By axing Andrew when he did, the King may have saved the monarchy

By Hannah Furness

This is what the Palace had feared all along.

The wholesale dump of three million documents, without warning, laying bare the emails, photographs, text messages, financial records and legal paperwork of Jeffrey Epstein, with Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor at the heart of it.

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There are photographs of the then-Prince Andrew on all fours and smiling, looming over the body of a woman lying on the floor, his hand on her torso.

There is an invitation to Buckingham Palace from Andrew to Epstein, timed after the financier's jail sentence for procuring a girl aged under 18 for prostitution.

Also released is an enthusiastic reply to an offer of entertaining a 26-year-old "beautiful, trustworthy" Russian woman, signed – excruciatingly – "HRH The Duke of York KG".

The latest files released by the United States Department of Justice contain references to business deals, introductions to the wealthy, and arrangements made around the world to make the then Prince's life a little easier and more – to use one of Epstein's favourite words – "fun".

They are still being trawled through, but there are 2,549 mentions of "Prince Andrew", 798 of the "Duke of York" and 107 of the "Invisible Man", the alias Andrew used to exchange warm, flirtatious and, on occasion, painfully insightful emails with Ghislaine Maxwell, who is now in jail in the US for procuring young girls for Epstein.

For Mr Mountbatten-Windsor, packing up at Royal Lodge to move into a new home he does not want, the headlines will make unpleasant reading.

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At Buckingham Palace, courtiers and King alike will be braced for more – and relieved that they have already taken action.

Aides have moved, privately, to protect Mr Mountbatten-Windsor to some extent. "There is a duty of care here, too," several sources said, despite an acknowledgement that the former prince has made "seriously bad decisions".

The King will fund a smaller home for his younger brother on his private Sandringham estate, making sure Andrew does not fall again into the trap of relying on the money of rich, influential friends and acquaintances who expect something in return.

It has been just three months since King Charles III finally moved to defenestrate his brother.

After years of agonising, which had begun under Queen Elizabeth II and, at one point, looked likely to fall one day to the future William V, Charles stripped Andrew of his titles and Crown Estate home.

As the court of public opinion turned against Andrew, the King and his aides finally made what was once thought near-impossible: making a man born a prince a mere mortal.

At the time, some – not many, but some – questioned whether he had been too harsh.

Mr Mountbatten-Windsor has never been convicted of a crime, just exposed in a "serious lapse of judgment", as one source put it in October.

The problem for the King's advisers, as for the late Queen's before them, is that they did not know the extent of what they were dealing with.

Some argued that it would be better to leave him with either his titles or Royal Lodge, reserving a trump card for the palace to play if or when more damaging allegations came out.

"He will come to a meeting, and say there's nothing else to come out, or that what's out there isn't true," a source explained last year, characterising Andrew as a man flying around the world meeting countless people, women and businessmen included. "He doesn't remember. They have no way of knowing."

There will be more headlines to come. Andrew's critics, including biographer Andrew Lownie, have predicted that his years as a British envoy, travelling the world meeting the great, good and not so good, will be fruitful hunting ground for those wanting to investigate the finances as well as the women.

Perhaps most strikingly, the files reveal the extent to which both Epstein and Maxwell were enmeshed in Andrew's life.

They organised accommodation, dinners, meetings and the company of women. In return, Andrew and his former wife Sarah Ferguson offered access to palaces and castles, discussing whether Princess Beatrice and Princess Eugenie, their daughters, would meet friends of friends passing through London.

"Love you," Andrew told Maxwell regularly, signing "A xxx". She called him "sweat pea" – a spelling mistake rather than a reference to his alleged sweating disorder, presumably – and he confided in her about the death of the valet who had been with him since he was two years old: "My whole life is in turmoil as I have no one to look after me."

There is no mistaking how Epstein used the King's brother: "Prince Andrew is at my house all week," said the email, along with an invitation to his high-powered contacts to pop in.

Epstein and Maxwell are revealed as conduits, passing messages and contact details to those considered worthy of Andrew's time. "Prince Andrew has been emailing you, with no response?" Epstein writes to a contact in 2010.

An anonymised 2002 request to Maxwell – "Julie would like andrcws address to send a ty for dinner for clinton" – was met with with a brief "Buckingham Palace SW1 London HRH Prince Andrew".

There are signs, as time went on, that Epstein came to regret the friendship.

"Prince Andrew will once again start the onslaught," he wrote in July 2011, an apparent reference to media attention.

"He must take his road on this and you must take yours," advised a friendly American journalist in January 2015. "It won't be easy for you, I know, but somehow you need to change the narrative."

There is little in the tranche of documents to redeem Andrew's reputation. But there is much to spell out how he ended up in such a mess in the first place.

Behind palace walls, there is no respite from the scandal. But there is, at least, distance.

Aides point to the October statement stripping Andrew of his styles, titles, honours and home.

"These censures are deemed necessary," the King's spokesman said then. "Notwithstanding the fact that he continues to deny the allegations against him."

The King will not be pleased to have been proved right. He will not relish the forthcoming questions about whether his brother ought to be compelled to help a US inquiry.

Other than offering Andrew an unremarkable home on private land, to stop him relying on others for his finances, the Palace has washed its hands of him.

When it comes to protecting the monarchy, actions have spoken louder than words.

Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor has already been severed from the royal ranks: there is nothing more, publicly, for the King to do.

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