Good God, thought Powerscourt. Another one. More bloody qualifications. They’ll start talking about the Hippocratic Oath soon. But he was wrong.
‘The key factor, I think, is whether it is influenza alone or if there is some accompanying illness which might speed up the process. Pneumonia comes often with influenza – two of my patients have recently died, not from the influenza, but from its terrible twin disease. If the pneumonia came quickly, you would expect the patient to go through a period of fluctuating conditions, apparently recovering one day, very high temperatures and a relapse the next. In those circumstances, the patient might die after four or five days, though that might be too abrupt. Anything between six and nine days would fit the prevailing trends of such a condition in Norfolk at the present time.’
‘Would that analysis meet with your approval, Dr Broadbent?’ Rosebery was anxious to carry the meeting with him, before further medical complications set in.
‘Of course, I do not know the particular circumstances in these rural areas.’
Here we go again, thought Powerscourt, casting a surreptitious glance at his watch.
‘But in general, that is a very fair description of the progress, the possible progress of the disease.’
‘Thank you, Dr Broadbent.’ Rosebery interrupted him neatly at the end of the sentence. Powerscourt felt Broadbent had been good for another three or four minutes of intervening conditions and unfortunate side effects.
‘Let me try to sum up our position with a concrete example.’ Rosebery smiled a thin smile at the medical gentlemen. ‘Let us say the Prince contracted the beginnings of influenza at the end of last week. We already know that he was suffering from a cold. On Friday, two days ago, he is taken seriously ill. Pneumonia symptoms appear quickly. The patient comes and goes in the manner described by Dr Manby over the weekend and through the first three days of next week. By Thursday, he could be dead.’
‘I am afraid that that is all too plausible,’ Dr Manby said. ‘Wouldn’t you agree, Broadbent?’
Surprisingly, Broadbent did. Even more surprising was what Rosebery did next.
‘Suter, do you have some pens and paper in here?’
Sir William produced some from the drawers on the table.
‘Gentlemen, I am going to give you some rather gruesome homework. And I am afraid it must be done now. It’s the express wish of the Prince of Wales.’
Rosebery’s making that up, thought Powerscourt. He’s making it up to make sure they don’t wriggle out of what he wants them to do.
Rosebery wrote rapidly on five separate sheets of paper. Sunday. Monday. Tuesday. Wednesday. Thursday.
‘I would ask you to remember that what you write for the Prince’s condition on Sunday will be the first news to appear in the papers. One bulletin should suffice. It will appear in the Monday editions, Monday’s bulletins appearing on Tuesday and so on. For each day from Monday to Thursday, gentlemen, we require two medical bulletins. They will be signed in your names. They will be pinned up on the railings of Sandringham House and at Marlborough House.
‘They can be brief, the bulletins, but they must be plausible. Just a couple of sentences at a time will do. Bring in the pneumonia as you feel appropriate. I think you might write a third bulletin for broadcast late on Wednesday. And I think you should also write one holding version which could be used if we find that we need another one in a hurry. No change in the patient’s condition, that sort of thing.’
‘Do you know when you want him to die, Lord Rosebery?’ Manby was looking practical, pen poised over his Sunday hymn sheet.
‘I do indeed, Dr Manby. I was just coming to that. Prince Eddy, Duke of Clarence and Avondale, is to die at 9 a.m. on Thursday morning, in time for the papers to prepare special editions for the Friday.
‘Now, I suggest that we leave you to this distasteful task. These other gentlemen and I are going to prepare the background material that will be distributed to the newspapers at the same time as the bulletins.’
Rosebery was now in complete control of the situation. ‘Successful generals,’ he said to the two doctors as he prepared to lead the rest of his small army from the room, ‘leave nothing to chance. Everything is planned. Everything is prepared. If we want our version to be believed, we are asking people to believe in one huge lie. They are much more likely to do so if we can support the big lie with a host of smaller ones.
‘We are going,’ he looked at Suter and Shepstone, ‘to invent the host of smaller lies to buttress the bulletins, when he first felt ill, when the first doctor was called, any trips he might have made outdoors, shooting or that sort of thing, which could have brought on or aggravated his condition.’
‘Lord Rosebery.’ Broadbent sounded plaintive. ‘Haven’t you forgotten something?’
‘I’m sure I have, my dear Broadbent. Please enlighten me. At times like this we need all the help we can get.’
‘This is Sunday,’ said Dr Broadbent. ‘Do you mean to say that you intend to get the first bulletin into the papers tomorrow?’
‘Indeed I do. That is why you gentlemen must make haste. The Prince of Wales’ special train is waiting to take me at full speed to London. There I shall meet the Queen’s Private Secretary. Together we have an appointment with the editor of The Times early this evening. ‘That is when, for our purposes, the history of this affair will begin to be written. The Official History, I mean. For that other history, the secret history, the history of secrets, could I paraphrase from the Danish play, the rest must be silence.’
8
Suter had posted notices of the Service of Prayer for the Sick all round the house and grounds by 10.30 in the morning. It was to start at three o’clock.
The staff filed into the little church two by two. Butler, footmen, housekeepers, parlourmaids, nursery maids, grooms, gardeners, blacksmiths, carpenters, coachmen, all arrived to insult their separate gods by praying that one already dead might live.
Powerscourt thought that the prospects of a Resurrection in East Anglia were rather remote. He had planned to spend the time talking to Lancaster, but received a message from Shepstone that his presence was specially requested by the Princess of Wales.
‘My soul he doth restore again,’ the congregation sang, slowly at first, and then with more conviction as the tune took hold.
‘And me to walk doth make
Within the paths of righteousness,
E’en for his own name’s sake.’
The singing was quite loud now, floating out from the little church across the white landscape and the frozen lakes.
‘Yea, though I walk in death’s dark vale,
Yet will I fear none ilclass="underline"
For thou art with me, and thy rod
And staff me comfort still.’
On the upper floor of Sandringham House Shepstone’s special forces moved with extraordinary speed. Prince Eddy’s bed and all the bedclothes were rushed out of his room and buried in the woods. The carpet was removed, the floor scrubbed, and a new bed with clean sheets installed. Mats that were almost indistinguishable from the previous carpet were laid upon the floor. His bloody clothes were taken away and a new series of pictures of his family, borrowed from his mother’s quarters, placed on the dressing-table. His old dress uniform which had been splattered with blood was replaced with a cleaner, freshly pressed model.
‘O most merciful God, open thine eye of mercy upon this thy servant, Prince Eddy, who most earnestly desireth pardon and forgiveness. Renew in him, most loving Father, whatsoever hath been decayed by the fraud and malice of the devil, or by his own carnal will and frailness . . .’
Canon Hervey hurried over the words carnal will and frailness. He had been chosen as Rector of Sandringham for the quality of his voice, which appealed to Princess Alexandra, and the brevity of his sermons which appealed to her husband. His beautiful speaking voice filled the little church as the thin afternoon sun lit the stained glass windows of the Last Judgement.