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                                                                                WORLD, Page 38

BRITAIN

The Not So Merry Wife of Windsor


Amid barbs from Buckingham Palace and press criticism of "Duchess
Do-Little," Fergie decides to end her marriage to the Duke of
York

By JAMES WALSH -- Reported by William Mader/London


    fergie (fr ft.ge) chiefly British: a rambunctious misfit
and renegade; a royal black sheep [late 20th cent., origin
obscure]


    When they married, they seemed a match made in tabloid
heaven: Andrew, the handsome playboy prince, and Sarah Ferguson,
the red-headed minx who enjoyed slap and tickle and a good
time. In contrast to the icy blondness of her sister-in-law
Diana, the fun lover all of Britain came to know as Fergie was
made up of earth colors and earthy views, promising a shot of
red blood into thin royal veins. "She is the best thing in my
life," Andrew often told friends, while his bride openly gushed,
"I love his wit, his charm, his looks. I worship him."

    That was before the children came. Before the royal duties
and stately protocols began weighing as heavily as maternal
pounds around the hips. Before the couple's enforced
separations, then separations by choice: Fergie's impulsive
flyaways to Alpine ski slopes and Mediterranean beaches, parties
with dubious friends and displays of desperate merriment. Before
Andrew began to slam her pals as "poncey philistines," and she
to knock his sometimes boorish behavior as "terribly gauche."

    Then last week, on the sixth anniversary of their
engagement, Buckingham Palace made it coldly official: the Duke
and Duchess of York's marriage was for practical purposes over.
They had agreed to separate formally, with the option of divorce
after two years. According to scornful palace officials, the
woman increasingly mocked by the press as Freebie Fergie and
Duchess Do-Little was "unsuitable for public life, for royal
life."

    The storm of headlines stole the thunder from the campaign
for Britain's April 9 general election. That the split also
upstaged news about the nation's deepest slump since World War
II demonstrated one value of the House of Windsor today: as a
distraction. At a time of anguish over Britain's national
direction, a Hollywood-style cult of celebrity surrounding Queen
Elizabeth II's offspring has endowed the royal clan with a more
modern relevancy. The Queen's second son and his wayward wife
provided everything in the way of gossip-page dramatics that
their 1986 wedding seemed to herald. But in the end, the couple
proved to be unsuitable for each other.

    Though Britons relished Fergie's outgoing nature, they
nonetheless expect members of the royal family to behave with
dignity. The new duchess could never manage that for long. When
the tabloids were not feasting on rumors of marital stresses
between Diana and Prince Charles, heir to the throne, they were
sniping at Andrew's spouse for her idleness, her "materialism"
and, well, her behavior that was Not Quite His Class, Dear --
reproofs that were said to reflect Buckingham Palace's views.
Britons high and low agreed: their revered sovereign and her
family deserved better.

    Eventually, the buzz saw wore down the polo manager's
daughter. She was particularly upset when the Daily Mail in
January splashed a scoop of her poolside unwinding in Morocco
with Steve Wyatt, 38, bachelor son of a Texas oil tycoon. A
cleaning woman had found snapshots of the scene in Wyatt's old
flat in London and tattled the tale. Though Scotland Yard
impounded the photos -- by all accounts they depicted only
innocent fun -- Andrew reportedly hit the roof.

    The royal family at first tried to patch things up but by
last week was in high dudgeon. "The knives are out for Fergie
at the palace," said Paul Reynolds, BBC Radio's court
correspondent. "I have never known such anger here." Reason:
suspicions that the duchess had engineered a leak of the
separation story. Fergie's friends denied it, but the upstart
had already angered the Queen by hiring her own lawyers.
"Unheard-of impertinence," huffed a senior palace official.

    The Queen was said at first to be "very, very sad" about
the separation, then "very, very angry." Once again the Daily
Mail had the scoop, confirming that Fergie had been quietly
pressing for a split since November. The paper also reported
that two weeks ago the Queen received her daughter-in-law at a
"private lunch" in a last-ditch effort to avert a breakup. "A
private lunch with the Queen is supposed to remain private, not
pitch up in the papers," fumed a palace official. The
condemnation of Fergie as unsuitable was a social death
sentence.

    The volley of stories detailing the palace's
behind-the-scenes fury ended up backfiring. The public
sympathized with the 32-year-old mother of two who had strayed
into the sights of such heavy artillery. The next day Charles
Anson, the Queen's press secretary and the source of some of the
vitriol, issued an extraordinary, perhaps unprecedented, public
apology to the monarch and Fergie. Anson was not the only
insider to spill venom, but he accepted "full responsibility"
for what some people had begun to call the "Mean Queen Machine."
The next step in damage control was to negotiate a deal with the
departing duchess: a possible $4 million-plus settlement, along
with retention of a noble "courtesy title," in exchange for her
keeping mum about life at court.

    Fergie's official duties were suspended, but the royal
family did its level best to give the impression of business as
usual. The Queen turned up for a scheduled visit to the
University of Surrey, where she chatted and joked. And Andrew?
According to a palace source, the duke "is calming down, but he
is bitter." Fulfilling one of his official engagements, the man
once dubbed Randy Andy alighted from his Jaguar at the
Contemporary Dance Trust headquarters in Central London with a
broad smile and a wave at the crowd of bystanders. It was in
stark contrast to the glum visage the Royal Navy lieutenant
commander and helicopter pilot displayed a day earlier as he
drove between Sunninghill Park, his and Fergie's controversial
modern mansion near Windsor Palace, and the Army Staff College
at Camberley, 25 miles southwest of London.

    The duchess is expected to retain custody of Princess
Beatrice, 3, and Princess Eugenie, who turns two this week.
Andrew is to have unlimited visitation rights. Which partner
would end up with the greater share of public sympathy remained
unclear. Often regarded as a hero for his service in the 1982
Falklands war, the duke proved to be less than heroic to his
wife. Frequently away on military duty, at home he began turning
Fergie into a golf widow as he pursued his passion for the
sport. Said Anne Fernley, a London housewife: "It's a pity,
really. They're a nice couple with nice children." Dudley Hicks,
a shoe-shop manager in the capital, disapproved. "They have a
position to uphold," he said. "They should have stayed together
for the children too."

    At a time when 1 out of every 3 British marriages ends in
divorce, however, the Yorks are hardly an unusual case. "I think
the appeal of the monarchy is precisely that these are ordinary
people with ordinary problems," said Lord St. John of Fawsley, a
British constitutional expert. He pointed to "the prevailing
climate of moral opinion" that accepts divorce. The royal
family, if anything, has had more than its share of split-ups:
Princess Margaret, the Queen's sister, ended her marriage with
Lord Snowdon 14 years ago, and Andrew's sister Princess Anne is
separated from her husband. Charles and Diana, frequently apart,
struggle with widely rumored private strains. The Queen's
marriage to Prince Philip is the only one that remains
resolutely correct.

    During the 1936 constitutional crisis over the engagement
of King Edward VIII -- later the Duke of Windsor -- and
American divorce Wallis Warfield, Winston Churchill growled,
"Why shouldn't the King be allowed to marry his cutie?"
Playwright Noel Coward shot back, "Because England doesn't wish
for a Queen Cutie." Today many Britons want a taste of soap
opera in their royalty. Sarah Ferguson, Duchess Cutie, proved
very suitable -- if only temporarily -- for that.