On March 7, 2011, the Duchess of York, Sarah Ferguson, issued a public apology expressing her deep regret. ‘I strongly oppose paedophilia and any sexual abuse of children, and realize that this was a significant lapse in judgment on my part,’ she told the media. ‘My remorse is immense beyond words.’

Her statement was in reference to her infamous connection with the late Jeffrey Epstein, a billionaire who had been convicted as a sex offender, with whom she and her former husband, Prince Andrew, had maintained a lengthy friendship.

Last weekend, The Mail on Sunday disclosed that only a little over a month following her heartfelt apology, Ferguson sent a flattering and poorly composed email to Epstein. In it, she expressed regret for disowning him publicly and confessed that she did so purely to protect her professional future.

‘I know you feel hellaciously let down by me from what you were either told or read and I must humbly apologise to you and your heart for that,’ read the duchess’s email. ‘You have always been a steadfast, generous and supreme friend to me and my family.’

The Mail on Sunday investigation has caused outrage, proving that Fergie’s contrition was little more than a PR stunt to keep her floundering reputation above the rising tide of disapproval that would later drown Prince Andrew. Yesterday, seven charities severed ties with the Duchess – Julia’s House, the Natasha Allergy Research Foundation, the Children’s Literacy Charity, the Teenage Cancer Trust, the British Heart Foundation, Prevent Breast Cancer and the National Foundation For Retired Service Animals.

And yet, today, I can reveal that Fergie’s relationship with Epstein likely extended for more than two years after she publicly split ties with the convicted paedophile. In fact, I have reason to believe she regularly stayed at an apartment linked to him until as late as 2013.

Furthermore, while it has been previously reported that Epstein paid Ferguson around £15,000 in December 2010 to help cover unpaid bills, I now believe – for reasons I shall explain – that figure to be wildly inaccurate. The actual sum given to Ferguson on that one occasion alone, I suspect, was closer to £2million.

Jeffrey Epstein was not a charity: He was not simply lending Fergie money out of the goodness of his heart. By all accounts, he didn’t appear to have any of what you or I would call ‘friends’: Instead, a grisly troupe of fawning hangers-on from Peter Mandelson to Ghislaine Maxwell.

Just look how, one by one, they all deserted him as law enforcement closed in. So we must reframe this possible £2million payment – and all other perks and gifts Epstein paid to Fergie – as not so much an act of friendship as an exchange or a deal. The question is, what was being handed back to Epstein under the table? What royal secrets, contacts or gossip might Fergie have shared to grease the wheels and keep her side of this insidious bargain?

It was the second half of 2013 when Claudine Pabst, a resident of New York’s luxurious Upper East Side, noticed that the doorman of her apartment building on 66th Street was in full regalia, despite the extremely hot weather and formal attire not being his usual uniform. ‘And that’s when they told me about our special guest, Sarah, Duchess of York,’ Claudine admitted to me. ‘She was staying in one of the building’s furnished service apartments.’

But this was no typical apartment block. Rather, it was the one nominally owned by Jeffrey Epstein’s brother and where Jeffrey allegedly boarded his legions of ‘models’, just a few blocks from his own sprawling townhouse.

Later that day, Claudine went to walk her dog. ‘When I returned, and as I waited for the elevator to arrive in the lobby, the doors opened and out popped Sarah. She was always escorted to and from her apartment by one of the doormen who would commandeer one of the two main elevators.’

Two months later and Claudine saw the doorman again in their large woolly coats. ‘She’s back?’ Claudine asked, before receiving a knowing nod. It is unclear on how many occasions Ferguson stayed at the residence, just that on each occasion it was ‘only for a few days’. What this testimony shows, however, is that she remained an associate of Epstein’s until as late as 2013, more than two years after her grovelling apology for ever having known him.

As I discussed Fergie’s shocking proximity to Epstein with his former associates and members of the royal household, two separate and unconnected individuals told me the same thing. That it was no surprise Epstein and the duchess remained close considering the amount of money he had given or lent her in December 2010: Not £15,000 as was widely reported, but closer to £2million.

I am told that this deal was brokered by none other than Prince Andrew himself, with the cash used to pay off pressing debts as well as restructure the remainder of the duchess’s finances. One thing that is abundantly clear is that Ferguson owed money to almost everyone she met. Famously, in the 90s, she owed her hairdresser £40 at the same time as owing a friend £95,000 she’d borrowed to take a holiday.

Regardless, these new revelations further prove the insincerity of Fergie’s 2011 apology, originally published in an Evening Standard interview by its then editor, Geordie Greig. But they also go some way to completing the picture of a woman who speaks and acts with flagrant expediency regardless of her true intentions.

In 2010, Ferguson famously appeared on the Oprah Winfrey Show to apologise after being caught selling access to her royal ex-husband for £500,000, in what turned out to be a tabloid sting. But Fergie wasn’t apologising for what she did, she was apologising for getting caught. As she did the following year regarding her links to Epstein.

And 2010 wasn’t even the first time Fergie appeared on Oprah. In a 1996 interview, the duchess attempted to align herself with Princess Diana, saying: ‘Diana and I are like rivers, we want to learn more, we want to go around the corner, we are hungry for more.’

Almost 30 years on and unfortunately we now know all too well just how hungry Ferguson is: Hungry for money, for lavish holidays, staff at her beck and call. Clearly, in her eyes, friendship with Jeffrey Epstein was a price worth paying to sate that voracious appetite.

As I make plain in my new book, Entitled, Sarah Ferguson has led a life of extraordinary luxury since her separation from Prince Andrew in 1992, just six years after their nuptials.

Reports of her excesses began in 1994 when Fergie rented Domaine La Fontaine near Cannes for £20,000. Although the property was supposed to be self-catering, she brought her own staff, including a butler, two housekeepers, a dresser, a general assistant and a nanny, as well as two taxpayer-funded protection officers to watch over her daughters.

Meanwhile, a truck drove to France from England with loungers and inflatable pool toys. Fergie also demanded a daily wine delivery, including Laurent-Perrier champagne and her favourite Puligny-Montrachet at £60 a bottle. The following year she moved into an eight-bedroom mansion with outdoor pool, tennis court, chauffeur’s cottage and guest house. All the while, she kept in her employment a butler, chauffeur, cook and secretary. This was the same year she gave an interview to Hello! magazine complaining of financial woes.

Perhaps most repulsive of all was, as told by a former staff member turned whistleblower, how: ‘Every night she demands a whole side of beef, a leg of lamb and a chicken, which are laid out on the dining room table like a medieval banquet. It’s a feast that would make Henry VIII proud. But often there is just her and her girls, Bea and Eugenie, and most of it is wasted. There is no attempt to keep it to have cold the next day. It just sits there all night, and the next day it’s thrown away.’

No surprise then that her former lover and financial adviser John Bryan admitted her annual expenses were a grotesque £860,000.

Back in 1989, the late Queen’s cook admitted: ‘Queen Elizabeth, may God bless her, never had a bad word to say about anyone except the Duchess of York. She thought Sarah was an opportunist and an outright liar. She used to joke about “the Duchess of Pork” and how she was an “embarrassment” to the Royal Family.’

Over a quarter of a century on and how fortunate the late Queen didn’t have to see quite what an embarrassment Fergie has turned out to be.

Andrew Lownie is author of Entitled: The Rise And Fall Of The House Of York, published by HarperCollins