Continuation.
The undiscovered dates between the Crown Prince and Mary takes place in Porter Street, where Mary lives with others in a charming post-Victorian townhouse from the 1920’s. The quiet Porter Street with the dense rows of Eucalyptus trees, which are so characteristic for Australia, become a haven and hiding place for Mary and Frederik. Here they can ride by bicycle down to the famous Bondi Beach in just a little under ten minutes, go for a swim and end the day with a barbeque on the beach or the local specialty, pizza with pumpkin.
Mary meets Frederik on her home-turf and gets to know him as if he was any other young man. In the unpretentious commune everybody take turn cleaning, cooking and washing up, and Fred, as he is simply known by Mary’s friends, impress the other with his skills as a cook and don’t mind flagging the dishtowels. Frederik is also introduced to two of Mary’s very best fiends. The mate from her youth and college mate from Tasmania, Hamish Campbell, who later becomes godfather for the little Prince Christian. And the (female) friend Amber Petty, whom Mary knows from Melbourne.
In Sydney Frederik and Mary also spend a lot of time together with the Australian sail-sportsman and real estate manager Chris Meehan and his Danish girlfriend and now wife (formal word), the sail-sportswoman Michaela Ward. The Danish-Australian double romance remains undiscovered by the Danish press, even though it involves an unmarried Crown Prince above the age of 30.
The two couples go sailing together and Chris Meehan and Frederik establish a close friendship. When Frederik visits Sydney, he picks up his sweetheart (*) at Belle Property, where Mary as sales director often works long hours. But the employees don’t know that Mary’s sweetheart is a genuine Crown Prince, and neither Mary nor Chris disclose that.
“Frederik also spend a lot of time with some of my friends. I didn’t think it was necessary to tell, neither my employees, nor my acquaintances exactly who he was. And I’m convinced Frederik enjoyed that freedom it was to be perceived as everybody else”, tells Chris Meehan.
During 2001 Frederik and Mary also go on a couple of holidays alone. (**) Mary borrows summer cottages by some friends and abducts Frederik to Australian scenic gems of nature.
“During one of my visits we lived in a small cottage almost up at the border to Queensland, where the climate is sub-tropical, lush and very, very beautiful. During a second visit Mary took me south of Sydney to a beautiful house, next to the beach. We went for long walks along the water, cooked good meals – or rather I cooked, because Mary isn’t that good at it – then we also really got to know each other. It was about laughing and talking, and getting further out into the bush, in regards to each other. Be present for each other”.
The secret love-vacations in Australia are remembered by Frederik down to the last detail. And as Frederik puts it himself, he made no fuss in telling Mary about the Danish Royal House, and what it takes to be a crown princess in the oldest monarchy in the world.
“Not al all. It was more the joy and innocence. She naturally knew who I was. I don’t know how much she had checked me out on the Net – but certainly not enough to find the horror-scenarios. We didn’t talk much about how it was at home and how our parents were, and where we came from. It was more funny things, loving things, as it is in the beginning of a great relationship of love. That thing being in love (***) is being build up. It was really lovely. Innocent, but totally in love. We took very much care of each other and of ourselves. We weren’t to show too much, how much it meant, (****) even though we couldn’t hide how fond we were for each other”.
Frederik smiles a little shy/awkward at the memory of the difficult act of balance it was to show your love and at the same time hide it, in order not to be too vulnerable.
The love for Mary grows during the first year. Frederik feels a depth, a seriousness and obviousness in regards to his feelings for Mary, which he has never experienced before. He is completely without doubt as to the character of his love.
“It was just everything about her, that I was drawn to. What it was exactly is difficult to say, when I love my wife (informal word) as I do. In the beginning it was her eyes and relatively deep voice and then Mary is an exciting person, but also very responsive”.
In October 2001 Frederik again goes to Sydney in order to enjoy both Mary and the Australian Spring. For thirteen months they have known each other and during Frederik’s two weeklong visits, they decide that Mary should go to Europe. It’s simply unsustainable for the couple in love to settle with seeing each other so rarely. Now their love must pass the big test. To Mary it’s a decision with big consequences to break up from her family, friends and job, but none of them are in doubt that it’s the right thing, when they kiss goodbye on Friday the 9th November 2001.
It will be the last anonymous date between the two of them in Australia. After more than a year’s secret romance the Danish press corps have finally gone into action. Who will be the first in revealing the identity of the sweetheart of the Crown Prince?
Less than flattering methods are used. The gossip magazines sales rise proportionally with royal romance and that’s why Se & Hør (*****) Billed Bladet put everything in on being the first with the news. Already in September 2001 Se & Hør reveals, to the undivided amusement of Frederik, that his new girlfriend is Belinda Stowell and that she is a gold-medallist at the Olympics in Sydney. After decades with the constant attention of the press, the Crown Prince knows it’s only a matter of days or weeks, before the revelation comes, but he and Mary has had a years solid lead ahead of the Danish weeklies and still enjoy being able to stroll around in Sydney without curious glances.
That changes three days after Frederik returned home. When Mary Donaldson Monday the 12th November in the late afternoon leaves her office at Belle Property, Anna Johannesen, the Billed Bladet Journalist is waiting for her and asks whether she is the sweetheart of the Crown Prince.
“No comments”, replies Mary Donaldson. But a photographer is snapping away and Thursday that same week, Mary ends up on the cover of Billed Bladet, which thereby lives up to it’s slogan: “Denmark’s Royal Weekly”. In one go Mary Donaldson in Belle Property becomes famous in Denmark. The peace and anonymity vanish forever. Her workplace is put under siege by photographers and journalists, yes, a Danish gossips weekly hire an Australian free-lance journalist to empty Mary’s waste bins in order to get a look into the shopping habits of the sweetheart of the Crown Prince.
But Mary and Frederik have made up their minds and Mary hands over the lease contract for Porter Street to her roommate Andrew Miles, packs and move initially to Paris. Closer to Frederik. Now it’ll become a weekend-relationship.
More later.
(*) May this charming word never vanish from the English language.
(**) With the usual anonymous gentlemen trailing behind.
(***) Forelskelsen = the initial stages of love. See also note in previous post. – You English speakers really need a few more words in your language…
(****) No, lest you scare her away.
(*****) Which in 2001 still treated its victims, let alone the readers with some respect.