As the Prince and Princess of Wales were driven from Wimbledon to Kensington Palace on Sunday evening with their two elder children, Prince George and Princess Charlotte, the excited chatter in their Range Rovers is likely to have been about Jannik Sinner’s brilliant victory over Carlos Alcaraz.
They’d watched the final, captivated, from the Royal Box.
Preying on William and Catherine’s minds during the 40-minute journey across south-west London from the All England Club would, however, have been the world exclusive story published by The Mail on Sunday that morning – and its implications.
Editor at Large Charlotte Griffiths disclosed on the front page that King Charles and Prince Harry’s senior aides had held a secret peace summit, marking the first significant move towards resolving their rancorous family feud.
Sources said last week’s meeting was the initial step in a ‘rapprochement process’ to restore the broken relationship between the Duke and Duchess of Sussex and the rest of the Royal Family.
Insiders described the talks, held at a London private members’ club, as the strongest sign yet of the determination on both sides to resolve the bitter House of Windsor feud.
Yet for William and Catherine, as they looked forward to the holidays with their children, news of the talks was something of a dark cloud in the otherwise blue summer skies.
For friends of the couple claim they had not been aware of the meeting, which was attended by the King’s communications secretary Tobyn Andreae and Meredith Maines, Harry and Meghan’s chief communications officer.
The meeting took place at the Royal Over-Seas League, which is situated just a stone’s throw from Clarence House, the London residence of the King – the club’s patron.
Also present was Liam Maguire, who runs the Sussexes’ public relations team in this country.
‘It’s no coincidence that William and Catherine did not have a representative at the Royal Over-Seas League,’ says one of their friends.
‘They were not asked to send anyone and will be treating the talks with extreme caution. The fact that it ended up in the newspapers tells you all you need to know.’
This refers to one of the biggest obstacles in the way of a ‘rapprochement process’ between the Sussexes and the Waleses: the complete loss of trust.
Harry and Meghan’s decision to betray William and Catherine by disclosing private conversations and incidents not only in the duke’s memoir, Spare, but in numerous interviews and in their Netflix ‘docuseries’ has destroyed trust between them.
Trust and loyalty have always been the most important qualities that William expected from friends. For his brother and sister-in-law to betray that trust in the most public way is something that he will never forget, even if he does eventually forgive them.
And forgiveness must, of course, be accompanied by repentance, of which there is little sign in Montecito, California.
The Sussexes have never apologised, privately or publicly, for the hurt they caused with their explosive claims in the Oprah interview or on several other occasions.
William is said to be particularly upset by the allegations against Catherine, which included the claim that she was unwelcoming to Meghan and had even made the American former actress cry after a stressful fitting of bridesmaids’ dresses before the Sussexes’ wedding.
Most hurtful of all, perhaps, were the claims of racism against unnamed senior members of the Royal Family, who were later claimed by the Sussexes’ sycophantic biographer Omid Scobie – in a Dutch translation of his book – to be the King and Catherine. No evidence was provided.
An indication of the private anger felt by the Waleses came a few days after the Oprah interview was broadcast when William told a reporter, with clear hurt in his voice: ‘We’re very much not a racist family.’
There will be no ‘olive branches’ offered, or meetings at private members’ clubs between aides, until William and Catherine receive apologies from the Sussexes.
Frankly, that’s the least they deserve.
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