"If you run away to Switzerland, on the other hand, you are a free woman, under the protection of a republican government.
"Switzerland, I needn't tell you, will not go to war to wrest your children from the royal family, but will afford you personally every advantage, legal and otherwise.
"Decide quickly: are you going to make King George a present of yourself as well as of the five children you bore for the benefit of the Wettiners?"
"Never."
My mind is made up. My few belongings are packed. I, who came to Dresden with fifty-two trunks, leave the palace with a satchel, easy to carry. I take nothing but my personal jewels, the little money I own and some changes of linen.
If I could only see my children for a moment or two, but the Queen has them in her keeping, and I might be seized as a "mad woman" if I dared leave my apartments and cross to those occupied by Her Majesty.
And Frederick Augustus! He will miss me in his way.
Ten more minutes. I hear the distant clatter of a carriage. Richard driving to our rendezvous, two streets north of the palace gate.