Shadows of a Princess. Patrick Jephson

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      No less impressive was her use of the phone as scalpel and feather duster. Under the latter, the most recalcitrant member of the ‘old guard’ would wag his tail with pleasure, but under the former, discarded favourites dumbly suffered their excommunication. In severe cases, any subsequent wailing or gnashing of teeth could be neatly avoided simply with a change of number. The magic digits – the coveted code to personal access – would abruptly fail to connect.

      The common denominator was her absolute command of the conversation. This she achieved with artfully presented moods and a surprising fluency which served as a reminder of her mental sharpness. Her sense of timing was sometimes uncanny. In my case she would usually ring when I was late coming back from lunch.

      Ultimately, of course, there was the royal hang-up, which could lend unprecedented significance to a simple click. On the other hand, a good call could put a smile on your face for the rest of the day.

      I had hardly finished congratulating myself on completing my first piece of written work in my new job when I noticed a lull in the hitherto ceaseless activity at the equerries’ desks. In unison, Richard and Christopher stretched and looked at their watches. It was 1.15, which my internal clock had already informed me was well past its customary lunch call.

      ‘Good heavens, look at the time, better go to lunch!’ said Richard.

      ‘Come on!’ said Christopher in a voice which would have galvanized his beloved Ghurkas, and I fell in behind the two veterans as we marched at speed down the stairs, across Ambassador’s Court and out into the sunshine of Green Park.

      Approaching Buckingham Palace from St James’s, the great building seems less intimidating than when seen from the grand processional route of The Mall. Visiting heads of state, arriving by the more impressive route, can look up with relief from their open carriage as the Palace fills the horizon, knowing their horse-drawn ordeal is nearly over, while heedless tourists reverse suicidally into the traffic as they struggle to squeeze the whole building into their viewfinders. From Green Park the view is oblique, framed by leafy branches and altogether more human in scale.

      The short walk between the Palaces became a well-worn route for me as I shuttled to and from the senior household offices with their Olympian denizens. Sometimes the journey was an opportunity for self-congratulatory reflection or garden party preening. At other times it was a true via dolorosa as the cares of the whole monarchy seemed to reach out at me from a hundred faceless windows on the monolithic facade.

      When great events were in the offing, the international TV networks set up their outside broadcast studios among the trees, creating a media gypsy camp under a forest of aerial masts. From this cover, preoccupied courtiers could be ambushed as they hurried by, later to discover that they had become unwitting walk-on extras in the main feature. As additional entertainment, Lancaster House would occasionally lay on a G7 or NATO summit, allowing us the chance to peer at the visiting Presidents and Prime Ministers as they were conveyed past in their limousines.

      Safely across the pedestrian crossing at the foot of Constitution Hill, our small detachment marched through the gates into the forecourt of Buckingham Palace, the focus of a hundred pairs of jaded tourist eyes. Were these men in the Simpson’s off-the-peg suits important? They did not look royal, that was certain (especially the one at the back who was explaining to the police that he had not yet got his security pass). But just in case, we had better take a photograph anyway – through the railings as if they were animals in a zoo; or inmates, I sometimes thought, at a secure institution.

      Buckingham Palace has two main working entrances – one round the side near the kitchens and one at the front on the right as you look at it. Like everything else, use of each entrance is determined by your place in the hierarchy. Being ‘household’, we strode proprietorially up the steps to the Privy Purse Door, thus being spared the indignity of queuing up with the delivery men at the side gate.

      A liveried doorman spared us the further indignity of having to open the door ourselves and, I noticed, greeted Richard and Christopher as if he really recognized them. This is the life, I thought, as my nostrils had their first sniff of the unique Palace smell: a mixture of polish and hot light bulbs with just a hint of mothballs. My feet at last felt qualified to pad across the red carpet as I followed my hungry guides into the bowels of the building.

      It was as well that I stayed close to them, because the route from the door to the dining room was labyrinthine to the uninitiated. The entrance gave on to a stairwell, which gave on to a corridor, which jinked, climbed, narrowed and divided before at last turning into the great entrance hall from which the dining room debouched. Even after several months’ practice the journey could seem hazardous, though whether this was from fear of getting lost or getting found I was never quite sure. The latter was a real anxiety at moments of internal tension, as my route even to the nearest exit offered ample opportunity for unexpected encounters with the Palace’s most senior inhabitants.

      Running this gauntlet was made slightly more pleasurable by detouring into the Queen’s Equerry’s Room for a preprandial drink. Every day without fail, it was full of courtiers intent on gin and gossip. While exploring the drinks tray on that first day I learned another lesson which time was to reinforce. In a way reminiscent of the tolerance extended by the Prince’s organization to his wife’s, the senior household played forbearant host to its subordinate satellites. Among these the Waleses’ organization constituted the most important – and certainly the largest – planet, but all down to the merest Pluto of royalty theoretically shared equal status as members of household. This entitled them to walk on red carpet, cruise the Royal Enclosure at Ascot and enjoy a number of other perks, one of whose daily rituals I was now experiencing.

      The atmosphere reminded me of one of those better service messes where the members had not forgotten some basic rules of communal living, principally the endangered art of making polite conversation. This was not surprising given the preponderance of ex-military personnel, but the similarity began to fray when I listened to the shoptalk which, inevitably, dominated the conversation. Beneath the surface conviviality I slowly detected a lack of the kind of common purpose to be expected even in the least cohesive wardroom.

      This was obviously a valuable clearing house for the various informal royal intelligence services. The principal members of the royal family were represented by their private staffs and the heads of the Palace’s great departments represented the behind-the-scenes support structure. This mixture of disparate interests genteelly fenced and bartered in a way that cannot have changed much, I supposed, since Victorian times. Then as now, representatives of lesser households might have felt themselves mere cousins admitted to the ancestral seat where the inner family carried on with its laundry, hiding its resentment that the visitors had the intrusiveness of kin without the discretion of polite guests. The soothing properties of civilized conversation were thus much needed – and were generously employed, not least in greeting the new boy, for which I was duly grateful.

      The room quickly emptied in a general move towards lunch. I joined the throng feeling I was among friendly people whose friendship would nevertheless have carefully controlled limits. I would be accepted subject to certain constraints, most of which appeared reasonable to me. These would be imposed by my comparative youth, junior position, temporary appointment and membership of a subordinate organization, tenants of a property outside the pale. In short, we were tolerated. Politely, entertainingly and often warmly, but still only tolerated.

      As senior staff, our ‘canteen’ was the Buckingham Palace Household Dining Room. In its scale, decor, portraiture and appointments it encouraged us to feel reassuringly exclusive. We helped ourselves from a sideboard and sat where we thought СКАЧАТЬ