Queen in Waiting: (Georgian Series) by Jean Plaidy Read Free Book Online

might say, a dying request.’
    He shivered a little. He believed she was telling him that if he did not grant it she would haunt him after death. He was no more superstitious than most, yet the accusing eyes of a victim whom one was sending to an early grave could be alarming. Pretsch, he thought. With trusted servants to see that she had no opportunity to escape to Berlin. To see that his orders were more effectively carried out than they had been here, for if what he had commanded had been done she would not have been fixing those wild eyes on him and making this request.
    It was not a bad idea. Magdalen would be happier when his wife was no longer at the Palace. Then she could act as Electress as much as she wished and would be more readily accepted when the real Electress was out of the way.
    To Pretsch to die. It was not a bad idea.
    He gave his permission and the next day, to Caroline’s relief, she left with her mother and a few attendants for the Dower House.
    Death, like a mischievous trickster, was threatening where it was least expected.
    News of the death of Eleanor would have caused no surprise but, although enfeebled and ill, she continued to exist at Pretsch and it was in the palace at Dresden that tragedy struck.
    Magdalen von Röohlitz kept to her apartments, seeing no one and the rumour was flying round the court and the whole of Dresden that she was suffering from the smallpox.
    This was God’s answer to her wickedness, said the whispers. She had planned to take the life of another and now her own was in jeopardy; she had planned to put on the robes of an Electress – instead it could well be a shroud.
    And even if she survived, would the Elector be so passionately devoted to her when she emerged from the sick room pitted with pox?
    Madam von Röohlitz was in despair. All her ambitions lay in her daughter; she had schemed; she had dreamed; she had seen her dearest hopes about to be realized, for surely even if John George’s plan to bring in polygamy failed, the attempts to poison Eleanor must sooner or later succeed; and now here was everything about to be ruined.
    Caroline listening to the rumours, which had reached the Pretsch Dower House, wondered whether her prayers had been answered. She had prayed that something would happen to save them. Could this really be an answer to prayer?
    Life was unaccountable. A few days before her mother had seemed doomed and Magdalen von Röohlitz triumphant; now by one little stroke of fate the position had been reversed.
    It seemed as though everyone was caught up in this almost unbearable suspense.
    In the Dower House Eleanor no longer thought of imminent death. In her apartments Madam von Röohlitz rallied against her ill fortune; in her bedroom Magdalen lay restless and delirious, blessedly unconscious of her plight.
    John George summoned the doctors, and demanded that they tell him it was not the dreaded scourge which had attacked his mistress. They were sorry they could not obey him because there was no doubt that the Countess was suffering from smallpox. He stormed at them; he gave way to fury; then he wept. His beautiful Magdalen ravaged by the scourge which destroyed life or – on those occasions when life was spared – almost always destroyed beauty. This could not happen to him and his Magdalen when they had such wonderful plans for the future.
    But it had happened.
    ‘She must not die. Anything rather than that. I must see her. I must talk to her.’
    ‘Your Highness,’ said the doctors, ‘you must not go into her apartments. That would be very dangerous. You know the nature of this terrible disease.’
    But he would not listen to them. He went to her apartments; he took her into his arms.
    ‘Listen to me, Magdalen,’ he cried. ‘You must get well. It will not matter if the pox disfigures you. I will not care. I want you to live. Do you understand that?’
    But she only looked at him with glazed eyes; and throughout the palace they heard him