The royals - Kitty Kelley [232]
Within days Robertson’s defense team had deposed employees who swore that the Princess actively encouraged attention in the gym by exercising in front of a window so the public could see her better. Several employees said she flirted openly with male club members and wore provocative, skintight clothes to show off her body. To them the Princess looked like a pickup.
Diana’s lawyers countered that she wore appropriate exercise attire every time she went to the gym, but no matter what she wore, she was entitled to privacy. They produced a letter from Bryce Taylor dated September 25, 1990, promising to protect her from publicity.
His lawyers responded that by accepting a three-year membership as a gift, Diana was not entitled to the privileges of someone who had paid. They argued that by freeloading, she had forfeited her rights to privacy, especially when she agreed to be weighed and measured. They produced the personal data form she herself had filled out using the name of Sally Hughes, her former secretary:
Blood Pressure: 120/60
Height centimeters: 183
BMI (Body Mass Index) 60.5
Girth measurements:
Shoulder: 40"
Chest: 35"
Right arm: 9 1/7"
Waist: 27"
Rt. thigh: 22"
Calf: 13½"
The Palace became dismayed when they learned that some of Diana’s sworn statements did not jibe with those of her personal detective. When Ken Wharfe was scheduled as a defense witness, the detective was swiftly transferred out of her service. Then Diana’s chauffeur decided he wanted to work for Prince Charles. Diana had not been consulted about either move. Losing both men, who had been in her service for several years, left her shaken. Hours after being informed of the transfers, she arrived at a theater gala with red, puffy eyes. She stayed less than an hour before she ran out sobbing. The Palace said she was suffering from a migraine.
The next day’s newspapers carried stories about “the tormented mind of a princess” and speculated she was suffering from a recurrence of bulimia. The employees’ transfers were interpreted in the press as Palace plots to undermine her stability.
She tried to put the matter to rest three days later in a speech to charity workers: “Ladies and gentlemen, you are very lucky to have your patron here today,” she said. “I am supposed to have my head down the loo for most of the day…. I am supposed to be dragged off the minute I leave here by men in white coats.”
Her audience applauded her good humor. “If it is all right with you,” she concluded, “I thought I would postpone my nervous breakdown to a more appropriate moment.” Smiling, she added, “It is amazing what a migraine can bring on.”
By then the Queen had reconsidered her support for Diana’s lawsuit. She questioned whether the emotional Princess could stand up to tough cross-examination. Further, she was troubled to learn that Diana’s former lover James Hewitt was a houseguest of Geoffrey Robertson. The lawyer indicated he might subpoena Hewitt to establish just how averse the Princess really was to invasions of her privacy. The Queen was disconcerted to read Hewitt’s comment to Robertson’s wife, Kathy Lette, who asked him what the Princess was really like: “She’s got bad breath,” said Hewitt, “and she wants sex all the time.”
The press was salivating over the prospect of a trial, and more than nine hundred reporters had applied for credentials in a courtroom with seventy-five seats. The Queen was concerned about the international media hoopla and did not want to see a member of the royal family take the witness stand. She recommended the case be settled out of court.
An overture was made to Bryce Taylor, but without a trial he would no longer be eligible for legal aid and would have to pay his own legal fees. So he had no incentive to settle. Now bankrupt, he was relying on a sensational trial to sell world rights to his story. The press agent he had hired said, “For him, it was always a matter of money—only