"I will speak to North," George was saying. "We cannot allow these people to forget that their queen is our sister. She must be treated with the respect due to the Crown.”
The Princess Dowager nodded, and George noticed her listlessness for the first time. She was different; in the spring light her face looked sallow and ravaged.
"You are ill," he said suddenly.
"No ... no ... no," she protested.
"This has upset you, I fear.”
"Yes," she answered. Let it go at that. She was not going to admit to George how ill she was. She was going on fighting to the end.
The news from Denmark was bad. There were strong opinions there that the Queen deserved the same fate as Struensee, so why should she not suffer it?
The Danish ambassador faced the King and his ministers. He should not forget, they reminded him, that the Queen of Denmark was an English princess.
"My government would never tolerate the execution of an English princess," said the King.
The answer came from the Danish Court that they would settle their own affairs without help from England; and as a result a squadron was ordered to sail for Denmark.
Now the Danes were alarmed and just as diplomatic relations between the two countries were about to be broken off, they expressed a change of attitude. The Queen should be divorced; they would not take her life, but she should be exiled from Denmark.
The squadron was not sent to Denmark; but the position demanded some action; therefore two frigates and a sloop were ordered to Elsinore to make sure that the Queen was allowed to leave Denmark in safety.
George had discussed the affair at great length with his mother. Caroline Matilda had been guilty of adultery; they must remember that. They could not blame the Danish Government entirely for its treatment of her. She had admitted that Struensee had been her lover; he had paid the price; they must not demand a free pardon for Caroline Matilda merely because she was an English princess. But they would remember that she was the King's sister; therefore the Navy must make this gesture to the Danes that they might not forget the exalted rank of the English princess.
The Danes had no wish for trouble with England. All they wanted was to be rid of Caroline Matilda. It was enough that she was divorced and exiled although the British ambassador did succeed in getting her a pension of about 5000 pounds a year. So it was goodbye to Denmark.
Caroline Matilda was weeping bitterly. Not that she cared to leave this land in which she had known such tempestuous years. She despised her husband; she had been disappointed in her lover; and all that was left to her was her children. And this was her punishment; she was to be parted from them. Frederick! Louisa! They were no longer hers. They belonged to the state of Denmark.
And she was to be exiled by a freak of fortune in the castle of Celle.
It was at Celle that her great-grandmother, Sophia Dorothea the tragic Queen of George I, had lived her happy childhood; and poor Sophia Dorothea's life had run on similar lines to that of Caroline Matilda, for married to the coarse and inconsiderate George I, she had taken a lover, been discovered, her lover had been brutally murdered, her children taken from her, and she exiled to spend the rest of her life in solitude. She remained in exile for more than twenty years, I believe, thought Caroline Matilda. I pray it will not be so long for me.
And so ended Caroline Matilda's life in Denmark, as, her children taken from her, her lover lost to her for ever, she made her journey towards Celle.
The Princess Dowager takes her leave
The family troubles were not over. It was hardly likely that Cumberland would learn his lesson; no sooner had the Grosvenor scandal died down than he came to his brother in a mood of something between contrition and truculence and told him that he had something of importance to tell him.
"You will hear of it sooner or later," he told George, 'and I would rather you heard it first from my own lips.”
George's spirits sank. He could see from his brother's expression that it would be something which would not please him.
"You'd better tell, eh?”
"I... I am married.”
"Married," spluttered George. "But ... but it's impossible. How ... can that be?”
"Your Majesty should know. You take your oath before the priest and ...”
Cumberland was looking sly, reminding George of that ceremony he had undergone with Hannah Lightfoot. George said: "You had better tell me the worst.”
"She's beautiful. I would have made her my mistress but she would have none of that. Marriage or nothing ... so it was marriage.”
"Who is she?" asked George.
"Mrs. Horton. You've heard of her. There's been plenty of scandal about us. Widow of a Derbyshire squire. Lord Irnham's daughter.”
"But this is ... impossible. You cannot marry a woman like that!”
"I have, brother. That's what I'm telling you. It is possible ... because it has been done.”
"You ... idiot.”
"I thought you would say that.”
George remembered hearing the gossip. The lady with the eyelashes a yard long. And his brother was a fool. One would have thought that having been caught over Grosvenor's wife he would have been more careful. But no. North had provided the 13,000 damages for that affair ... and as soon as it was settled, this young idiot had gone off and committed another piece of folly. Would he never learn?
George was really angry. He thought how he had sacrificed lovely Sarah Lennox for plain Charlotte because he thought it was his duty and here was his brother living with no restraint whatsoever, becoming involved in one scandal and then plunging straight into the next.
He said : "I... I will not receive her ... nor you. You understand. Eh? What?”
Cumberland lifted his shoulders and accepted his dismissal. Old George wouldn't keep it up, he knew. He was too good-hearted and he hated quarrels. He'd give way in time just as he had over the Grosvenor case.
The Princess Dowager asked the King to come and see her. She did not feel equal to making the journey to him, but she did not wish him to know it. She was very worried about her family. Her sons were wild; there was no doubt about that. Her daughter Augusta was very dissatisfied with her life in Brunswick and what Augusta's daughter would grow up like she dared not think. It must be a very strange household with her father paying more attention to his mistress than to her mother; and how would proud Augusta react to that? And then Caroline Matilda whose case was the worst of all and did not bear thinking of. And now this news about Henry Frederick. Oh, what a fool. Women would be his downfall; and now he had been caught by this siren with the long eyelashes. How like him to be caught by eyelashes. He was without sense and without dignity.
She heard that he was extremely coarse; his only cultural interest being in music. But the whole family shared that interest. And now ... this disastrous marriage.
When the King came to her she seated herself with her back to the light that he might not see the ravages pain had made on her face. George was too indignant about this new turn in the family's affairs to notice.
He said: "You wished to speak about Henry Frederick I don't doubt, Mother, eh?”
"It's a sorry business.”
"I won't receive them.”
"That can't undo the mischief; and perhaps it is not wise ...”
George's mouth was set along the stubborn lines with which she had now become familiar.
"I shall not receive them," he said; and she knew that that was an end of the matter. She tried again though.
"Family quarrels never did any good. In the last two reigns they were disastrous to the family and made it a laughing stock to the people. We do not wish that.”
"True," agreed the King, 'but I won't receive them.”