Diana in Search of Herself (44 page)

Diana gave a speech on AIDS that March at a monthly dinner gathering of high-powered media executives called the Thirty Club. About 150 members showed up at Claridges, and although Michael Adler, chairman of the National AIDS Trust, was by Diana’s side, she was extremely nervous—so
much so that
she was visibly shaking. But she rose and talked about the incidence of AIDS among women, and afterward fielded questions from the likes of
Telegraph
owner Conrad Black and
Mail
owner Lord Rothermere. “
It was a hard-boiled crowd,” Andrew Knight said. “She spoke well, but it was awfully stilted, and she didn’t say much. During the question period, she would say something sweet, and Michael Adler would add chapter and verse. But overall, she did awfully well.”

The most revealing part of the evening occurred before her speech. At dinner, she was seated next to film producer David Puttnam, who was a friend, though not part of her intimate circle. Perhaps as a result of her nervousness, “
suddenly she started confiding in me how unhappy things were in her marriage,” Puttnam recalled. “She said, ‘Neither of us has been perfect, but I’ve done a really stupid thing. I have allowed a book to be written. I felt it was a good idea, a way of clearing the air, but now I think it was a very stupid thing that will cause all kinds of terrible trouble.’ She said, ‘I would like to reel the movie back. It is the daftest thing I have ever done.’ ”

In May, the rumors began to surface as
The Sunday Times
announced it would serialize the book starting on June 7. When Morton’s publisher, Michael O’Mara, had first taken the book to Andrew Neil in March 1992, the
Sunday Times
editor had replied, “
I think it would be better off in a tabloid.” Neil was intrigued by O’Mara’s description of the book’s disclosures, along with his assurance that it had been “
effectively” authorized by Diana, yet Neil at first “did not believe it,” he later said. “It seemed too fantastical.”

Morton then came to see Neil to persuade him otherwise. “
He started going through and naming sources, even those not named in the book,” Neil recalled, “and he said, ‘I have a lot more backup.’ I was impressed.” Neil dispatched his deputy Sue Douglas to read the manuscript. Although she was put off by the “
gushing prose,” she was jolted by the revelations, but even more by O’Mara’s tip that the photos had come from Diana’s father and that some of her best friends had spoken to the author. Douglas spoke to Andrew Knight, who revealed Angela Serota’s role and vouched for her as a “person of integrity.” “
We have something serious on our hands,” Douglas told Neil, who agreed to consider publishing excerpts if Douglas and a task force could independently verify the allegations.

Based on his knowledge of Serota’s involvement—and recalling Diana’s request—Knight lobbied for publication. “
I was able to say to Andrew Neil, ‘I think you are right to get more interested in this book, because I have been following it through one person, and she is completely trustworthy, and she and Diana are close.’ I knew it was a huge story which was sure to break in one paper or another, and
The Sunday Times
’s function over the years was to break that kind of story without favor.” Douglas’s task force corroborated the book to their satisfaction. A number of the major
sources had signed statements certifying their quotes, and the photos from the Spencer family confirmed Diana’s authorization. “
I never had any doubt that this was a reasonably accurate version of what she believed to be the truth,” Neil said. When Neil went to Rupert Murdoch to
say
The Sunday Times
was prepared to publish, “Rupert said, ‘I’ll back you on whatever you do, but remember, if you do this they will try to destroy you.’ ”

The
Daily Mail
had also read the manuscript and made a bid, but
The Sunday Times
upped the ante to £250,000 ($440,000) and secured the rights. By then, Neil, Douglas, and others believed Diana had read the manuscript. Douglas knew “
there were large chunks of tape-recordings. Andrew Morton let me believe these were friends being briefed by Diana and taped by him.” Morton had also told Stuart Higgins of
The Sun
, “
Treat that book as though the Princess had signed every page.”

Given the number of journalists aware of Diana’s fingerprints, it was probably inevitable that an article of unsettling accuracy about the Morton book would appear only weeks before publication. “
It is believed,” said the
Daily Express
in early May, that “the author has had close cooperation with the Princess and her family to produce startling revelations about her marriage … The Princess is already reported to have read the proofs and has the power to make amendments.… Officials are also concerned that pictures in the book have come from the Princess’s family and will be seen as more evidence of her tacit approval.”

A few days later at a dinner at the British ambassador’s residence in Cairo, Diana startled her fellow guests by announcing, “
I still see myself as Lady Diana Spencer.” When someone asked what would happen when Charles became king, she replied, “I think I will still be Lady Di.” It was an uncomfortable moment that turned reckless a few moments later when an Egyptian said, “Here we can change our royal family every few years.” Catching his words, Diana shouted across the room, “In our country, we are stuck with ours.”

The misgivings she had expressed to David Puttnam seemed to have vanished, and Diana was again emboldened. Weeks away from her thirty-first birthday, she was on the verge of seeing her “true” story in print, buttressed by the respectable imprimatur of
The Sunday Times
. It is impossible to know what she expected: certainly sympathy for how she had been treated and understanding of her problems, as well as the ruination of Camilla Parker Bowles. She also seemed to think that the press would accept her story and move on, that she could preserve her marriage, and that she could maintain her innocence. “
The Princess hoped by putting her side across with the Morton book that the press would do her a favor,” said Robert Hardman of
The Daily Telegraph
. “She was very wrong.”

Chapter 17

T
he uproar that followed the serialization and publication of Andrew Morton’s book in June 1992 shocked everyone, including Diana. By exposing her emotional torment and mental illness, the book created enormous sympathy for her, but nearly destroyed Charles by blaming him for her problems and portraying him as a callous and unfaithful husband, as well as an insensitive parent. Perhaps the most wounding quote of all came from Diana’s close friend James Gilbey, who said, “
She thinks he is a bad father, a selfish father; the children have to tie in with whatever he’s doing.”

Diana may have explained herself to the public, but she had alienated her husband, his family and their retainers, members of her own family, and the establishment, whose support she needed. She had exposed a group of her friends to press harassment. Most of all, in creating new story lines for the inquisitive press, she had invaded “
her own privacy,” as Lord McGregor, Chairman of the Press Complaints Commission, put it. “
There was no commercial advantage to holding back once we got an inkling of how bad things were,” said Max Hastings, then editor of
The Daily Telegraph
.

In the weeks before the book’s publication, senior advisers in the Palace had believed it increasingly likely that Diana had colluded in some way with Morton, but she had deflected their efforts to pin her down. Three days before the first excerpt appeared in
The Sunday Times, The Sun
ran an article saying that Diana was “
coming under strong pressure … to publicly disassociate herself” from the book, even as Morton and Buckingham Palace “strenuously denied” that she had cooperated. Nevertheless, the tabloid pointed out that “other royals” had begun to question Diana’s role after learning about the inclusion of pictures from Spencer family albums and her approval of the cover photograph. Morton later characterized the atmosphere as “a war situation. I felt very much on her side.”

Diana’s brother-in-law Robert Fellowes asked her directly, not once but several times, if she had cooperated with the book. Each time she assured him that she had not, and he believed her.

Fellowes had served the Queen for fifteen years, and since 1990 had been her private secretary, the highest position in the courtier ranks. A former Guards officer educated at Eton, Fellowes was regarded as intelligent, steady, and deliberate in his work.
Fealty to his sovereign was paramount: He devoted himself to protecting the Queen’s interests and took the heat on her behalf whenever necessary. Since their marriage in 1978, Robert and Jane Fellowes had been an exemplary couple, living modestly and avoiding the limelight. “Robert is absolutely incorruptible,” one of his friends said. “He’s the sort who bicycles to work with his father’s old battered leather briefcase. He isn’t interested in money or power. He is not fashionable today because he is so straight.”

Behind his Bertie Wooster manner, however, Fellowes could be astute and worldly, and in his own quiet way he was trying to modernize the monarchy—helping to ease the Queen into paying income tax, for example. But he had a blind spot when it came to Diana and, recognizing that Diana was troubled, he tried to give her the benefit of the doubt. “Perhaps if Robert had been more Machiavellian, it might have served him better,” said another of his friends. He might have profited from more imagination as well. When Diana denied cooperation with Morton, Fellowes took her at face value, assuming she had responded straightforwardly (as he would have), and disregarding evidence that indicated otherwise.

The first
Sunday Times
excerpt on June 7 highlighted Diana’s bulimia, suicide attempts, and Charles and Camilla’s secret relationship. Although clearly one-sided, the article was persuasive in its details and its naming of Diana’s friends as sources. After reading it, one of Diana’s close friends called her immediately. “She pretended to me it had nothing to do with her,” said her friend. “But my heart sank, reading it, because I could see she had. One thing gave it away, that quote, ‘He was all over me like a bad rash.’ But I never brought it up again.” Dining with another friend a few days later, Diana said, “I couldn’t stop my friends talking.” As the friend recalled, “It was fantastically disingenuous. If you are a friend of the royal family, you don’t talk unless they tell you to.”

“
I HAVE NOT COOPERATED WITH THIS BOOK IN ANY WAY
,” announced the
Daily Mirror
’s page-one headline on June 8, quoting Diana. That day, Lord McGregor of the Press Complaints Commission contacted Robert Fellowes, who assured him, as did the Queen’s press secretary Charles Anson, that Diana had no involvement in the Morton book. McGregor then drafted a statement condemning press coverage of the Wales marriage as an “
odious exhibition of journalists dabbling their fingers in the stuff of other people’s
souls.” Before releasing the statement,
McGregor checked once more with Fellowes about persistent rumors that Diana had leaked information on the Wales marriage. Fellowes said the rumors were baseless.

Prince Charles first read the excerpt over breakfast at Highgrove on Sunday, but when he tried to talk to Diana about it, she fled to London in tears. Charles and Diana met at Kensington Palace the next day to discuss what to do next. Diana recounted her version of that meeting to Morton’s middleman James Colthurst, who recorded her description in a diary: “
Diana and Charles agreed that they were incompatible, and decided on a parting of the ways…. He was being reasonable, grown-up and himself. No tears. First time Diana slept through night without sleeping pills.”

On Tuesday, top Murdoch executive Andrew Knight wrote what he later described as a “
pompous” letter to McGregor, insisting that
The Sunday Times
had serialized the book only after establishing its authenticity. According to Colthurst’s diary, Robert Fellowes called Diana that day to probe her further about the book, saying “
she was making his life unbearable.” Diana also told Colthurst she had talked to friends about finding a lawyer and had drawn up “a shortlist of five.”

Lord McGregor phoned Knight on Wednesday the tenth. “
Are you really telling me the Princess knew?” McGregor asked. “She did know,” replied Knight. “She authorized it.” Only moments earlier, Knight had heard from Kelvin MacKenzie, editor of
The Sun
, who said, “You’ll never guess what today’s story is. We’ve been phoned and told there is a photo op with Diana at the home of one of her friends.”

At Diana’s direction, the tabloids had been alerted that in the evening she would be visiting her friend Carolyn Bartholomew, one of the named sources in the book. “
This was Diana’s elaborate way of authenticating the source,” Knight said. Knight relayed this information to McGregor: “What would you say if in tomorrow’s newspapers there are photos of the Princess of Wales visiting Carolyn Bartholomew in an orchestrated way?” McGregor “was absolutely amazed,” Knight recalled.