Emerging a few moments later, having secured an extra-large serving of chocolate, she proceeded to juggle both the umbrella and the dish with her left hand, while manipulating the plastic spoon with her right. The mechanics involved in this hampered her progress somewhat, but that was all to the good. Charley having left for Scotland a little early on his own in order to attend to some pressing affairs that he had claimed would only bore her, she was faced with her first Friday evening alone in a long time, and she was at a dead loss as to what to do with herself.
Tap, tap, tap. Stop.
Tap, tap, tap. Stop.
Daisy paused again, feeling herself being tugged by a series of indescribable smells that were wafting out onto the evening air through the propped-open door of a Chinese restaurant. Steamed dumplings, cashew chicken. She walked backwards a couple of paces, peering in. Garlic shrimp and fortune cookies? Damn! Maybe she should have had some dinner instead of leapfrogging straight for dessert.
Oh, well, she sighed philosophically. Extensive past experience had taught her that while frozen yogurt and garlic went together just fine if you ate the garlic first, somehow, when you tried to reverse the process, the resulting combination was just plain icky.
Tap, tap, tap. Stop.
Tap, tap, tap. Stop.
Hey, wait a second. Was there an echo out there?
For quite some time now, every time that Daisy had moved a few paces along the glistening sidewalk, there had occurred an equivalent answering response from behind her. But it had taken the novel concept of dinner before dessert to yank her meandering consciousness up to a level of full awareness where she might be better equipped to deal with those threatening, dogged reverberations.
Ever since her return from Edinburgh, members of the press had been shadowing her every move, as though they were a whole roll of bad pennies waiting for something to change. And, granted, maybe it had been forgivable the other evening, when that one reporter had trailed her into the ladies’ room in the tube station, peeking over the top to catch a snap of her straddling the loo. After all, he’d looked young, had a dirty job to do, probably had a whole flat full of starving kids at home, and he had to earn his living somehow.
But not even allowing a girl a moment’s free time, in order to eat her dessert in peace? That really was the limit! It was the kind of gross harassment that literally shrieked for extreme measures. Or, at least, it did in Daisy’s book.
Feeling herself to be justifiably and adequately armed—with righteous indignation, if nothing else—Daisy whirled to confront her pursuer.
As she was completing her turn, a figure leapt from the gathering darkness, seizing both of her wrists.
She tried to pull away, but the hold was too strong.
“Daisy!” the voice of her attacker cried, whether with malice or with something else, it was impossible to tell. But anyway, she thought, it sure was loud.
She pulled back one more time as hard as she could, and just barely succeeded in yanking the figure towards her, where she could examine his features under the lights from the Chinese restaurant.
“Blah!” she screamed, umbrella and frozen yogurt dish flying.
It was pretty safe to say that the sight of Pacqui, standing there, had scared the daylights out of her.
“Daisy, it is you!”
“Pacqui?”
“I was not certain at first, it being so unforgivably lengthy a time since we last met and your appearance having changed so somehow. My Daisy,” he laughed softly, pointing at her person.
She glanced down at what his finger was indicating. The point of her umbrella had only missed impaling Mr. Wu by mere centimeters, but she had succeeded in donning her dessert, proving once and for all—and with an empirical exactitude that would never be called into question—that there was at least one other item besides a garlic chaser that chocolate did not in fact go with.
“But now I see that it is most definitely you!” he added.
“Pacqui!” she screamed again, unthinking. “Why have you been stalking me?”
“Stalking?” His brow furrowed, a hurt expression clouding his features.
“The notes,” she stammered. “All of those threatening phone calls.”
“But I was merely trying to advise you, as your most dear friend, that you must be discreet. The press in this country can be brutal and I did not wish to see you eaten up by them. Or spit out, for that matter.”
“But what about that thing you wrote, about being a homicidal maniac?”
He roared out loud, his body shaking with laughter. “Oh! Silly Daisy! You were worried about that homicidal maniac stuff?”
She nodded dumbly.
“Why, that is just an old insider’s embassy joke!”
“But I thought that you were angry with me. I thought that somehow I had led you on, but I couldn’t for the life of me figure out how, or what I could do about it, seeing as how you had fallen in love with me—”
Another rather insultingly loud shriek of laughter managed to forestall her speech.
“Oh, no! Daisy! You thought that I was in love with you?” he cried with incredulity. “Oh, no! I am in love, it is true. But I am in love with Packey!”
Her confused expression begged for enlightenment.
“Remember when I told you that there are three of us at the Embassy: Paki, Packey and Pacqui?”
She nodded.
“Well, I have fallen most gloriously in love with Packey! And only as most recently as last night, he has most joyfully informed me that he completely returns my affections. So you must congratulate me.”
“But, then, that means that you’re not in love with me?”
“Of course not! It is not enough for you that the Future King of England has fallen rump over teakettle for you? Must the whole world likewise fall prey to your inestimable charms?”
He gave her arm a reassuring pat.
“Just remember to grant a wide berth to those leeches from the press, and you should do just fine here.”
He headed off into the night, but then paused, turning.
“You know, you really must do something about that most incredible imagination of yours before it carries you off somewhere.”
He continued for a few paces before calling over his shoulder, “And a ready supply of napkins might not be such a bad investment either!”
3
And just how had the Fleet Street scavengers learned of the existence of Daisy as a fixture in the Prince’s life?
Well, nasty Court rumor had it that the Prince had had to put in a formal written request to the Lord Chamberlain on behalf of Daisy, in order for her to be presented to the Queen at Holyrood. The Lord Chamberlain had then passed this seemingly innocuous tidbit onto the Master of the Household, who, in an attempt to avoid a further thrashing from his wife late one drunken evening, had offered it to that gossip-loving grim person by way of an evasion tactic. She, in her turn, lording her own exalted status in life over her little sister, had passed it to her along with the tepid tea and stale scones one dismal afternoon. And Little Sis, inevitably, had parlayed the information—accompanied by her questionably intact virginity—into a romantic liaison with a fledgling stringer for the Evening Standard, whom she had met in a pub at closing time one evening.
The result of all of this telling tales out of school was, as they say, some idiot’s idea of history.
4
Ever since the Garden Party at Holyrood, the press—that cruel stepsister—had been tripping all over itself in a panicked effort to dig up the dirt on Daisy. Although, another truth to tell, having come up with exactly zippo, they were now pathetically overdue for another shift in focus. After all, there were just so many consecutive days that even the News of the World could run banner headlines, screamingly proclaiming: “MYSTERY WOMAN STILL NOT SAYING MUCH!” Even they could only persist in the pursuit of the vacuous for just so long. Eventually something, of at least the slightest newsworthy value, had to give.
In fact, things had gotten so bad that, really, any minor alteration in the landscape would serve as a major scoop.
5
It was perhaps a mathematical given that in a city of London’s size—with a populace numbering around seven million, combined with an annual influx of about twenty million tourists to be tossed into the equation for good measure—that This One would finally run into The Other One. It had only ever been a matter of time, really, and when that summit did occur, it happened, quite naturally, in the umbrella department at Harrods.
So what if the inevitable summit was in reality no more than just a dream? Inevitable meetings really are just so inevitable.
• • •
Before he’d died, Daisy’s father, Herbert, had advised her that if a girl wanted to avoid going wrong in life, it was always a safe bet to keep her legs crossed and her mouth shut. And while she hadn’t had any trouble—at least not too often—with the physical requirements necessitated by the first portion of his counsel, the second had on more than one occasion proven to be a mental and oral impossibility. She thought, therefore she spoke, and that was pretty much how her Descartesian personality had always dictated that she behave, and there had never seemed to be much that could be done about it. It was the nature of her beast to speak, and that she did.
Leaning on the handle of the purple umbrella she’d been holding for support, Daisy gave an ethnically inspired, self-effacing shrug of the shoulders to the blonde woman whose image towered over her own by nearly a foot in the mirror they were gazing into, standing side by side. “I didn’t think you needed him anymore?” she winced, really asking more than telling.
The Other One returned with a shrug of her own, surprising This One with the dismissive gesture that backed up the most magnanimous words that Daisy had ever heard in her life.
“Oh, I don’t care about all of that,” the Princess pooh-poohed. “I just wanted to see what you really looked like. Oh, sure I saw those pictures in the paper; but those black and white jobs never really do one justice, do they? Color is ever so much nicer. Don’t you think?”
Daisy couldn’t help but stare at The Other One, marveling that even when she appeared to be trying her hardest to look tacky, The Other One just couldn’t help herself: She might be wearing an outdated turquoise, mauve, and orchid Pucci babushka around her head, but those damned purple granny sunglasses accessorized perfectly.
The Other One sighed. “Sometimes, I think that it’s kind of like a bad marriage. The press and one, is what I meant to say. It’s as though…” She looked upwards, squinting one eye and chewing on the corner of her lip. “It’s as though one feels stifled and can’t wait to get away. But, then, when one finally does, and all of the attention stops, one feels as though it was the other party that had abandoned you. Don’t you think?”
“I never really…”
“No, of course not. You haven’t gotten to that stage yet.”
Daisy, who had been about to say that it was not the kind of thing that she would ever expend even the tiniest particle of gray matter on, remained mum.
“And then of course, there’s the public,” The Other One sighed. “So, I guess, it really is more like a bad triangle than a one-on-one thing. But, only, with the press being the bad husband and the public being the good lover. I think. And then, I expect that even the good lover will decide to leave one day.”
Daisy, being Daisy, just had to offer advice.
“You should never worry about what other people think,” Daisy counseled. “You need to either learn to be pleased with the person you are, or change to become the person that would give you most pleasure to be. But, under no circumstances, should you ever worry about what the rest of the world thinks.”
“What a novel concept,” The Other One giggled her agreement, “just ignore what others think.” As she giggled softly, an evanescent puff of perfume escaped from her person. And Daisy, dying to know what the most popular woman in the world smelled like, endeavored to chase it with her nose.
Daisy sniffed, inhaling an odor oddly reminiscent of the seventies.
Kinda “something,” kinda now…
She struggled to retrieve the aroma from the banks of sense memory, snapping her mental fingers along with the catchy beat. Now, that was certainly surprising, she thought, getting a full-flavored hit from a cheap drugstore scent.
Kinda sleek, kinda “wow…”
No way!
The Princess of Wales smelled like Charley?
Nobody would ever believe it…
“You really have given me quite a lot to think about,” the Princess said. “Say,” she added, clearly enthused, “those are some super shops you have in your town!”
What? blinked Daisy.
“Westport, silly. The papers said that you hailed from there.”
Clearly, one couldn’t believe everything that one read in the papers.
“I passed through there once, when I was on a visit to the States. They have a lovely Barney’s there, don’t they? I thought their prices were quite reasonable. Don’t you think?”
Daisy—who had long since given up on the temptation to say that she did think, and quite a lot actually, only not about those things—found herself thrust into the preliminary stages of déjà vu. Hadn’t she had this conversation at some point before?
“Oh, and they had this really great bookstore there. Klein’s was what I think they called it. Anyway,” she added, reaching out to impulsively rub Daisy’s forearm as though she were the person responsible for the creation of the store. “I got some great children’s books there, for Harry and Wills, of course. Oh, and a new one on AIDS hospices. But, when I passed the biography section, all I could see was my own face staring out at me. Spooky, the effect that still can have when one is not expecting it.”
It was this whole conversation that was spooky, Daisy thought. She found herself wondering what it must be like to suddenly find yourself famous, your image plastered on every magazine cover the world over. She shuddered at the prospect, as though she were someone living in the darkest heart of Africa, who truly believed that the photographers were trying to steal her soul.
Diana, seeing the shiver, reached out to rub the arm again, this time with reassurance. “Oh, you mustn’t trouble yourself about such things. You know, I’ll just bet that you’re far too smart to let the press get the better of you.”
And Daisy who, like most people, did truly believe that she was smarter than the average baron, found herself feeling mollified. This really was nice, she thought. Now they were both each making the other feel better.
“Say!” Diana impulsively cried. “Do you think that we might have lunch together sometime? I’ll bet we could be super friends!” But then, her face clouded over at the impossibility of it all. “No, I suppose not…”
And where were the members of the press, while this meeting of the minds was going on right under their very noses? Why, they were covering the earth-shattering events at the bleeding London Riding Horse Parade, for goodness’ sake, that’s where they were.
Besides, the meeting between Di and Dai was, as they say back in Dallas, all just a dream sequence.
Still, when Daisy finally rose, wiping the leftover sleepy stardust from her eyes, she did so with a smile of contentment; somehow, now, Dai felt as though she’d been given Di’s permission to proceed.
• • •
A dubious quantity of each having been achieved, excitement and psychotherapy had been temporarily placed on hold for the duration. For other cheap thrills, then, the roving eye would have to scan elsewhere.
Which shouldn’t be much of a problem since, quite soon, Daisy—along with a host of royals—would be back in Scotland.
September
1
The Prince was walking in the sunken gardens, in front of the granite mansion that had been built in the Scottish baronial style by Queen Victoria’s Prince Albert. He was anxiously awaiting the arrival of Da
isy, whom he had not seen in well over a fortnight, and it would have taken a trained lip-reader—or one very good friend—to make out the words that he was mouthing to himself.
Sturgess bravely approached, extending before him the woman’s namesake flower.
“Here, take this, Sir,” he offered. “It is still the most scientific procedure devised by man for discerning the true feelings of a woman.”
And so, for the remainder of the afternoon, to anyone observing from afar, Charles could be seen to be pacing up and down, the hands that were usually clasped behind his back with dignity now obsessively tearing the petals off of flowers with an Ophelia passion. And those same faraway people, had any of them been bold enough to venture nearer, would have heard the Future King of England muttering under his breath, repeatedly, and with a renewed and ceaseless devotion to his cause, “She loves me; she loves me not. She…”
2
The sight of one thousand of them, all in one place, went a long way towards making the typically perceived common-as-weeds daisy seem, oddly enough, a lot less humdrum.
And their presence in her room at Balmoral, when she arrived, made the human version feel a lot more welcome concerning her two months’ stay there.
3
“I believe that it is all going quite well. Don’t you?” Sturgess asked.
He and his partner in crime were holding one of their, by now, regular confabs. On this occasion, however, their eagle’s-eye view was from the 100-foot Great Square Tower, where Bonita was finding the rarefied air to be gloriously clear, if just a little bit cool.
“Time, Sturgie,” she advised, patting his arm, just as a strong gust of wind came along, ripping the bow off of her topknot, and sending her long gray hair loose, whipping like a standard behind her. “That’s the only thing that ever tells diddly squat.”
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