“Your mummy’s gone to heaven.” Prince Charles spoke the words quietly and slowly as he told his two sons- William, 15, and Harry, who will turn 13 this month- the awful, inconprehensible news about their mother. “She died,” he said. “The doctors couldn’t save her.” But he asked the boys not cry and, in the British royal tradition, he said he expected them both to follow his lead- and to be brave little soldiers. “We all have to be strong,” Charles explained. “Your mummy would have wanted us to be strong for her.” It was the most heartbreaking moment in the wake of the senseless tragedy that claimed the life of the glamorous princess- loved by millions throughout the world- at the age of 36. But for the future kind William and his younger brother Harry, Diana wasn’t just a glamorous, famous princess. She was their mother. The one who, unlike stuffy Charles, gave them their kisses and cuddles. The one who took them on romps around London- to play commando games at video arcades, to meet their motor-racing heroes and to eat at burger joints. The one who listened to the Spice Girls with them, let Harry eat chocolate until he was nearly sick and traded sly jokes with them as if she was their pal- not just their mother. The boys used to have signals arranged with their mother for whenever she was away from them. An exact time would be set, the phone would ring, and they would be allowed to pick up the reciever. That way Diana could talk to just them, not any of the nannies or palace help that had never really been on her side. All the recent calls from abroad had been happy ones. She had been happy with the new man in her life, Dodi Fayed, and she was coming home to her sons the next day. A palace insider says the boys- both so protective of their mother- “loved it when she’s feeling on top of the world.” But nothing could prepare them for this call that would tear their world apart. Charles was awakened by British Foreign Secretary Robin Cook shortly after midnight in Scotland, within an hour of the accident in Paris. Dressed in pajamas, he put on a cashmere dressing gown and woke his mother, the queen. They went to the drawing room and began the most agonizing wait of their lives. Charles had a whiskey, the queen drank tea. Deciding not to wake the children until more news was in, they sat together in near total silence. But when Diana’s condition was described as grave, Charles rose and went to William’s bedroom. He turned on the bedside lamp, sat down beside him and gently roused him with a hand on his shoulder. When William sat up, Charles put a hesitant arm around him and said: “I think you better get up, Wills. Mummy’s been in an accident. She’s at the hospital and they’re operating on her.” The boy sat there stunned, then managed a few questions. His father gave hima few details, but left out any metions of the paparazzi- the stalking photographers that friends say William hates and even fears more than his mother did. Charles led William to his brother’s room that is just down the broad hall. When they told Harry together, the youngster burst into tears. William rubbed his back and reminded him of the need to be brave and grown-up. Then Charles took both boys into the drawing room to await the next fateful call. Charles took it out of earshot. When he returned, he waslked straight over to his sons and reached out to them. Then he told them the terrible news. The two sons of Princess Diana sat in silence, lanky youngsters in grown-up straight chairs, as the adult royalty around them spoke I nhushed tones of the dreaded arrangements for the next few hours and days. The boys had been so close to their mother- much more so than with their aloof, often distant father. Diana had been fiercely protective of them and determined to raise them well. In return, they were totally suportive of her in her times of unhappiness and tragedy. It was William who, a few years back, sat outside his mother’s bathroom as she cried about her marriage, har problems and all the hurdles she faced. He slipped tissues to her under the closed door and kept whispering: “Don’t cry, Mummy. Please don’t cry.” Just two weeks earlier, the boys had the summer of their lives- Diana called it the best holiday ever- in the south of France. With their mother and Dodi Fayed in St. Tropez, they dove off hsi massive yacht and jet-skied around the Mediterranean. And, with the two teenagers from Fayed’s father’s second marriage, they danced and swank disco in town that Fayed rented just for them. For boys used to the staid recretions of the Winsdors back home, it was the kind of big, happy extended-family fun that they’d never had. Plus, there was the joy of seeing their mother happier than they’s een her for years. When Diana returned them to England mid-month, they headed north to Balmoral for a long holiday with their father before the start of school. “Diana loved those boys so much,” says one royal insider. “They were the most important thing in thw world to her. Her death is such a senseless tragedy. But nothing is more senseless than the two of them now having to grow up without a mother.”
by Barbra Jones- September 16, 1997