SPARE | 3
Ground. Final resting place for so many of us, including Queen
Victoria. Also, the notorious Wallis Simpson. Also, her doubly
notorious husband Edward, the former King and my great-great-
uncle. After Edward gave up his throne for Wallis, after they fled
Britain, both of them fretted about their ultimate return – both
obsessed about being buried right here. The Queen, my grand-
mother, granted their plea. But she placed them at a distance from
everyone else, beneath a stooped plane tree. One last finger wag,
perhaps. One final exile, maybe. I wondered how Wallis and
Edward felt now about all their fretting. Did any of it matter in
the end? I wondered if they wondered at all. Were they floating in
some airy realm, still mulling their choices, or were they Nowhere,
thinking Nothing? Could there really be Nothing after this? Does
consciousness, like time, have a stop? Or maybe, I thought, just
maybe, they’re here right now, next to the fake Gothic ruin, or
next to me, eavesdropping on my thoughts. And if so . . .
maybe
my mother is too?
The thought of her, as always, gave me a jolt of hope, and a
burst of energy.
And a stab of sorrow.
I missed my mother every day, but that day, on the verge of
that nerve-racking rendezvous at Frogmore, I found myself long-
ing for her, and I couldn’t say just why. Like so much about her, it
was hard to put into words.
Although my mother was a princess, named after a goddess,
both those terms always felt weak, inadequate. People routinely
compared her to icons and saints, from Nelson Mandela to Mother
Teresa to Joan of Arc, but every such comparison, while lofty and
loving, also felt wide of the mark. The most recognizable woman
on the planet, one of the most beloved, my mother was simply
indescribable, that was the plain truth. And yet . . . how could
someone so far beyond everyday language remain so real, so pal-
pably present, so exquisitely vivid in my mind? How was it possible
that I could see her, clear as the swan skimming towards me on
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