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ceremonial, that's all it is and that's all it's got to be. He's the Monarch, not a bloody architect.'
    They were driving past the Banqueting Hall in Whitehall, slowing down as they approached the barriers at the head of Downing Street, and Urquhart was relieved to see there were rather more people here to wave and cheer him on for the benefit of the cameras than at the Palace. He thought he recognized a couple of young faces, perhaps party headquarters had turned out their rent-a-crowd. His wife idly slicked down a stray lock of his hair while his mind turned to the reshuffle and the remarks he would make on the doorstep, which would be televised around the world.
    'So what are you going to do?' Elizabeth pressed.
    'It really doesn't matter,' Urquhart muttered out of the corner of his mouth as he smiled for the cameras which were thrusting their lenses towards him as the car turned into Downing Street. 'As a new King the man is inexperienced, and as constitutional Monarch he is impotent. He has all the menace and bite of a rubber duck. But fortunately on this matter I happen to agree with him. Away with modernism!' He waved as a policeman came forward to open the heavy car door. 'So it really can't be of any consequence . . .'
    'Put the papers down, David. For God's sake take your nose out of them for just a minute of our day together.' The voice was tense, more nervous than aggressive.
    The grey eyes remained impassive, not moving from the sheaf of documents upon which they had been fixed ever since he had sat down at the breakfast table. The only facial reaction was an irascible twitch of the neatly trimmed moustache. 'I'm off in ten minutes, Fiona, I simply have to finish them. Today of all days.'
    'There's something else we have to finish. So put the bloody papers down!'
    With reluctance David Mycroft raised his eyes in time to see his wife's hand shaking so vigorously that the coffee splashed over the edge of her cup. 'What on earth's the matter?'
    'You. And me. That's the matter.' She was struggling to control herself. 'There's nothing left to our marriage and I want out.'
    The King's press aide and principal public spokesman switched automatically into diplomatic gear. 'Look, let's not have a row, not now, I'm in a hurry and . . .'
    'Don't you realize, we never have rows. That's the problem!' The cup smashed down into the saucer, overturning and spreading a menacing brown stain across the tablecloth. For the first time he lowered his sheaf of papers, every movement careful and deliberate, as was every aspect of his life.
    'Perhaps I could get some time off. Not today, but . . . We could go away together. I know it's been a long time since we had any real chance to talk . . .'
    'It's not lack of time, David! We could have all the time in the world and it would make no difference. It's you, and me. The reason we don't have any rows is because we have nothing to argue about. Nothing at all. There's no passion, nothing. All we have is a shell.
    I used to dream that once the children were off our hands it might all change.' She shook her head. 'But I'm tired of deluding myself. It will never change. You will never change. And I don't suppose I will.' There was pain and she was dabbing her eyes, yet held her control. This was no flash of temper.
    'Are you . . . feeling all right, Fiona? You know, women at your time of life . . .'
    She smarted at his patronizing idiocy. 'Women in their forties, David, have their needs, their feelings. But how would you know? When did you last look at me as a woman? When did you last look at any woman?' She returned the insult, meaning it to hurt. She knew that to break through she was going to have to batter down the walls he had built around himself. He had always been so closed, private, a man of diminutive stature who had sought to cope with his perceived physical inadequacies by being utterly formal and punctilious in everything he did. Never a hair on his small and rather boyish head out