A travelling coach and six horses thundered into Stuttgart, driven at a hand gallop, and raised clouds of white dust as it passed down the Graben. An escort of Silver Guards rode with this coach. One of the soldiers' horses knocked over a child playing in the roadway, but the cavalcade passed on unheeding, leaving the little crushed figure lying limp and still in the dust.
The coach drew up at the Jägerhaus, where the doors stood wide open, disclosing a company of servants drawn up in solemn line. Two sentries were posted at either side of the entrance. A black-clad major-domo bowed on the threshold, while half a dozen lackeys sprang forward to receive the tall woman who was slowly descending from the coach. Madame la Comtesse de Würben, her Excellency the Landhofmeisterin of Wirtemberg, Countess Grävenitz, had arrived at Stuttgart to attend to the duties connected with her invalid husband's court charge.
This exalted lady was the first personage of the court after the reigning Duchess, and his Highness had offered her apartments in the castle, but these were refused, her Excellency preferring to occupy an independent residence.
Thus it fell out that Wilhelmine returned to the Jägerhaus towards the end of September, some four months after she had fled from Urach, and a few days since the mock marriage with Würben, 'ce cher Nepomuk, mon mari,' as she ironically named him to Madame de Ruth.
There had been grievous storms at Stuttgart during the days succeeding his Highness's return from hunting in the Schönbuch, that shooting expedition which had been but a pretext to leave Stuttgart and hurry to Schaffhausen, in order to hinder the celebration of the ceremony of Wilhelmine's marriage.
Serenissimus returned in a mood which would brook no contradiction. He announced to the Geheimräthe, and to the court, that it was his pleasure to revive the ancient office of Landhofmeister, and that he had conferred this, the highest charge of his court, upon a Bohemian nobleman of the name of Würben, but that this gentleman being seriously indisposed, his lady-wife had undertaken to fulfil the various duties of Landhofmeisterin, and would reside at the Jägerhaus. Private information came to the astonished Geheimräthe that this new evil was but the old poison with a new label; that this Countess Würben was the hated Grävenitzin. Bitterly they regretted their refusal of the two hundred thousand gulden, but it was too late now.
To Johanna Elizabetha this announcement was made by his Highness in person and with cruel frankness. She was told that she had refused a life of ease and peace, leaving his Highness to enjoy a happiness which she herself could never have provided, and that he took this way to save himself from despair, for without Wilhelmine he would not, nay, could not, live.
'You must abide by this, Madame, and if you are peaceably disposed, and behave with becoming consideration to her Excellency the Landhofmeisterin, it will be possible for you to remain in Stuttgart,' he told her.
Her Highness made no reply to this surprising speech, but immediately wrote to Stetten, imploring the Duchess-mother to come and put order into the family affairs. The dear lady arrived in high dudgeon, and according to her custom stated her opinion to Eberhard Ludwig in words he could not misunderstand. But in vain, and it was a very crestfallen, angry old lady who drove back through the fields to Stetten.
The court was in a quandary, in comparison to which the former perplexities in regard to the Grävenitzin were mere bagatelles. If they refused to go to court festivities where the Landhofmeisterin, after the Duchess, held the first rank, they would risk being excluded from court perhaps for years. Again, who knew how soon the favourite might fall into disgrace, or be banished once more by some unexpected event? There was much talk and fervid declarations of noble sentiments, loyalty to the Duchess, love of purity, and the rest; but when Wilhelmine invited the entire court to visit her at the Jägerhaus, on the occasion of a grand evening rout, it was noticeable that those few who did not appear sent copious excuses, pretending illness, and adding almost medical descriptions of their ailments, so anxious were they that Wilhelmine should believe them to be really indisposed! Already it was considered dangerous to offend the Grävenitzin, as they still called the Countess of Würben, her Excellency the Landhofmeisterin, but to her face she was 'your Excellency,' and they paid her great court.
