The ghosts of the Duke of York continue to haunt the corridors of Buckingham Palace, and the chill is now being felt most acutely by his daughters. Princess Beatrice and Princess Eugenie have long been the quiet, diligent, and largely blameless face of the York branch of the family. They work hard, they don’t cause a fuss, and they’ve carved out respectable lives in the private sector. But the ongoing fallout from the arrest of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor in connection with the Epstein case has cast a long, dark shadow over their futures within the institution. The question being asked in hushed tones among courtiers is brutal: can the daughters of a pariah remain frontline members of the ‘Firm’?
The King has a notoriously difficult balancing act to perform. On a personal level, he is said to be fond of his nieces. He knows they are victims of their father’s catastrophic judgement, not perpetrators. But the optics of the monarchy are a cold, hard science. Every time Beatrice steps out for a garden party or a charity gala, the tabloid comment sections fill up with vitriol about her father. The association is inescapable. The Palace has been trying to manage this by slowly, almost imperceptibly, downgrading their roles. They are no longer expected to stand on the balcony for major flypasts. They are “family” but not “working royals” in the traditional sense, receiving no Sovereign Grant money. This semi-detached status was supposed to be the solution.
