Anna Pasternak - Princess in Love: The Story of a Royal Love Affair

PRINCESS IN LOVE

The Story of a Royal Love Affair

Anna Pasternak

First published by Bloomsbury Publishing in 1994

Copyright Anna Pasternak 1994

This edition published in 2022 by Lume Books

The right of Anna Pasternak to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner.

www.lumebooks.co.uk

To my grandfather, Frederick Pasternak

Table of Contents

A froth of self-satisfaction filled the room. Women cosseted by wealth and position, sleek in smart suits and statement jewellery, tossed their heads alluringly for confident men with expansive body language and studied nonchalance. The mood was exuberant, the air alive with the fizz of irrelevant party chatter.

When the Princess of Wales entered that Mayfair drawing room in the late summer of 1986, none of the assembled crowd courtiers, titled grandees, fast, eligible young blades and their safe, pretty girlfriends would have dreamed of breaking off conversation and publicly displaying even the slightest flicker of awe. Nevertheless, an almost imperceptible collective ruffling of feathers could be detected as everyone noted that they were at exactly the right place to be.

From the moment he caught her entrance Captain James Hewitt was aware of Diana. Not in the gawping, lets-assess-her-from-head-to-toe way, but with a protective sense of excitement and relief. Silently he watched her mingle, drinking in her effortlessness, her vibrant sheen and the way she cupped hands, tilted her head and generously, laughingly, gave everyone something to take away: a look, a smile, a bubble of conversation and, most impressive, the rare gift of sincerity.

With his acute sense of noblesse oblige , James returned his attention to the fey, wispy blonde with whom he was half-heartedly flirting, made a valiant attempt to spruce up the conversation, and offered to get her another glass of champagne. Just as he was proffering it, his host grabbed his arm. Leading him across the room, he told James that there was someone he wanted him to meet: Come on, Ill introduce you to Diana.

As they approached her, Jamess heart might have been pounding with the thrill of anticipation but what struck him, from the second he shook her hand, was an overwhelming sense of familiarity. How utterly right it all seemed. Of course this was a beginning but he felt as if he were treading a well-worn path, comfortable in the knowledge that he knew the camber. Intuitively he knew both the deceptive crevices and the effortlessness of the plain, untroubled ground; he knew exactly where, and where not, to tread.

Fortunately, the noise and energy levels were soaring up to meet the ornate, vaulted ceilings, so no one noticed their rapt attention as they faced each other with a measure of shock and disbelief. There was no mistaking it; they both knew. Suddenly every nerve-ending was raw and dangerously alive.

In a hurried bid to gain composure they chatted frantically, marvelling at the ease with which conversation came. There were no awkward pauses, no searching for subjects. They were too hungry to learn about each other, too keen to devour those insignificant details that speak volumes when you need to know.

Diana was showing her most dazzling public face. Naturally she was aware of her magnetism but here, suddenly, was a man whom she actually wanted to captivate. Her desire, as she told him later, both frightened and excited her. Most men were attracted to her golden aura but blinded by it. They were dazzled but dared not touch. She was unaccustomed to meeting a man who allowed his interest to show, who, rather than trail behind in deference, was bullishly taking the conversational lead.

Unlike many in his military world, James Hewitt had no fear of, and genuinely liked, women. His flirtatious gambit was to chide gently, to couch his flattery in caressing teases and a warm, ready smile. Diana returned the compliment, rather straining to do so as she was out of practice. Not for a long time had she wanted to appear so vivacious and enticing. She felt so secure, wrapped in his kind attentive gaze, that almost before she was aware of it, she found herself opening up to him, talking honestly about herself, and greatly enjoying an all too rare opportunity. It was like cycling down a steep hill: at first it is smooth and easy, then, as the gradient tips, exhilarating, and finally, by the time you have brushed away that first wisp of fear, your momentum has gathered to such a pace that it would be more frightening to brake than just to let go.

Within half an hour, having ascertained that James was a Staff Captain in the Household Division with responsibilities that included running the Household Division stables, Diana had told him of her deep fear of riding. She explained that she had had an accident as a young girl while out riding with her sisters and her nanny. She had fallen in the grounds of Park House, the Spencers Norfolk home, had hurt her arm and lost her nerve.

She said that although she had not enjoyed riding as a child, the fact that she had plenty of opportunity to do so now, having married into a thoroughly equestrian family, had made her decide that she would dearly love to conquer her fear. She wanted to do so for her own satisfaction, she stressed, not to suit anyone else merely to regain her strength in the saddle.

James leapt for the bait. He would be delighted, in fact nothing would give him greater pleasure, he said, than to help the Princess rebuild her confidence. He was a skilled horseman, and his mother ran a riding stables in Devon. He assured her that he was eminently qualified for the job. It would be easy and within his military capacity, he explained, to arrange a series of lessons for her at Knightsbridge Barracks, so convenient for Kensington Palace.

United by a conspiratorial wave of relief at having so quickly and efficiently found an excuse to meet again, they parted and rejoined the bubbling throng of the party. Diana had promised that she would telephone him, and he knew that he would nurse his secret with the discretion that was the underlying condition of their friendship a condition that was so glaringly obvious, it could be left unspoken.

That night, after the party, James did not just take any remotely beguiling young girl out to dinner as he would normally have done, but returned alone, harbouring an unfamiliar euphoric glow, to his South Kensington bachelor flat and went straight to bed.

Since his early twenties, when he started playing polo for the Life Guards, James had had regular contact with the royal family. Throughout his school career at Millfield his sporting prowess he played polo, fenced, point-to-pointed and shot bred an unshakable confidence in the outdoor world which he soon discovered was equally powerful indoors. As his acute sense of protocol rested on impeccable manners, it never occurred to him to feel anything but utterly at ease in the presence of Prince Charles, whom he admired and liked enormously.

Once, after a particularly rumbustious match at Smiths Lawn, when the players were united by their self-congratulatory sense of exhaustion and fun, James asked the Prince back to his rented flat in Ascot for tea. Prince Charles gently declined but asked his fellow sportsman to join him for a quick drink in the pavilion; a tiny but solid gesture towards friendship.

Remarkably for a man whose rigid, military upbringing had fed a simple, pragmatic approach to life, Jamess entre into the royal milieu precipitated a strangely potent sense of destiny. He became aware of Lady Diana Spencer slightly sooner than the rest of the world through the polo fraternity, and inexplicably he always knew that he would meet her and get to know her. It was as if, slowly but surely, unseen hands were pushing him through life towards her, his experiences being mapped out to prepare him for her.