subalterns come to ask if the scheme were still to be had, at which Hervey looked at his fellow captain and smiled. ‘Nothing so bad, d’ye suppose, as that day in —’ He could have said any number of places in Spain, sluiced top to toe with water colder than ice, but instead he chose to include them all, ‘— before Waterloo.’
Barrow nodded, but could not quite forbear to humble the lieutenants and cornets by saying that neither would there be lance-points pricking at them through the rain. They left sheepishly, no doubt to repeat the admonitions when they in turn received the enquiry from their juniors. When they had gone, Barrow declared that their concerns had been proper enough: the weather would take its toll of the men’s uniforms, and with the major general’s inspection so close it would mean more expense and trouble. In truth, Hervey had already been minded to abandon the scheme, but, on the other hand, so torrential a downpour — especially if it continued during the night — would test the squadron more than any general could. It would reveal what he must do in the short time before the inspection.
And so, in the middle of the following morning, they left the barracks, marched on parallel lines of advance to Chobham Common, throwing out scouts for five miles along the River Ash, finding fords and swimming points, and eventually occupied a vidette line on Oystershell Ridge at last light.
At midnight, Hervey and Barrow rode the line, finding varying degrees of vigilance, and at dawn they began a rearguard which took them back again to the river. There they picketed its bridges, ‘blowing’ them and retiring in the face of the ‘enemy’, and then galloped to seize them again. They proved their carbines soon after (the old hands largely with success, the young ones largely without), then Hervey and Barrow inspected every shoe, and were agreeably taken by the permanence of the farriery.
The rain had continued throughout the night with little respite, but it had stopped after first light. The sun soon had men and horses steaming before even the final gallop, so that if spirits had been at their lowest ebb before the false dawn, they were restored by the time Hervey’s trumpeter blew ‘cease firing’ just after nine. And those restored spirits were lifted still further when, after a short trot to the Red Maid at Bedfont, the quartermaster-serjeants turned out a warm bran mash for the troopers, and tea, rum, beef and potatoes for the dragoons.
On the ride back to Hounslow, Hervey and Barrow gave each other their opinions of the work. For the most part, Hervey’s estimation of B Troop was favourable, but Barrow’s of A Troop was markedly less so.
‘You’ve some clewed-up corporals,’ he said. ‘And Armstrong’s price’s beyond reck’ning, but it’s that serjeant-major of yours. Kendall just hasn’t the zeal for a troop, and it gets to the men. You need rid of him, and quickly.’
There was much else besides, little of it agreeable, so that stables was a muted affair when they got back to Hounslow; though Hervey’s dragoons seemed pleased enough, brightened by the exercise and the encouraging words he had managed to find to finish his otherwise critical peroration at stand-down.
He left the barracks an hour before watch-setting. He was late for dinner — very much later than he had anticipated — and he was discouraged by how unhandy the troop had become since Paris. If only the fourth piece of tape could be Armstrong’s instead of Kendall’s. He resolved to make it his first objective with Lord Towcester. And between now and the major general’s inspection he would have to use every spare minute to lick his troop into shape. And all he would have to do it with was the sand-table and his imagination.
Henrietta was already reconciled to the lateness of the hour, and she listened tolerantly to her husband as he scarcely drew breath while recounting the battle of Chobham Common, bidding her stay even as he took his bath, and then denying his hunger to explain how he intended arranging things better for Thursday’s inspection. She had long since dismissed her servants, and arranged a sideboard that would not greatly deteriorate by the hour: braised crab, fig-peckers, cheese, strawberries and claret.
‘Come,’ she insisted, when Hervey had said he would take only a minute or so to dress. ‘Put on your gown and come to eat. I have something to tell you.’ She kissed him on the lips, smiling conspiratorially, and led him to the dining room.
He took in the sideboard with some delight, if also with dismay, for while the champagne he had been sipping was an extravagance he might justify as a reward for his exertions, their supper seemed rather more than he deserved, or, indeed, could rightly afford.
‘Well, what is it which prevents my dressing?’ he teased, as he spooned some crab onto her plate.
‘Private Johnson is a very good sort,’ Henrietta began. ‘He spoke very freely, you know. He was not in the least bit ill at ease.’
Hervey smiled. He could well imagine it.
‘He told me that things are not at all happy in the barracks.’
‘But
‘But do you know that your Serjeant Armstrong’s wife has been teaching in the regimental school?
Hervey knew that, too. ‘But how does this make for unhappiness?’
‘Because Lord Towcester, when he learned of who she was, declared he would not have a papist — and an Irish papist at that — teaching the regiment’s children. Except that he apparently used words altogether too coarse to repeat.’
Hervey put down his knife and fork. Caithlin Armstrong was a well-read woman. He himself had introduced her to Greek. The regiment’s children would find no kinder or cleverer teacher — at least, for the modest outlay it was prepared to make. ‘I wonder that Serjeant Armstrong has not spoken of it.’ He sighed, a little bruised.
‘He has too strong a regard for you.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean that he would not wish you to risk Lord Towcester’s wrath when there is quite evidently little chance of his changing his mind.’
Hervey looked at Henrietta for a few moments, contemplating the suggestion. ‘What do
Henrietta did not answer at once, having achieved her purpose in alerting him to the news he would soon hear, while warning him against precipitate action. ‘Your Duke of Wellington would say so.’
Hervey was not so sure of that proposition; the duke’s views were sundry in the matter of Ireland. ‘How do you know?’
‘My guardian dined with him last year, and he was root and branch against removing the Penal Laws there.’
Hervey realized he had strayed from the point. ‘But I first asked what
‘Matthew, she is Irish, of the meanest sort. How can you presume her loyalty in all things?’
‘But plenty of Irishmen have spilled their lifeblood for England these past twenty years.’
‘And she is a Catholic. What sort of notions might she fill the children’s heads with?’
‘Oh, Henrietta —
‘I don’t suppose anything, Matthew. All I suggest is that with two such grounds for anxiety, Lord Towcester might be said to have just cause to be cautious.’
Hervey saw that yet again she had skilfully evaded his question. ‘You have
‘Ah!’ she smiled. ‘My opinion is that Caithlin O’Mahoney — Caithlin Armstrong — is a very dangerous woman. Look at the trouble she caused in Cork!’
Hervey went bright red and almost stammered. ‘That is very unfair — on
‘Matthew, sweetest, I only tease!’ Her smile revealed it, too.
He picked up a crab claw to compose himself. ‘Then tell me what is your true opinion.’
‘Why do you wish to know? My opinion cannot count for anything in such an affair.’
The crab claw shattered noisily, failing in the purpose for which Hervey had taken it up. ‘Why should a man not want his wife’s opinion?’ He was tired and Henrietta was trying him, for some reason or other. It was not the soldier’s welcome he had hoped for. ‘Why should a wife wish to withhold it, indeed?’
‘Because’ — Henrietta drew out the second syllable as if to emphasize her own dismay in his lack of perception — ‘she might be afraid of what her husband would do as a consequence. I mean, Matthew, that if I say I
