Page 45 of The Heir Apparent
“Are you working over New Year’s?” he mumbled.
“No, somehow I got the whole week off.”
I suspected Ben had arranged the roster that way, but there was no point wondering what he might have had planned.
“I was thinking we could go camping. Maria Island maybe? Can’t beat the sunrise there.”
A new year, a new chance.
I smiled. “Yes please.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
13 March 2023
It was one of those March days in London that brings with it just the slightest hint of spring, like a whispered promise on the breeze. There had been weeks of relentless rain. Then, on Commonwealth Day, we woke to find an impossibly clear sky.
The service to celebrate the Commonwealth was one of the most important events on the royal calendar, which every member of the family was expected to attend. The event dictated that we be publicly ranked in the pews according to our place in the line of succession. This year’s service, our first family appearance since the funeral, was expected to be heavily scrutinised. After a childhood spent in the second row, I was now by Granny’s side. Richard, Demelza and Birdie had also moved forward, taking the seats left vacant by Papa, Louis and Annabelle. In a move theDaily Postdescribed as “a touching but somewhat unorthodox gesture,” Amira sat behind me.
Evicted from Elton Park, Annabelle had moved to Papa’s estate in Scotland after the funeral. She wasn’t in touch with anyone from the family, not even bothering to RSVP to the service.
TheDaily Postran a photo from the Abbey on its homepage: Granny, me, Richard and Demelza sitting solemn-faced in our pew. Poor Birdie must have been clipped out. The gap betweenRichard and me would give body language experts enough content for a week’s worth of interviews. The headline read: “The New Royal Order.”
Once we got home, I went straight to the bathroom to remove the bobby pins from my elaborate updo. Tucked into the mirror was a polaroid I’d found under the sink weeks earlier: Louis and Kris, their arms looped around each other. On the back, Louis had scrawled:I wish everyone could know how happy we are.In a different pen, Kris had added:Maybe one day—after we’re gone. I kept meaning to move it. It was risky keeping it out in the open where a maid might pull it out and see the tender secret on the back. But I liked to imagine that Louis kept it above the sink where he could see it as he got ready for his day.
Just as I relieved the source of my tension headache, I heard the phone ring from the bedroom.
“Is that mine, Mary?” I called, plucking the tiny metal rod that was menacing my temporalis muscle. “Could you answer it for me?”
“Princess Alexandrina’s phone, this is Mary,” I heard her say in her phone voice, two full octaves lower than the way she spoke to me. “Yes, one moment, sir.” To me, she called, “It’s Mr. Jennings, ma’am.”
I looked at my reflection in the mirror and smiled. She would never call him Jack, no matter how much we both insisted. My hair free, I came out of the bathroom and took the phone.
“Hey,” he said, “do you ever think the Commonwealth is just a way of keeping everyone in the empire under a new name?”
I smiled. He was never afraid to say things like this to me.
When dusk finally fell on the British empire, an ancestor transitioned this rapidly unravelling collection of colonies into a modern economic bloc. Fans of the Commonwealth say we are richer and stronger together. Critics call it Empire 2.0.
“Well, I don’t know if it’s that simple,” I said, one of the mealy-mouthed non-responses I had become very good at delivering after three months back home. “I’m sure there’s away to acknowledge its colonial past but make it work better for everyone.”
“Ahh, so it just needs a better CEO then,” Jack said. “You sure spend a lot of time in churches these days.”
“A weird place for a bastard love child to hang out,” I tried to joke.
For the past week, the tabloids had speculated about my and Louis’s paternity, based on “whispers travelling around the palace” that Mum had an affair with a doctor from Médecins Sans Frontières. Their evidence for this theory was a photo of an admittedly saucy-looking Mum seated next to a handsome young man at a charity gala in 1992. One “royal watcher,” who clearly had a sophisticated understanding of genetics, claimed that since this man and I were both doctors, we were obviously father and daughter. The doctor now lived in Angola and was refusing to speak at all—a strategy Mary thought prudent for everyone involved, though I knew for a fact that Mum didn’t give up on the marriage and seek comfort elsewhere until I was thirteen. I could also point out that the shape and circumference of my hips marked me as a true Villiers woman.
“Tell me something that’s happening at home,” I said, suddenly keen to change the subject. I lay on the bed in my dressing gown.
“Well,” Jack said, “the harvest starts next week, so Ragu and I are up early. He caught a blackbird this morning, so he’s happy.”
I could hear the gravel and leaves under his feet. The sun had just left me and was currently rising above his head. It was hard to believe he was 14,000 kilometres away when I could almost see him ambling between the vines, his full lips curving into a smile.
“What are you wearing?” I asked, realising too late the innuendo lurking in the question.
We laughed softly. Mary, who had been packing up my suit in the closet, made a swift exit and closed the door behind her.
“A very sexy outfit,” he said. “I’m in Blunnies, which are getting a hole at the toe. And those jeans you keep trying to make me throw out. Ragu’s wearing his collar and no pants.”
