A Close Run Thing

‘Oh, not my words, Mr Hervey — Horace Walpole’s. No, of all theories I think the Danish is the least convincing. There is sufficient literary evidence to suggest it is much earlier.’

‘Then, what do you think is the explanation of the stones, sir?’ Hervey pressed.

‘Well, I consider that Mr Aubrey’s study is the most scholarly. He suggests that the henge is a religious site of the Ancient Britons and their priesthood, the Druids.’

‘Ritual sacrifices?’ said Hervey.

‘I fear so.’

But for sheep beyond the cursus, and the footmen, the four were quite alone. Sitting in the middle of the stone circle after their luncheon, even with so much Longleat finery, it was not difficult perhaps to imagine these Druids, especially since John Keble seemed to know so much about their religion, its rites and ritual. Elizabeth and Henrietta wished to view the circle from one of the tumuli, leaving Hervey and Keble to the Druids and a last glass of Madeira. When they were gone, John Keble interrupted his own speculation on the nature of primeval belief to ask Hervey so direct a question that the latter was all but stunned. ‘Mr Hervey,’ he began, fixing him with a benignant expression that belied his junior years, ‘you are, I perceive, much troubled by your affections for Lady Henrietta. Are you uncertain of them, by some chance?’

Hervey made not a sound.

‘Permit me, my friend, but is it — as I suspect — that you are not able sufficiently to discern what is love and what is merely admiration? Do not misunderstand me, mind, for there is infinitely much that a man might admire in Lady Henrietta — and love might follow as a consequence. Yet, it seems to me, after so many brutal years in Spain one might be inclined to be enamoured of something merely because it stands in such contrast to the brutish.’

Hervey smiled thinly. ‘You have said “merely” twice, sir; I wish it were indeed thus!’

John Keble smiled, too, but warmly.

‘Holy, fair, and wise is she;

The heaven such grace did lend her,

That she might admired be.’

Hervey threw his head back, smiling broadly:

‘Is she kind as she is fair?

For beauty lives with kindness.

Love doth to her eyes repair,

To help him of his blindness …’

‘Bravo, Mr Hervey! We are two gentlemen indeed, if not actually of Verona. But permit me to make one more observation on the matter of searching for perfection — and a profound one, I trust. At the beginning of the gospel which bears your name, the apostle sees fit to place the genealogy of our Saviour, and in it are the names of four women: Tamar, Rahab, Ruth and Uriah’s wife, Bathsheba.’ Hervey studied him intently as John Keble’s expression turned to one of even greater warmth. ‘Tamar’s sins we both know of, as indeed we do Rahab’s; Ruth was an alien, and Bathsheba was both adulteress and conniver to murder. Yet these women are of our Lord’s family. I commit this to your reflection, Mr Hervey.’

Never before had Hervey considered the passage in more than the driest genealogical terms, but before he was able to reflect, or even to make some interim acknowledgement to this man whose charity now seemed as great as his incisiveness, the contemplative peace of the stone circle was broken by the return of his sister and Henrietta.

‘Mr Keble,’ began Elizabeth ‘my companion is tired of the sun. Would you hold my parasol while I sketch the stones?’

John Keble agreed readily.

After they were gone, and after an even longer silence, Henrietta asked: ‘Is it not perfectly horrid to imagine human sacrifice in this very place?’

‘It is; horrid,’ Hervey agreed, somewhat abstractedly.

‘But, if there were sacrifices, there must surely have been weddings here, too!’ she added brightly. ‘Do you not think it a perfectly wonderful idea to be wedded in such a place, the stones draped with mistletoe perhaps?’

Hervey was startled. ‘I … I had not thought of it,’ was all he could manage by reply.

‘What? Had not thought of marriage, or not of such a thing in this place? Surely you do not lack heart?’

The mocking again — why did she taunt him so? He said what first came into his head (and cursed himself as he did so): ‘Are you thinking of such a place for marriage with Mr Styles?’

‘Matthew,’ she began quietly, ‘how could you possibly have supposed that I should wish to marry Hugo Styles?’

He struggled for some explanation. ‘Well, I … that is,’ he stammered. ‘That day in the park when you read from your novel — you seemed to be suggesting—’

‘Suggesting what?’ she continued softly.

‘You seemed to be suggesting that a yeomanry officer was irresistible — something about regimentals, and the ladies of the district or whatever. I took it to mean that you referred in particular to Styles. He has a very handsome income at least, has he not?’

‘Matthew,’ she said with a smile, taking no apparent offence at his actuarial recommendation, ‘have you since read Pride and Prejudiced?’

‘No, I—’

‘Well, go and do so!’ she laughed. ‘At least, read that passage carefully when they are all at Meryton, the one I read aloud that day — chapter six or seven, I think it is!’

More riddles. Why? How was he to discover her meaning? Was it merely that a spoiled existence was to be relieved by dallying? Or was this sumptuousness around them another kind of riddle, a sign of the gulf between them perhaps? However close their childhood in that schoolroom, and however close Henrietta’s friendship with Elizabeth, perhaps that gulf were so wide as to be a chasm, unbridgeable. It was a wretched, hopeless conclusion, and he lapsed into unhappy silence.

As if then, at some unheard trumpet-call, Serjeant Armstrong, who had so far dutifully stood aloof (indeed, unseen — on the instructions of the lady’s maid), now appeared from between two of the sarsens. And never had Hervey been so pleased by his appearing, for it reminded him of the promise of their return to the regiment, and the promise of— What? Relief from the necessity of confronting these other … intrusions?

Henrietta seemed equally delighted. ‘Serjeant!’ she called, ‘come here and give us your opinion.’

In God’s name, thought Hervey, was he now to be humiliated by having his serjeant drawn into this? He made to protest, but—

‘Serjeant, we have been discussing these stones. Could they have had some military purpose, do you think?’ asked Henrietta.

Relief coursed through him.

‘I couldn’t honestly say, miss,’ began Armstrong, ‘but a circle’s a powerful defensive position, for sure.’

‘Could you imagine that the circle was used for sacrificing maidens to pagan gods?’ she asked, smiling coyly.

And, with the sure coup d?ceil that had so evidently deserted Hervey, Armstrong smiled, too, pausing only for an instant: ‘Not if they were as bonny as you, miss!’

Hervey was dumbstruck as Henrietta shrieked with laughter.

Three days later Elizabeth made the shortest entry in her journal in many months:

August 28th, St Augustine’s Day