Without Meghan Markle, Kate Middleton will be the star of Charles’s coronation

There have been four words missing in Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s huge coronation news that show Kate Middleton is quietly sitting pretty.

COMMENT

Oh boy, has it been a week and a half. (Note to ed: Might just go and have a quick lie down.)

Since news broke on Thursday that Harry and Meghan, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, are to go their separate ways on the day of King Charles’ coronation, with him set to be ignored by his family in London while she stays in LA to work on her Tig 2.0 moodboard, it has been a hurly-burly, headline-a-minute type situation.

There have been stories about “transatlantic ping pong”, how the best that Harry can hope for is curt ‘hello’ from his glacial family, and so much finger-pointing, yelling and name-calling on Twitter it’s enough to make any sensible sort delete the app tout suite.

But notice what was largely missing in that 48-hour frenzy? What name we have not really heard? The one person who seems to have been overlooked in the orgy of clucking and arguing?

Kate, the Princess of Wales.

Kate has ended up as the most successful royal ‘hire’ in Buckingham Palace history. Picture: John Stillwell – WPA Pool/Getty Images

And with less than three weeks to go until King Charles and Queen Camilla are set to learn first-hand how hard wearing a crown can be for One’s lower backs, something interesting is taking shape.

The woman whose greatest achievement pre-marriage was to organise a charity roller-disco and to never once punch a paparazzo in the chops is looking like she is going to be the coronation’s biggest winner.

Unlike the last commoner who married into the royal family, the tragic Elizabeth Woodville, whose sons got whisked off to the Tower, likely murdered by their uncle Richard III, Kate has ended up as the most successful and powerful royal ‘hire’, possibly, in Buckingham Palace history.

Kate has been through a hard slog since her marriage into royalty. Picture: Arthur Edwards / POOL / AFP

Come coronation day, sure, it might officially be Charles and Camilla’s big day, but really, it will be the Princess of Wales who looks set to really triumph. Her evolution, from being little more than an average university student with great legs to a formidable Queen-in-the-making will be all but complete.

For one thing, the media oxygen is now largely hers and hers alone.

Oh, I know, there will be lots of huge splashy UK colour pull-outs full of pictures of a dignified-looking Charles with a clunky crown perched on his head and lots of long-winded pieces about how Camilla went from the most hated woman in the UK to sitting in the Gold State Carriage.

But really, c’mon, the person that everyone will be watching is Kate.

In so many ways, the late Hilary Mantel was right when she controversially described Kate as “(appearing) to have been designed by committee and built by craftsmen.” While the famed author might have meant it pejoratively, Kate has turned out to be exactly what the British monarchy never knew it needed.

She had the style and bearing of someone with the bluest of blue blood and I would bet every single one of my commemorative Queen Elizabeth mugs on being a bobby dazzler on the big day.

I would put good money now on us getting lots of ‘Kate the Great’ type news stories.

The fact that Meghan won’t be going just made pulling off this coup de grace that much more of a sure thing. With the Duchess of Sussex having removed herself from the narrative, that takes away the biggest possible distraction – and symbolic detractor – from the princess.

The absence of the duchess gives Kate a clear run on the day and means none of the Fleet Street editors will have to run anything but fawning headlines.

Look, I’ll be frank: It pains my beating feminist heart that women are ever set up to compete against one another – but let’s be realistic here. If the Duchess of Sussex had fronted up to Westminster Abbey on May 6, likely done up in exquisite couture because she has taste up the wazoo, she and Kate would have been relentlessly compared to one another.

One of the biggest stories on the day would have been the interactions – or far more likely, total lack thereof – between Kate and Meghan, and who had come out on top in the style stakes.

More seriously for Kate, Meghan’s presence would have meant the coverage rehashed their fraught relationship, the tears, the bridesmaid dresses contretemps and accusations of “baby brain”. Basically, the tabloids would have had a romp over the women’s complicated history.

Instead, with Meghan back in California and handily, for Buckingham Palace’s sake, entirely out of sight, Kate can rule the day, cheap pun wholly intended. I would put good money now on us getting lots of ‘Kate the Great’ type news stories that are long breathless tributes to how she is the best thing to happen to the monarchy since they decided to stop marrying their cousins.

The coronation will also further cement her place in the history books.

Kate and plus one Prince William’s son Prince George will serve as one of his grandfather’s pages, making him the youngest future monarch to ever take part in a coronation.

There is a real teachable moment in all of this for any aspiring future Queens or junior socialite sorts with their eyes on the next generation of crown princesses currently scattered throughout the most expensive boarding schools and military academies available.

Play the long game.

For Kate, her rise to success has been more long distance than sprint. Picture: Yui Mok / POOL / AFP

But she has definitely arrived at the finish line. Picture: Max Mumby/Indigo/Getty Images

For years I thought Kate was about as useful as gluten-free shortbread; she was so pliant and docile, like some sort of demure ’50s throwback who bought pantyhose in bulk and whose greatest achievement seemed to be mastering the complexities of cutting ribbons.

However, I will happily put my hand up and admit: I was completely wrong. What has really become apparent over the last few years is that all the while the princess was popping out babies and keeping her knees out of sight, she would seem to have actually been keeping her head down and figuring out the rules of the royal game.

It looks like she watched, listened and learned and then, once she had a handle on things, went about staging what might have been the world’s quietest intra-organisation coup.

Kate has government ministers, leading academics and CEOs of some of the UK’s biggest companies all eagerly pitching in to support her Early Years Foundation work as she attempts to engineer what amounts to something of a societal revolution about how Britons raise their children.

Kate’s shaping up to be as a formidable, highly influential force not only in the royal family but in the wider British context. Picture: Dominic Lipinski-WPA Pool/Getty Images

It might have taken her so long to do this that in the meantime, since the Waleses’ engagement, we have had six UK Prime Ministers and Kim Kardashian has been married and divorced twice, but hey. The woman got there in the end.

And ‘there’ is shaping up to be as a formidable, highly influential force not only in the royal family but in the wider British context.

It is absolutely not too much of an overexcited, high-on-the-fumes-of-the-coronation view that much of the future of the British monarchy rests on her blazer-wearing shoulders. (Does this sound like a nearly unbearable weight for one person to bear? Abso-bloody-lutely.)

So bring on coronation day and bring on the reign of Kate and mid-range power blazers. Because, turns out, it really is the quiet ones – wearing nude hose no less – that you have to watch.

Daniela Elser is a writer and a royal commentator with more than 15 years’ experience working with a number of Australia’s leading media titles.

Originally published as Without Meghan Markle, Kate Middleton will be the star of Charles’s coronation