Camilla Takes a Break: A Royal Schedule's Toll

With thirteen official engagements back-to-back, too many for Her Majesty Queen Camilla, described as 'exhausted', who has taken a week off after having sustained all the royal commitments alone for several weeks, filling in for her convalescing spouse, King Charles III, who is being treated for cancer. The British press notes that the queen consort, aged 76, has attended all appointments alone or as head of the family, leading, among other things, the British Royal Family at the funeral of King Constantine of Greece, Charles's godfather who passed away in January, from which the heir to the throne William also withdrew at the last minute for unspecified 'personal' reasons. Now Camilla's agenda, whose resilience has seemed to worry observers and media, is clear, at least until Commonwealth Day, which will be celebrated on March 11. Well-informed sources at the Daily Mail have suggested that it was probably the sovereign himself who insisted that his wife take a few days off. 'Although she did not expect to find herself in the position of leading the family - the Sunday Times writes - the queen is absolutely ready to do whatever is necessary for the institution' she represents, that is, for the monarchy. The commitments of the Royal Family thus fall into the hands of Princess Anne, the second daughter of the late Elizabeth II, who has impeccably followed the events of the Crown for decades, and on William, whose wife is still convalescing from abdominal surgery. The health of Kate, to worry and intrigue the subjects and not only, is precisely the health of Katherine on whose figure more and more conspiracy theories are gathering considering that the Princess of Wales has not been seen in public since Christmas after the operation. William and Kate, and their team at Kensington Palace, maintain the line expressed in January: the princess will not return to public engagements until after Easter. The rumors and gossip were then fueled after the decision of the son of Charles and Diana not to attend a funeral ceremony in Windsor last Tuesday for unknown personal reasons, although the palace insisted that the princess is recovering well. But the prince's decision and the lack of explanations have highlighted how high-risk their strategy of silence is: a vacuum of information that is quickly filled by speculation and plots, which have echoed on social media throughout the week. According to the former Palace communications secretary, Ailsa Anderson, the voracious appetite for news about the princess is not new, recalling having received dozens of phone calls when Prince Philip attended an engagement with a plaster on his hand. In an editorial, the BBC spoke of a thick fog of uncertainties that surrounds the royals that only raises more questions. The British broadcaster, always attentive to the affairs of the crown, emphasizes that the secrecy surrounding the gilded world of a modern monarchy, although it serves to feed that necessary mystery to maintain an aura of regality and mysticism, risks at the same time being interpreted as a real concealment of reality.