Royals at War

by Dylan Howard

  A source close to the brothers said Harry’s behavior, including attacks on the media and weeping in public as he spoke of son Archie’s birth, showed all was not well.

  “Harry is not in great shape,” they told these authors. “I’d say he’s not well, declaring war on everyone, crying in public. These are not the actions of a well-balanced man. He and William are badly split over his mother’s legacy and add to that, William is clearly in training to be King and recognizes that, while Harry has little purpose, he doesn’t really have a job of any description and stews on perceived wrongs.”

  Royal biographer Penny Junor also felt that Harry was in a bad place.

  “In the past when we have seen Harry on TV, we have come away with a smile on our face because he is a character who is funny, and is so positive,” she told The Sun, in a conversation about the documentary. “I felt sorry because he was not behaving as he would in the past. Something’s wrong. He looked burdened and playing the victim, which does not sit comfortably with him.”

  William himself made his feelings known, with characteristic tact and obliqueness, about the situation. He and Kate were on an official tour of Pakistan, which was going splendidly. The couple had conducted themselves impeccably. William reflected sagely on the country’s precarious political, security, and social problems and offered strong friendship and encouragement to the reformist prime minister, former cricketer Imran Khan. He managed to look statesmanlike, dignified, and serious, while Kate was solid, reliable, and drama-free, playing games with children and being feted for her happy demeanor everywhere she went.

  In the days after the film was aired, it was made known by Kensington Palace that William was “genuinely worried” for Harry and Meghan after their emotional television tell-all and hoped “they are all right.”

  “William is going to be King and acts like that,” a source continued. “The Pakistan trip brings that into sharp focus. They are doing what’s expected of senior Royals. At the same time, you’ve got Harry and Meghan pouring their hearts out and on the verge of tears.”

  But his laconic leaked comments belied the fact that William’s concern was very real. Ever since their troubles had begun, dating back to when he tried to advise Harry to take things slowly with Meghan, he had been fretting over his wayward younger brother. William knew, more than anyone, how much unresolved anger and anxiety lay in Harry’s psyche from childhood, as those who know him have described. He also knew how vulnerable and softhearted his little brother was. He understood how hard it had always been for Harry to be always second, behind him, the spare to William’s heir. He loved his brother’s warmth, his laughter, his determination, and his innate sweetness and kindness. He cherished Harry’s sense of justice, his empathy with the underdog and those who had been subject to misfortune and pain. Deep down, in the place where William had taken to hiding his feelings way back in his teens, where only he could find his true self, he was mourning their relationship.

  In the aftermath of Harry and Meghan’s dramatic revelations to Bradby, any lingering doubts that Meghan’s entry to the Firm had been a success were violently shattered. The sense of betrayal and disbelief must have been mind-boggling as the couple mused openly on their desire to leave the United Kingdom and live in Africa.

  “I don’t know where we could live in Africa at the moment,” Harry had pondered in his interview with Bradby. “We’ve just come from Cape Town, that would be an amazing place for us to be able to base ourselves, of course it would. But with all the problems that are going on there, I just don’t see how we would be able to really make as much difference as we’d want to.”

  “None of this is remotely helpful to the monarchy as an institution,” noted a Palace insider. “It is promoting discord and taking attention away from the good work senior Royals do across the board.”

  Meghan was especially frustrated by the reaction from eminent writers on postcolonialism, such as Kehinde Andrews, associate professor in sociology at Birmingham City University. He wrote an op-ed for CNN titled “Harry and Meghan, Africa Doesn’t Want You”:

  Presumably, whichever country Harry and Meghan choose is supposed to be grateful for their presence. But charitable donations and being pictured with elephants cannot overturn the historical nature of the monarchy’s relationship to Africa. Plenty of the privileged well-meaning elite during colonial times moved to the colonies; they just did not have the royal public relations machine to spin their visits in positive terms.

  Harry and Meghan living in a gated community, surrounded by the largely white elite and locked away from extreme poverty, would be the most appropriate symbol of royal privilege in the 21st century. It is the height of British colonial arrogance for the royal couple to be cherry-picking their dream destination at a time when African migrants have never been less welcome in Britain.

  Bradby himself spoke to the media in the torrid wake of the revelations.

  “I went intending to make a documentary that was always going to be about their work in Africa and then a little about where they are at in life,” he told Good Morning America a few days after the film was broadcast. “I knew that everything wasn’t entirely rosy behind the scenes. I found a couple that seemed a bit bruised and vulnerable. That was the story I found, and it seemed the right journalistic thing to do to try and tell that story as empathetically as I could. The thing about Harry is, whether in private or in public, if you ask him an honest question, he’ll give you an honest answer, for better or worse.”

  Commenting on the tensions between William and Harry, Bradby speculated that this too would take time to settle. “It’s quite interesting,” he said, diplomatically. “William is taking a more traditional approach. He has to—he’s going to be King, he can’t afford to alienate any constituency. Harry and Meghan have just decided to play things very differently.” Bradby concluded by expressing his hope that everyone would now “take a deep breath.” He was to be sorely disappointed.

  Britain at the end of 2019 was riven with the grisly aftermath of Brexit, years of political uncertainty, underfunded public services, neglect, and austerity. The Royals, who once were seen as a calming, stabilizing influence on the nation in times of trouble, seemed to be contributing nothing but more chaos and misery.

  Prince Andrew, a man of overweening pomposity and arrogance, gave a calamitous television interview with the BBC’s Newsnight program, in which he firmly denied any impropriety with a girl alleging abuse by his rapist friend, Jeffrey Epstein. A denial of involvement would have sufficed, but Andrew left the viewing public seriously questioning his mental health. Virginia Roberts, a young victim of Epstein’s, claimed the portly, perspiring Prince had been dancing with her the night the Prince is alleged to have assaulted her in London. Andrew claimed that due to his heroic war service (flying helicopters in the Falklands conflict of 1982) he had a medical condition that meant he couldn’t sweat. Furthermore, he couldn’t have been with Epstein that night because he had been at his daughter’s birthday at Pizza Express, in the nondescript suburban town of Woking. “I’ve only been to Woking a couple of times and I remember it weirdly distinctly,” he added, helpfully.

  As the country held its hands and groaned at the sight of what the Royals had become, their newest recruit was equally unimpressed with the unedifying spectacle of her boorish uncle-in-law dissembling in a manner that would make even Thomas Markle, Jr., himself a match to the Markles’ headline-grabbing antics, wince.

  “Meghan doesn’t view Andrew as one of the family’s great assets,” a source told The Sun. “She views him as the ultimate embarrassing uncle. Not just because of his questionable attitude to women and how he referred to them in that awful Newsnight interview, in which he was talking in an almost alien language, as if all women were conquests.”

  Meghan’s disapproval of her uncle only roiled ferment inside the Palace. No one, with the exception of the Queen, his ex-wife, and daughters perhaps, had much sympathy left for the boorish Andrew
. But for Meghan to be heard and vocal about a long-standing Royal was regarded by many as being wildly inappropriate. Meanwhile, it emerged that William was the prime mover behind having Andrew “step back” from his royal duties in the wake of the scandal and the BBC interview.

  “William is becoming more and more involved in decisions about the institution [monarchy] and he’s not a huge fan of his uncle Andrew,” said a source.

  “William thinks the right thing happened,” added another aide.

  The Duke withdrew from all his 230 patronages and royal duties, with the blessing of his mother, the Queen. The loss of this senior member of the Royal Family, under such unhappy circumstances, was shocking and would have been unthinkable just a few years back.

  Just when the Queen and the Palace felt the Andrew situation was being resolved, with a grim sense of inevitability, a new announcement was made from Frogmore Cottage.

  “The Duke and Duchess have a full schedule of engagements and commitments until mid-November, after which they will be taking some much-needed family time.” In effect, Harry and Meghan were going off the grid for almost two months, at least.

  The couple insisted that a six-week sabbatical from onerous royal duties was essential, to spend some valuable time as a family with Doria and Archie over Thanksgiving. There was no plan to make contact with Thomas Sr. or the rest of the Markle clan.

  The dilemma faced by Harry—as to his position as a Royal—celebrating the traditional American holiday historically conflicted with Britain, would have taxed the most agile of brains in the Palace press office. In any event, Thanksgiving with Doria evolved into an extended private holiday, free of royal or any other obligations, for the young family, to be spent in the United States and then in Toronto.

  But there was more to this trip than a chance to eat turkey and pumpkin pie with the family and show off Archie to friends back in Canada. Meghan had been patient, but this whole Princess thing didn’t seem to many to be working out the way she wanted. The gossip was that the pair was scoping out possible new homes in Los Angeles, ahead of a move Stateside, or at the very least, a permanent base in California.

  There was some relief in London at this idea, as the Palace continued to struggle with the wishes and dreams of the couple. “There’s an acceptance that things haven’t worked out with the Sussexes full-time in Windsor,” a royal insider commented. “Theoretically, they could have a second base in America.”

  The six-week break began after Harry and Meghan joined other Royals at the the Field of Remembrance, as part of the annual Royal British Legion Festival of Remembrance on November 9 and the Remembrance Day Service on November 10. They then flew to Los Angeles to join Doria for Thanksgiving, an intimate feast reportedly cooked solely by Meghan “without any servants.”

  Thanksgiving is traditionally a time for family, so it wouldn’t have been complete without a special contribution from the Markle side of the clan, and into the breach stepped eighty-year-old Michael Markle, Meghan’s uncle. Weighing in with his thoughts on his niece’s relationship with her sister-in-law, he ensured that Meghan be reminded that at this special time of the year, her family was still keeping a close eye on her.

  Talking to The Sun in the United Kingdom, Michael accused her of acting immaturely “towards family members” since she became a member of the Royals. Mr. Markle admitted that Meghan had left the family behind despite support from them. “It could be that that’s part of the problem she’s having with her sister-in-law,” he confided. “Meghan is immature in some ways. I feel that because of the way she acts—not only towards family members, but other people.”

  Also weighing in was the figure of Paul Burrell, Diana’s former butler. In the wake of her death, he had notoriously caused mayhem with his bizarre and shrill assertions that he had been Diana’s “rock.” He had been peeved with William and Harry ever since they had begged him to be quiet after hurtful revelations and betrayals of their mother’s final years, back in their teens. Now, Burrell echoed Mike Markle’s comments about Meghan.

  “What comes with maturity is a set of beliefs and they don’t sit well with the Royal Family,” he pontificated. “She has to tow the party line.”

  Ironically, this was in complete contrast to Palace musings about Kate before her wedding, when the Queen expressed her concern that Kate didn’t have any charities associated with her—an essential part of the gig. She was asked to step up her charity work and individual identity, whereas Meghan, who had charity coming out of her ears, was told to get in line and be less outspoken.

  But meanwhile, what of Meghan’s sister-in-law? Kate had reacted to the news that the Sussexes were leaving town for a prolonged period of time with mixed feelings, according to a source. On the one hand, with the removal of the constant stream of drama and chaos, their absence meant her own standing in the Palace would be golden. Kate, who seemingly never caused a fuss or behaved in an unseemly manner, was regarded by everyone now with even more appreciation and fondness for her stability and calm, as she busied herself with her photography, her royal duties, and her growing family. She now held the upper hand, observers would note.

  Kate had made visible attempts at getting along with Harry and Meghan over the preceding year, after Charles had warned them all to make an effort. But now things had changed. “Kate’s standing in the palace has never been so high, so she feels no obligation to make nice with Meghan and Harry,” an insider said. The source added that Kate would “not be apologizing or attempting to mend fences until they reciprocate the effort she and William have been making with them for well over a year now.”

  In a move clearly designed to show Meghan who’s who, Kate planned a series of cool social events for her BFFs in January 2020; regardless of whether the dynamic duo would be back in town from their sabbatical, she made sure that Meghan would not be invited. “Kate’s decided she needs to be cruel to be kind and it’s time her sister-in-law learned a harsh lesson,” said the source. “Needless to say, it hasn’t been well received at all.”

  After the dramatic revelations of Harry and Meghan’s documentary, Kate and William lightened the mood somewhat as they got competitive over Christmas roulades, with celebrity chefs Mary Berry and Nadiya Hussain on the BBC special, “A Berry Royal Christmas.”

  It couldn’t have come as a greater contrast to the intensity of the ITV documentary, much to everyone’s relief. William played the jokily inept dad messing about in the kitchen while Kate shook her head fondly and knocked the baking out of the park. The kids acted cute and adorable while the regal Mary Berry and engaging Nadiya Hussein brought the festive mirth. The message was one of cheery knockabout family fun.

  When he saw the show and read the rave reviews and fond comments that came in its wake, Harry was upset. “He felt cut off and excluded,” said an insider. “He wished he had been there with them all, laughing, fooling around, having fun before everyone gathered at the table for a lovely family feast.”

  On top of that, there was the question of their own disappearing portrait. During the Queen’s Christmas speech, curious viewers always note the monarch’s surroundings, especially the family photos carefully placed in shot. This year, much comment was aroused by the fact that among the massed banks of framed family snapshots on the desk, one particular branch of the family was missing, even though they had produced a cute baby that year and come up with a family Christmas card featuring him nosing at the camera adorably. Social media went into a ferment, with people debating whether the Queen was throwing sly regal shade at Harry and Meghan for deserting her at Yuletide along with the rest of the family at Sandringham. There were also reports that despite some Royals asking Harry and Meghan to return, to spend Christmas in the United Kingdom following the sudden and unexpected hospitalization of Prince Philip over the holiday, he refused to do so.

  Wearily, the Buckingham Palace press team rose to the occasion to deny anything untoward was going on. “As has been reported,” a slightly testy s
tatement read, “Their Royal Highnesses The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are spending private family time in Canada. The decision to base themselves in Canada reflects the importance of this Commonwealth country to them both. They are enjoying sharing the warmth of the Canadian people and the beauty of the landscape with their young son.”

  At that moment, the couple and Archie were indeed somewhere in the Great White North. The following month, they would publicly thank the Canadians “for the warm Canadian hospitality and support they received during their recent stay in Canada.”

  As it turned out, the Sussexes spent their first Christmas with Archie in a $14.1 million waterfront mansion owned by a mystery multimillionaire on Vancouver Island. With eight bedrooms, the gated estate had two private beaches and stunning views across the peninsula, from the four-acre property.

  “Locals in the island’s rural community of North Saanich noticed cameras and fences erected at the property as early as December 19, and the mansion is now swarming with security guards,” reported the Daily Mail. “One officer from the couple’s royal protection team was spotted patrolling the roads dressed in a Barbour jacket and driving a black Range Rover, and two other British guards were seen flying out from nearby Victoria International Airport, swapping in for new officers.”

  Unfortunately, once the family’s location was leaked, a local restaurant, the Deep Cove Chalet in North Saanich, became the target of a demented hate campaign by Meghan fans. Bored over the holidays and deprived of hourly updates about their hero, numerous emissaries of “Team Meghan” somehow got the idea that owners Pierre and Bev Koffer had turned the Sussexes’ entourage away, due to the size of their security detail, and decided to make their feelings plain. There was no support or apology to the couple from the Sussexes.

  “We’ve been getting hundreds of emails,” reported a harassed Koffer. “Nothing but s**t, saying what terrible people we are, and we didn’t even meet the people or see them. It just took on a life of its own. It’s f***ing p****d me off. They came to have a look and then they left,” he said. “I didn’t turn them down. I’ve got no idea where that came from, things take a life of their own. I wish I was never involved in it, it’s getting worse and worse.”