William and Harry (20 page)

Knowing he would not see Kate for over a month, William had taken Harry’s advice and whisked her off on yet another holiday to Klosters after the New Year celebrations. The Swiss resort was one of their favourite places, and Kate had mastered the off-piste runs, occasionally outshining William with her impressive technique. Just two years earlier the couple’s romance
had been revealed on these slopes as William put his arm around Kate in an unthinking show of intimacy. This time there was no holding back in spite of the cameras. Standing together in the deep powder snow, William pulled Kate towards him and kissed her. It was clear that he had found someone he could love, someone he was completely at ease with, a woman who understood and accepted the huge pressures that came with dating him. Apparently, a number of dates had been pencilled in the royal calendar in anticipation of an engagement announcement.

Such planning might seem a touch premature, but for the royal family this was quite normal. The Palace works months and sometimes years in advance: preparations for the Queen Mother’s funeral started in 1969. ‘It’s being talked about within the Palace very openly,’ a well-placed source insisted to me. ‘The word is that there might be an announcement in the spring.’ It was the sort of predictive story that needed to be taken with a pinch of salt, and Clarence House was quick to deny any concrete plans were in place. But there was definitely something to the story, which was picked up by royal commentators and newspapers around the world. Of course William had yet to pop the question, but as far as insiders at the Palace and his inner circle were concerned it was only a matter of time. There was no escaping the fact that in Kate Middleton Prince William had found a potential bride.

Kate had arranged a farewell drinks party for William at Clarence House and had been dreading the moment they would have to say goodbye. William would miss her twenty-fourth birthday and she wanted to make sure they could at least celebrate before he left for Sandhurst. They had had a wonderful
summer after working through their rocky patch. After they graduated William travelled to New Zealand, where he represented the Queen at events commemorating the sixtieth anniversary of the end of the Second World War and spent time with the British Lions, who were there on tour. Then he visited Jecca in Kenya, but this time he took Kate with him. He wanted her to experience the wild beauty of the country he had grown to love and reassure her that she had no cause to worry about Jecca. William had whisked Kate off for a romantic holiday at the Masai Lodge where they stayed at the £1,500-a-night Il Ngwesi Lodge in the Mukogodo Hills of northern Kenya. During the day William worked on the Craig family’s Lewa Wildlife Conservancy, which protects the endangered black rhino from poachers. In the evenings he and Kate would sip cocktails and dine al fresco. The post-graduation holiday had been a blissful fortnight, and they had been joined by Jecca and William’s friend Thomas van Straubenzee. When they left, William and Kate promised to return again soon.

As William prepared for Sandhurst his girlfriend had moved to London and into the flat her parents had bought for her. As she set about sending her CV to art galleries she had plenty of time to wonder about her future. William, on the other hand, had the next year all planned. He spent a fortnight working at Chatsworth on the Duke and Duchess of Devonshire’s 35,000-acre Peak District estate and three weeks doing work experience at HSBC’s headquarters in St James Street in London and the Bank of England. He had already decided he wanted to be a pilot like his Uncle Andrew, and had enjoyed the fortnight he had spent working with the RAF Valley Mountain Rescue Team
in Anglesey, where he learned about helicopter flying and mountain rescue. Having decided he wanted a career in the military, he joked that he had sent Harry to Sandhurst as his guinea pig.

Joking aside, Sandhurst was unlike anything he had ever known. Echoing his message to Harry, Major General Ritchie told the waiting media that William would be treated exactly the same as every other cadet: ‘Everyone is judged on merit. There are no exceptions made.’ Occasionally William was afforded special treatment. As the only cadet to be president of the Football Association, he was given leave during his second term to travel to Germany to support England during the World Cup, much to the envy of his fellow cadets. Harry had also been granted leave to compete in the Cartier International polo tournament in the summer of 2005. While the rest of his platoon was in chapel, he had enjoyed a champagne lunch in the July sunshine and mingled with socialites and celebrities in the VIP tent. Such privileges were rare however, and when it came to their training, neither prince was given special treatment.

William was under the command of Sergeant Major Simon Nichols and Colour Sergeants Nathan Allen and Jimmy Parke from the Irish Guards. He took up judo when he started at Sandhurst but found that being left-handed prevented him making much progress. His natural fitness helped him to cope with the punishing training exercises, but his plan to keep up the yoga he had mastered in Chile was abandoned. He was simply too tired to do anything at the end of the day and mornings weren’t an option. William made the most of every minute he had to stay in bed and rest his aching body. While he just about coped with the physical exhaustion of the eighteen-hour days,
he found the monotony of Sandhurst challenging. On his leaves he complained that he was constantly exhausted and could not get to grips with making his bed ‘the Sandhurst way’, which included tucking the sheets in with precisely the right number of folds before room inspection at 5.30 a.m.

By spring, with William knee deep in trench training, it was time for Harry to pass out. He had spent weeks preparing for the parade and apart from the occasional blip had proved himself a model soldier. Just days before the passing out ceremony, however, Harry was back on the front pages. He and four other cadets had visited Spearmint Rhino, a lap-dancing club in the nearby town of Colnbrook, and while he had not technically broken any rules (cadets are allowed out as long as they do not socialise within three miles of the academy), the details of their drink-fuelled night out made for rather unsavoury reading. D
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had included the prince dancing with two strippers and getting drunk. It was embarrassing and very poor timing with Chelsy on her way to the UK from South Africa to celebrate Harry’s passing out.

Fortunately 12 April was gloriously sunny and nothing was going to spoil Harry’s big day. Immaculate in his pressed ceremonial dress, Harry looked every inch a second lieutenant. He had signed up to join the Blues and Royals, the British army’s second oldest regiment and part of the Household Cavalry, and now had the qualifications to do so. Harry was pleased as punch, as was his grandmother, who had come to inspect the parade for the first time in fifteen years. The Duke of Edinburgh, the Prince of Wales and Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall, elegant in a dark purple outfit, were also there to watch Harry pass out,
along with William, who saluted his brother as he marched past in front of Old College. Harry had also invited his former nanny Tiggy to the ceremony along with Mark Dyer and Jamie Lowther-Pinkerton.

The Queen, dressed in a beige three-quarter-length coat with fur-trimmed cuffs, addressed the senior cadets, who had spent weeks polishing their boots and equipment ahead of the Sovereign’s Parade. As she inspected the 219 officer cadets she paused in front of her grandson to check every button was polished and every hair was in place. Of course it was, and Harry could not resist a grin at his grandmother. The Queen described the day as ‘a great occasion’ and spoke of the importance of effective leadership. ‘This is just the end of the beginning, and many of you will deploy on operations within months or even weeks. I wish you all every success in your chosen career. My congratulations, my prayers and my trust go with you all.’ After Major Stephen Segrave rode his horse up the steps of Old College, a tradition which stems from the 1920s when Major William ‘Boy’ Browning first decided to do the same, Harry and his platoon slow-marched into the building, as the band, in bearskins and red tunics, trumpeted out ‘Auld Lang Syne’. Eating his lunch and toasting his friends, Harry could hardly wait until later that night, when he would be reunited with Chelsy. The couple had not seen each other since their New Year holiday.

When she touched down on the tarmac at Heathrow it was clear that she was to be treated like a princess for the duration of her stay. At Harry’s insistence she was met by two armed policemen, who whisked her through the terminal and into a waiting chauffeur-driven four-by-four. Harry and Chelsy had
agreed that she would not come to the ceremony; instead she would make her entrance at the passing-out ball.

She did not disappoint Harry when she stepped through the doors of the gymnasium, which had been dressed with white flowers and scented candles. He had excitedly told his friends all about his ‘knockout’ girlfriend and his fellow officers had seen pictures of Chelsy in the newspapers, but in the flesh she was even prettier. She stole the show in a stunning silk turquoise bias-cut silk dress that clung to her curves and dipped daringly at the back to reveal acres of tanned skin. She had had several fittings at home to make sure the evening gown was perfect and had arranged her hair in a loose chignon. Harry kissed her as they danced the night away to the sound of a live jazz band. They shared cigarettes and flutes of champagne under the night sky and wandered hand in hand around the gymnasium, which had been transformed into a labyrinth of different rooms and dance floors. There was a casino, an ice sculpture from which guests could drink shots of vodka, and a chocolate fountain in which to dip marshmallows and strawberries. In another room footage of the afternoon’s ceremony was being played on a loop on a giant screen. Any worries Chelsy may have had about her boyfriend’s night out the week before were now a distant memory. They were happy, in love and most importantly together again.

But as William downed glass after glass of red wine, Kate Middleton was conspicuous by her absence. Harry had been allowed to bring eight guests to the ball, but this was Harry and Chelsy’s night and the two girls had always had a slightly frosty relationship. Although Chelsy gets along well with Kate’s sister Pippa who she occasionally goes out with, she and Kate are less
friendly. They got off to an ill-fated start when Kate offered to take Chelsy shopping on the King’s Road the last time she was in London. When Chelsy, whose sense of style is very different from Kate’s, snubbed the invitation, Kate was said to be offended. Feeling slightly isolated, William proceeded to drink his fill before retiring to his room alone. At midnight, as tradition dictates, to the backdrop of an impressive fireworks display that spelt out
CONGRATULATIONS
in the night sky, Harry finally ripped the velvet strip from the sleeve of his jacket to reveal his officer’s pips. He had proved his critics wrong. He was now a cornet in the Household Cavalry and within weeks would be training with his regiment and preparing for war.

Despite hangovers William and Harry continued celebrating the following night, and this time Kate joined the royal clique at Boujis nightclub in Kensington. As the DJ played their favourite tunes, the bar’s amiable owner Jake Parkinson-Smith strolled over to check that everything was in place. Kate had ordered a round of the club’s signature Crackbaby cocktails, a potent combination of vodka and fresh passion-fruit juice topped up with champagne and served in a test tube, and by three in the morning the group had run up a notional £2,500 bar bill – notional because, as always, the charge was waived. The DJ played his final tune of the night and it was time to leave, but the fun was set to continue for both the boys. William had an Easter break to Mustique with Kate to look forward to, while Harry was heading off to Mozambique with Chelsy. It would be his last holiday for a while. When he returned to the UK he would start an intensive twelve-week training programme at the Household Cavalry’s headquarters in Bovington Camp in Dorset. The
imposing walls of the military camp could not be a starker contrast to the deserted palm-fringed beaches of the Caribbean, but Harry soon acclimatised. He was a trained officer now and equipped to lead his men into war, which was exactly what he planned to do.

As she took her place in the front row Kate Middleton looked every inch the princess-in-waiting. Accompanied by her parents Michael and Carole, she had been given a VIP seat at the passing out ceremony and could not contain her excitement. Dressed in an elegant red dress coat, black leather gloves and a broad-rimmed black hat, she looked smart and sophisticated, if a little older than her twenty-four years. She had wanted to make an effort and had deliberated over her outfit for weeks determined to get it just right. While it was William’s big day, it was the second time Kate would be in the official presence of his grandmother, and she wanted to leave an impression. Just seats away from the Queen, Prince Philip, Charles and Camilla, she certainly stood out among the other guests, many of who were in long dark overcoats wrapped up against the December cold.

As William found Kate in the crowd he smiled. He was glad she was there to see him pass out. Over the past months, although they had seen little of one another, she had been a great support. The official inquest into his mother’s death had been published
that week, concluding the crash in Paris nine years before had been a tragic accident, and relief as well as pride seemed etched on William’s face. ‘I love the uniform. It’s so sexy,’ Kate whispered to her mother as they took their seats. Dressed in No.1 dress, a dark blue tunic and trousers, with white tabs on the collar and a red stripe down each leg, William proudly wore the red sash that accompanied carrying the Sovereign’s Banner for the best platoon of the year.