The Prince and the Quakeress: (Georgian Series) (20 page)

‘To stand up in the Steeple House, to confess my sin. That I could do… but return to him… never.’

George said: ‘I shall be King of this country. When I am, I shall know what to do. You must think of nothing but the child. It would be bad for it if you fretted. Remember that. And leave it to me. I will think of what we must do.’

On his way back to Leicester House he could not suppress his excitement.

I am about to be a father. I, George, Prince of Wales!

This would be the most wonderful thing that has ever happened to me if only…

Recently he had gained confidence. Everyone paid homage to him. His mother listened to him with more attention than she ever had before. Lord Bute was respectful. And even the King could not command him to do what he did not want.

He must not forget that he was the Prince of Wales and that one day he would be King. Kings were meant to govern, so said Lord Bute and he was a very wise and clever man.

Surely it was within the means of a King to discover a way round a situation like the one in which he found himself.

*

He wanted to talk to someone about it and whom could he trust but his favourite brother and sister.

He called Edward and together they went to Elizabeth’s apartment. Poor Elizabeth, it was one of her bad days and she was unable to leave her bed. She looked very wan propped up with pillows, but at least one did not see her deformity in this position.

‘I have some news for you,’ said George. ‘I don’t know what you will think of it.’

‘Well, let’s hear and we’ll tell you,’ retorted Edward.

‘I am going to be a father.’

He looked from one to the other. Edward’s mouth had opened in surprise; a faint colour touched Elizabeth’s cheeks, making her look almost healthy.

Elizabeth spoke first: ‘So Hannah is with child.’

George nodded.

‘What are you going to do about it?’ asked Edward.

‘Do? What can I do?’

‘Is Hannah happy?’ asked Elizabeth.

‘She is both happy and sad. She is happy because she longs for the child and unhappy because of the circumstances.’

‘Poor Hannah! And you, George?’

‘I wish to God I could marry Hannah.’

‘They would never allow it.’

‘No. And there is Mr Axford.’

‘It was a marriage mill,’ said Elizabeth. ‘So perhaps if it were possible it could be proved that the marriage was not legal and that Hannah was free.’

‘Oh, do you think that could be.’

‘Marriages like that are illegal,’ said Edward. ‘If you married Hannah, and if this child is a boy it could be a King of England, think of that.’

‘Children can be made legitimate, I believe, even if the parents were not married at their birth,’ said Elizabeth.

George’s blue eyes were shining with purpose. ‘I shall not rest,’ he said, ‘until I have righted this.’

‘George,’ cried Elizabeth, suddenly fearful, ‘will you promise never to do anything… that might be considered rash… without first telling me about it.’

George was at his sister’s bedside; he took her thin hand and kissed it.

‘I swear that I will consult you first.’

She seemed relieved.

‘It is most exciting,’ said Edward. ‘George, I never thought you’d have it in you. When we used to sit in the schoolroom while we cogitated over those ridiculous problems and I copied the answers I used to think Old George will always be the good and respectable member of the family.’

‘I always wanted to be good and respectable,’ George admitted. ‘It is strange how fate seemed to decide against one’s own decision and make one what one is not.’

‘We always have the chance to go our own way,’ Elizabeth reminded him.

‘It’s true,’ put in Edward. ‘If you had taken one look into that linen-draper’s window and then looked away and forgotten all about the girl you saw there this would not have happened. You would have been cosily married either to one of the Wolfenbüttels of Grandfather’s choice or the Saxe-Gothas of our mother’s. Perhaps you would have been about to be a father. You see it is in our own hands.’

Elizabeth was watching her elder brother anxiously. But he had promised to let her know before he did anything rash.

*

The Prince was not subtle enough to hide his feelings and
Elizabeth Chudleigh recognized the change in him and guessed its cause.

‘A natural and not unexpected result,’ she chuckled. ‘What now?’

Whatever it was she decided to have a place in the centre of affairs.

As soon as she had an opportunity of speaking to him alone she told him that she was sure there was something about which she should congratulate him.

He looked startled. ‘How… how did you know?’

‘Oh…’ she smiled wisely and with the utmost affection. ‘Perhaps it is knowing Your Highness so well, having Your Highness’s welfare at heart. I sensed that something of importance has happened.’

The Prince had unconsciously pressed his lips together.

‘Your Highness should not imagine that I wish to pry. I only want to tell Your Highness that if at any time you should need my help…’

‘You are very good, Miss Chudleigh. I shall never forget how good.’

‘Then if there is anything I can do at any time…’

‘Oh yes, yes, indeed. I know I can ask you because I know I can trust you.’

As she had guessed, it was not long before he was confiding in her.

Hannah was going to have a child and he naturally wanted the best attention for her. He believed that a lady might help him best in this matter.

He was right about that, Elizabeth assured him. In fact she had some knowledge of these matters. Some of the maids of honour… Oh, the Prince must not be too harsh in his judgment of these giddy young girls. They were careless, thoughtless and they found themselves in this kind of trouble. She had helped more than one.

‘But how?’

‘Taking them away from Court… perhaps some servant’s house… and there taking a doctor to them.’

‘I should want this to be very secret.’

‘It could be arranged so that even the doctor did not know whom he was attending.’

‘But this would have to be a very
qualified
doctor.’

‘Naturally. Has Your Highness anyone in mind?’

‘Y… yes. Dr Fothergill.’

‘The Quaker!’

George nodded.

‘Well, it is natural that she should wish for one of her own sect.’

‘Being a Quaker he may not consent to…’

‘Not a bit of it, Your Highness. I know Dr Fothergill well. He is not a very
stern
Quaker. He will wish to serve Your Highness.’

‘But he is not to know.’

‘Of course not. I will tell him it is a person in a very high place. I will accompany him in the carriage and when we reach a certain point he must consent to be blindfolded.’

‘Blindfolded!’

‘It is an old method, Your Highness. Doctors have attended ladies in extraordinary circumstances before. You may safely leave this to me. I will approach Dr Fothergill. I will tell him his services are needed; and then when the time comes I will take him to Tottenham, but before we reach the house I shall blindfold him, and the bandage will not be taken from his eyes until he is actually in the room with the patient. Then he will do what is necessary, we shall blindfold him again and then… when we are back in London the bandage will be removed from his eyes. He will be well paid… paid a little extra, of course, Your Highness…’

‘Of course.’

‘And that is an end to the matter. You have had the doctor you wished for; he has delivered the child safely; and he cannot be sure where he has been or whom he has delivered.’

‘It sounds very cléver.’

‘But I do assure Your Highness that it has been done many times before.’

‘I shall pass on this information. I am sure it will give great relief. And when the time comes…’

‘When the time comes, you can count on me, Your Highness.’

*

So, when Hannah’s time came, Elizabeth was there with Dr
Fothergill, the not-too-stern Quaker, who was delighted to act as instructed. Such commissions were always very profitable and he had undertaken them before and he was becoming known throughout the Court for his discretion… not the least important quality in such a doctor’s reputation.

He rode out to Tottenham in the company of that fascinating, mysterious and rather wicked young woman, Miss Chudleigh, allowed himself to be blindfolded at the appropriate moment, and entering a house, the destination of which he could not be sure but could vaguely guess, he delivered a very personable young woman, whom he quickly discovered to be of his faith, of a healthy girl.

‘The Butcher’s’ Disgrace

CUMBERLAND WAS COMING
home to England… in disgrace. The King strode about his compartment, wig on one side, cheeks scarlet with rage.

‘Hanover!’ he moaned. ‘Hanover in the hands of the French! And he calls himself a son of mine. Was ever a father so cursed by his children? I thank God the Queen has not lived to see this day.’

Mr Pitt had called to see the King. Mr Pitt, the man who believed that England’s glory lay overseas. Here was a pretty state of affairs, a good beginning to Mr Pitt’s grand schemes. Hanover, the home of the Kings of England, the sacred spot, loved by this royal family as St James’s, Windsor, Hampton, Kensington had never been… and now it was in the hands of the French!

‘Mr Pitt, sir, you find me low… very low.’

‘Your Majesty is grieved by the loss of Hanover, I know.’

‘It is the home of my fathers, Mr Pitt. I was brought up in Hanover. As you know, I have never let long periods of time pass without visiting it.’

‘I know it well, Sire.’

‘I was happier at Hanover, Sir, than anywhere else in this world.’

‘Your Majesty’s subjects have been made aware of that fact.’

‘And now it is lost… lost by that fool of a son of mine. Why did I ever put him in charge of my armies… ?’

‘An old custom, Sire, to keep the plums of office in the family.’

‘Eh… eh, what’s that?’

‘Not always a wise one as Your Majesty is now perceiving, but is Your Majesty being entirely fair to His Royal Highness?’

The trouble with these geniuses, thought the King, was that they believed they had some prerogative to speak their minds. They gloried in it. They boasted of it. These honest men! The unpleasant truth was that a King could not do without them. Mr Pitt was such a one.

‘The puppy was caught asleep, I heard, at Hastenbecke… The French surrounded him and he would have been taken but for the prompt action of Colonel Amherst.’

‘One of the officers I recommended to Your Majesty, you will remember. Yes, he did good work. The Duke’s position was not a happy one at Hastenbecke, Sire, and I dareswear you knew that some compromise would have to be made. Bremen and Verden had to be saved and the troops brought out of danger. It was the loss of the duchies and all those men… or Hanover.’

‘Hanover,’ wailed the King. ‘It has a special place in my heart, Mr Pitt. I spent the first years of my marriage there, you will remember.’

Aye, thought Pitt, and courted Madame Walmoden there too, and sent the Queen accounts of your courtship in that delectable spot.

‘You will, then, understand my feelings.’

‘Indeed yes, Sire.’

‘So that is why I can’t wait to get my hands on that… puppy.’

‘Sire, Hanover is temporarily lost. It is a small electorate. I believe Your Majesty penned your signature to the orders which were sent to the Duke to sign the convention.’

‘I thought the Duke would make a stand.’

‘Against orders from home, Sire?’

‘The Duke calls himself a soldier, Mr Pitt. I had not thought he would lose Hanover. I believed that he would have fought to the last man to save Hanover.’

‘But, Sire…’

The King glared at his minister. ‘That was my belief, sir.’

Mr Pitt despaired. What could one do with a man who believed what he wanted to believe, who twisted the facts to suit his own taste. Bremen and Verden had had to be saved at the cost of Hanover… why did he not admit it? Because he could not face the fact that Hanover was lost, and that he had agreed to its loss. Why? Because he was sentimental about Hanover. Because there he had lived in the first days of his married life, because there he had courted Madame Walmoden.

Pitt despised the little man, but shrugged aside his duplicity. There were more important matters ahead than the assessing of a King’s character – which would doubtless prove not worth the trouble.

‘It is a small electorate, Sire,’ he repeated, ‘and there is Canada and America… needing our attention.’

*

Hanover lost! It was terrible. It was unthinkable. The King wept with emotion, thinking of the Alte Palais where he had lived in his boyhood; the old Leine Schloss where assassins had murdered his mother’s lover, the Count of Königsmarck, Herrenhausen where his grandmother had lived for so long and dreamed of becoming Queen of England. In the hands of the French!

I cannot bear to think of it, he mourned.

He had given his consent that it should be signed away. It was like betraying his family. He could imagine Caroline’s eyes regarding him sorrowfully. What would she have said could she have been here? He could hear his father’s voice cursing him in German.

George II of England who had lost Hanover to the French! He would not admit it… even here in the seclusion of his own apartments. It was not
he
who had lost it. It was that blockhead… Willie… who had been Caroline’s favourite son. Her Duke of Cumberland whom she had said so many times she wished had been the eldest of the family instead of Fred. They had agreed that Willie would have been the better King. Willie had been brought up in England; he spoke English like an Englishman. He had always wanted to be a soldier. Willie had been their darling as a child. So bright… so loving. Different from the
canaille
Fred – Caroline had declared. And now
William was the one who had sold Hanover to the French. But the fault was William’s, for no one was going to blame him, the King.

He had already forgotten that he had agreed with his German Council to save Bremen, Verden and the armies. The English had known nothing of this. None of their business, snorted George. But Mr Pitt had known. Mr Pitt was one of those men who were aware of everything.