“Be it Declared and Enacted by this present Parliament and by the Authority of the same, That the People of England, and of all the Dominions and Territories thereunto belonging, are and shall be, and are hereby Constituted, Made, Established, and Confirmed to be a Commonwealth and Free-State: And shall from henceforth be Governed as a Commonwealth and Free-State, by the Supreme Authority of this Nation, The Representatives of the People in Parliament, and by such as they shall appoint and constitute as Officers and Ministers under them for the good of the People, and that without any King or House of Lords.”
- Proclamation of the Commonwealth of England
19th May, 1649
PROLOGUE
Tuesday, 1 December 1992
2:37pm
Elizabeth II was late.
As a general rule, monarchs are never ‘late’; they are always scrupulously on time. That being said, if their subjects wish to arrive
early, that is quite often respected and appreciated by the Royal Authorities.
On this occasion, however, it was clear that this legal fiction would not be accepted by at least one of the two people present.
It had been a bitter, fractious couple of days for The Queen. Another set of pernickety letters to The Guardian about the restoration of Windsor Castle had put her in just the wrong frame of mind ahead of her audience with the Prime Minister, and the latest reports from the tabloids had served only to darken her mood yet further. The Mirror had been a particular source of disquiet amongst the Palace Staff, and had been the catalyst for the afternoon’s summit meeting.
A set of doors were opened in front of her, revealing the Drawing Room beyond.
The couple - as they still legally were - were already there, sitting with the same air of icy politeness that results from being forced to be in the same room as someone you dislike intensely.
The Queen paced in, doing all she could to avoid rolling up her sleeves and knocking their respective heads together.
“My thanks to both of you for com...”
Time takes on a strange quality when one trips. For those witnessing it, the victim often seems to do so in slow motion, with arms akimbo and a look of profound desperation. For the fall-ee, the matter passes so rapidly as to render the transition from standing to splayed almost instantaneous. Even Elizabeth II, a woman possessed of the profound dignity that results from a millennium of careful breeding and adopted decorum, was not immune.
A century ago, the incident would have resulted in gasps of horror from the assembled ranks, but in the years separating one monarch from another, attitudes had changed. Besides, there were only two witnesses.
And so, in the White Drawing Room, as The Queen picked herself up with as much dignity as possible, she heard a single, feminine, giggle.
Elizabeth II
seethed.
