Hervey 09 - Man Of War (44 page)

His thoughts returned to Peto, however. His friend had no family – none to speak of: if he did not recover sufficiently for the Admiralty to employ him, in however sedentary an appointment, how was he to be attended? He had wealth enough, Hervey was sure: he would be able to engage such help as was necessary. But how might his
mind
be occupied? That was the material question. How might such a man as Peto, whose life had been spent at sea and in the habit of command – and, it had to be said, who had received the cruellest rejection from the woman who would have been his wife – how might such a man be kept from despair? Did his old friend, as did he, harbour hopes that Elizabeth, even at this hour, would have a change of heart?

He had not seen his sister since putting her into the chaise at Greenwich; she had not written to him, or communicated with him in any way. Nor he with her. Neither would he, indeed. It was unthinkable now. And yet in not many weeks’ time she would bring Georgiana to Hanover Square and see her brother married to the woman who would thereafter supplant her in the role of guardian.

In this, too, there lay a concern: he had not spoken with Georgiana of his intentions, where they would live, how things were to be arranged. He had left the explanations to Elizabeth, as he had so much, and yet he had given his sister little enough information with which to allay the anxiety that Georgiana might have – must have, indeed, at least in some small measure. Why did he see these things only now? He had not, in truth, discussed any arrangements with Kezia. He had thought vaguely of engaging a governess to accompany them to the Cape, but more he had not been able to turn his mind to.

That evening he and Fairbrother dined at Holland Park. Kat had pressed him hard to do so before the week was out, pleading imminent necessity of leaving for Warwickshire to visit with her sister. And she was – she insisted – determined to meet Fairbrother properly, ‘for he is evidently of singular virtue to have secured your friendship’.

The only other guest was a dowager Irish countess, a near-neighbour in Connaught, who had known Kat’s mother since childhood, and who now lived in semi-seclusion at Portland Place. She greeted Fairbrother with a most quizzical look, Hervey too, until after a while she appeared suddenly at ease. ‘So
you
are Captain Hervey.’

Hervey was puzzled; they had been introduced, and for some time – for a whole glass of champagne indeed (and Kat had distinctly pronounced his rank). ‘I am, Lady Ballindine, though in point of fact it is “Colonel”.’

‘But you were “Captain”, were you not, these many years past, when you wrote to Lady Katherine from India?’

Hervey stopped himself from clearing his throat; the Countess of Ballindine evidently knew something of their acquaintance, and he hoped she did not intend revealing all of it. ‘Yes, I was, your ladyship. I received my majority but a year ago, and acting rank at the Cape Colony.’

‘Whither he returns in but a few months, Aunt,’ explained Kat, raising her voice very slightly.

Hervey had surmised that Lady Ballindine’s hearing was faulty, but it did not entirely explain her expression of surprise. He was certain she must know of their . . . friendship.

‘And with a new wife!’ added Kat (and with exaggerated pleasure, thought Hervey).

Lady Ballindine eyed him most particularly. Hervey braced himself for an infelicitous question, but, having imperilled him in the first instant, Kat came to his aid. ‘When is the happy event to be, Colonel Hervey? Is a date resolved upon?’

Hervey swallowed hard, and hoped no one – Fairbrother especially – noticed. ‘The eighteenth of next month,’ he near-stammered, adding, for no reason he would be able to recall, ‘a Wednesday.’

‘In London?’

‘Yes.’

‘Are you able to be more
particular
?’

He cleared his throat. ‘Hanover-square.’

‘Oh, that is most agreeable – think you not, Aunt?’ She turned to Lady Ballindine with a distinctly conspiratorial smile, and then back to Hervey. ‘I shall be returned from Warwickshire then;’ (she paused) ‘I may take it that I
shall
be invited?’

Hervey now saw the net into which he had so obligingly stepped. In the company of an ‘aunt’, and Fairbrother, and the conversation heavy with overtone, like a huge rain-bearing cloud threatening to burst, there was not a thing he could do but concede the game. ‘Yes, indeed, of course . . . I would deem it a true blessing were you to attend, though it will be a very small wedding.’

‘Then I shall suspend all other engagements, my
dear
Colonel Hervey.’

He could not but admire, even as he despaired of it, Kat’s consummate skill in persuading a man of a course he would otherwise not choose to take, yet in a way that appeared his free choice alone. And so swiftly, so deftly, before even they were sat down to dine. It was, of course, the same skill that she had exercised so well to his advantage these several years; but he had never seen it played to Kat’s own advantage at his expense. A very little expense, it was true, for Kat’s presence at Hanover Square would be no occasion for concern (except, of course, that his sister believed she knew of their association), though it might be considered faintly distasteful – Kat’s sharing a ‘secret’ with the bridegroom. He sighed inwardly: these were the consequences of the life, the unwholesome life, he had drifted into –
descended
into, indeed.

But it would soon be put to rights by Holy Matrimony. For, as the Prayer Book proclaimed, was it not ‘ordained as a remedy against sin, and to avoid fornication; that such persons as may not have the gift of continency might marry, and keep themselves undefiled members of Christ’s body’? And if he was not entirely certain any longer of the claims of the Church, there were some practices which were proven by time. Of course, there were other causes for which Matrimony was ordained, said the Prayer Book, and these were by no means disagreeable to him; quite the contrary, indeed – in due season. But chiefly he sought, and confidently, the promises of the remedy, not so much against sin as its wretched consequences. He sought a simpler life in ‘the honourable estate’, and a better one for the child he neglected.

And he had no doubts, none at all, that Kezia Lankester was that remedy. A delightful remedy too, in the wait for which he could barely contain himself.

XXI
THE EYE OF THE BEHOLDER

London, 17 June 1828

Fairbrother stood winding his new hunter in the United Service’s hall. On the inside of the cover was engraved
EF from MH
, and he was still relishing the sentiment with which his friend had presented it to him the evening before. Hervey had spoken of the Cape, the Xhosa and the Zulu, of his gratitude for Fairbrother’s ‘singularly faithful and adroit service in the most dangerous of circumstances’; and most of all for his ‘companionship these latter months . . . forbearance and good counsel, support and . . . friendship’ which he confessed he had not imagined he would see so manifest again in any but Peto or Somervile. And now he, Fairbrother, waited, unusually, on his friend, who was invariably in advance of him. He was, however, early upon his hour; but he had business with Hervey’s tailor – a new coat, the final fitting for which had been most promising. He wished it done before midday, after which the two were to dine early with Hervey’s parents, and with Elizabeth and Georgiana, at Grillon’s Hotel in Piccadilly, where they were lodging, having arrived in the afternoon of the day before in a glass landau lent by the Marquess of Bath.

‘Forgive me; I had a letter for the agents,’ said Hervey, come at last.

‘It was an agreeable wait; I saw Lord Hill.’

‘Indeed?’

‘Was presented to him.’

‘How so?’

‘Your friend Howard. They are breakfasting now.’

Hervey hoped that whatever the deliberations were, they would not inconvenience Lord John Howard, who was to stand supporter at Hanover Square in the morning. ‘Well and good. Let us go to Gieve’s together, then.’ It was but the shortest of walks: he would in truth have preferred to take a turn about the park, but he had arranged to call at Russell Square with Georgiana at ten-thirty, and it was already twenty after nine. ‘You are certain there is nothing more I can do regarding Devon?’

Fairbrother had written to his father before leaving the Cape, informing him of his sojourn in England, and his father had secured an invitation to visit the relicts of his family in the West Country. He was at once delighted and apprehensive, but he had been determined to detach himself from his friend – and his friend’s new wife – for a decent period following the wedding. ‘Everything is arranged: the mail to Exeter, and from there I shall be conveyed to Crediton by my aunt’s carriage.’

‘I must hope you will not be
too
pleasantly detained there: I shall count on your arriving at Walden on the fifteenth.’

‘On the ides proximo: depend upon it.’

‘I shall. And . . . may I say again, my good friend, how prodigiously grateful I am that you will escort my people tomorrow.’

‘There is no cause for gratitude. I am honoured.’

But there was most particular cause. Hervey knew full well that Elizabeth wished Baron Heinrici to be invited, for, as she had insisted ‘he is soon to be your brother-inlaw, Matthew’. The idea was, however, unsupportable. He had no clear notion of what had passed between Elizabeth and Peto at Greenwich, but he was certain yet that she would come to her senses before it was too late. Which was why he must make sure there was no impediment to her doing so, and Heinrici’s attending at Hanover Square would undoubtedly be such an impediment. Fairbrother had, without doubt, been the very model of tact in this: Hervey knew that he owed much to the good offices of his friend in ensuring sufficient harmony for the wedding to be celebrated with all due decorum . . . and happiness. He squeezed Fairbrother’s arm.

* * *

The Hervey family was, indeed, much engaged this morning. The archdeacon was to call on his old Oxford friend (and as sometime vicar of Bradford Peverell, fellow Sarum priest), the Bishop of London. Dr Howley was soon to be translated to Canterbury, and Archdeacon Hervey wished to present him with a copy of his new-published (at last) monograph on Laudian decorum, as well as his felicitations. Mrs Hervey was still of a mind that such a thing was perilous: ten years before, her husband had been threatened with the consistory court on account of ‘popish practices’, and she saw no occasion for raising suspicions once more. She had decided to forgo accompanying the archdeacon to Aldersgate on account of the necessity of finding a milliner selling ribbon appropriate to her needs, for which neither Warminster nor even Bath had apparently been satisfactory. Elizabeth had her own calls to pay. And so Hervey was able to take his daughter from their charge with universal contentment.

‘I thought that we would walk,’ he said as they left Grillon’s. ‘It’s a fine morning, and but a mile or so to our destination.’

‘Oh yes, Papa,’ replied Georgiana, taking his hand. ‘I would see all there is to see!’ It was her first time in London proper. ‘Where do we go?’

He had thought carefully how he might broach the matter. He did not know quite why he was so determined that she should see the painting
before
the wedding, before she would have a new mother (have a mother, indeed, for she had never known one). It was, he supposed, some sort of desire for – as Kezia herself might put it – an appropriate ‘cadence’.

They crossed Piccadilly at a brisk walk, Hervey tipping the sweeper a penny, thence propelling Georgiana to his left, inside, hand. ‘We are going to see a portrait of your late mama. It was begun before you were born, and I learned of it but a month ago. It is by Sir Thomas Lawrence, who is a very great painter.’

‘Oh Papa! Have you seen it? Is it like her?’

He felt Georgiana’s hand squeeze his, and knew the keenest relief at her evident joy. ‘I have, and it is the very image of her, just as she was before . . . before we were wed.’

Georgiana bubbled with questions – how large was the portrait, where had it been all these years, what did her mother wear, did she stand or sit? And then, as if the thought came suddenly to her, she paused for a moment, and her voice changed. ‘But Papa, does it make
you
sad to see her?’

He had never imagined such a question of her, for he had never imagined her grown to such sensibility. It fair took him aback, and he was momentarily at a loss to make any reply. ‘I am very glad that it is discovered,’ he said, resolutely.

Georgiana knew that her father’s answer was an evasion of sorts, but she would not press him, for the evasion answered for itself.

When they arrived at Russell Square – it took them all of three-quarters of an hour to get there through the throng of pedestrians, drovers and carriages in Soho – they were received by a footman with whom Hervey had become almost familiar. He took them at once to the viewing room, where the canvas stood upon an easel, and then withdrew.

Georgiana advanced on the portrait in silence, and cautiously, as if she were to be presented. She gazed only at the face, and for a long while. Hervey stood back, not wishing in any way to influence her reaction, hoping, indeed, that she might forget he were there, so that he might see her true opinion, and not merely of the portraitist but of his subject.