Queen in Waiting: (Georgian Series) Read online

  She had enjoyed riding through the streets of Ansbach, the capital city of her husband’s little domain. She had received the loyal cheers of the citizens for the Margrave was deeply loved and respected, largely because he, a Hohenzollern, and connected with the Brandenburgs, had not scorned to concern himself with trade, and as a result he had made a thriving community. He had brought skilled weavers from abroad; nor had that been all. He had set up metal workers in his town; and all his officials and servants were commanded to buy articles which had been produced locally. This foresight had brought prosperity to Ansbach; and the citizens made their approval of his methods known when he rode through their streets with his family.

  ‘Long live the Margrave! Long live the Margravine!’ She had basked contentedly in his popularity.

  There had been minor irritations. It was often difficult for a stepmother to win the love of her predecessor’s children; and George Frederick, the elder of her stepchildren, his father’s heir, actively disliked and resented her. This had seemed unfortunate but not disastrous when her husband had been alive; but when on his death George Frederick had become the Margrave of Ansbach, it was a different matter.

  He did not exactly tell her to go, but when he took over the apartments with their brilliant frescoes and porcelain galleries which she had inhabited with her husband he made it clear that she was not welcome in his palace.

  She was a proud woman and had no wish to remain where she was not wanted, so she decided that she would leave Ansbach with her children – Caroline who was then only three years old and William Frederick who was two years younger. Her old home was in Eisenach on the border of the Thuringian Forest and here she went with the children, although she knew it would only be a temporary refuge.

  Often she thought of her kindly, plump husband prematurely killed by the smallpox, and longed for the old days. There was little pleasure in spending one’s life visiting other people who, kind as they were, would not wish her to stay forever.

  Sometimes she asked herself if she had been headstrong in leaving Ansbach. George Frederick was a minor, and not allowed to govern; and until he married and had a son, the heir presumptive to Ansbach was her own son William Frederick.

  Her greatest friends in her misfortune were the Brandenburgs and at their suggestion she had sent William Frederick back to Ansbach – for after all it was his home – and had travelled to Berlin with young Caroline.

  Here she had made the acquaintance of the Elector John George of Saxony, and both the Elector and Electress of Brandenburg had persuaded her that it was her duty to accept the proposal of marriage he would make to her.

  It was for this reason that she was waiting for him now.

  He was coming towards her – a young man with wild eyes, full, sensuous lips, and an ungraciousness about his manner which was disturbing.

  He bowed stiffly and, she fancied, avoided meeting her eyes.

  He was thinking angrily: She’s older than I thought. Already a matron and a mother of two!

  ‘Madam,’ he said, ‘I believe you have some notion why I have asked for this… er… pleasure.’

  His voice was cold; he scarcely bothered to hide his dislike.

  She looked alarmed and that angered him still further. There was no need for her to play the coy maiden. She knew very well what his purpose was; and she doubtless knew how vehemently he had had to be persuaded. He was not going to pretend to her now or at any other time. He would make no secret to her or to anyone that if he was forced into this marriage it was under protest.

  She inclined her head slightly, conveying that she was aware of the reason for his visit.

  ‘I understand you are prepared to marry me.’

  Eleanor wanted to cry out: No! I must have time to think. I have allowed them to persuade me. I have been carried away by their arguments. She thought of herself growing older, Caroline becoming marriageable. What hope would she have of finding a suitable husband for her daughter if she were a wandering exile? But if Caroline’s stepfather was the Elector of Saxony…

  She said quietly: ‘Your Highness does me much honour.’

  Much honour indeed! He wondered what Magdalen would say when he returned to Dresden. Her mother would be furious because he knew that Madam von Röohlitz dearly desired her daughter to be his wife. An exciting project! He would be willing to marry Magdalen but his ministers would never agree of course, and he had to take this poor creature instead.

  He looked at her with fresh distaste but reassured himself that a wife and a mistress need not interfere with each other.

  ‘Then you will take me as your husband?’

  ‘I… I will, Your Highness.’

  ‘Then that matter is settled.’

  He bowed, turned on his heel and went to the door. The natural sequence to such a question and answer should have been an embrace, a confessing of admiration, a promise of enduring affection. But he had no intention of letting her think he cared sufficiently for her to pretend to hold her in any regard. She would have to understand that this was an arranged marriage. He might have to attempt to get an heir; she had two children already so was no doubt fertile, and once she was pregnant he need not see her unless it was necessary to get another child.

  Left alone Eleanor stood staring at the door. She was trembling. He had seemed so strange. He was younger than she was – in his twenties and not without good looks. Uneasily she remembered having heard a rumour that he behaved oddly at times since he had had a blow on the head. She had heard too that he was dissolute, extravagant – in fact a libertine.

  What will this marriage be like? she asked herself.

  It will be like many other marriages of state, she told herself. Arranged. The surprising aspect was that she should have something to offer. If he had not been infatuated with a woman who was reputed to be a spy for the Austrians would the Brandenburgs have arranged this marriage? It was scarcely likely. Her duty was to influence him when she was married; she had to keep him aware that alliance with Brandenburg was preferable to that with Austria. How could she persuade him when he seemed to regard her with such distaste?

  She could have wept with humiliation and frustration. With the passing of the years tears had come with increasing ease.

  It was a bitter choice – to wander from one friend’s hospitality to that of another, becoming more and more of an encumbrance as the years passed; or marriage with a man of wealth and some power who could, if he were so inclined, make a good match for her daughter.

  There can be no choice, she thought. Besides, it is the wish of the Brandenburgs. But how I wish it need not be, how I wish my dear John Frederick had lived. Never had the palace of the Margraves of Ansbach seemed so inviting; never before had she longed so fervently to be back in those baroque rooms with their porcelain galleries.

  Trying to hold back her tears she went to find her daughter.

  Caroline curtsied before the Electress Sophia Charlotte.

  ‘Well, my dear,’ said the Electress. ‘We have some good news for you. Have you told her yet?’

  ‘Not yet,’ answered Eleanor. ‘I thought I would consult you first.’

  ‘Come here, my child.’

  Sophia Charlotte stroked the auburn hair and smiled into the pink rather plump little face with the bright blue, very intelligent eyes.

  ‘You will soon be going to a new home, my dear. I think that will please you.’

  ‘Are we coming here?’ asked Caroline eagerly.

  Sophia Charlotte shook her head but she looked pleased because Caroline had betrayed her desire to stay in Berlin.

  ‘No, my dear. You are to have a father.’

  Caroline looked bewildered; then she saw that her mother, although pretending to smile, was really very frightened; but as the Electress was pleased she supposed it was a good thing.

  ‘You will be going to live in Saxony and you will find it very agreeable to have a settled home.’

  ‘When are we going?’ asked Carolin
e.

  ‘You are impatient, my dear, but when you are at Dresden we must see you often. You shall visit us and we shall visit you.’

  ‘Then,’ said Caroline, ‘I am glad we are going to Dresden.’

  Sophia Charlotte smiled over the girl’s head.

  I wish, thought Eleanor, that I could feel as pleased.

  It was arranged that the wedding should take place at Leipzig and neither the Brandenburgs nor John George’s ministers saw any reason why it should be delayed. It was only the bride and groom who wished for that.

  Both had considerable misgivings. Eleanor, who had gone back to Ansbach to make preparations, spent a great deal of the time on her knees praying for a miracle, by which she meant some occurrence which would make the marriage unnecessary. Blankly she faced the future, trying hard to convince herself that it was all for the best and that marriages which were made as this had been, often turned out to be the most successful.

  John George in Dresden had no such illusions. The more he thought of marriage with Eleanor the more he loathed the idea; he was beginning to hate the woman they had chosen for him.

  His ministers had suggested that while he was waiting for his wedding day he should not see his mistress. It would not be considered good taste and it was impossible to keep such meetings secret. If news reached the bride-elect that her husband was spending his nights with a mistress she might decide not to marry him after all.

  That made John George laugh aloud. ‘Then for the love of God tell her.’

  ‘Your Highness is not serious.’

  ‘Never more. Never more,’ he cried.

  But he dared not oppose his ministers. His position was too precarious. Harried on one side by them and by Magdalen’s letters on the other, he was frantic and when he was frantic he was furious.

  ‘I won’t go through with it!’ he declared a hundred times a day.

  But his ministers assured him that he must.

  Magdalen’s letters were smuggled in to him every day. He had betrayed her, she wrote. He had promised her marriage. He had taken her virtue… and so on.

  He laughed reading them. All written by her mother, he knew. Magdalen was too lazy to write; all Magdalen wanted to do was make love. ‘Very creditable, my darling,’ he said fondly; and he wanted her with him, no matter if she did say what her mother had taught her to; he didn’t care if the old woman was taking bribes from Austria. Magdalen was worth it. With her masses of dark hair, her willowy body which was at the same time the most voluptuous in the world, how different she was from the flaxen German women he had known before! She was a perfect animal; she cared nothing for politics; she cared nothing for anything but sensual pleasure.

  He wanted to be with her. He would marry her if he could – to please her mother and her too, for that ambitious woman had convinced her daughter that what she wanted was to be the Electress of Saxony.

  He might defy his ministers and the Brandenburgs yet. What if he married Magdalen… secretly? What if he summoned them all to his presence chamber and told them they could stop the preparations for the wedding in Leipzig for he was already married?

  He shivered. They were powerful old men. They had the experience which he lacked and had deposed their leaders for less.

  No, he must do as they wished. He must marry that woman. He would prove to them that she was a spy… a spy for the Brandenburgs. What was the difference between spying for the Brandenburgs and spying for Austria?

  To hell with the agreement they had made with the Brandenburgs and which they fondly called The Golden Bracelet!

  But a pretty princeling who is young and uncertain cannot say to hell with his ministers or his ministers may say to hell with him.

  He must do as they wished but it should not always be so. One day they would have to obey him. In the meantime there was nothing he could do but depart for Leipzig.

  Leaving Caroline in Ansbach with her brother, Eleanor travelled to Leipzig with her friends the Elector and Electress of Brandenburg, and with each stage of the journey grew more and more uneasy; and when she met her future husband her fears were increased. She had heard rumours of his passionate attachment to Magdalen von Röohlitz whom he had made a Countess and on whom he had bestowed rich lands, but she had not thought he would be so inconsiderate as to allow the woman to accompany him to Leipzig and attend his wedding.

  In fact John George had not known it either but his satisfaction was immense when he discovered that Magdalen had been smuggled into his entourage. That was her mother’s doing. He believed that indefatigable woman never gave up and had some idea that even at this late hour he might be persuaded to substitute his brides.

  They were together during the journey. His ministers pretended not to see. They doubtless said to each other: Let him have a little sweetmeat before he takes his medicine.

  He was determined to enjoy his sweetmeat. She railed against him at first in a half-hearted way, repeating the phrases her mother had taught her: ‘If you wanted a wife why should you choose her? Have you forgotten you promised me…?’ No, he hadn’t forgotten he soothed her, and he wished with all his might that it could be different. If it were possible he would marry his Magdalen and send that woman back to Ansbach or to the Brandenburgs wherever she belonged. All he wanted was his Magdalen. Nothing would be changed. She would see.

  Magdalen was ready to be placated. In her opinion any time not spent in love-making was wasted time.

  The days were filled with tension. It was feared that at the last moment the bridegroom would rebel. His ministers wrangled together. It had been a great mistake to allow Magdalen von Röohlitz to come. Who had been responsible for that? They blamed each other but they all realized that they would not feel safe until after the ceremony.

  There had been that shocking episode when he had received his future wife with his mistress beside him. Coldly he had greeted her, plainly showing his dislike and then during the ensuing banquet had given his attention to his mistress. Fortunately the bride was of a meek disposition; fortunately the Brandenburgs were too eager for the marriage to take offence.

  And to the great relief of all except the bride and groom the wedding day arrived and the marriage was solemnized without a hitch.

  But at the banquet and ball which followed the bridegroom said not a word to his bride; and made it clear that he had no intention of consummating the marriage by brazenly spending the night with his mistress.

  The shadow of murder

  DRESDEN, WHERE CAROLINE joined her mother, was very opulent; it was said to be one of the most licentious courts in Germany and since the Elector’s marriage had become even more so. Having obeyed the wishes of his ministers by marrying a woman he did not want, John George made it clear that as far as they were concerned that was an end of the matter. The woman they had chosen for him might live in his palace but he wanted nothing to do with her. It was only on state occasions that he saw her and then he treated her as though she were not there. At the same time he made no secret of his unflagging devotion to Magdalen von Röohlitz, and as her mother scarcely gave her daughter a moment’s peace, instilling into her mind that she had been betrayed by her lover, that she should have, besides everything else her lover had given her, the supreme gift, the title of Electress – even Magdalen was beginning to grow ambitious for that one thing he could not give her, and he grew more and more resentful against his wife.

  Caroline very quickly discovered that as the daughter of her mother she shared the resentment; and this knowledge made the court of Dresden an alarming place for an eight-year-old girl.

  Yet it was very beautiful. The gardens were laid out in the French fashion with fountains, statues and colonnades; they and the court throughout were an imitation of Versailles; and the Elector behaved as though he were the Sun King himself. There were lavish banquets, balls, garden fêtes and entertainments in the palace. It only had to be said that this or that was done at the French court and it was done in Dresden. And everything
was presided over by a dark-haired woman whom Caroline’s stepfather could not bear out of his sight and whom everyone said was the Electress in all but name.

  At first she had been puzzled, for her mother should have borne that title. Of course she did; and on state occasions she would be dressed in her robes and stand beside the Elector; and then immediately afterwards she would go to her apartments, take off her robes, dismiss her attendants, lie on her bed and weep. Caroline knew because she had seen her do this. No one took very much notice of the child; she was expected to remain in the small apartments assigned to her, with her nurse, her governess and one or two attendants. No one was the least bit interested in her; she was merely an appendage of the woman whom nobody wanted. She was even less significant than her mother who was at least actively resented. She might have been one of the benches in the ante room, one of the flowers in the beds about the fountains. Not so useful as the bench, not so decorative as the flower – but any of them could have been removed and cause no comment.

  The Electress Sophia Charlotte had talked of Dresden as though she would be very happy there. She could certainly never have been to Dresden. But since Sophia Charlotte had thought it would be so different surely it should have been if something had not gone wrong. Caroline had an inquiring nature. Passionately she wanted to understand what was going on around her – particularly when it concerned herself. Her mother’s unhappiness worried her, for although she had never been a gay woman, although she had never been brilliant like Sophia Charlotte, she had never been as sad as she was now. She had seemed older since she had come to Dresden; dark circles had appeared under her eyes; she had grown pale and thin.