Jerusalem’ was playing on the radio on a perpetual loop. The costumers would not stop circling him, but finally they seemed to be done. Matthew Windsor stepped down from his perch, away from the mirrors surrounding him. He did not like to look at himself anymore. The room was full of personnel and his family, ready to shepherd them all to the Abbey. The Coronation was set for three o’clock. The crown was heavier than it looked. Matthew saw that, for the first time in a long time, nobody was looking at him. Quickly he took off his red velvet cap with fluffy white trim. He placed the crown back on its cushion. He could do it now, and he would. There was an open window across the room, nobody in the way. He could get there before anyone realised, and then he would be out – whether he would be able to climb down, or whether he would just fall and be done, he did not really care. He took a step towards the window, but instantly felt a hand on his shoulder.
Maud clutched her son, giving him a hug and a small shake of the head. That was not the way. Matthew relented to her and went back to his plinth as the costumers returned, his chance gone. Maud was worried about her boys, and she went to find her other. She found young Martin sitting in the corner of the busy room, on the floor with his head on his knees. The boy had never been the same since he had to do what he did. Maud could not imagine the amount of strength it had taken him to do the deed required of him. She slid down the wall next to him, ignoring the squawks of the personnel muttering that she would ruin her dress. She touched Martin on the knee.
Martin got up and stormed away. He could not even look at her. He could not even look at any of them, most of all himself. He pushed his way through tens of samey-looking men and women, all with coils in their ears and all only here to keep them in their place. He was going so fast that he bumped into Anton Blake, who was hugging Emeline. Blake looked down at him and smiled, and Martin stalked off again.
Anton Blake knew he had picked the right ring when Emeline’s eyes had lit up with that same fire he had seen in her before Christmas Day last year. She was getting it back slowly, but there were still glimpses of the utter sorrow that they all felt. Blake himself felt it too. Although he knew that his beloved was not telling him everything of what happened that Christmas Day.
As they ceased their embrace, Emeline searched Anton’s eyes. That expectant glint was there – the problem was that she had no idea what was being asked of her. She had said yes to marrying him, hadn’t she? What else was there? He had been all she wanted. Now he was just another man whom she couldn’t tell her secrets to. Anton went to kiss her, but she gestured towards the drinks table and made her way over to it. It wasn’t that she did not love him anymore, it was just that she was different now. She wished she could get therapy, but of course they would never allow that. It wasn’t her fault she was changed. It was his fault he was not. Maybe that wasn’t fair, but there it was.
At the drinks table, as Emeline obtained a glass of water, Marjorie ordered an aide to pour her two glasses of wine. Marjorie took the wine thankfully and immediately disposed of half of one of the glasses down her throat. She went back to her seat in the corner of the room and placed the full glass next to her, looking to her side. He wasn’t there; he never would be again. David had decided to take the payout, signed an NDA willingly and buggered off – he’d run away from his family and gone back to New Zealand. She had been forgotten again. But at least she had an extra glass of wine and a seat. She was becoming an old woman and should be allowed a nice sit-down once in a while. She would have to do plenty of bloody standing up later on in the Abbey. She drank the rest of her wine and her legs seemed to get a little better. She drank his glass in one and they got even stronger. And now she had no wine – she almost wished she’d gotten Eric one too. Suddenly, before she could cackle loudly, someone came, plucked her glass from her hand, and refilled it.
Miss Darcy left the bottle with Marjorie. It couldn’t hurt – well, not any more than it already had anyway. Things were going well, on such a grand day – almost too well. Tony Speck was by the door, talking into his earpiece. It seemed important, but he smiled at her anyway. Nothing to worry about. All Royals were accounted for. Miss Darcy regarded them all. And saw, almost as a premonition, that the day would go swimmingly.
‘Jerusalem’ began again.
George Tippin had gotten into the office early that morning, even though the entire production company had been ordered to stay at home and watch the Coronation with a notepad in their laps and a Dictaphone in their hands. Tippin somehow couldn’t bring himself to care though. He used to be so driven, enthusiastic, brazen even. That drive had taken him to The Gentlemen that day years ago and had secured the company the biggest source of royal information they had ever seen.
Something had happened in the last year though, since the King’s death. Thomas Crockley had gone quiet, disappearing at the same time as the King and the chef. Since then, the Royal Family had been on lockdown – more secretive than Scotland Yard, less penetrable than the Tower of London. The Monarch’s ratings had soared as rabid royalists looked for their royal fix, but information was incredibly light. Tippin spent most of his days travelling the country, chasing whatever scraps of knowledge he could. And he was dealing with the fact that something didn’t sit right with him – what had happened last Christmas up at Balmoral?
The official line was that the King had died peacefully in his sleep, the King’s brother had actually decided to travel back to New Zealand after falling in love with the country, and Thomas Crockley had decided to withdraw from the public eye to focus on his business. That was all widely accepted. It was the chef whom Tippin was confused about. It was not reported even slightly, but Jonathan Alleyne, the King’s private chef, had been dismissed on Christmas Day 2022 as well. He’d had to search Alleyne’s name in many different databases until he found the very odd and intriguing words: ‘Wanted for Questioning.’ After further exploration, he had come up with nothing but dead ends. He had to employ the services of a friend who worked over at Crimewatch to dig deeper. His friend came back to him white-faced and troubled. He told Tippin that Alleyne was being hunted down with the tenacity the government would hunt a terrorist. But unlike even a terrorist, there was a Protocol 219 order out on Alleyne. When Tippin said he’d never heard of 219, his friend laughed. No one had, because it didn’t exist outside of being attached to Alleyne’s name. What was Protocol 219? That was comparatively easy to uncover – Protocol 219 was ‘shoot to kill.’
Had Alleyne murdered the King? And if so, why was the government not alerting the public to this dangerous individual? Why had Tippin needed to dig to even find Alleyne’s name let alone his status? What really happened on 25 December 2022?
Tippin put some coffee on, switched on the television in his office, and flipped over to the Coronation buildup. He knew he should at least have it on in the background. People were flooding into Westminster Abbey while commentators were talking about the eagerly anticipated arrival of the new King. Tippin slid over the box his assistant had collected with three months’ worth of post piled up.
He riffled through letters that didn’t look at all important, until he happened upon a beefy padded envelope with a wobbly handwritten address in green felt tip, fastened closed with a single piece of dirty masking tape. If it wasn’t so ramshackle, Tippin might have overlooked it, but as it was, he ripped it open and upended the contents onto his desk.
Five unlabelled CDs clattered off his desk and finally a small USB stick came to rest on the top of the pile. He shook the package and peered inside. Nothing else – no note, no explanation.
He took a sip of coffee and glanced down at the pile of post next to his desk. He should ignore this and go back to his boredom. His eyes rose to the television. He should watch the Royal Family arrive at least. He should do literally anything other than putting this no doubt virus-ridden USB stick into his computer.
He put the USB stick into his computer.
It was a 256GB stick, full to the brim with video files. Most files had time stamps and locations on them. They were all jumbled. West Corridor East View 09:00 to 10:00. Bedroom 37 13:00 to 14:00. East Courtyard South View 23:00 to 0:00. Etcetera. Etcetera. It just went on and on, but as Tippin scrolled down, he saw a video file labelled ‘Play First.’
He clicked on it.
A close-up of a face filled his computer screen. Old. Defeated. Broken. The man on the screen was a shadow of what a man should be. His thick beard made him almost unrecognisable.
‘Hello,’ the man rasped. It seemed that it pained the man to talk. ‘My name is Jonathan Alleyne.’ What – how could this be? But it was. Under all that greasy hair lay the former chef. Tippin’s eyes flitted to his office door. He quickly dashed to it and closed it, before sitting back down and inching closer to the screen. ‘I’m sure by this point you know that I am wanted, so maybe you won’t listen to me. I used to be an optimist, but even optimists die, and I’ll almost certainly be dead by the time you see this. I got shot, as you’ll see, and it’s infected. And that’s not even mentioning the cancer. That doesn’t matter though.
‘You have no reason to believe what I’m about to tell you. But I’ve come to you with evidence – evidence of what really happened. I’ve sent you every video file from every security camera, inside and out. Yes, inside Balmoral Castle – they had cameras everywhere.’
‘Everything I’m about to say will be backed up by the footage. I’m telling you simply in the interest of time, and because I was there. So, are you ready to hear what really happened on 25 December 2022, at Balmoral Castle?’
‘Holy shit . . . ’ Tippin whispered.
Alleyne took a break to splutter his way through a coughing fit. When his eyes raised to the camera again, Tippin could see some of the spark of life that he’d seen in his photos.
Alleyne did an odd thing then. It was almost imperceptible under his beard, but Tippin realised that he was seeing it reflected in the chef’s eyes.
Alleyne smiled and said –
‘First I need to tell you a story – a story about a common family who went to London Zoo to see the lions . . . ’