Queen in Waiting: (Georgian Series) (20 page)

Caroline told him he must not say such things; as for that other matter, since it was over they would say no more about it.

He fell upon her, embracing her. She was the best wife in the world. It should never happen again. And now they would have their son. His clever, beautiful Caroline had at last become pregnant. He would have a son and she should have a husband whose military exploits were the wonder of the world.

Once I have a child, thought Caroline, that child’s interests will be the centre of my life. Then I shall not care that I have an adolescent boy for a husband.

‘The Crown Prince and his wife are reconciled,’ said the court. ‘There was never a more devoted husband. Why, he is with her every minute of the day. She will grow weary of his company.’

If she found his company a little tiring she was pleased to have it. It was a triumph for that policy which the Electress Sophia had used to her advantage.

The Electress complimented her on her tact.

‘It is the first which is often a little difficult to accept. I remember my own case. I was young then and a little unworldly, I suppose. I was quite grieved. I quickly learned though, as you
will, my dear. Never interfere with a husband’s mistresses and you may find that you can have charge of almost everything else. It was a rule I followed with my husband; and Ernest Augustus was a clever man; your husband is a fool.’

Caroline did not deny it.

But relations between her and the Electress were still luke-warm because her friendship with the Duchess of Celle continued to make a rift between them, although Sophia did not mention it. But that difference was almost obliterated by Caroline’s attitude towards the English.

Caroline had decided that it was impossible to pursue a solitary course at Hanover. She had to take sides either with the Elector or his son; it would be folly, she knew, to alienate her husband, so she had ranged herself beside him. That meant that she must delight in the English as George Augustus was doing – not because he liked them, but because his father didn’t care for them.

Therefore the rift between the Electress and herself was slowly being bridged.

Sophia was also delighted by Caroline’s pregnancy.

She hoped with her that the child would be a boy.

Everyone was waiting for the birth of the heir of Hanover. The child should be due by November, it was said, and the court was preparing to celebrate; even the Elector realized that the birth of a grandson should be heralded by a little extravagance.

But November passed, and although the Electoral Princess continued to look as though she were in the last stages of pregnancy, still the birth did not take place.

The Electress Sophia was worried. At last here was something to turn her attention from the English throne.

She talked to Caroline as they walked in the gardens together.

‘You are feeling well?’ she asked.

‘Yes, as well as can be expected in the circumstances.’

‘But… shouldn’t your time be at hand?’

‘Doubtless I miscalculated.’

A week or two, yes, thought Sophia. But December was upon them, and the child was very much overdue.

She talked to some of the doctors.

It sometimes happened, she was told, that when a woman ardently wished for a child she had all the outward symptoms of pregnancy, but there was no child. This seemed hardly likely in the case of the Princess Caroline. She was not a nervous type; she seemed so serene, so certain. But it was strange that the child did not arrive. It might be that she was not pregnant after all.

George Augustus was having his uniform made. He was certain that he would soon be going into battle. One thing in the favour of his father was that he kept his word.

All through the December they waited and still there was no birth.

Christmas passed, and the New Year Carnival was celebrated throughout Hanover in accordance with the old custom. There were fancy dress balls in the Palace and the Town Hall; for the New Year was brought in with revelry among the high and the low.

In the Opera House, of which George Lewis was justly proud, operas were performed – the one
divertissement
that George Lewis could tolerate.

Caroline appeared at the revels, obviously pregnant; but everyone was saying now that there would be no child. Only Caroline was certain that she would soon bear a child; and George Augustus, dressed as a General at the fancy dress ball, was certain he would soon be at the wars.

On a cold January night Caroline went to bed and during the night her pains started.

The next day the long-awaited child was born.

It was a boy.

Exhausted and triumphant, Caroline lay back on her pillows. She had succeeded when all the court had thought she would never give birth to a child at all but was the victim of some strange disease.

But there he was, a strong, healthy child, bawling with a good pair of lungs to let the world know that he had at last arrived.

George Augustus came to show her his uniform and to admire the baby at the same time. He looked with fond admiration at his wife. Clever Caroline! She had produced a son and given
him his heart’s desire; he was overcome with love for her; he knelt by the bed and covered her hands with kisses.

The Electress came to see the baby.

‘It’s to be hoped,’ she said, ‘that he will have more sense than his father.’

The child was christened Frederick Louis and was known as Fritz; Caroline called him Fritzchen.

So he had his son; now he could go to war.

He must first fit himself for the task, said George Lewis; but he could now study military tactics and be ready perhaps to leave Hanover with the next expedition which would not be for some months.

To argue with George Lewis might mean some fresh embargo, so George Augustus curbed his impatience and set about learning how to become a soldier. He enjoyed the life; he was certain it was the one for him; meanwhile he was attentive to his wife and liked to watch the progress of little Fritzchen.

When the baby was six months old, Caroline thought she had caught a chill and kept to her bed for a day, but as she grew worse the doctors were sent for.

Her blood had become overheated, she was told. It happened sometimes after childbirth.

She said she would rest in her apartments for a few days and asked that Fritzchen be brought to her.

Frizchen was sleeping, she was told.

‘Then as soon as he is awake,’ she said, ‘bring him to me.’

But the child was not brought and it suddenly dawned on Caroline that the doctors had not told her the truth. She sent for them and demanded to know it.

The doctors exchanged glances; she would have to know sooner or later.

‘Your Highness, we fear the smallpox.’

The smallpox! That dreaded scourge which either killed or ravaged. And it had come to her!

Someone was at her bedside.

‘Who is there?’ she whispered.

‘It is your husband.’

‘George Augustus. What are you doing here? Don’t you understand…?’

‘I understand,’ he replied dramatically.

‘But you are running a risk.’

‘Who but I should nurse you at such a time?’

She was incredulous. He nurse her? He could not do it. He would be of no use whatever in a sick room. Yet he was determined to share her danger. What a fool… but a brave fool! If he could not show his valour on the battlefields of Flanders he would in his wife’s sick room.

‘George Augustus,’ she said weakly. ‘You must not stay here. It is folly.’

He leaned over her, unnecessarily close. ‘Did you think I should desert you at such a time?’

‘You have convinced me of your devotion. I am touched by it. But please… please don’t stay here.’

‘Rest assured that I shall never leave you.’

‘For my sake go, George Augustus. I am so anxious for you.’

He leaned over the bed and kissed her.

For her sake. No, for his own, she thought in weary exasperation. He wanted the whole court to be talking about the brave devotion of its little Prince.

Through her illness – and she was very ill – she was aware of him. She heard his voice through her delirium; she heard the sound of breaking china; she was aware of the shape of him close to the bed, the touch of his hands.

Go away, George Augustus, she thought.

She heard his voice. ‘She is in the critical stage, I know. Tell me… tell me the worst. It will break my heart but I can bear it.’

She was too ill to care whether he went or stayed. And, throughout Hanover they were saying: ‘The Electoral Princess is dying.’

There came a day when the crisis passed and she found herself still alive.

George Augustus was sitting by her bed, holding her hand.

You… fool, she thought.

She heard his voice, high-pitched with self-satisfaction. ‘You’re
better, Caroline. I’ve been with you the whole of the time. I never stirred from your bed except in the evening. Then I took a horse and rode for miles. I had to take some exercise, and I thought that would keep me well after staying the whole day at your bedside. I nursed you, Caroline. They are saying in the palace that no Princess ever had a more devoted husband.”

‘Thank you, George Augustus.’

‘That shows you, doesn’t it? That shows you!’

Contrition for infidelity, she thought; although all the time he was with his mistress he was telling himself it was his right.

She murmured faintly: ‘You are very good, George Augustus.’

‘Oh yes, they told me I was running a terrible risk. They told me I should catch the pox. You’ve been very ill, Caroline. We didn’t think you’d live. And I was there all the time… even at the most contagious time. They begged me not to stay but I wouldn’t go. I said: Caroline is my wife. No one can nurse her as I can.’

Nurse her? How had he nursed her? She pictured him, fussing round the bed, getting in the way of doctors and nurses, talking too much – not about her needs, but his own courage.

Oh go away, go away, she thought wearily. Leave me in peace.

But she said: ‘Thank you.’

And his voice went on telling her a little of how ill she had been and a great deal about how brave he had been.

Caroline sent for a mirror. It was brought with some reluctance. This was the moment which all sufferers from the smallpox had to face. It could be terrifying.

Caroline held it up and caught her breath. There was change, and although she was not disfigured, the pox had not left her unscathed. When did it ever do that? But she was not badly marked, although her delicately coloured complexion had gone.

She sighed. It was sad for a woman, who needed all her weapons to fight for and hold her place in the world, to find one of her valued assets, though not entirely lost, blunted.

It was inevitable, said everyone, that George Augustus should have caught the smallpox after his attendance in his wife’s sick
room. Very soon the news was brought to Caroline that he could not visit her because he was sick.

She was relieved because she could not visit him, but as she lay thinking of him she felt a new tenderness for him. She knew him well enough to understand his need always to call attention to himself; she knew that his devotion to her – in fact every action in his life – was directed by this motive; and yet he
had
braved this dreaded disease; he
had
shown his devotion to her.

Lying there, thinking of George Augustus, she came to new terms with her life. She would try to understand him, to help him conquer that feeling of inferiority which being smaller than most men had given him and which manifested itself in arrogance and apparent conceit.

Their destiny lay together. There should be no discord between them.

She must remember that in future. She must curb her impatience; she must try to give him the confidence he needed and perhaps she could do this by letting him know she valued him.

She would try to make him understand this when… if he recovered.

If he recovered? She shivered at the possibility of his not doing so. And it was not only because of the uncertainty his death would place on her, for after all she was now the mother of little Fritzchen who was one of the heirs to Hanover and possibly the crown of England. No. It was not that. Could it be that she really had some affection for the little man?

The Prince’s attack was a slight one and he soon came to Caroline’s apartment in good spirits.

The need to go to war was temporarily forgotten; he had won his laurels for bravery in the sick room.

Caroline was still very weak, having suffered a more severe attack, and George Augustus was delighted to prove his great resistance to the disease, having taken it after and recovered sooner than his wife.

The Electress Sophia came to see them as soon as there was no danger in doing so.

She embraced them both and was delighted, she said, to see them well again.

‘It has been a very anxious time,’ she told them. ‘The whole court was plunged in melancholy, so fearful were they. The English were very disturbed. They think very highly of you both.’

She looked at them proudly as though it were more commendable to please the English than to recover from an attack of the smallpox.

She was thinking that poor Caroline looked very wan. She will never again have that bright young beauty, that freshness, she thought. She has come through better than I expected; but the change is there.

As though reading her thoughts, Caroline said: ‘You are thinking I have changed.’

‘Very little,’ answered the Electress. ‘And you have to get really well yet. You have had a very bad attack, remember.’

‘And do you think
I
have changed?’ demanded George Augustus.

‘You don’t look as if you’ve had the pox at all,’ replied his grandmother. ‘The people might wonder whether some fleas had bitten your face.’

George Augustus was examining his face at a mirror.

People would look at him and say: Have some fleas bitten his face? And the answer would be: No, he caught the smallpox, you know. He could have avoided it, but he
would
nurse his wife. He saved her life. Brave. I should say so! How many men or women would risk their lives like that!