The Princess of Celle: (Georgian Series)

by Jean Plaidy

  ‘He’s dead,’ whispered one of the halberdiers.

  ‘Do you see who?’ asked another.

  ‘Königsmarck! Oh, my God, what have we done!’

  Clara who had been waiting close by, came hurrying out. She carried a candelabra in her hand and holding it high above her head stared down at the figure on the floor.

  ‘Oh, God!’ she whispered.

  Königsmarck, opening his eyes, saw her. ‘You! So it is you!’ he murmured. ‘You evil woman. Murderess. Your revenge this… . The Princess is innocent… .’

  That he should seek to defend her rival at such a moment maddened Clara.

  She put her foot on his mouth and ground in her heel.

  But even as she stared down at him, her feelings suffered a reversal. She knew that he was the only man she really wanted.

  She cried out: ‘You clumsy fools. You’ve killed him. You were told to arrest him and you’ve killed him!’

  She knelt down and put her arms about him.

  ‘Königsmarck,’ she whispered, ‘you’re not going to die.’

  ‘Evil woman … would to God I had never …’

  So he was conscious still. He was cursing her. Then his face softened as he said: ‘Save her… . She … innocent …’

  His head fell backwards and his glassy stare was fixed on Clara’s face.

  ‘He’s dead,’ she whispered. ‘Königsmarck is dead.’

  She looked down at her blood-spattered gown; then she hurried to the Elector’s apartments. He started up in bed at the sight of her – dishevelled and bloody.

  ‘They have killed Königsmarck,’ she said.

  ‘Killed him! No!’

  She nodded. ‘We must act quickly. His body is lying there near the Princess’s apartment. He resisted arrest and so was killed.’

  Ernest Augustus looked at her intently; but he was too old and tired to attempt to probe her devious intentions.

  Königsmarck murdered! This would create scandal throughout Europe and more than scandal. Königsmarck was of too important a family for his murder to be hushed up.

  Clara followed his line of thought. ‘There is only one thing to be done,’ she said. ‘Leave this to me. His body must be buried before dawn and all signs of the murder removed.’

  Clara left the Elector and went back to the halberdiers, two of whom were badly wounded and in need of attention. They must invent some story of a street fight in which they had been hurt, she told them. The other two must hastily put the body into a hole in the grounds and cover it with quick lime. All the bloodstains must be washed away; while they were fresh it would be easy to do so. They would need help and they must get it, but inform all those who were called to their assistance that if they spoke a word of this night’s work they would bitterly regret it.

  They knew how terrible the anger of Clara von Platen could be. They had an example of it in the dead body of Königsmarck. They worked with speed; and by the morning there was no sign in the Leine Schloss of what had happened during the night.

  With the help of Eléonore von Knesebeck Sophia Dorothea was packing her jewels.

  ‘This time tomorrow,’ she said, ‘we shall be far away.’

  ‘Yes,’ agreed Eléonore, her teeth chattering.

  ‘I could endure it no more.’

  ‘No. You have endured too much. But there will be such a scandal.’

  ‘I no longer care.’

  The jewels were packed into a case which Fraulein Knesebeck would carry.

  ‘Let us lie down,’ said Sophia Dorothea. ‘I feel exhausted and yet wide awake. You lie down with me … and we’ll talk as we used to when we were little.’

  They talked of the next day. They would be in readiness, waiting until the message from Königsmarck arrived; and then they would put on two of Eléonore’s oldest cloaks and slip out of the palace. The coach would be waiting for them and in it Königsmarck. And as soon as they were safely inside … away to Wolfenbüttel.

  ‘There are strange noises in the palace tonight,’ said Eléonore von Knesebeck.

  ‘You are never awake at this hour, that’s why you notice them.’

  ‘What should they be doing in corridors by night?’

  ‘You are dreaming, Knesebeck. You’re half asleep.’

  ‘Am I?’

  ‘Yes. Go to sleep. I shan’t. I shan’t sleep until I’m in Wolfenbüttel.’

  How long the morning seemed. At every sound they started up. But no messenger came, and the morning passed and they were still waiting.

  It was afternoon.

  ‘Something has gone wrong,’ said Sophia Dorothea. ‘He said he would send for us in the morning. It would have been easier to slip out then.’

  ‘He will send in the afternoon,’ consoled Fraulein von Knesebeck.

  ‘The children will be here for their daily visit soon,’ said Sophia Dorothea.

  ‘If the message comes while they are here we shall wait till they have left.’

  ‘I shall be tempted to take them with me.’

  Eléonore von Knesebeck shivered.

  But the children did not come and there was no message; and by the time the afternoon was over they knew that something was wrong.

  Where is Königsmarck? It was the question which was being asked all over Hanover. His servants had not seen him. They had not been alarmed when he had not returned home that night because he often indulged in night adventures. But now he had been missing for two nights and not one of his household knew where he was.

  Hildebrand, Königsmarck’s faithful secretary, was very anxious because he was aware that his master had been making plans to leave Hanover and that the Princess Sophia Dorothea was involved in them.

  He would send to Dresden, he said, for it might be that some news of him could be found there. Königsmarck’s sister Aurora was now beginning to be very disturbed; she herself would visit Dresden for, she said, she was determined to find her brother.

  In her apartments Sophia Dorothea was both heartbroken and terrified.

  ‘I am afraid,’ she said to Eléonore, ‘that the greatest tragedy of my life is about to happen.’

  Even at that moment Ernest Augustus had sent his guards to search Königsmarck’s apartments in the hope, he said, that some clue might be found which would explain his disappearance.

  Ernest Augustus was staring at the papers which lay before him on the table. Watching him intently were the Platens and the Duchess Sophia.

  ‘So they were going to Wolfenbüttel,’ said the Elector. ‘They were going to our enemies.’

  ‘Traitors – both of them!’ cried Clara.

  ‘The Duchess Sophia said nothing; she sat back in her chair, her hands folded on her lap, her lips tight. The daughter of that woman who had supplanted her all those years ago was in utter disgrace from which she could never extricate herself. Sophia at least would do nothing to help her. She would show George William what a fool he had been to refuse the daughter of Kings and take a commoner to wife. This slut, this French-woman’s brat, had disgraced her parents and she should never again set foot in the court of Hanover if the Duchess Sophia could help it.

  ‘Ernest Augustus was angry. To elope to Wolfenbüttel – that stronghold of traitors! It was too much. If she had merely taken a lover he would have forgiven her. God knew she had had enough provocation, and he was not the man to condemn others for weaknesses which he himself possessed. But in planning to go to Wolfenbüttel, she had forfeited all claim to his, sympathy and help. And there it all was in the papers found in Königsmarck’s apartments. No, he would have no mercy for Sophia Dorothea.

  ‘Her parents should be informed of her guilt,’ said the Duchess Sophia.

  ‘Without delay, I think, Your Highness,’ agreed Clara.

  The two women nodded to each other. There was no rancour between them; they were agreed on this. They both urgently desired the ruin of Sophia Dorothea.

  ‘She walked about her apartments in a daze. She took no heed of time.
She did not know now how many days had passed. There was only one thing she knew: her heart was broken, for some terrible tragedy had overtaken her lover; it was the only reason why he would desert her.

  She had lost him; some intuition told her she would never look on his face again; and she was alone … staring disaster in the face.

  ‘What shall I do? What shall I do?’ she demanded of a terrified Fraulein von Knesebeck.

  But the Confidante had no answer for her.

  There was Celle. There was her mother.

  ‘My mother is the only one left to me, Knesebeck. She would never desert me. She will come for me. She will take me home now.’

  The Duchess Eléonore was in tears. ‘She must come home. I will look after her. This is lies … all of it is lies. She has been indiscreet … but never wicked. She is incapable of wickedness.’

  George William looked in astonishment at his wife.

  ‘Have you read these letters? Her guilt is plain. She has been Königsmarck’s mistress. She was going to elope with him … to Wolfenbüttel.’

  ‘I don’t believe it.’

  ‘You must believe your own eyes. Read these letters … in her handwriting. They will make you blush with shame. Your daughter so to conduct herself!’

  ‘She was driven to it. Oh, God, I foresaw this… . On that morning … that birthday morning… . Life was so wonderful before that. And you gave her away as though she were nothing more than a piece of land. Your own daughter! My daughter! Now she must come back to me. I will nurse her back to health. I will make her happy again.’

  ‘She shall not come here.’

  They faced each other. He had been primed by Bernstorff, for Clara and the Duchess Sophia had determined that the Princess was not going back to her mother. Oh no! She had sinned and they were going to see that she was punished. Not back to Celle to be petted and pampered by the Frenchwoman – that clot of dirt, who doubtless thought it was amusing that Princes should be deceived.

  George William must be a man in his own house.

  ‘I have made up my mind,’ he said.

  ‘If you close your door to her my heart is closed to you forever,’ she told him.

  But he would not give way. He was older now, more selfish. Her approval was not so necessary to him as that of his brother the Elector.

  Her beautiful face was set in a stony expression as she said: ‘I no longer care for anyone but my daughter and my grandchildren. And all the years of happiness I had with you are without meaning, for I was mistaken when I gave my love to a man who could so heartlessly treat his own daughter.’

  She turned and left him and he almost ran to her crying out that he wanted it to be as it was in the beginning. They would have their daughter back; they would be together as they were in the days of Sophia Dorothea’s childhood when the whole world meant nothing to them and their happiness was in each other.

  But even as he moved he could hear the mocking laughter of Hanover – his brother’s supercilious chuckle, the sneer of the Platen woman, the scorn of the Duchess Sophia; and his pride was stronger than his love.

  Eléonore went alone to her apartments to pray for her daughter and to fight for her as well as she could … alone.

  ‘I have no friends,’ said Sophia Dorothea. ‘There is no one to help me.’

  But she had a friend in her mother. Eléonore made no excuses for her father. He was against her and all who were against Sophia Dorothea were against the Duchess of Celle. ‘Rest assured, my darling,’ wrote Duchess Eléonore, ‘your enemies are mine and though all the world were against you I should be at your side. Do not despair. I shall find some way of bringing you comfort.’

  Sophia Dorothea wept when she read that letter. She believed now that her lover was dead, for only death, she was sure, would have kept him from her.

  Her heart, she said, was broken; and doom was close at hand.

  Count Platen came to her apartments.

  He scarcely recognized the white-faced wild-eyed girl who received him. It was two weeks since the night of Königsmarck’s marck’s murder and Sophia Dorothea had eaten scarcely anything and had slept little since.

  ‘Your guilt is known,’ said Platen. ‘Many of your criminal letters are in the hands of the Elector and we know that Count Königsmarck was your lover and that you were planning to elope with him. It is decided that you are no longer welcome at Hanover.’

  ‘Nothing would please me more than to leave it. And how dare you keep me here a prisoner!’

  ‘Your father agrees with all that is being done. The Elector is in constant communication with him. It has to be decided whether you are pregnant by Königsmarck which, you will admit, is a possibility.’

  ‘How dare you address me in such a coarse manner! You speak to me as though I am a woman like your wife.’

  ‘Madame, such insults will not help you. Everything is known.’

  ‘And where is Count Königsmarck?’

  ‘He was killed resisting arrest in the early morning when he was discovered leaving your bedchamber.’

  She had known it; but the blatant truth was hard to accept. She put her hands to her face that he might not see her agony.

  But how could she hide it? Everything was lost. She could see nothing about her but desolation and misery.

  When Platen left, Eléonore von Knesebeck helped her mistress to her bed; and there she lay for several days not caring what became of her.

  Shortly afterwards arrangements were made for her to leave Hanover, and she was conducted to the castle of Ahlden – a state prisoner.

  Epilogue

  ‘THE PEOPLE OF Ahlden could scarcely remember what life had been like before the coming of their Princess. They would see her often riding out in her carriage, always surrounded by her guards, gracious, charming, beautiful, and infinitely sad. She was becoming a legend – a Princess about whom a spell had been woven. She was the Queen of Ahlden but a prisoner. There was a boundary beyond which she must not pass, she was shut away from the world that she had known. It was as though a magician had set an impenetrable forest about her domain and all that she loved best in the world was on the other side of it. The magician was George Lewis her husband.

  He had divorced her and declared to the world that he no longer considered her to be his wife.

  Sometimes they saw her at the window of her apartments standing looking out over the marsh lands across which the river Aller wound its way. In summer the sun touched the river to silver and the scene in golden light had a certain strange beauty; in winter when the land was flooded and winds howled across the marshes it was gloomy and full of foreboding.

  But when she drove herself in her cabriolet in summer, she was a magnificent sight for she dressed as though she was attending a state occasion; with her dark hair flowing, diamonds sparkling in it, her gowns of velvet or satin cut in the French fashion which she loved, she was a colourful figure and the people ran out of their houses to watch her. In winter she was driven in her closed carriage – riding like a Queen, none the less grand.

  They curtsied to her; they cheered her; she had the gift of making them love her.

  Six miles from the Castle of Ahlden was the boundary beyond which she was forbidden to go. The guards were there to prevent her and, resigned, she would return to her prison.

  In the beginning she had been listless, but after a while she noticed the people in the cottages who came out to curtsey to her; and now and then she would stop her cabriolet or order the carriage to be stopped and ask them questions about their lives. Their poverty shocked her; it was the one misery she did not have to endure, and she found that by interesting herself in them she forgot a little of her own wretchedness.

  They must be helped she said; not only with food, clothes and fuel but their children should be taught. She set up a village school and it delighted her to watch the progress of the children and to attend the school on prize-giving day and award the prizes.

  And thus two years passed
and while she dreamed of escape the people of Ahlden told each other that life had become more pleasant when the lady of Ahlden had come among them.

  Sometimes she paced through her apartments and thought of those in which she had spent her childhood at Celle. These were not dissimilar. From the two windows in her bedroom she looked over the gardens to the village, as in Celle she had looked on the moat; her bed was in an alcove and often during the first months, waking in the night from a dream, for a few happy seconds she believed herself to be a child again, that it was a birthday morning and that her parents would come through the door their arms full of presents.

  Then she would rise from her bed and try to raise her spirits by planning a levee to which she would invite the nobility of the neighbourhood, the governor of the castle and her own ladies and gentlemen-in-waiting. Then it would seem to her that she had indeed made her own little court when, magnificently gowned, glittering with diamonds, she would receive them.

  But it was a game of make-believe. No matter what she did, she was a prisoner.

  The happiest days were those when she received a letter from her mother. The Duchess of Celle wrote frequently always assuring her that never would she relax her efforts to have her daughter released. The letters contained news of Sophia Dorothea’s children – the young George Augustus and the adorable little Sophia Dorothea.

  ‘They visit me often,’ wrote the Duchess, ‘and they talk eagerly of you. I shall never let them forget you. I am working, my darling, to have you brought to me. Keep up your courage. One day we shall be together.’

  After receiving such a letter she would dress herself in her most magnificent gown; she would put the diamonds in her hair and would ride out through the village to the stone bridge which marked the boundary beyond which she could not go. And on such days she could believe that the future might bring some happiness back into her life.

  Three years of captivity had been lived through when news came to Ahlden of the death of Ernest Augustus. George Lewis was now Elector of Hanover.

  It seemed that Sophia Dorothea had little to hope for from her husband. He was content with his mistresses – Ermengarda von Schulenburg still held chief place – and made no attempt to marry again. He had his heir in George Augustus and now that his father was dead he was in complete command. He dismissed Clara to Monplaisir; his mother, too, was deprived of many privileges – a punishment for never having favoured him as she did his brothers. The Duchess Sophia spent most of her time in Herrenhausen watching events in England; Anne had a son, the Duke of Gloucester, who, if he lived, would be the King of England, for Mary was dead and William, it had been said for years, was half way to the grave; in any case he was unlikely to marry again and have heirs; only Anne then and young Gloucester, who had water on the brain, stood between Sophia and the throne of England. So in Herrenhausen she lived quietly, awaiting news from England. If I can die Queen of England, she said, I shall die happy.