‘I think,’ he said, ‘that Caroline will want a husband now that her sister has one.’
‘Caroline is a child yet.’
‘Do you think so? You saw her down there—’
Madame de Hertzfeldt was silent for a moment. Then she shrugged her shoulders. ‘Like her sister she has matured early. But you won’t have to raise the money for her wedding for a few years.’
‘It might not be easy. Her brothers—’ A look of pain crossed the Duke’s face and his mistress hastened to console him.
‘There is nothing wrong with Frederick William and the girls.’
‘Oh, my dear, what an affliction! My eldest son almost an imbecile, my second completely so and the third blind. What is wrong? Why should I be so cursed? If I had married you—’
‘We have been happy together for all these years.’
‘What should I have done without you?’
‘Why ask— when you have never been obliged to— and as long as it rests with me never will.’
He looked at her beautiful face and was reconciled to everything-an unhappy marriage with his English wife, even the fruit of that marriage which had caused such grievous disappointment. All these years they had been lovers— even before his marriage to Augusta, and he had refused to give her up when Augusta had arrived from England and found her installed as mistress of his household. And so she had remained in spite of Augusta’s protests and she had behaved with such dignity that in time even Augusta had come to accept her value.
‘If our son—’ he began, but she silenced him.
‘You have your legitimate heirs,’ she reminded him. ‘There is no gainsaying that.’
‘Only private people can expect happiness,’ he answered bitterly, ‘because they can choose their mates. The marriages of royalty scarcely ever result in happiness because they are not founded on love. They become embittered and often this is disastrous to the children of the marriage. They are often unhealthy in mind as well as body.’
She sought to comfort him. ‘Charlotte seems happy,’ she reminded him.
‘My dearest, I know you seek to comfort me. Charlotte is excited. She is like Caroline. They crave constant excitement. It is a sort of madness— no— no. It is a compulsion they have. I pray God Charlotte will be happy when the excitement is over.’
‘The excitement will go on for a time and perhaps she will soon have a child and that will sober her.’
‘Determined as ever to look at the brightest side, I see.’
‘Well let us at least enjoy that while we can. In any case, there may not be another side. Who shall say?’
He pressed her hand. ‘You are right as usual.’
She smiled at him, her eyes still a little anxious. Since he inherited the Dukedom some two years before, life had been less carefree. His father had been a spendthrift and Charles had taken over an almost bankrupt country. He had determined to bring his country to prosperity and practised economy as far as he could; but that was not easy and he had been trained as a soldier rather than a statesman. But Madame de Hertzfeldt was as good as any minister; he rarely made a move without consulting her and he had proved again and again that this was wise. It was she who had helped to arrange this match for Charlotte; and she would do the same for Caroline when the time came. She had suggested that the Princesses be brought up with religious freedom so that they could in due course become either Protestant or Catholic according to the religion which their future husbands might follow. This, she had pointed out, would make it so much easier to find husbands for them, since many good matches were lost through a difference in the religion of either parties.
What a Duchess she would have made! And he had to be content with Augusta who was constantly reminding everyone at Brunswick how much better affairs were managed in England under the rule of her brother King George III.
‘So,’ she said, ‘we will think only of the wedding celebrations and deal with future problems when they present themselves.’
The Duchess was talking to her daughter Charlotte, soon to be a bride.
‘Of course I could have wished we could have had an English Prince for you.
My brother’s son, the Prince of Wales, would be— let me see— Twenty, would it be? Yes, I should think twenty, and surely it is time he married, but do you think they would marry him to a Princess of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel? Oh no! The very suggestion would give my sister-in-law an apoplectic fit. How I hated that creature. She— Queen Charlotte— was one of the reasons why I was anxious to get away from England.’
‘Well, Mamma,’ said Charlotte pertly, ‘it is no use repining for the loss of the Prince of Wales now that I have my Frederick William. Würtemberg will have to do. And as the marriage is to take place within a day or so even if my wicked old aunt Queen Charlotte relented and sent me your nephew the Prince of Wales it would be, to say the least, a little awkward.’
‘Charlotte, you really are impertinent,’ said her mother mildly.
‘What do you expect when I am named after that wicked sister-in-law of yours?’
‘You happen, Charlotte, to be speaking of the Queen of England.’
‘And so, Mamma, were you a moment ago and every bit as disrespectfully.
Confess it.’
Oh dear, thought the Duchess. She would never be able to control these children of hers. It was the same with Caroline. The girls had their own way. But what can I do? she asked herself. I am not in command here. It is always Madame de Hertzfeldt. She is the Duke’s confidant. She decides all matters, even those concerned with my children. What a situation! I wish I’d never left England. She shivered. Fancy being there, with George expecting her to live with her sisters like nuns in a nunnery. No, this was preferable, even though she had an unfaithful husband who cared little for her, and children whom she could not control. Her children alarmed her. She could not bear to be in the company of her eldest boys. They seemed a continual reproach. Was it her fault? What had she done to produce those three boys who would never be able to rule? The youngest boy, thank God, was normal; and his father doted on him, and was terrified that some harm was going to befall him-his only normal son. He cherished the boy almost as much as he did Madame de Hertzfeldt— though not quite— No one could be quite as important to him as that woman!
Then there were the girls who were so wayward that they always seemed to get the better of her. They are so German, she decided ; and I am so English. Sometimes she felt it was not such a bad thing that she had a strong-minded woman like Madame de Hertzfeldt to help her control the girls. That woman, thought the Duchess petulantly, would control anybody.
‘Mamma,’ Charlotte was saying, ‘I have matters to which I must attend. So you must give me permission to leave you.’
The Duchess nodded and shaking her head sank down on to her sofa and stared blankly before her. How she had disliked this room! When she had first seen it, it had seemed so primitive after the apartments of St. James’s, Hampton Court and Kensington Palace. But she had grown accustomed to it. And she had not really been sorry to come here. After all, a woman must marry— and they might have given her a less attractive husband. Charles had at least been a hero when he had come to England to marry her. Not that he had been quite as handsome as she had pictured him, but the people had liked him. She remembered how they had been cheered at the Opera while George and Charlotte were received in silence. What a triumph! Serve them right. It was all jealousy— Charlotte’s fault, she was sure. George would never have had the gumption. Their mother had completely dominated him at that time, and he had done everything that she and Lord Bute told them.