Chapter 2
Prince Charles was waiting for William in the library of Clarence House.
“Do you really believe that you can choose your own destiny?
“Sorry, Pop. I had no choice. I can’t do this anymore. I won’t do this anymore.”
“William, I thought you understood that you don’t have choices. That’s one of the prices that we have to pay for the life that we are privileged to lead.”
“I don’t want this life. I don’t want this life for my children. It’s an outdated puppet show, can’t you see that? All this nonsense of kings and queens and princes and princesses and dukes and duchesses living in palaces and getting dressed up in these ridiculous costumes. I don’t want to be a part of it anymore.”
“And your wife? What does she think about your decision?”
“I haven’t spoken to her about it yet.”
“You haven’t…”
“I couldn’t tell anyone. I couldn’t trust anyone.”
“William. I need you to change your mind.”
“Are you not listening to me? I’ve been working up to this moment for years. It’s not a quick decision that I made on the spur of the moment. I’m not stupid. I want out.”
“Look, William. We can still turn this around. Why don’t you just take a few days and talk it over with Kate, before you make a final decision.”
William gave his father a steely stare and shook his head.
The heir to the throne smiled at the second in line to the throne and opened his arms to hug his son. As the 2 men embraced Charles reached into his jacket pocket and took out the syringe and quickly injected the sedative into his son’s right buttock. William felt a pounding in his head and then it all went dark.
Yolanda Ojukwu and Steve Fordham, the cameraman, were on their way to St. James’s Palace. Her editor at the BBC had told her that she was to stay with the story. Prince William was in Clarence House, part of St. James’s Palace, so she would probably be broadcasting from there for the rest of the day. Steve was driving the outside broadcast van down the Great North Road on the way back to the centre of London.
Yolanda was still worried about the state of her white blouse.
“Steve. Is there a Tesco or something around here? I wouldn’t mind getting a new blouse. I might be on the TV again tonight, and this coffee stain just looks awful. My mum’s gonna kill me when she sees it.”
Yolanda’s mother came to London from Nigeria in the mid-eighties. And while they never had much money when Yolanda and her brother were growing up, Mrs Ojukwu always made sure that her kids’ clothes were sparkling clean when they left the house.
“I think there’s a big Tesco near Colney Hatch Lane. It’s not much of a detour. We can try there if you like.”
“Thanks, Steve. I really should make a little effort for the story of the century.”
“No worries.”
Steve was quietly thinking that he would happily drive to the ends of the earth for the beautiful young woman sitting next to him. A couple of hundred yards were not going to be a problem.
Steve pulled the big van into the Tesco car park. It wasn’t easy to get close to the entrance.
“I’ll have to park up here if that’s OK, Yola. This van is a bit big.”
Yolanda flashed him the biggest whitest smile he had ever seen. Mrs Ojukwu took care of her kids’ teeth as well, and Yolanda had the kind of smile that could even land her a job reading the news in America.
“No problem, Steve. I’ll be as quick as I can.”
The van radio was on Five Live which was full of the news of the day, but there hadn’t been any developments. 90 minutes after the big announcement, there had been no comment from anyone of any importance. Some politics professors and constitutional experts had been saying that there would have to be some kind of law passed for William to be removed from the line of succession.
Yolanda hadn’t even got to the huge superstore entrance before a big lady in a bright blue mac was calling out to her,
“It’s you. It’s you. From the BBC. I saw you today on the TV.”
Yolanda wasn’t used to this kind of encounter, because she had only ever done a few short broadcasts before and they weren’t about anything that anyone was interested in, so she just smiled and kept on walking.
“Good luck, dear,” the lady continued, “You have a lovely smile.”
On the van radio the Five Live presenter was now introducing the former MP Stephen Mott who was a well-known republican, and still very much involved in politics even though he was in his late seventies.
“Mr Mott. What is your reaction to Prince William’s announcement?”
“Well, Sue. First of all I’d like to thank you for inviting me on to give my opinion. I wasn’t sure anyone listened to an old fool like me anymore. I believe that it’s inevitable that one day Britain will wake up and realise that it can’t run its political system like a mediaeval costume drama. It seems that Prince William has already woken up to that realisation. It’s ironic that you frequently hear our politicians quite rightly judging the unjust actions of African dictators as backward and out of place in the 21st century, whilst our own political system is fabricated on the archaic notion of hereditary privilege to which Prince William so eloquently referred.”
“Were you shocked by Prince William’s words.”
“I must admit, yes. I was very shocked, but also extremely pleasantly surprised. Perhaps the fact that this view has come from the second in line to the throne will finally make people realise that it is time to become a truly modern country and consign the royal puppet show to the past where it belongs.”
“Thank you for the moment, Mr Mott. We are also joined by the royal biographer, Sir Christopher Fortesque-Blythe. Sir Christopher, what is your reaction to Prince William’s announcement?”
“First of all I must take umbrage with Mr Mott’s description of our dear royal family as a ‘puppet show’. This kind of disrespect for the traditions of our great nation is truly unforgiveable and is tantamount to treachery.”
“Off with his head!” Mr Mott could be heard chuckling on the other line.
“I’m very glad you find all this so amusing, Mr Mott. What you perhaps don’t realise is that the rest of the world loves our royal family and they help to bring huge amounts of inward investment into our economy, which gives jobs to the people that you used to purport to represent in parliament.”
“Thank you, Sir Christopher. But you still haven’t answered my original question. What is your reaction to Prince William’s announcement?”
“I’m certain that there is a perfectly reasonable explanation for his words. They are certainly not consistent with his true beliefs. Perhaps the recent press intrusions have caused him a great amount of stress, and this has led to this announcement which I’m sure he will recant in due course.”
Stephen Mott was chuckling again,
“If I hadn’t heard such similar nonsense a thousand times before, I might be struggling to believe my ears. Here we have one of the staunchest defenders of the infallibility and divine wisdom of the royal family questioning the very words that have been clearly and sincerely delivered by the second in line to the throne himself.”
“That is simply preposterous. Mr Mott is misrepresenting me. I have the deepest respect for Prince William.”
“If you had deep respect for him, perhaps you should respect his wishes and let him bow out. He clearly has the wisdom to see the royal farce for the outdated anachronism that it most obviously is.”
“You can’t bow out of a divine duty, Mr Mott.”
“Are you now trying to tell us that abdication is not permitted, Sir Fortesque? Should Prince William be forced against his will to do a job which he doesn’t wish to do? Does he not have the basic human right to determine his own future? Does he not have the human right to express his opinion in public?”
There was no response from the royal biographer.
&nb
sp; “Sir Christopher, are you still there? ….. Sir Christopher? It appears that the line has gone dead. So what now Mr Mott? What are the implications of the Prince’s announcement?”
“Well, I imagine there will have to be an act of parliament like the Abdication Act of 1936, where William declares his desire to remove himself and his descendants from the right of succession to the Throne. This act would of course have to be given royal assent by his grandmother, the Queen. Prince Willam’s younger brother, Harry would then be the second in line to the throne.”
“So you believe that the mechanisms are already in place to make these changes?”
“Well, Sue. Parliament can always create new mechanisms for any eventuality. Having said that, I would hope that today’s developments will kick-start a genuine debate about the validity of our current political system. I believe that it is high time that Britain became a republic with an elected head of state, and it seems that Prince William holds the same belief.”
“Stephen Mott. Thank you very much.”
“Thank you.”
Yolanda had found a suitable white shirt for just a tenner in Tesco’s and was soon back in the van with Steve, whose heart raced with Yolanda in his presence again.
“Did you find a shirt?”
“Yeah. No problem. Thanks. Let’s go.”
Steve started the engine and after a few careful manoeuvres they were back on the North Circular Road and on their way back to the centre of London. It was a grey September day in London. There was a light breeze and the occasional drizzle.
Yolanda had never been to Nigeria, so it wasn’t like she had any experience of a hot climate, but she definitely wasn’t keen on London winters, and the air was starting to get that bite which can chill you to the bone. Yolanda had studied politics at university, where she had also worked on the student paper and at the uni radio station. She graduated 2 years before and had done some internships for some small media companies before landing this job as a junior reporter with the beeb. She knew she was lucky to get the job. She also knew that her good looks and her dark African skin probably didn’t do her any harm when it came to the application process. She had met other applicants with a lot more experience than her own. She wanted to be a political reporter so she wasn’t really that pleased to be following royals around on their charitable duties, but now fate had placed her at the centre of an unprecedented historical event. She was reporting on what would be history and she had already realised that people may be watching her original broadcast in twenty years time. She was now applying a little light make up around her eyes while listening for any pertinent facts on the radio.
Steve started to tell her about the recent radio discussion,
“Stephen Mott was just on - having an argument with some double-barrelled royal expert.”
“Did he say anything important?”
“He was talking about there having to be some kind of law passed to allow William to duck out of the line of succession. He mentioned King Edward’s abdication in 1936.”
“Thanks, Steve. 1936. I might be able to use that in a broadcast.”
At 10 Downing Street the PM’s private secretary had just received a call from Clarence House. George Barclay answered the phone in the Cabinet Room,
“Hello.”
“Hello, Prime Minister, it’s Prince Charles.”
“Thank you for calling your majesty, do you mind if my communications director, Billy Herbert listens in?”
“No. Not at all.”
“Prince William’s announcement must have been a shock, sir.”
“Yes. It was a complete surprise. I didn’t even have an inkling. “
“Your majesty, I am making a statement at three o’clock, so I need to know what the situation is. Have you spoken to Willliam?”
“Yes, we’ve spoken. I will be frank with you Prime Minister. William has been under a lot of pressure recently what with all those press intrusions. Because of the nature of his mother’s tragic passing he is particularly sensitive to these issues. But I can assure you that today’s views are just a temporary reaction to the recent events, so we need to buy some time. We really don’t need to upset the apple cart.”
“No, of course not. So you think he’s going to change his mind?”
“Yes, yes, yes. Unquestionably. I think you need to throw the dogs off the scent for a while, Mr Barclay. I’m sure that you will come up with a solution.”
“Yes, your majesty. We will draft a statement and send it to you for your approval.”
“Excellent. Thank you prime minister.”
Billy Herbert had been taking notes.
“What do you think, Billy?”
“Sounds like we need to say something and nothing. Obfuscate.”
The prime minister didn’t know the meaning of ‘obfuscate’. So he just nodded in agreement,
“Indeed. Thank you, Billy. As quick as you can.”
George Barclay’s mood had suddenly improved a little. Maybe this wouldn’t be the constitutional crisis destined to ruin his autumn that he feared it might have been. He had a nice little trip to Japan and Korea in two weeks, and he wasn’t keen on having to cancel to take care of home affairs. To be honest, he had very little interest in home affairs. The fun part of the job for him was travelling and shaking hands with foreign dignitaries. He could do that. Walk the red carpet. Stop and inspect some soldier’s uniform. Put on mummy’s ‘strength and confidence’ face. That he could do. That’s why he entered politics. Battling it out in the Commons with some Labour MP from the North was not his cup of tea at all. His cup of tea was Earl Grey on the White House lawn with the President of the U.S.A. He saw himself as a statesman, a British bulldog in a suit portraying ‘strength and confidence’ on the world stage. He imagined his stiff upper lip alone could rescue the economy, vanquish all foes and restore the might of the Empire. He was a superhero in a blue suit.
His adviser, Peabody, managed to lighten his mood still further,
“Well, George. Look on the bright side. If the monarchy goes down the tubes you might be able to run for president one day.”
“Don’t be so disrespectful, Peabody. God save the Queen I say. The bedrock of our nation.”
That’s what he said, but Barclay was secretly smiling inside. He hadn’t thought of the presidential angle…..President Barclay of Britain….It had a nice ring to it. And the president’s gig would be nothing but red carpets, cocktails and state dinners. His wife, Penelope would be overjoyed.
A Royal Resignation Page 2
