Queen in Waiting - Plaidy Jean. Страница 71

"And you a Queen."

She put her hands on her stomach. "Oh, I must bear the children.... That is for the vomen."

"But I vould always talk to you, Caroline. There is no von else I vould talk to as I do to you."

"You are so goot to me. Ve shall be careful with Townsend. Should ve send for him now? I vill dress and we can receive him in the Queen's gallery. Vould you give your consent to this?"

The Prince nodded eagerly.

"I believe the King is trying to make England declare war. Do you think that will be goot for England? Goot for Hanover yes, but vill it be goot for England? The people do not vant it. Do you think it would be goot for England to declare var vhile you are the guardian of the realm?"

"It would be bad. I vould not allow it."

*'I thought you vould not. I vill summon my women and join you in the Queen's gallery. I vill have vord sent to Towns-end that he is to come there."

Caroline, in a long robe which did its best to disguise her advanced state of pregnancy, walked up and down the gallery between the Prince and the Prime Minister.

Townsend was saying: "The English will never willingly go to war for the sake of Hanover."

"They must never do so," replied the Prince.

"I am glad of Your Highness's support," replied Townsend, "for the Cabinet are of your opinion. It was against my advice that we sent a squadron to the Baltic. This was said to protect our trade but our trade was in no real need of protection. It was meant to protect Bremen and Verden ... for the sake of Hanover."

"Hanover must fight her own battles," said the Prince.

"The King does not think so."

"The King is von fool," reorted the Prince.

Both Caroline and the Prime Minister lowered their eyes.

"I repeat... von fool," went on George Augustus. "He must be to prefer Hanover to England. But then he is not English ... as I am..."

"As ve both are," added the Princess.

The Prince smiled across at her. "Yes, all things English ve love."

"There are new propositions from Hanover," said Towns-end. "I do not agree with them and I should like to know that I have Your Highness's support in refusing them."

"You have my support if it is for England's goot. I vould never put Hanover before England."

"Veil spoken," murmured Caroline; and again he smiled at her.

"Denmark offers Bremen and Verden to Hanover on the condition that England declares war on Sweden and pays to Denmark ?150,000."

"And vat goot vill this bring to Englandt?" asked the Prince excitedly.

"No good to England, but Hanover will get Bremen and Verden, of course."

"And Englandt would be at var with Sveden and Russia," added Caroline quietly.

"It shall not be!" cried the Prince clenching his fist, while the veins at his temples became swollen.

"I am delighted to have Your Highness's support in this as I intend to place Stanhope's proposals before the Cabinet. I can assure you they will be rejected ... particularly in view of the fact that we have Your Highness's support."

The Prince was delighted. When the Prime Minister consulted him he was truly playing the King.

The golden September days were passing. Each day Caroline wondered whether there would be news of the King's return. But he stayed on in Hanover and left them free to enjoy the blessing of his absence.

To the Prince's great joy, Townsend, with whom he was now on excellent terms, suggested that he make a tour of the countryside. He had seen little of England, except during his journey from the coast to London on his arrival and the English liked to see their sovereigns.

Townsend was already talking to him as though he were the King and he was thinking of himself as such.

The Prince immediately began making his preparations.

"There is but von thing that grieves me," he said. "You, my tear, vill not come vith me."

"You vill manage very veil on your own," Caroline told him.

"It vould have been happier for me if I could have had my tear vife beside me."

"I shall be thinking of you ... all the time. And you see I am in no condition to come vith you."

"Take care of yourself. I vill give Mrs. Howard very special instructions."

"You need not. She is the best of vomen."

The Prince smiled at her gratefully. It seemed there was nothing to spoil his pleasure.

And what joy it was to travel through the countryside of Hampshire, Sussex and Kent where the people lined the roads to cheer him as he rode by and he told himself and his attendants that he would never tire of smiling for the English people.

To signal his approach bonfires were lighted all along his route and girls with flowers and leaves came out to dance in his path. At Portsmouth he was entertained at military as well as naval reviews. He went aboard the finest of the ships and guns were fired in his honour.

His eyes shining with sentiment, he told those who welcomed him that he had never been so happy in his life. He loved England; he loved the English people; he was English; he would not have it otherwise. Every drop of blood in his veins was English; he had inherited it through his grandmother.

He would never willingly leave England; the best and lovingest people in the world were the English.

He loved the English and the English loved him.

He was different from his dour old father, said the people; let that old fellow stay in Germany with his Maypole and Elephant, let him stuff himself with sausages and sauerkraut. His son was quite different. He was English, although he spoke with an atrocious German accent. He was one of them because he was determined to be.

So the bonfires were lighted; and the people sang and danced; and the theme of the day was "God Bless the Prince of Wales".

October was well advanced by the time he returned in triumph to Hampton. He found Caroline delighted to see him, eager to hear of his triumphs; but although she was more heavily pregnant than ever, there was no sign that her confinement was imminent.

Bothmer sat in his apartments writing to the King, to Berns-torff and to Robethon.

"The Prince," he wrote, "has become the King. The Prime Minister confers with him. Townsend has in fact become his

man. His Highness has just returned to Hampton from a royal progress through Hampshire, Kent and Sussex. He is treated as the ruler of the realm."

Caroline was delighted and yet apprehensive. The more popular the Prince became the more determined the King would be to suppress him. Their only hope to go on living this delightful existence was for the King to discover that he loved Hanover so much he would stay there.

She believed there might be a faint possibility that he would. She prayed that it might come true. But while his father lived George Augustus could not be King. Still, to live as pleasantly as they had been living for this wonderful summer would be very delightful while they waited.

Yet as the days grew sb.orter her apprehension grew. There were no longer charming afternoons in the pavilion. The wind was too chilly. Walks had to be taken early in the afternoon if she was to be back in her apartments by dusk. It was not so exciting playing cards by candle-light as in the fresh air.

It cannot go on, of course, she thought sighing.

News came from Hanover which saddened her.

Leibniz had approached the King and begged leave to come to England and this had been curtly refused. Poor Leibniz! He had been unpopular enough in the past but he was more so now. Then he had merely been disliked as a man of intellect and a friend of the Princess's, when the King had considered her to be an unimportant woman whose only function was to bear children. Now he would know that she was not so stupid. Bothmer would have reported how Townsend had first approached her; and she would have her full share of the King's animosity.