Buckingham Palace was rocked this week by news that the King’s most loyal and influential aide will be stepping down after more than 20 years of service to the Crown.

However, Sir Clive Alderton’s decision to retire as Charles’s Private Secretary will likely have been met with relief across the pond, considering California-based Prince Harry’s long-running feud with the courtier he dubbed ‘The Wasp’.

Coming so soon after the Duke of Sussex‘s meeting with the King, he will undoubtedly feel it is another step towards reconciling with his father – but a royal expert has warned Sir Clive’s exit won’t automatically ‘clear a path’ back to the Palace.

Royal expert Richard Fitzwilliams told the Daily Mail that whoever inherits the £305,000-a-year job faces a ‘huge challenge’ considering the Prince of Wales is ‘doubling down’ on his decision to cut Harry out of his life.

The royal expert said: ‘The most disastrous thing that could happen to the monarchy would be a falling out between King Charles and Prince William, who together with his family, is its future.

‘The King would obviously be unwise to approach this without [his older son’s] support as it could be incendiary. This presents a huge challenge for whoever succeeds Sir Clive!’

Sir Clive’s decision to step down as the King’s Principal Private Secretary was announced this week.

As the King’s right-hand man and most trusted aide, Sir Clive oversaw the planning for the Queen’s funeral and Charles’s Coronation, ushered in a royal era of ‘informal formality’, masterminded the monarch’s state visits and steered the ship in times of unprecedented crises.

From the downfall of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor to the King’s cancer diagnosis, Sir Clive has been by the King’s side through it all – including ‘Megxit’.

‘He rightly appears to have been appalled by the way the Sussexes cynically exploited their newfound freedom by lashing out at the Royal Family so brutally and so publicly,’ Mr Fitzwilliams told the Daily Mail.

His role in the Sandringham Summit, which ultimately led to the Sussexes’ departure following an impasse over their status as ‘half-in, half-out’ royals means there is no love lost between Sir Clive and Prince Harry.

After his request for police protection to be reinstated while in the UK was rejected, Harry raged that the Executive Committee for the Protection of Royalty and Public Figures (Ravec) had ‘knowingly put me and my family in harm’s way’ in a thinly veiled attack on Sir Clive, who sits on the Committee.

That Sir Clive and Prince Harry did not see eye-to-eye is to put it mildly; the pair have repeatedly clashed and it is understood the courtier played a crucial role in blocking attempts to arrange solidarity meetings between Charles and his son.

Harry was critical of Sir Clive in his memoir Spare, writing: ‘The Wasp [Sir Clive] was lanky, charming, arrogant, a ball of jazzy energy. He was great at pretending to be polite, even servile.

‘Because he seemed so weedy, so self-effacing, you might be tempted to push back, insist on your point, and that was when he’d put you on his list.

‘A short time later, without warning, he’d give you such a stab with his outsized stinger that you’d cry out in confusion. Where the f*** did that come from?’

Royal experts have long held the view that chances of reconciliation between Harry and Charles – who last month sat down for tea at Highgrove House in what was seen as a big step forward for their relationship – would greatly improve if Sir Clive stepped down.

Mr Fitzwilliams told the Daily Mail that ‘the optics clearly indicate that a path is being cleared by the King for reconciliation’ amid speculation that Sir Clive will be succeeded by a much friendlier royal aide.

The man widely tipped to take over from the courtier next May is Theo Rycroft, who was appointed the King’s deputy private secretary in February.

‘He is impeccably connected, being married to the Hon Flora Astor, who hails from one of Britain’s most significant dynasties, and having previously been the Deputy Chief of Mission in Paris,’ Mr Fitzwilliams said.

Dubbed Mr Nice Guy, the former diplomat has emerged as a key peacemaker between Charles and Harry in recent years – and also hopes to heal the rift between the monarch’s warring sons.

According to The Mail on Sunday’s Editor-at-Large, Charlotte Griffiths, Mr Rycroft is understood to have made it his ‘number one mission’ and career ambition to reunite the estranged royal brothers ‘urgently’ for the King’s sake.

Ahead of Prince Harry’s visit to the UK last month, a Palace insider told the Daily Mail: ‘Theo would not be one of the many aides at the palace wishing to block a meeting.’

However, Mr Fitzwilliams cautioned there may be bumps along the way for whoever accepts Sir Clive’s baton – including Mr Rycroft.

If their recent meeting at Highgrove suggests the monarch, who is still being treated for cancer, is keen to put the past to bed and start a new chapter in his relationship with Harry, there is no evidence William has ‘changed his mind’ about the Sussexes.

Mr Fitzwilliams suggested the heir to the throne ‘showed public disdain for his (wayward) brother’ when he spent the day playing polo instead of joining Harry and Meghan’s meeting with Charles and Camilla.

The Prince of Wales is said to believe his father is making a ‘misjudgment’ in making efforts to rebuild a relationship with Harry, sources say.

William has allegedly barred any mention of his brother in his presence, with insiders saying he remains unwilling to even contemplate a reconciliation.

The siblings are believed not to have spoken since the late Queen’s funeral in 2022.

Further, William is unlikely to have forgotten the ‘far-from-flattering way’ he and his wife were portrayed in Spare.

In his ghostwritten memoir, Prince Harry accused his brother of assaulting him after a meeting at ‘Nott Cott’ on the grounds of Kensington Palace allegedly turned ugly.

Harry alleged that he fought with his brother at his and Meghan’s royal home in early 2019 after a conversation about their relationship, the Duke’s rows with the press and Meghan’s ‘rude’ and ‘abrasive’ demeanour escalated dramatically.

The Duke of Sussex said that the Prince of Wales grabbed him by the collar, ripped his necklace, then pushed him over in the kitchen, causing him to land on a dog bowl that shattered and injured his back.

He also alleged that William and Kate urged him to wear the infamous Nazi dress outfit to a Halloween party.

Harry did not hold back as he laid bare his complicated feelings towards William, describing the future king as both his ‘beloved brother’ and his ‘arch-nemesis’, and branded the Queen their ‘wicked stepmother’.

The King was rather unflatteringly described as an emotionally stunted and ineffectual ‘old man’ while the Princess of Wales was accused of overreacting when she demanded an apology from Meghan after she attributed Kate’s apparent forgetfulness to ‘baby brain because of her hormones’.

Against the backdrop of Spare’s sensational claims, the Sussexes’ Netflix docuseries, and a fallout that predates ‘Megxit’, it is unsurprising that William ‘does not trust’ Harry and Meghan, said Mr Fitzwilliams.

However, the Royal Family’s future relies on William and Charles adopting a ‘joint approach’ to Harry’s visits to the UK, he added.

And it will be up to Sir Clive’s replacement to bridge the gap between the King’s desire to be closer with his grandchildren and William’s concerns – insurmountable as they may seem now.