There’s a hidden message in Diana’s brother’s vengeful new book. No wonder William has kept silent… Harry’s role in this is so suspect: MAUREEN CALLAHAN

This is no mere book. It’s an assault on the monarchy itself.

Charles Spencer’s allegation, in the pages of Swan Song: Diana, My Sister, that Prince Charles sounded ‘giddily elated’ at the news of her death, is surely meant to do one thing: Revive concerns about his fitness to be king.

As is Spencer’s claim that Charles also said to him, of Diana and her legacy: ‘Rest assured, we’ll forget her soon enough.’

The real questions regarding this vituperative, vengeful book: Why does it exist?

Why publish it now?

Why, if Charles Spencer cares so much about his nephews — as he bombastically claimed during his self-serving eulogy to Diana — would he assail their father so brutally?

Remember that Spencer, at Diana’s funeral, said this:

‘I pledge that we, your blood family, will do all we can to continue the imaginative and loving way in which you were steering these two exceptional young men so that their souls are not simply immersed by duty and tradition, but can sing openly as you planned.’

If he was true to his word, one must ask: Why is Harry such a mess?

Why does William seem to have nothing to do with his uncle?

And, if Charles Spencer cared as much about William as he does Harry, why would he attempt to so malign the House of Windsor and the crown that William will inherit?

The timing feels more than suspect.

It was only two months ago that Harry and Meghan stayed at Althorp, the Spencer family’s ancestral home — a visit made public after Meghan posted a photo of Harry, Archie and Lilibet on what looked like their way to Diana’s grave.

The notion that Harry would have no idea what was in this book simply beggars belief. By July, two months ahead of Swan Song’s September 22 publication date, Charles Spencer would have had bound galleys in his possession, if not finished physical copies.

And, as one source told Page Six, the book’s claims ‘didn’t come as a shock’ to Harry.

Of course not. Harry is also reportedly working on a film about his mother, ahead of the 30th anniversary of her death next summer.

Included in the vicious allegations Spencer levels against King Charles is the wild claim that Diana believed her husband was ‘in love’ with his valet.

No matter the truth, that’s rather extraneous and irrelevant to this book’s apparent raison d’etre, don’t you think?

Spencer has gone even further, taking to American television to repeat yet another conversation that he claims in the memoir to have had with the King.

‘It was a very peculiar conversation, actually,’ Spencer told CBS Sunday Morning, ‘because my father had died very suddenly a few days before [in 1992]. And I was just so surprised, because Prince Charles, as he was then, said to me, “You’re so lucky.” And I said, “I’m so sorry, sir?”

‘And he said, “You’re so lucky to have inherited so young.” And I thought that’s such a peculiar way of looking at somebody’s family loss, really. And I suppose it betrayed his frustration at not being king.’

Subtle.

So Charles Spencer just wants to make sure we all get it: King Charles is cold-blooded, calculated and cruel.

Do we really think he’s never spoken of the King this way to Harry?

Can it really be any accident that Spencer, in his written assessment of William and Harry’s emotional states leading up to Diana’s funeral, claims that William seemed to be managing but that it was Harry who needed special attention?

William was only 15 when his mother died. That’s all too easy to forget, given how Harry bangs on as if he were the only son to lose his mother.

Charles Spencer, in this memoir, makes it abundantly clear that his sympathies are with Harry.

‘My chief memory [after the funeral],’ he writes, ‘is of being concerned at the lack of obvious care for Harry.’

Ugly, divisive and destructive: Spencer is telling the world that then-Prince Charles was negligent in caring for his grieving younger son.

Even if Spencer believes this, why would he say it — to either Harry or the world? How could this do anything but ratify what seems to be Harry’s eternal anger?

And what about Prince William, who has built a stable family and comports himself with the dignity and bearing of a future king?

Charles Spencer has an answer for that.

Recalling the day of Diana’s funeral, her boys walking behind her casket, Spencer writes:

‘William, although doubtless suffering equally terribly, looked more self-possessed. He was the image of his mother then: tall and handsome and dignified. Although I cared deeply about what he must be going through, his greater composure and maturity made him my secondary concern that morning.’

More likely, William hasn’t needed or wanted Spencer’s brand of comfort. Notice William’s utter silence in recent days.

It’s likely that William assessed his uncle as a threat quite some time ago.

And it’s also likely that he suspects Harry’s goals in allying with Charles Spencer.

As Richard Kay, the Daily Mail’s longtime royal reporter and friend to Diana, wrote of Harry this weekend: ‘In the six years of his exile, it was his uncle Charles and aunts Jane and Sarah with whom he kept in touch as relations with his father and brother collapsed. In the context of his falling out with the Royal Family, keeping close to the Spencers looks critical.’

Swan Song is no elegant depiction of a beautiful creature’s emotional and physical descent. It’s an ad hominem attack on the reigning monarch and an institution that Spencer seems hellbent on destroying.

And Harry’s continued closeness with his uncle sends one message: No matter what he says, Harry isn’t here to make peace.