‘You look puzzled, brother. It is not ill news surely?’ asked Elizabeth, sipping her unsweetened tea with no great relish.
‘It is from my major. I am to rejoin the regiment in Cork within ten days,’ he replied.
‘But you were expecting these orders, were you not?’
‘I was, but there is something more. It seems that Major Edmonds — he is acting as officer commanding since the lieutenant-colonel was wounded in France — it seems that he had asked the colonel to secure me an appointment at the Horse Guards, but that this had not proved expedient.’
‘But that is surely a most agreeable compliment, is it not, Matthew?’ she asked, further puzzled by his want of enthusiasm.
‘Perhaps so, but the major said nothing of this to me, and it astounds me that he should think I might welcome such a preferment. It is almost as if he wished positively to see me away from the regiment.’ He knew, or at least confided, that this latter could not be so. Curiously, however, he sensed that, if the choice had been his now, then it might indeed have been for London rather than for Cork. For, much as the Sixth meant to him, at that moment the thought of quitting Horningsham for so distant a station as Cork, without resolving his feelings for Henrietta Lindsay, filled him with profound gloom. Had he now been with the regiment he would have been able to do what he had always done when troubled: he would have thrown himself at once into an excess of duties, not emerging until he was quite sure that his feelings were, like some difficult remount, in hand. But he was not with the regiment, and the feelings were not, in truth, an unwelcome intrusion. Elizabeth sensed all this better than he might have supposed, but again she said nothing.
‘I think I shall ride out on the plain a while,’ he said suddenly, almost jumping from his chair. ‘Shall you come with me?’
She declined, however, judging the invitation to be but politeness. ‘But call, do, on Daniel Coates, Matthew. He is ever wise in all matters,’ she urged.
He went to the stables, saddled Coates’s bay and within the hour he was on the downs, walking along the scarp with its distant views of Somerset, the Bristol road, and beyond, he supposed, to Cork. In some way or other he had imagined the ride might clear his mind, or steel him perhaps to what he must do. But the purpose was unaccomplished, for as he turned back at Wadman’s Coppice all he had succeeded in doing was to identify, by a process not unlike the appraisal of some military problem, two equally impaired options. First, he might proceed to Cork and put Henrietta Lindsay from his mind. The flaw in this, it was soon apparent, was that he did not possess the initiative in matters of the mind. Alternatively, he might make his still-indistinct feelings known and leave for Cork with some understanding between them. Here, however, the flaw seemed even greater, for he was near- certain that his feelings must be wholly unreciprocated — or else he might be deemed unsuitable by the marquess who, though no longer strictly her guardian since she had come of age, was unquestionably a man whose blessing must be sought. But in truth the real impediment was an incapacity to press himself with Henrietta, especially in light of her attachment, however imprecise, with Styles.
For a while he contemplated returning via Drove Farm, where he hoped Daniel Coates’s wisdom might extend to matters of this kind. But their talk had always been of the soldier’s art and of horses, and there was no reason to suppose that a facility with these might apply equally to his newer concern. Daniel Coates had, indeed, expressed himself only once on the subject: of soldiers marrying he had opined it ‘a cruel thing to make a camp- follower of a decent maid’. So instead Hervey made straight for Horningsham by descending the near-vertical sides of Arn Hill (it gave him cause to make much of the young gelding for his balance), and thence through Norridge Wood, the furthest place he and Henrietta had ventured on their childhood rambles together. (He could picture, with surprising recall, her old nurse huffing and puffing, and protesting at the distance they had brought her from Longleat.)
As he neared the edge of the estate he saw the yeomanry again, leaving the park, and they looked more than usually purposeful. He had not known they were to have a drill day and was surprised to see Styles at the head of them. ‘Haven’t time to dawdle with you, Hervey. There’s work to be done,’ he called loftily as they broke into a trot.
Armstrong rode up with a resigned look. ‘Afternoon, Mr ’Ervey sir. They’re off to sabre some poor noddleheads hereabouts.’
‘What?’
‘Seems there’s a gang intent on breaking up machinery at Hindon and the justices have called out the yeomanry. Mr Styles asked me to go with ’em but I said I’d rather not if he didn’t mind. An’ d’you know what he said? “Damn you for a Luddite yerself, Serjeant — or don’t the regulars have the stomach for it?”’
‘Ass!’ rasped Hervey.
‘Well, yer cannee get sense out’r haddock on a Saturday night,’ pronounced Armstrong in his broadest Tyneside. ‘An’ yer wastin’ yer time the rest o’ the week an’ all! Come on, sir, don’t worry about it. Come on back to me lodgings and we’ll toast the regiment.’
‘No, Serjeant Armstrong — tempted as I am. Orders for Cork have arrived: you and I are to be there in a week or so, and there is much to be done. And, besides, today is a fast day,’ he added with a smile.
Armstrong looked appalled. ‘Well, I for one will go and drink to our return to the regiment!’ he said, striking his boot with his whip. ‘Oh, an’ by the way, Miss Lindsay has been looking for you, and proper keen to see you she appeared to be.’
Hervey was at once quickened by this report, though he tried to look otherwise. ‘Very well, then, Serjeant, I am for home: I will see you at the Bell some time tomorrow or the day after when arrangements for Cork are made.’ And he turned the bay sharply back in the direction of the village, putting him into a fast trot.
He did not expect to encounter Henrietta so soon, but as he rounded a corner a half-mile on, he found her walking her hack, alone, in the same direction. His bay’s hoofs on the hard-baked road gave away his approach, and she turned. ‘Mr Hervey!’ she called, ‘I was on my way to ask Elizabeth and you to come with me to the great henge tomorrow. Shall you?’ she asked, in a manner altogether warmer than ever he had observed at the drill ground.
‘With the greatest of pleasure, ma’am. I have not seen the henge since we shared the schoolroom. I cannot speak for Elizabeth, of course, but I am sure—’
‘I am going that way,’ she replied. ‘I will ride with you and save you the trouble of sending word. Tell me, do you cherish those schoolroom days?’
He sighed to himself. She was the model of self-possession, more captivating than ever. Her riding habit was the same blue as the Sixth’s uniform, its finely cut bodice accentuating her slender waist, and the full skirt, reaching almost to the ground, was all elegance. Her black silk hat was oiled to a high gloss, her dark tresses were pulled back, and her blue eyes shone. ‘I might wish we were there still.’
Even as they rode to the village, however, his doubts began returning. Why had she chosen now to reveal a warmth hitherto concealed? It was not as if she had known he was about to leave. And when she had said ‘Poor Hugo will be away at Hindon for several days, I fear’, it seemed both invitation and caution. But was he under some obligation to Styles in the lieutenant’s absence in aid of the civil power? So many questions of propriety did the circumstances pose that instead he fell into silent confusion.
When, an hour or so later, Henrietta had left the vicarage with his sister’s acceptance of the invitation to the henge, he resolved to end his dilemma. ‘Elizabeth, I must speak with you about … that is, I should welcome your opinion as to …’ But he was again unable to summon the words.
Hervey was relieved that there was a fourth occupant of Henrietta’s barouche, and especially pleased with who the occupant was (the early return of Styles would have been more than he could have borne). The evening before, John Keble had called on his way to Oxford from Lyme Regis where he had been taking the sea air and writing poetry. At first Hervey had thought that the object of his calling might have been Elizabeth, for whom the poet seemed to have formed a strong regard at his first visit (and Hervey had begun increasingly to think that this would be a wholesome match). But John Keble had no other object but to deliver letters of introduction to several clerics beneficed in the neighbourhood of Cork and Dublin, a gesture of kindness for which Hervey made fulsome show of gratitude. And when Elizabeth had asked him to join them for the excursion to the henge Hervey, too, pressed him to accept, word being sent to Longleat that, with Henrietta’s leave, a man of letters would accompany them in the morning.
An hour or so before their barouche departed, another coach, not so grand but also bearing the Bath arms,
