A Regimental Affair

where it will all end!’

‘Mama,’ protested Elizabeth. ‘You cannot blame Mr Keble. Father has held these opinions for many years before he visited with us. You may as well blame the Jesuit at Wardour, for Father has dined with him many more times than he has ever spoken with Mr Keble.’ It was well known in the village — and therefore in the diocese — that the Reverend Thomas Hervey had for many years enjoyed monthly conversation with Father Hazelwood. It was even supposed by some that these were occasions for auricular confession, and yet this had never given offence (as far as the family was aware), for such was Mr Hervey’s genuine piety and devotion to his parish. It was true that he had some years ago written a monograph on the life of Archbishop Laud, but since it remained unpublished its support for Laudian excesses could only be imagined.

‘Well, we may say goodbye to all hopes of preferment at any rate,’ complained Mrs Hervey. ‘We shall not see even a canon residentiary now!’ And with that she rose and left the room.

Elizabeth knew that her father had long considered himself past all preferment, but she was also aware that her mother still entertained some hope of easeful retirement in a cathedral close, and it had occurred to her more than once that her own life might take a more lively turn were she to be translated thus. And much as Hervey would have been loath to quit the place in which he had been born, he too had hoped that his father might see out his days in such comfort, for there was little enough prospect that the modest family annuity would allow him to do so.

It appeared that John Keble had visited twice while he had been away, and Elizabeth had been to his priesting at Trinitytide the year before. Hervey imagined that to his father the young clergyman was a remembrance of his elder son. Hervey had also imagined some attachment forming with Elizabeth, for in John Keble’s letter to him (a most welcome poste restante in Paris) there was mention of quitting Oxford — and therefore its rule of celibacy — for his curacy in the Cotswolds. But it was evidently not so. Devoted to her father though Elizabeth was, there were evangelical sentiments in her which might in any case militate against such an alliance. She read Hannah More copiously, and had only recently declined a position out of Clapham with the Society for Returning Young Women to their Friends in the Country; not out of any qualmishness, but from a conviction that her father and mother had need of her.

With their mother gone, Hervey thought he might change the subject. ‘How are your good works in the town, Elizabeth?’

‘Never in all our years at Horningsham has there been such distress,’ answered his sister solemnly. ‘The marquess has set in place a system of relief, but it does not extend beyond the estate, and so many were the calls on the parish last year that funds were exhausted before harvest time. Warminster Common is become more than ever a refuge for beggars and every kind of felon.’

Hervey could easily believe it. At the time of his going to the Sixth it was known to be a fencing-crib for the three counties.

‘Gangs now maraud from there. They take the game, sometimes quite openly, at Longleat. Daniel Coates sat three times each week with the other magistrates last month, and still there is no end to the lawlessness. Father will not allow me to visit, though.’

‘And how should your being allowed to visit the common prevent this?’ Her brother frowned sceptically.

‘I do not for one minute think that it would. My concern is for the children who are being raised in that depravity. And Daniel Coates believes there should be a mission there too.’ Elizabeth knew this recommendation would turn her brother’s opinion.

‘I shall see Daniel this morning. He’s coming to look over Jessye.’

‘Do you know he is the owner of three brewing houses now?’

‘Which keep his bench well supplied with miscreants of a Monday, no doubt!’ joked Hervey.

Elizabeth returned his smile, for she was not so much an evangelical as to be an advocate of temperance.

Hervey was pleased, for with a smile her face became pretty, and he still entertained hopes of a husband in regimentals rather than clericals.

‘He is the only farmer hereabouts who has managed to keep all his labourers in work these past two years.’ Elizabeth said it with real pride, as if Coates were family. ‘He has not dismissed a single one. Indeed, he has even engaged some of the wretched Imber shepherds, so much in need of relief were they.’

‘Well, I’ll be very much interested to learn how he has been able,’ replied her brother. ‘For everything I read is of depression in that business.’

She frowned. ‘It’s an ill thought that with peace there comes a fall in demand for the county’s wool. I hope we shall never come to be thankful for war as the means of providing for our working men.’

‘Let us hope not,’ he agreed. ‘Though I should sooner see sturdy men in a red coat — with the colours, that is — than have them without work. There are men in scarlet begging along every road from here to London.’

‘I can believe it, for there are several in Warminster, and a sorry sight it is too. They would at least be provided for in the army. And they would be under discipline. I confess I am sometimes a little afraid of them in the town now. And that was never so before.’ She poured him more tea and then for herself. ‘By the by, Matthew, do not take against Mr Keble for this business of Father’s. I truly believe there is not any guilt attached to him in this — if guilt, indeed, be the right notion.’

‘No,’ sighed Hervey. ‘I don’t suppose I should have been inclined to think Mr Keble guilty. How is he?’

Elizabeth frowned again. ‘I think he is well, though his eldest sister suffers ill health still. You did know, did you not, that a younger one died of consumption?’

Hervey did not. He had written to Keble from London but a fortnight ago: he hoped the letter did not intrude on any grief. ‘When did this happen?’

‘Two summers past — the time, in fact, that he stayed here.’

That was a mercy in its way, thought Hervey, though he had written to him several times from Ireland unconscious of his grief. ‘I had no way of knowing when I wrote to him later. And he said nothing by return.’

‘Then he will presume you still do not know.’

‘I shall write to him at once. I should very much like to see him again.’

The younger Towle girl, elevated to parlourmaid since last Hervey had been home, came with the news that Mrs Pomeroy was returned. The household would no longer be reliant on extemporary measures in the kitchen, therefore. ‘Well, Matthew, shall you join us for a proper dinner this evening?’ asked Elizabeth. ‘Or do you expect to dine at Longleat?’

‘I really cannot say,’ he said, reddening a little. ‘I still don’t know that Henrietta will return today. Tomorrow is the more likely.’

Moreover, he was by no means certain that Henrietta’s return would bring an invitation to dine. Indeed, nothing had discomposed him quite so much of late as the anxiety that his sweetheart might jilt him. And now his father’s troubles with the bishop seemed to threaten his happiness even if she did not, for if the Reverend Thomas Hervey were dispossessed of the living, then his son would be obliged to support the family — with the very means he required to keep a wife.

Hervey looked long at Elizabeth as she gave Hannah Towle instructions. Might she not at least be able to set his mind at rest on the first question? He had never been able to fathom the true extent of his sister’s intimacy with Henrietta, the two being so different that he could not imagine on what basis their familiarity proceeded. In truth, he invariably underestimated their connection, though it made little odds, since asking his sister about his fortunes in love would have been entirely ignoble to him.

Two years of absence suddenly seemed a long time. If Henrietta had changed, then perhaps Elizabeth had too. Hervey’s mother had told him that despite what she was sure had been the pressing attentions of three suitors — of whom Lord John Howard had been one — Elizabeth showed no signs of accepting any offer of marriage. He was sad of it, for his leaving Horningsham with Henrietta would be to make a lonely woman of his sister, now especially that their brother was dead. And, indeed, if the business with the bishop went ill for their father, who could tell what would become of the family?

‘Did you hear what I said, Matthew?’

He was brought rudely back to the present. ‘No, er… I…’

‘I said that there is one about whom you have not yet asked.’ He looked puzzled.

‘Mrs Strange: I saw her yesterday. She asks to be remembered to you.’

He had not forgotten. He had enquired of her of both his mother and father, but their replies had not yielded