Helliker New fear for Fergie
The man who knows the people you’d like to know...
THE Duchess of York is held in such low esteem by the Royal Family (apart from her blinkered ex-husband Prince Andrew) that she will not be invited to take any part in the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee celebrations. Yet her raddled reputation may sink even further on the publication of a book which threatens devastating exposures of her affairs and louche lifestyle.
Fergie’s former aide Jane Andrews plans to release this volume of vitriol on her release from jail, where she has served 11 years of a life sentence for the horrific murder of her boyfriend. On Tuesday she was interviewed by a parole board at Send Prison in Surrey, at which she was invited to make her case for rehabilitation into society. If successful she could be released in June, just in time to watch the Jubilee pageant on the Thames. The psychotic Miss Andrews has always maintained that she was acting in self-defence when she battered her boyfriend, businessman Thomas Cressman, around the head with a cricket bat and then stabbed him around the heart. She claimed he had raped her but a jury concluded that she had killed her lover in a jealous rage after he refused to marry her.
The court heard that Andrews had a history of taking revenge on those who spurned her, so it’s not surprising that she sees her memoirs of her nine drama-packed years in royal life as a suitable payback for Sarah sacking her and not supporting her at her trial.
As for the book, one would think that there isn’t much more to know about Fergie’s rackety life. Yet Andrews is threatening to reveal secrets about the Royal Family she was told by the Duchess. The two women became close friends, particularly during the years leading up to Sarah’s divorce from Prince Andrew in 1996.
She also knew all about her libidinous boss’s tangled love life; and her affair with American chancer John Bryan, with whom she was photographed topless while he sucked her toes. Fergie and her aide even shared lovers, once falling out over an Italian boyfriend. A string of other, hitherto unknown, flings may be exposed, plus details of the drugtaking crowd Sarah mixed with.
“Jane has a long memory and is out for revenge; she knows absolutely everything about Sarah because they were like sisters,” says a friend. “It would devastate Sarah if all this damaging stuff comes out; she’s been trying to lead a quiet life and she would hate to see anything upset Beatrice and Eugenie.” Thank goodness Prince William is back from the Falklands to snuggle up with Kate under the crested duvet at their windswept Welsh farmhouse. She needs a darn good comforting cuddle after being spooked by the unsavoury history of Anglesey.
Ever since Roman times, when the island was the scene of grisly pagan rituals, there’s been unnerving chatter about the occult and ghostly goings- on. But what Kate hadn’t realised – until she was helpfully informed by a local when she was out on the beach walking the dog one day – was that the supposed “curse” on the community has continued with a spate of murders.
Among the worst were the three residents stabbed in 1995 by serial killer Peter Moore, who was fixated on the Friday The 13th films. Four years later came the gruesome stabbing of an Anglesey mechanic. Then art student Matthew Hardman killed a 90-year- old resident, cutting her heart out and drinking her blood. At his trial there was talk of “vampirism”.
“If the Duchess is nervous she can’t be blamed,” says one regular at the White Eagle, a pub often visited by the royal couple. “The history of the place doesn’t help; all those stories about cult sacrifices and witchcraft.”
All silly talk, of course, but no wonder the poor girl has been spending so much time in London while her princely protector has been away.
CLOSE FRIENDS: Jane with Sarah in the Nineties Sorry to see that
88, has been railing about people making fun of the elderly. Particularly as he’s always been so proud of his vitality (he once told me he attributes his good health to eating burnt sausages).
I know what would cheer up the old dear (whoops)– the touch of Her Majesty’s sword on his shoulder on behalf of a grateful nation. He’d so love a knighthood and so would his wife Ann.
Sir Nicholas Parsons? Mmm, it’s already tripping off the tongue. Congratulations to my kinswoman
who gives a splendid performance in the film Salmon Fishing In The Yemen, in which she has a rather soggy, saliva- exchanging scene with Ewan Mcgregor.
Roehampton-born Emily, 29, niece of Justice Minister Crispin Blunt, was required to get passionate with Ewan in a midnight swim in a river on the set in Morocco but the water was so cold it dampened their ardour. Recounts the dear thing: “What everyone forgot is that in the desert at night the temperature plummets. It was supposed to be a romantic swim but our teeth were chattering. Plus the water was only about two feet deep; we were scraping our knickers on the rocks.”
Happily for Emily, who used to live with the Canadian crooner Michael Bublé, her own love life is anything but frosty now that she’s married to the hunky actor John Krasinski, who is in the US version of The Office.