In the summer of 2017, it had become very clear to everyone that Prince Harry was deeply in love with then-Meghan Markle and he had plans to build a future with her. Meghan hadn’t been scared off by his family or the racist press, and they went to Botswana for weeks that summer. I always believed that they made the plan for their future and really began talking about getting married there. Meghan was already spending more time with Harry’s family, so much so that Camilla offered Meghan some advice. From Spare:

Meg, meanwhile, reached out to Camilla, who tried to counsel her by saying this was just what the press always did to newcomers, that it would all pass in due time, that Camilla had been the bad guy once.

The implication being what? Now it was Meg’s turn? As if it were apples to apples.

Camilla also suggested to Meg that I become Governor General of Bermuda, which would solve all our problems by removing us from the red-hot center of the maelstrom. Right, right, I thought, and one added bonus of that plan would be to get us out of the picture.

[From Spare by Prince Harry]

So… even back in the summer of 2017, there were already conversations about “exiling” Harry, sending him away somewhere, and those plans involved Meghan too – because the family already saw that Meghan and Harry were on the path to an engagement and marriage. Speaking of, Harry also wrote about a conversation he had with his father (and William, who was also there) in what was probably September/October 2017. Remember, Harry proposed to Meghan in November 2017. Harry was trying to tell them both that he intended to propose to Meghan, which is when Charles began talking about not being able to afford Meghan:

Cloudy, blustery day. I jumped into the venerable old Land Rover, the ancient Army ambulance that Grandpa had repurposed. Pa was behind the wheel, Willy was in the back. I got into the passenger seat and wondered if I should tell them both what I was intending. I decided against it. Pa already knew, I assumed, and Willy had already warned me not to do it. It’s too fast, he’d told me. Too soon.

In fact, he’d actually been pretty discouraging about my even dating Meg. One day, sitting together in his garden, he’d predicted a host of difficulties I could expect if I hooked up with an “American actress,” a phrase he always managed to make sound like “convicted felon.” Are you sure about her, Harold? I am, Willy. But do you know how difficult it’s going to be? What do you want me to do? Fall out of love with her?

…Pa, driving us out into the fields, asked about Meg. Not with great interest, just casually. Still, he didn’t always ask, so I was pleased. She’s good, thanks.
Does she want to carry on working?
Say again?
Does she want to keep on acting?
Oh. I mean, I don’t know, I wouldn’t think so. I expect she’ll want to be with me, doing the job, you know, which would rule out Suits…since they film in…Toronto.
Hmm. I see. Well, darling boy, you know there’s not enough money to go around.
I stared. What was he banging on about?
He explained. Or tried to. I can’t pay for anyone else. I’m already having to pay for your brother and Catherine.

I flinched. Something about his use of the name Catherine. I remembered the time he and Camilla wanted Kate to change the spelling of her name, because there were already two royal cyphers with a C and a crown above: Charles and Camilla. It would be too confusing to have another. Make it Katherine with a K, they suggested. I wondered now what came of that suggestion.

I turned to Willy, gave him a look that said: You listening to this? His face was blank.

Pa didn’t financially support Willy and me, and our families, out of any largesse. That was his job. That was the whole deal. We agreed to serve the monarch, go wherever we were sent, do whatever we were told, surrender our autonomy, keep our hands and feet inside the gilded cage at all times, and in exchange the keepers of the cage agreed to feed and clothe us. Was Pa, with all his millions from the hugely lucrative Duchy of Cornwall, trying to say that our captivity was starting to cost him a bit too much?

Besides which—how much could it possibly cost to house and feed Meg? I wanted to say, She doesn’t eat much, you know! And I’ll ask her to make her own clothes, if you like.

It was suddenly clear to me that this wasn’t about money. Pa might have dreaded the rising cost of maintaining us, but what he really couldn’t stomach was someone new dominating the monarchy, grabbing the limelight, someone shiny and new coming in and overshadowing him. And Camilla. He’d lived through that before, and had no interest in living through it again.

[From Spare by Prince Harry]

The Duchy of Cornwall is worth over a billion dollars and Charles receives an annual payout in the tens of millions, money which is supposed to go to support his own office and his sons’ offices and homes. I’ve always said that these people were too f–king stupid to prepare themselves for Harry falling in love and getting married. Like, the only way their crazy system functioned was if Harry never married. That way, William could still order him around and Charles could shuffle him off to some shack and they could all pretend that Harry wasn’t the most charismatic one. Anyway, this was Charles setting the stage for financially abusing his son.

Photos courtesy of WENN.