She flinched whenever her family’s private moments were shared without permission and dissected by strangers. Why would anyone willingly submit to this scrutiny? And yet millions did, and many of them obviously got comfort from it. She had tried to understand, but it was still beyond her. However, Rozie was adept at using it to their advantage when there was a problem to solve, such as this one, so for that she was grateful.
‘We might speed things up by gently finding out if Ned had approached the chief constable about any concerns,’ she suggested. ‘Mr Bloomfield runs the National Drugs Task Force.’
‘From what I know of Ned, I can imagine him starting out along official channels, then getting frustrated and going it alone.’ She paused and turned her pony for home. Reluctantly, she added, ‘There’s one more thing.’
‘Julian Cassidy. I gather the police are interested in his activities. He obviously had some sort of quarrel with Ned. I doubt we have reason to be worried, but let me know if you hear anything.’
‘I’ll see what I can find out, ma’am,’ Rozie assured her.
A quiet moment with her lady-in-waiting before lunch the next day brought with it the answer to one mystery, at least.
‘I think you ought to see this,’ Lady Caroline said.
‘Yes, ma’am. So sorry. Of course.’
Lady Caroline read aloud:
Thank you so very much for your kind letter to my mother. She was utterly charmed and I know she’s writing to Your Majesty separately. I just wanted to let you know how touched I am that you’re thinking of me and Ned my darling fiancé. I’m sure you must have been worried about what had happened to me but I wanted to reassure Your Majesty that I’m fine and I’m staying with Mummy out of the way of the press who are so odious, as I’m sure you know, and were making all sorts of hurtful comments about our age gap and me marrying him for his money, which is the opposite of the truth. I just couldn’t face them so I came here to join Mummy at Guist, not so very far from you at Sandringham.
Your Majesty is so kind to think about Mummy, who sends her love. Darling Ned talked about you a lot and his happy days at Sandringham where Your Majesty treated him like a second son. I know he wanted to show me those special places where he grew up.
I simply cannot begin to take in what’s happened to the person who I was going to share my life with. Ned was a pure ray of light, as I’m sure Your Majesty knows. We were due to get married in six weeks.
