by William Kuhn
At this, murmuring rose from the stalls to the dress circle to the upper balconies.
“May I have quiet, please, ladies and gentlemen?” resumed the police inspector. “A bomb was discovered. It was defused before it could explode, but we have reason to believe that this was a terrorist event, and we are not completely certain that it is over. It may well have been aimed at Her Majesty’s presence here in the theatre, no more than a hundred paces from the railway station. The South Bank has been sealed off. We believe that it is unsafe for the public to leave the theatre at this time, so the Metropolitan Police would like to request your remaining here, in your seats, until we can give the all clear. Our duty is to protect the safety of the public, and given the nature of what has just occurred, we do not think it is safe for you to leave the building at this time. As soon as our investigations are complete, I will return and make an announcement to you all. It would assist us if you were to keep your seats until our investigations finish. We anticipate your being free to go before the evening is over, but at this time, we cannot allow you, for your own safety, to leave the premises.” The inspector then nodded to the audience, bowed once again to The Queen, and left the stage, walking quickly.
As soon as the inspector finished his speech and walked off the stage, the former quiet murmuring of the audience turned into agitation. The actors broke from their characters and grouped in clusters to discuss what they’d just heard. A woman in the front row fainted. Her husband poured a little water from his Evian bottle on her forehead. Others just faced forward in shock. The sound of a hundred different worried conversations rose into a muffled roar. Many looked up to the royal box for a cue about how to behave, what to do.
The Queen was not in the least surprised or frightened. She’d lived through the blitz of the Second World War. She could recall vividly the Irish Republican Army bombing London railway stations and murdering Lord Mountbatten when he was on his boat with his grandchildren in the 1970s. More recently she’d joined in the memorial service for those who died from the bombs of Islamic terrorists on the Tube and on several buses on the seventh of July 2007, 7/7/07, Britain’s own 9/11. During the memorial, she’d stood alone, silent, in front of the palace. She was fully prepared for more trouble. What the police inspector had described at Waterloo was not far different from the sort of terrorist attack that had been anticipated in briefing papers that had been circulated to her by the secret services.
Luke stepped back inside the box. He leaned over to whisper in The Queen’s ear. “Your Majesty, the police and secret services would like you to leave the theatre. They think there’s a small possibility that you are in danger and they would like to take you to safety.”
The Queen looked out into the theatre. She could see that members of the audience were upset and that order needed to be restored. “No, Major Thomason. We’re staying right here. We will wait with the others for the all clear signal. We face whatever it is together. If I go, they should all be allowed to go. If they must stay, I must stay too.”
“But, Ma’am . . .”
“Tell the police. Thank you.” Luke knew he had been dismissed and went back out to the corridor to convey The Queen’s decision.
The Queen resumed her survey of the audience and the groups of actors onstage. She picked up her copy of Henry V and slowly rose to her feet at the edge of the box.
The audience, through some archaic collective memory of right behavior, seeing The Queen on her feet, struggled to rise to their feet too. Anne quickly followed her example. With all the audience now standing, The Queen looked at them gravely, and then looked at Rajiv. She wanted the play to recommence. It was the only way to calm everyone down, and there was no point in sitting there doing nothing while they waited for the police to come back and let them go. Just as she’d expected, Rajiv had his copy of the play open too, and was following along. She looked at him directly, made eye contact, and then gently nodded her head in the direction of the stage. By a kind of sympathetic telepathy between them, he instantly knew what she wanted.
The audience grew silent, rapt, looking at The Queen looking at Rajiv. Suddenly, in a deep baritone, without consulting his script, as he knew this particular passage in his sleep, Rajiv faced the actors onstage and began with the words of the Earl of Westmorland, who had been about to speak when the police inspector came in and interrupted the action. Standing with King Henry before the English army, Westmorland said he was sorry there were so few English soldiers compared to the French and wished they had more men from England to fight with them. “O that we now had here but one ten thousand of those men in England that do no work today!”
The audience and the actors onstage looked curiously at Rajiv, who might have been a Bollywood cast member himself, planted in the audience, speaking lines from the play, just where the action had left off before the interruption. Was the terrorist event planned or real? Was it part of the play, or was it a true crisis? They were frankly confused. They looked up at The Queen, the stage lights glancing off her large-framed 1980s spectacles. She was now looking not at Rajiv, but at the stage, where the actors were all still in chaotic groups. There was an awkward pause.
Then Rajiv tried again: “O that we now had here but one ten thousand of those men in England that do no work today!”
Suddenly the Bollywood film star recognized this was his cue. He walked to the position onstage he would have taken just after the police inspector had appeared and began Henry’s heroic lines in reply to Westmorland.
What’s he that wishes so?
My cousin Westmorland? No, my fair cousin:
If we are mark’d to die, we are enough
To do our country loss; and if to live,
The fewer men, the greater share of honour.
The audience and the actors onstage were all transfixed. What was happening? The Bollywood actor continued,
God’s will! I pray thee, wish not one man more.
By Jove, I am not covetous for gold,
Nor care I who doth feed upon my cost;
It yearns me not if men my garments wear;
Such outward things dwell not in my desires:
But if it be a sin to covet honour,
I am the most offending soul alive.
The remaining actors now resumed their places. They ceased to look in surprise from Rajiv to the royal box. Everyone now looked at Henry.
No, faith, my coz, wish not a man from England:
God’s peace! I would not lose so great an honour
As one man more, methinks, would share from me
For the best hope I have. O, do not wish one more!
Rather proclaim it, Westmorland, through my host,
That he which hath no stomach to this fight
Let him depart; his passport shall be made
And crowns for convoy put into his purse:
We would not die in that man’s company
That fears his fellowship to die with us.
There was an emotional current in the air, which everyone felt. When Henry said that he did not wish to die with someone who feared dying with him, many hearts lurched in their chests. They were with The Queen. There was a crisis nearby, wasn’t there? She was willing to die. She hadn’t left the theatre under heavy police guard. She was staying where she was. Right there in the theatre with them. And they were willing to die with her. It didn’t matter whether the crisis were real or imaginary. They would go right through it together.
The Queen, still standing at the edge of the royal box, script in hand, could see that the audience’s attention had returned to the action onstage. The police inspector’s announcement had electrified the Bollywood actor. He spoke the part with a passion that it was impossible not to notice. She saw that the audience had ceased to look at her. So she sat down. And because she sat down, Anne and Luke in the box as well as William and Rebecca and Rajiv
all sat down too. The Queen and everyone else in the royal box having sat down, the audience sat down too. Now all attention went back to the stage, where Henry told the soldiers about to fight with him:
He that shall live this day, and see old age,
Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours,
And say ‘To-morrow is Saint Crispian:’
Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars.
And say ‘These wounds I had on Crispin’s day.’
Old men forget: yet all shall be forgot,
But he’ll remember with advantages
What feats he did that day: then shall our names
Familiar in his mouth as household words
Harry the king, Bedford and Exeter,
Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester,
Be in their flowing cups freshly remember’d
This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispian shall ne’er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remember’d;
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he today that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother.
The orchestra struck up music for the dance number to accompany the choreographed battle between the English and French armies. The audience had forgotten The Queen altogether. At that moment, most of them were no longer thinking of a terrorist scare at Waterloo, either. They were so wrapped up in the action of the play that they were in France in 1415. The play carried on seamlessly to its conclusion, the audience jumping to its feet once again, with a shout, when the curtain fell. The cast came to the front for repeated smiling bows and handholding and acknowledgment of seemingly endless applause. After nine curtain calls, the police inspector appeared sheepishly from the wings.
The audience was not surprised to see him and began to applaud him too. “No, no!” He said, “No. This is just to give you the ‘all clear.’ No further danger. You’re free to go. Your Majesty. Ladies and gentlemen.” With two quick nods, he got off the stage as quickly as he could. The house lights came up and the audience stood to go, many still wondering what exactly had happened. Was the crisis real or make-believe? Had the stage Henry brought them together, made them feel as one, or was it The Queen?
The Queen was in no doubt about whether the crisis was real or imagined. She turned to Luke and said, “Now, Major Thomason, I would like to go to Waterloo.”
Luke looked at her with surprise.
The Queen realized that what she was proposing was out of the ordinary, but she was also determined to help. “I must get to Waterloo. The emergency services will still be there and will need some encouragement. The bomb disposal unit too. I would like to thank them.”
“But, Ma’am. We’ll be in their way.”
“Please telephone and let them know we’re coming.”
Luke sprinted down the steps ahead of her to speak to the police at the side of the theatre. The Rover was waiting for her at the side door, where she could make an inconspicuous exit. Anne could do nothing but follow as The Queen made her way laboriously down the red carpet. A group of police officers had circled around Luke, telling him that it was impossible for The Queen to go to Waterloo. Luke took his mobile phone out of his pocket and punched in a redial number for Arabella Tyringham-Rode.
“Hello?” She picked up impatiently after a single ring.
“Ms Rode, Luke Thomason here.”
“No time just now, Major. Doubtless you know what’s happened. The Queen herself may have been one of the targets.”
“Yes. I understand that.”
“Oh, and good show finding her last night. I’m afraid I underestimated you and Mr de Morgan. Took the precaution of removing your security clearances, but they’ve now been restored. I will also overlook your disobeying the order to remove the Queen from the theatre earlier.”
“You what?” Luke had been given no notice of his clearance having been revoked.
“Just a formality. Now completely on the up-and-up. If you don’t mind, I do have other matters to attend to. I’m sure you can understand that just now we’re rather busy here.”
“Yes, um, that’s why I’m telephoning, actually.” The wailing klaxon of a police vehicle went by and temporarily drowned out the conversation.
“Where are you, Major? You’re supposed to be with The Queen at the theatre.”
“Yes, well, The Queen feels she could be of more use in the station right now.”
“Under no circumstances, Major.”
“Her Majesty would like to give moral support to the emergency services. She would like to meet the bomb disposal unit. What I’d like you to do is phone ahead to the police and let them know Her Majesty’s coming.”
“Are you out of your mind, Major? You cannot take The Queen onto the site of a terrorist attack, even one that has been prevented from happening. It is out of the question. The crowd rushed the exits when they were clearing the station. No one trampled, thank God, but there were a few falls and some injuries. They have been taken to St Thomas’s Hospital. You take The Queen back to Buckingham Palace right away, do you hear me?”
Luke could understand the logic of her forbidding him to take The Queen to Waterloo, but he also felt that his department needed some defending against the presumption of an arrogant civil servant. He forgot that he had once been afraid of her. “No, I’m perfectly sane, Rode. By the way, in case you’ve forgotten, Her Majesty was Queen before you were born. Before the Prime Minister was born too. Before the last one that was in too. She knows what’s she’s doing.”
Here a string of vituperation followed from the other end of the line that surprised even Luke. He thought he’d heard it all in Iraq, but Arabella Tyringham-Rode appeared to have the vocabulary of a stevedore.
“Dear me, you’re breaking up,” said Luke mildly as he waved the phone away from his ear and in the direction of the passing traffic. “Thank you so much,” he said, bringing the phone back to his mouth for a moment, and then he pressed the red “END CALL” button.
Just then The Queen appeared at the foot of the stairs at the side entrance of the theatre. “Your Majesty, the secret services are grateful for your offer to help at Waterloo,” Luke began. “They feel that the station is still in a state of confusion, however. A number of the public were injured when they cleared the station. They have been taken to St Thomas’s. Under the circumstances, they wonder whether it mightn’t be better if you were to return to BP.”
A look of dismay crossed The Queen’s face.
Looking off into the distance, Luke said, “But I see no objection to our stopping at St Thomas’s. Visit Mrs MacDonald, who will probably be out of intensive care by now? Perhaps, if we happen to chance on some of the injuries from Waterloo in one of the wards, we might say hello to them too? Some of the emergency services will doubtless still be there,” said Luke with raised eyebrows, as if proposing an extra plaque for her to unveil.
“And the secret services have approved that, have they?” asked The Queen with a grim note of irony as she was on the verge of climbing into the unmarked Rover.
“Well, I believe Miss Tyringham-Rode is a very reasonable woman. I’ll see to her.”
The Queen looked briefly at Luke and guessed exactly the sort of conversation he’d just had with MI5. With a glance into his eyes she conveyed that nothing about her renewed sense of what she might still be able to do as sovereign was simple, and that if he wished to carry on as her equerry, difficult telephone conversations might in future be the least of his worries. “Thank you.”
“Not at all, Your Majesty.” Luke looked away from The Queen and straight ahead to the open car door in front of them. What he meant was “Count on me.”
The Queen set off in the Rover with Anne in th
e back, the Royal Protection officer in the front alongside the driver. Luke was to have returned to the palace in the Rolls Royce The Queen had arrived in, but he now jumped in the front of the bigger car with another driver and they drove off first to arrive at the hospital before The Queen. The maroon Rolls Royce swept into the forecourt of the accident and emergency entrance and Luke hopped out before the car had come to a complete halt. He walked quickly up to a knot of police officers who were standing at the door. “Good evening, Officers. Her Majesty The Queen will shortly be arriving to make an informal visit. She will be on her way to see a member of staff who is in the cardiac ward, upstairs.”
The police officers looked at him with expressions varying between shock, disapproval, and consternation.
“We will not be in your way, gentlemen, I can assure you of that. There is the possibility . . .” Luke here refused to make eye contact and looked at the ceiling of the portico. “The possibility that Her Majesty may, on her way upstairs, wish to thank you for doing your duty tonight on an extraordinary occasion. And to call in on members of the emergency services, medical personnel, and any of those injured during tonight’s incident at Waterloo who are in a position to receive her, um, grateful acknowledgment.”
The three policemen goggled at him. “Look here. Who are you, then?” began one of them. Just then, The Queen’s Rover drove into the forecourt, and she came out of the car with her gleaming handbag hanging over the crook of her arm. They knew it was her from the way she carried the handbag. She came straight up to Luke and the three officers. Anne hung behind at a tactful distance.
“Your Majesty, may I present Police Constable, um,” Luke looked at the first officer’s badge and nameplate, “Police Constable Mulready.”