"What is it?" she asked, her teeth beginning to chatter because she was conscious of a sense of doom.
"Your mother has been taken ill and is asking for. you."
"How... ill?"
"Don't talk so much. She's waiting."
As she was hurried into her robe she was thinking: She is going to die. She will tell me what I have to do when I am alone.
Then a feeling of desolation struck her and she knew that she had rarely been so frightened. She was so lonely. She had no friends in this alien court. Because she was her mother's daughter nobody wanted her.
"Hurry?"
"I'm ready," she said.
She was taken to her mother's bedchamber where Eleanor lay in her bed looking exhausted, her skin yellow, her eyes glassy.
"My child..." she began and Caroline ran to the bed and kneeling took her hand.
"Mamma, what has happened. You are ill."
"I have been very ill, daughter. I think I am going to die."
"No ... no ... you must not."
"I have no place in this world, child. Life has not been very kind to me. I trust it will be kinder to you."
Caroline gripped the bedclothes and thought: I will never let people treat me as they have treated you! But how prevent it. There must be a way. She was sure of it and she was going to find it.
"Mamma, you are not going to die."
"If this attempt has failed, there will be others."
"Attempt ... failed ..."
"I ramble, child."
It was a lie, of course. She was not rambling. Why would they treat her as a child? It was true she was only nine years old but the last year at the Court of Saxony had taught her more than most children learn in ten. She knew how frightening marriage could be; but she thought: Had I been Mamma, I would not have allowed it to happen. What would she have done? She was not sure. But she believed she would have found some way of avoiding a position which was degrading, wretched and had now become very sinister indeed.
"If anything should happen to me, Caroline ... are you listening?"
"Yes, Mamma."
"You should go back to Ansbach."
"Yes, Mamma."
"You could write to the Electress of Brandenburg. She was my good friend until she persuaded me to this marriage."
Caroline spoke hotly in defence of her beloved Sophia Charlotte. "But, Mamma, you need not have married had you not wished to."
"You are a child. What do you understand? I would to God I had remained a widow ... for he will do nothing for you ... nothing for me and nothing for you. No, you had best go back to Ansbach. Your brother will help you."
"I am two years older than he is, Mamma. Perhaps I can help him."
Eleanor smiled wanly. "Go and call someone," she said. "I'm beginning to feel ill again. And don't come back till I send for you."
"Yes, Mamma."
She called the attendants and then went to sit in the ante room.
She heard her mother groaning and retching.
She thought: What will become of me when she is dead?
It was not now a question of trying to listen. Caroline could not escape the whispers.
"It was an attempt to poison the Electress Eleanor."
"By whom?"
"Come, are you serious? Surely you can guess."
"Well if there is to be a new law that a man can have two wives why bother to rid themselves of the first?"
"It'll never be a law. That's why. They know it. They will keep to the old ways. It's been used often enough and is the most successful."
"Poor lady. I wouldn't be in her shoes."
"Nor I. He'll have the Roohlitz ... never fear. He's set on it and so is her mother."
"Poor Electress Eleanor, she should watch who hands her her plate."
They were planning to poison her mother. They had tried once and failed. But they would try again.
She was frantic with anxiety, but to whom could she turn? She, a nine-year-old girl without a single friend in the palace— what could she do?
If only the Electress Sophia Charlotte were here, she could go to her, explain her fears, be listened to with attention; she would be told what to do and it would be the right thing she was sure. But Sophia Charlotte was miles away and there was no one to help her.
She went to her mother's apartments. Eleanor was in her bed, recovering from her attack and she looked exhausted.
Caroline threw herself into her arms and clung to her.
"Oh Mamma, Mamma, what shall we do?"
Her mother stroked her hair and signed to the attendants to leave them. When they were alone, she said: "What is it, my child?"
"They are trying to kill you, Mamma."
"Hush, my child, you must not say such things."
"But it's true. And what are we going to do."
"It is in God's hands," said Eleanor.
"But unless we do something. He won't help us."
"My child, what are you saying?"
"I know it sounds wicked, but I'm frightened."
"Where did you hear this?"
"They are all saying it. I overheard them."
"So ... they are talking! "
"Mamma, you don't seem to want to do anything."
Eleanor lay back on her pillows and closed her eyes. "What can I do? This is my home now ... and yours."
Caroline clenched her fists, her exasperation overcoming her fear.
"Why don't we run away?"
"Run away! To where?"
"Let us think. I here must be something we can do. This is a hateful home in any case. I should be glad to leave it ... and so would you."
"My place is with my husband."
With a murderer! thought Caroline and stopped herself in time from saying the words aloud.
"We could go to Berlin. Perhaps they would let us live with them ... for a while ... until we knew what to do."
"We should have to wait to be invited. You shouldn't listen to gossip, my child. It's not ... true."
Caroline sighed wearily. It was useless to try to make her mother take action. She was well aware of the danger; but it seemed that she preferred meekly to be murdered than make any effort to avoid such a fate.
"You see, Caroline," said Eleanor, "this is where we belong."
"Can we belong where they are trying to be rid of us?"
In that moment Eleanor was as frightened for her daughter as for herself. What would become of Caroline? The child was growing up and in what an atmosphere! Her licentious stepfather made no secret of the life he led; he would sit with his friends at the banqueting table and they would discuss their conquests—not of wars but of women—in crude detail, seeking to cap each other's stories and provoke that rollicking laughter which could be heard even in the upper rooms of the palace; he could often be seen caressing the bold Countess von Roohlitz in public; while equally publicly he insulted his wife and sought to replace her. Now he was advocating polygamy because he wished to discard his wife—if he could not have been said to have discarded her from the moment he married her— and set up another in her place. And because his plans were not proceeding fast enough it might be that he had tried to poison her.
All these things were talked of; and this young girl heard what was said.
I should never have brought her here, thought Eleanor. Better to have stayed at Ansbach—poor and without prospects. For what prospects have we now?
"My poor child," she whispered.
"But what are we going to do?" demanded Caroline.
"There is nothing we can do."
"So you would stay here and let them kill you?"
"That is only rumour."
"Mamma, you know it isn't. Let us go away. We mustn't stay here. It isn't safe."
Sighing, Eleanor turned her face away. "You must not listen to servants' gossip, my child. It is beneath the dignity of one in your position."
What can I do? wondered Caroline in desperation. She won't help herself!
"Go now, my dear," said Eleanor. "I want to sleep."