwick, to design The Dress.
But LoyalSubjekt101 said she was a control freak with an ego problem, who didn’t care about British trade, the Royal Family or even the Prince of Wales. And other bloggers started to creep out of the ether, repeating the same story.
‘Bloody nonsense,’ said the King, storming into Lady Pansy’s office while Bella was there one Wednesday. He was in a fine temper, and knocked over a small table stacked with files as he fulminated.
Lady Pansy, leaping to her feet, did not know whether to curtsey or rescue the files, so did a sort of wild salmon writhe until the King said, ‘Oh sit down, woman. Sit down.’
This grumpiness was so unlike him that Bella was astonished. His colour was high, too.
‘Are you all right?’ she asked him.
‘Bastard reptiles, he said, not answering directly. ‘All they want to do is tear into people. Never mind who gets hurt. You carry on, my dear. You tell the truth – and if they don’t like it, tough.’ He turned on Lady Pansy. ‘And if any of them ask you, it’s no comment. Right?’
And he stamped out, leaving Lady Pansy curtseying behind him.
‘I do think,’ she said in the soft, patronising voice that Bella was coming to loathe, ‘that it would be a lot easier if you were to move into the Palace, where you could be guided more, Bella dear.’
‘Bastard reptiles,’ floated back down the corridor.
Bella’s lips twitched. ‘I think I’ve got it about right as far as His Majesty is concerned,’ she said.
And left, with a spring in her step.
If only she had known.
She spent Easter with the Royal Family at the Castle and, after lunch on Sunday, she and Richard drove down to Devon to cheer on Neill and his fellow Vikings the next day. The fields were full of green shoots and a brilliant spring sun made the budding trees look as if they had been studded with tiny emeralds.
They had a perfect evening in the grounds of a small village pub tht led down to the river where the longboat was due to land the next day. In fact they were sitting there in the scented dark when Neill arrived, looking harassed.
‘We’ve got a problem, Sis,’ he told Bella. ‘Our celebrity has broken his hand, careless bugger, and we’re one oarsman short. Can you call Lottie? She said she’d try and get one of the Richmond lot to come along. At this stage, we can live without a celebrity. We just need someone to pull an oar.’
Richard stretched lazily. ‘I can pull an oar,’ he remarked.
Neill said, ‘I haven’t got her number. I’ve looked everywhere. I—’ He did a double take.
‘I can pull an oar. I was in the second eight at college. Of course, it wasn’t quite Viking style.’
Neill said eagerly, ‘But you were pretty good when we were playing around that weekend.’ And then, ‘No. No, you can’t. We haven’t got a costume for you.’
‘What happened to the celebrity’s costume, then?’
‘I mean we haven’t got a costume for you.’
‘I don’t think Viking raiders had Prince of Wales feathers on their sea coats,’ said Richard dryly. ‘I’m up for it, if you are.’
And of course, he did brilliantly. His springy hair kept pushing off his Viking helmet, so it had to be held on with elastic, but otherwise he looked the part fantastically. And when they came to land, he swaggered up with the rest of them, bare-chested and with a distinct glint in his eyes.
‘Sexy swine,’ said Bella, going to meet him along with all the other wives and girlfriends. ‘God, you smell good.’
There was a lot of laughter and making faces at the camera but the wind had got up and soon enough the mighty oarsmen decided they could do with tee-shirts. And the tee-shirts, carried the logo of the sponsor, a hand-crafted biscuit manufacturer.
It was on the internet by nightfall. Prince of Wales in Advertising Scandal. And there was Richard, in the green-and-white tee-shirt, with a tankard of ale in his hand and one arm round a laughing Bella, advertising Morgan’s Ginger Thins.
Some said he was stupid and drunk. Some said he was stupid and calculating. Some said he was stupid and did what his bride-to-be told him to. Of course,