A Regimental Affair (47 page)

‘Captain Hervey, forgive me!’ Lady Sarah Maitland was come at last, smiling wide and confidently. ‘I had to put on another dress. Allow me to congratulate you on being the father of a most beautiful daughter!’

Hervey stood speechless.

‘A
very
beautiful daughter. I never saw such eyes and hair!’

‘And . . . and Henrietta?’

‘Oh, she is fine,
fine
– very well indeed! A few minutes more and you shall be able to see her. My husband’s physician and your regimental surgeon attended throughout, but they scarce had a thing to detain them.’

He shook his head in a sort of disbelief.

‘And I may tell you she bore it all with a most noble heart.
Dear
Henrietta. Oh, but I forget – some refreshment? How was your patrol? Was it very arduous? How is Lord Towcester?’

He didn’t have to answer, for Henrietta’s maid entered, smiling too. ‘Your ladyship, sir.’ She curtsied to each. ‘Her ladyship is ready to receive Captain Hervey now.’

‘Thank you, Ruth.’ Hervey glanced eagerly at Sarah Maitland.

‘Come, Captain Hervey.’ She led him to the stairs.

He had meant to ask how his wife came to be here, and to express the thanks due to the Maitlands for their unusual hospitality, but he found his tongue strangely tied. Sarah Maitland was saying something about his daughter being the first child to be born in York that year . . . or perhaps she said the first girl, or . . .

‘Here, Captain Hervey. I shall leave you.’ She opened one door – to a dressing room – and motioned to another.

He tidied his stock in a looking glass, checked that all his tunic buttons were fastened, then knocked softly on the door to the bedchamber.

‘Come,’ came a male voice.

He opened the door gently.

‘Matthew!’

There was pleasure and pride and relief all together in that single
word. But how spent Henrietta sounded, too. Her hair lay on the pillow as it had that night at the Nottingham inn, and he knew again that he had laid privations in her way. She should by rights have been at Longleat, in the great rose bedchamber that had been hers since childhood.

‘See, Matthew.’ She turned her eyes to the Maitlands’ nurse.

He took her hand, and bent and kissed her forehead, but she made a little sound of protest, and he kissed her again, on the lips. The doctor nodded, and the nurse presented their swaddled issue. Hervey stared with pride and wonder in equal measure. He saw what Sarah Maitland had told him, for there were the largest, bluest of eyes, and the most luxuriant shock of dark hair.

Henrietta squeezed his hand. ‘I’m sorry, my love, for you wanted a son truly very much.’

Her voice was so tired that just saying the words could not have been without effort. He was wholly at a loss to respond to anything so entirely selfless.

‘We must decide on a name,’ she said, raising her head slightly to see better.

‘My darling, I never so much as once uttered any thought that I wished for a son. She is quite perfect. I would not have things any other way.’

‘Then sit with me a while, and let us speak of it, for I can’t bear to think of her without a name.’

Stables was done by the time he returned to the troop lines. Indeed, the orderly trumpeter was sounding first post for watchsetting. Hervey complimented him as he passed the guardroom. ‘A pretty sound for so cold a night, Martin!’

Private Martin saluted. ‘Thank you, sir. But a whole tone flat, I’m sorry to say.’ Martin took his music seriously. He did not quite have perfect pitch, but he had a good memory. ‘I’d warmed it by the stove for a quarter of an hour until its pitch were right, sir. Two minutes later and it’s dropped a whole tone. I thought it’d freeze to my lips.’

Even to Hervey, his mind so agreeably preoccupied as it was, the cold was uncommonly severe. ‘Has the guard commander shortened the duties, do you know?’

‘He has, sir. To half.’

‘That’s as well. Very good, Martin. I should begin warming your trumpet for
second
post if I were you!’

‘Ay, sir! Good night, then, sir.’ Something, clearly, had put the captain in good spirits. He saluted again as Hervey turned for the troop office.

A sound man, Martin, said Hervey to himself. Meet to replace ‘Susan’ Medwell. It seemed strange to think like that, perhaps, but there could be no other way. Once a man was struck off strength – no matter what the circumstances – it was a case of ‘soldier on’ for those who remained. No one was irreplaceable. All else was mere sentiment. That, at least, was what Hervey had always tried to tell himself. Now, especially, must he do so since he bore the additional rank of father. He must soldier on, no matter how difficult his commanding officer made it. The Sixth were strong enough to ride out a man like Towcester, were they not? His real nature would soon become apparent to those in authority, and he would be checked, surely, for wasn’t that the way with the army?

He was surprised to see Major Lawrence in the troop office. ‘A word, Hervey, if you please.’

The troop orderly serjeant made to leave.

‘Is Mr Seton Canning in the lines, Corporal Sykes?’ asked Hervey, winding his hunter. It still seemed a mean instrument compared with the one it had replaced, but every time he wound it now he felt the want of his old friend’s gay society most keenly. In d’Arcey Jessope he could have confided happily, even if that delightful Coldstreamer’s counsel had not always been practical.

‘He’s in his quarters, sir. Shall I fetch him?’

‘No. Have him informed that I shall do picket officer’s rounds myself, please.’

‘Very good, sir.’

Lawrence scarcely waited for the door to close. ‘What in the name of heaven happened at Niagara? There’s all manner of rumour abroad on the reservations.’

Hervey poured himself coffee, took off his cape and shako and sat down. ‘One of the patrol’s pistols discharged accidentally when a hunting party came out of the woods.’

Lawrence frowned. ‘No, Hervey – that will never do! I never expected such a thing from you of all men.’

Hervey sighed. How easy it would be to tell him all, to pretend
Major Lawrence were d’Arcey Jessope. And what hard-edged counsel he would have by return. Yes, it would be very easy. But Lawrence wasn’t Jessope. There was no basis for mutual trust – yet – other than instinct. They had not campaigned together, they did not wear the same uniform. Hervey had no right to discuss his commanding officer with Lawrence, no matter what the inducement. ‘I cannot think what you mean. That is the substantive report,’ he said defiantly, though sadly.

‘Well, to begin with, I never imagined I would hear you use the word “accidental”.’

‘Well, it was certainly not deliberate.’

‘Do not sport with me, sir! You know very well that the term is
negligent
discharge!’

‘That would be the term if we were talking of the Mutiny Act, yes. But it doesn’t render my report inaccurate.’

Major Lawrence’s powers of observation were not to be underestimated. ‘Hervey, who are you shielding?’

That might well have been impertinent, but Hervey knew it was apt. He supposed the Cayugas had already told him. But much as he was tempted to confide, the circumstances made it impossible, for nothing he told the superintendent could be in confidence. ‘What does that matter, Lawrence? What is the greater problem?’

‘The tribes are saying the white soldiers rode through their hunting land without thought for disturbing the little game there was, and even fired to frighten them away.’

‘We were on a road that appeared on a map.’

It was the superintendent’s turn to sigh. ‘The Cayugas say you are a brave man.’

‘Do they indeed? How would they know one way or the other?’ Hervey managed an expression of innocence as much as puzzlement.

Lawrence narrowed his eyes. ‘They told me what they saw.’

‘You must have a care that they saw enough.’

‘Oh I shall, Hervey; I shall. For it is my duty to apprise the lieutenant-governor of all matters touching on the affairs of the Indian nations. And when he returns I shall give him account.’

Hervey had not known Sir Peregrine was away. ‘Where is he gone?’

‘To Quebec. And he shall be gone another fortnight, too. But on his return I must give him my assessment.’

‘Of course you must. And any report on our encounter with the Indians must properly come from Lord Towcester, not from me.’

‘So I should hope. Do you know when I might have it?’

Hervey was puzzled by the persistence. ‘Tomorrow, I should imagine. The day after, at the latest.’

‘Indeed, Captain Hervey?’ smiled Lawrence. ‘How so?’

Hervey looked at him blankly.

‘Lord Towcester set out for Quebec by sleigh this afternoon. Did you not know?’

After first parade next day – a pale affair with all those of the patrol stood down – Seton Canning went to the troop office. ‘It was good of you to stand my picket for me last night, Hervey.’

His captain smiled. ‘I had rather forgotten myself earlier. I didn’t know it was so late.’

‘You have my hearty congratulations, at any rate, sir. St Oswald has gone to find flowers to send to Government House.’

Hervey smiled again. ‘I salute his gallantry – and even more his optimism, Canning, for where in heaven’s name does he expect to find flowers here?’

‘I asked him the same, but . . I had intended coming to see you last night, you know.’

‘That was very good of you, but there was really no need—’

‘No, Hervey, not about your good news, but rather about our misfortune.’

‘I don’t follow.’

Seton Canning took a deep breath. ‘Look here, sir: how long are we to suffer that man?’

Hervey quickened, but then gave him the benefit. ‘Which man?’

‘Towcester, of course! He’ll be the death of—’

‘Mr
Canning
!’ Hervey’s tone managed reprimand, surprise and disappointment in one go.

‘It’s no good, Hervey. We can’t pretend we didn’t see what we saw. The man bolted!’

‘That is not true, Canning!’

‘Oh, Hervey! Have it that way if you will, but if you hadn’t barred his way he would have fled!’

Hervey had known this might come. The last twelve hours had merely been an unexpected suspense. But it made it no easier. ‘Sit down, Harry.’

Seton Canning took off his gloves and laid them in his lap with his forage cap. ‘Please don’t speak of the necessity of loyalty, Hervey. I know full well what you might say on that account. I’m your lieutenant. Like it or not the men look to me when . . . when they feel unease with . . .’

‘With their captain?’

‘No . . . not that. Surely you know what I mean?’

Hervey did. He might say, though, that that was the true price of a lieutenancy, not the cash sum which the agents demanded. But he had learned enough these past three years to know that that would sound like cant. ‘You will have to trust me, Harry. I can say no more.’

‘Of
course
I trust you, Hervey! The whole troop would follow you over those damned falls if you led them!’

It was only yesterday that Hervey had had the same sentiments for Joseph Edmonds and Edward Lankester. They, of course, would have known how to act. Major Edmonds would have taken the affair head-on. There would have been blood on the stable floor, so to speak, but the matter would have been resolved. Captain Lankester would have found an altogether different way – subtle, indirect – and would have succeeded with patrician ease. It was not by fear that Hervey shied from Edmonds’s direct approach, or from distaste that he eschewed Lankester’s indirect methods. It was just that he lacked the certainty for the first, and the craft for the second. And there was no other way. Yet his troop evidently expected him to find one. ‘If I have the troop’s trust, why did you feel it necessary to speak thus, Harry?’

Seton Canning picked at imagined idle ends on his cap. ‘Perhaps I didn’t trust myself.’

Hervey sighed. Why did his lieutenant imagine himself alone in this? ‘We all have our doubts, Canning. All we can do in the end is hope for the grace to do our duty.’

A week passed, a week of guards, drills and fatigues – of nothing more, indeed, than a week at Hounslow would likely bring, except that a great number of the fatigues were as a consequence of the
bitter chill, worse now than when they had arrived. They shovelled snow, cut firewood and drew ice, as well as the hundred and one stable and cookhouse fatigues that detained so many of them, no matter where the station. It was hard labour. But it was no more than a homesteader thereabouts would be obliged to do. The Canadas were spoken of as a land of opportunity, but in the depths of winter it was first a question of survival. Yet on the whole the dragoons liked it. They fed well, the wet canteen of an evening was lively – the trappers passing through regaled them with extraordinary tales, as well as dispensing princely hospitality – and the parade hours were not long. In one sense, too, Hervey could not have imagined himself happier, except for the nagging question of his superior and the incident in the forest.

Hervey was not so proud that he ruled out talking of it with someone. The problem was, who? Lawrence had his own loyalties. Charles Addinsel was in Quebec with General Maitland, and anyway, as aide-de-camp his loyalties must be to his principal. The DAAG, he scarcely knew. He had even thought about Bagot, who was to return in a day or so from Sackett’s Harbour, where he had been inspecting the
New Orleans
. Hervey had very much taken to him. Bagot was not more than ten years his senior, and his wife, as the duke’s niece, would already have predisposed her husband to believe that his complaint would not be frivolous. Yet what should Bagot be expected to know of military particulars? As far as Hervey was aware, the man had never so much as worn a militia coat. And, besides the practical, how honourable was it to take the affairs of the regiment to one so wholly unconnected with it (less so even than Lawrence)? No, Mr Bagot would not do. Which left only those who shared the Roman six. The adjutant? It was unthinkable. Seton Canning? Unsupportable. Strickland was days away, as was the major. There was the chaplain, of course, the Reverend Mr Esmond Shepherd, MA Oxon., who had been unable to obtain a living for himself, and had taken his bishop’s advice instead to answer the call for military chaplains. He was a faithful man, he said morning and evening prayer conscientiously, he preached unmemorably but aptly at divine worship on a Sunday, he visited the sick, dined unobtrusively with the officers, and was treated kindly by the ranks but otherwise generally ignored. Hervey had some regard for him. Even now the chaplain was
preparing for the ministration of baptism that afternoon to their infant. And yet Mr Shepherd could offer him no more advice, surely, than that he must do his duty according to his conscience. Doing one’s duty was never as difficult as some supposed it to be. The difficulty lay always in determining what that duty was.