Chapter 17

That went pretty well, Philip congratulates himself, as he runs down the palace steps and out to the car he has parked in the forecourt. Not the most exciting evening he’s ever had, and he’d been momentarily dismayed by the nursery set up, but on the other hand, there was something restful about not having to be witty or sophisticated. Without thinking, he had reverted back to being a teenage boy, showing off and basking in their admiration.

In Margaret’s admiration, anyway. He wasn’t so sure of what Elizabeth thought. She’s harder to read.

The two princesses are such innocents, almost childlike still. Philip thinks of the girls he met on shore leave in Australia, in Sydney and Melbourne: smart, funny, clever girls out to have a good time. There is something almost touching about the princesses’ lack of sophistication, although Margaret has all the makings of a minx. She’s only sixteen and has the potential to be a beauty, but she is obviously spoilt and determined to be the centre of attention.

Elizabeth allows herself to be overshadowed, but there’s a restraint about her that he approves of, a refreshing quietness in contrast to the frantic rush of so many of his contemporaries who have survived the war and now don’t know what to do with themselves.

It’s a feeling he shares. After the first giddy rush of the war being over, he’s been left with a hollow sense of ‘now what?’ The truth is that he is going to miss the buzz of action. Training petty officers or whatever they have in mind for him is not going to offer the same satisfaction, but what else can he do? He has no inheritance to fall back on. He isn’t cut out for university, even if he could afford to go, and to stay in the Navy requires him to be a British citizen, something that is now looking uncertain.

The truth is that everything looks uncertain now that his father is dead. It is just over a year since Philip heard the news and he is still surprised by how much of a shock it has been, by how the painful jab of memory can still catch him unawares.

A heart attack after a party, in bed with his mistress: somehow it seemed a fitting death for Prince Andrea. Philip didn’t get those details until later, though. He was on board Whelp in the middle of the Indian Ocean when the news reached him. Mountbatten sent a naval message, meticulously deciphered by the rating on radio watch.

So shocked and grieved to hear of the death of your father and send you all my heartfelt sympathy. Following has been received from your mother: “Embrace you tenderly in our joint sorrow.”

Philip gets into his car but he doesn’t start the engine immediately. He is back on the bridge, taking the message with a brusque nod of acknowledgement. His mind is on the ominously purple clouds boiling up on the horizon and the way the ship is pitching from side to side. He’s thinking about whether they will be able to outrun the storm or whether they should just batten down and ride it out so when he opens the message, he doesn’t immediately register the words. Then he looks again and the pitching is inside him.