‘Yes, yes indeed. But I must admit to one doubt, however, and that is the hardiness of the mechanism as a whole. For campaign service, I mean. I have doubts that it would stand up to a dragoon’s rough handling. And might it not be susceptible to dirt causing the rotation to jam?’
Collier’s response was eager. ‘When clean, and with a little oil on the working parts, there is no reason for it to do so, though I concur that to allow a great ingress of dirt would be to risk such an outcome. I have fired forty- two rounds in rapid succession, pausing only to reload the cylinder, without interruption.’
Hervey was to some extent reassured, but there was no doubting the danger in having a weapon which might fail in the exigencies of campaign service. Damp powder was a bad enough risk already with the service flintlocks.
‘But you must not accept my word alone for it, sir. I would be most honoured if you would take the arm for a month’s trial, and at the end of that period I would beg the favour of your recommending it — if you were to feel inclined, as I’m sure you shall — to the Duke of Wellington.’
So here, at last, was Collier’s purpose revealed. But no matter, thought Hervey. If the weapon were to prove as capable as it now seemed then he would have every wish to recommend it. ‘Yes,’ he replied. ‘I should be most happy indeed. Though I must tell you that I am no longer on the duke’s staff; neither might my opinion be of any moment with him.’
‘I am content with that, sir. I would send it myself to the Ordnance, but I believe it would be the better for having an advocate.’
Hervey was enjoying his celebrity. ‘Very well, Mr Collier. We shall see how it fares on Salisbury Plain.’
* * *
Next day Hervey woke early. Though the curtains were full-closed he could see it was not yet light, although there was already a noise of carting in the street. He thought to light a candle to see the time, but with a sick feeling he recalled that he no longer had a watch. He had ordered tea and shaving water to be brought at a quarter to seven, and a bath at a quarter past, so there seemed no great need for him to do anything but enjoy the remaining repose — such as might be with the noise of the carting traffic and the chorus of birdsong growing by the minute, dominated as the latter was by the far from melodious starlings.
He lay musing at how queer it was that so unbecoming a bird should have so pretty an egg. What had happened to his collection of them, he wondered? He had amassed so many in Horningsham before going to Shrewsbury. There were only two more days to the Ides, now. Such a time it would be in Wiltshire for natural history. The woodpigeons would have begun their soaring and their clapping and diving. There would be redwings and fieldfares getting ready to go north again after winter. And very soon — perhaps already — they would be replaced by sand martins come from Africa. These would be feeding high still, above the Wylye and the lake at Longleat, before returning to the crags to dig out last year’s nest holes. Might he get home in time to see the first swallows? The beginning of April was their habitual season. How dull might seem the village plumage after India, though.
Those garden birds would even now be courting a mate — and threatening their rivals — for tomorrow was a full month after St Valentine’s day. It was the better part of two years since his own affiancing, and he had not been able to make even one Valentine gift to Henrietta. Since his arriving in Paris, on the second of the month, where the duke had given him leave to proceed home, he had sent three expresses to Horningsham (or rather one to Horningsham and three to Longleat), the most recent only this last evening. But he had had none by return. There again, he had perforce changed his quarters so frequently and without notice that none could have found him. And in this latest express he had been able to say only that he fervently hoped to be in Wiltshire soon, and depending only on the Earl of Sussex’s pleasure (not that he truly expected a significant delay). Beyond that, what could he do but trust in Henrietta’s patience and say his prayers? And think of her, over and over again. Think of when they had enjoyed the woods and meadows of Longleat, first in childish innocence and then in faltering courtship. She had teased him when a child and tormented him when full-grown. Horningsham was Henrietta as much as it was his family.
Meanwhile the morning was fast advancing. His bath had not been as warm as he had hoped, and the fire — for which he had tipped one of the club’s servants handsomely to have banked up — was more smoke than flame, and certainly very little heat. Perhaps it was not really so chill, but his blood was still accustomed to the warmth of Madras, and a fresh March morning in London was not to be underestimated. He had shivered more than once. But a breakfast of kidneys and eggs and toasted bread (and coffee exemplary hot) had set him to rights, and he left for Albany feeling comfortable enough without a surtout.
The Earl of Sussex received him promptly. ‘My dear Captain Hervey, I am very glad we are met at last,’ he said, holding out his hand and, despite his years and a leg which a musket ball at the Helder had rendered half useless, closing briskly with him. ‘Sit you down, sir; sit you down!’
A footman placed a chair adjacent to the earl’s, and Hervey did as he was bid.
‘I generally have sherbet at this time. My digestion is not what it was. But yours, I should imagine, is plenty robustious. Would you care for Madeira?’
Hervey most certainly did. It was a taste to which he had become happily accustomed in Captain Peto’s company to and from the Indies.
‘I am very glad you are come this morning. You will not have heard of Huntingdon’s son. Killed in the streets yesterday with the regiment, trying to quell a riot. It has saddened me more than I can say.’
‘I did know, Colonel. Indeed, I saw the riot.’ He thought it of no purpose to add that he had gone to Guy’s Hospital that evening, too.
‘Shall you stay to luncheon and tell me of it?’ said the earl, with evident sadness. ‘Young Wymondham was my godson.’
Hervey accepted readily. It was a handsome invitation, even with so sorrowful a purpose.
‘Let us postpone talk of it until then, and stay instead with pleasanter thoughts,’ the earl suggested. ‘We have not met before, and I much regret it. But it is not, perhaps, so curious — these last tumultuous years and all. I do, though, make it a rule to receive my officers on gazetting. In fact
‘Indeed, your lordship. It is well known.’ The Earl of Sussex was an assiduous colonel in this respect, as every other. Only the exigencies of war had distanced him from his beloved Sixth.
‘I remember your nomination for a cornetcy well. By Pembroke’s hand. No little recommendation, that. If I remember rightly, he said words to the effect that he did not think Wilton House had ever had a better pupil!’
Hervey felt himself redden. ‘Lord Pembroke was very kind, sir. He allowed me much time in the company of his riding master.’
‘Foreign, I suppose?’
‘Yes, sir — Austrian.’ Hervey smiled, noting the sigh in Sussex’s question.
‘Now when did that occur? The cornetcy, I mean.’
‘Eighteen hundred and eight, sir. I was but seventeen.’
The earl took a sip of his sherbet. ‘So you were at Corunna?’
‘I was, sir.’
‘Did you see anything of Moore?’
‘Oh yes, sir. He was everywhere.’
‘So I heard tell. I wonder if Wellington would have got the army had he lived.’
It was a question posed often enough, but not one Hervey felt able to address in his circumstances. ‘I saw rather more of General Crauford, sir, for we were with his division some of the way through the Astorgias.’
‘Black Bob? And was he as fearsome as his name?’
‘I think his men were more terrified of him than of the French — the officers especially.’
The Earl of Sussex seemed to be deep in thought. ‘And then you were at Ciudad Rodrigo, and saw the lines of Torres Vedras.’
Hervey nodded. This much was what all of them in the Sixth had seen.
‘And then at Albura, and you greatly distinguished yourself at Salamanca.’
Hervey, proud to be so recognized, and by the colonel whom he had never before met, was nonetheless discomfited by the approbation.
But the Earl of Sussex had not finished. ‘And you showed great dash, and no little resolve, at Vitoria. At
