Princess Diana perched on the diving board of Mohamed Fayed’s private yacht, *Jonikal,* in St. Tropez, 1997.

Bed of Lies

Dodi Fayed’s super-yacht, a Paris suite, 11 shots of whiskey—25 years after Princess Diana’s death, there are still more questions than answers

By Tom Bower

The mood on the helicopter heading from London to the landing pad by the Eiffel Tower was somber. Thirty-two hours after the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, I was flying on Mohamed Fayed’s helicopter with three others: his security chief, a Scottish pathologist hired to deliver a verdict approved by Fayed on the condition of the dead chauffeur, and a Washington lawyer. He was tasked to protect Fayed from any personal recrimination for the fatal accident.

Minutes after we landed in Paris we were heading towards the Ritz hotel, the scene of the last sighting of Dodi Fayed and Diana. Mohamed Fayed had personally agreed that I would be allowed to interview all the hotel’s staff who had cared for the couple during their last hours. What I heard from 14 of Fayed’s employees over the next 24 hours was astonishing. Not least because the real story of Diana’s romance over the previous weeks in the South of France with Fayed’s wastrel son Dodi had magnified Fayed’s well-established notoriety in Britain.