A Call to Arms

years.

The duchess seemed to know his thoughts. ‘Yes, my dear, but I would not have had it any other way, even had I known what was to be its outcome.’

It was a simple truth, and Hervey saw that it applied to him in equal measure. His own surprise silenced him for the moment.

‘So I give thanks daily to the Almighty for those few years, my dear,’ continued the duchess, now placing her hand on his. ‘For they might never have been.’

When it came for them to leave, Shelley told Hervey he would not be able to join them the following morning, for there were lodgings by the Spanish Steps that he wished to look at. The two friends exchanged a few words on the suitability of the location, before bowing and bidding each other goodnight. When Hervey had retrieved his hat, he found he had fallen behind his sister in their farewells, and so he hurried past one or two dawdlers on the staircase to see Elizabeth at the door with Peto. The commodore had evidently said something amusing, for Elizabeth threw her head back and smiled broadly — laughed a little indeed. Hervey checked, an instinct saying he should not intrude. It was the first time he had seen Elizabeth smile quite like that, and the first he had seen Peto looking anything other than a man of the quarterdeck. Truly, it took him by surprise. And how foolish he would think himself, later that evening, when he turned the thought over in his mind. For of what property did he imagine Elizabeth and Peto to be beneath what they were obliged to show to the world? Peto was not married to the sea, for all the poetic attraction in that saying, and indeed for all Peto’s own protestations of it. And neither was Elizabeth his sister alone.

Despite these notions, however, and the thoughts which the duchess had planted in his mind, Hervey slept uncommonly well that night. He rose at seven-thirty next morning and went with Elizabeth to morning prayer at the Reverend Mr Hue’s new meeting rooms in Piazza Colonna Traiana. It was the second anniversary of his marriage, a union that had brought him unimaginable happiness and fulfilment, and he intended to give unequivocal thanks to the Almighty. It was a holy day too, the feast of Saints Philip and James, and there was an infectious exuberance about the people in the Corso even at this early hour.

Hervey and his sister were the only congregation as Mr Hue began to read the Sentences. ‘Rend your heart, and not your garments, and turn unto the Lord your God: for he is gracious and merciful …’

The rush-seat chairs held their backs erect, and the high ceiling was a sounding board for the minister, whose voice made full use of it. It was so far from the hushed ease of his father’s chancel, and yet the words of Cranmer spoke to them both, in the Pope’s very capital, as if they had been in Horningsham itself. Hervey was content, as if he were somehow awaiting the arrival of his bride. Indeed, he turned half-expectantly when he heard the scrape of feet as two more brethren joined them at the General Confession. At the Venite two sightseers joined them, curious. They all remained standing as the minister, in stark white surplice, began the Old Testament reading. ‘The spirit of the Lord God is upon me; because the Lord hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek; he hath sent me to bind up the brokenhearted … to comfort all that mourn … to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning.’

How apt did Hervey find Isaiah — always wise, always certain.

‘I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my soul shall be joyful in my God; for he hath clothed me with the garments of salvation, he hath covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decketh himself with ornaments, and as a bride adorneth herself with her jewels.’

How little had Henrietta needed to adorn herself with jewels! He could see her before him now as plainly as he had that day in the chapel at Longleat. He could almost reach out to touch her, as he had that day, when he had found a warmth in her hand that spoke more than any words might. For the rest of the office he heard little, neither readings, nor prayers, nor psalms, nor the comings of the faithful nor the goings of the sightseers. Only the familiar words of St Chrysostom recalled him, beseeching Almighty God to fulfil ‘the desires and petitions of thy servants, as may be most expedient for them’. Desires and petitions — how he prayed for their fulfilment.

Afterwards, as they walked back to their lodgings, Elizabeth took careful note of her brother’s mien without, she hoped, giving him the impression of study. She concluded — she hoped not overhastily — that it spoke of something different in his heart. So it seemed, too, for he announced with uncommon brio that they would take their breakfast at the Caffe Greco.

And at that place, amid the greater than usual bustle of a Roman festival, Elizabeth observed that her brother was indeed a blither spirit. He took notice of what was about him, and in an approving way, whereas at times before, when he had not been sunk in introspection, he had seemed positively to despise the exuberance of the Greco’s less contemplative patrons.

‘Shall you go to your secret garden with Mr Shelley today?’ asked Elizabeth brightly. ‘Or does Commodore Peto command your attendance?’

Hervey returned her smile, but wider. ‘Mr Shelley is looking at new lodgings this morning, near the Spanish Steps. He asked me to accompany him but I told him he would better take a sapper than a dragoon. He will make up his own mind whatever it is that I say.’ He cut into a crostata, and none too neatly: sugar and crumbs spread about the table, so that Elizabeth began sweeping them together with a napkin, and a sisterly frown. ‘Commodore Peto wants to go and see the graves of some sailors. Apparently there was an affair on the Tiber a few years ago, when the Navy saved the Pope’s treasure from Bonaparte’s men, or something very like it.’

‘I should like to see them too,’ said Elizabeth decidedly. ‘May I come with you? Is it far?’

‘Testaccio, the other side of the Aventine. I thought we would walk since he wants also to see the Circus Maximus, though I told him it was nothing but a cow meadow.’

‘Then I shall dress for a country walk. It will be pleasant to spend a day out of the city. Do you not find the constant noise wearying?’

Hervey looked as though it was the first time he had considered the noise.

‘I quite confess to missing silence. I had a mind, indeed, to seek out a convent for a few days.’

Hervey brushed more sugar and crumbs from his coat as he finished the crostata. ‘That might be apt, for I had a mind to go to Naples for a few days. I should very much like to see Peto’s command. Would that disappoint you? You could join us there later. The duchess said she would see Naples, and would welcome your company.’

Elizabeth was, in truth, disappointed, but she readily understood that her brother’s return to full spirits needed the attention of a man under orders, and that she would break that peculiar fellowship if she travelled with them. Indeed, her withdrawal to a convent for a few days had been designed principally with that fellowship in mind. She nodded in agreement at her brother’s proposal. ‘I do not want to leave this country without seeing Pompeii and Vesuvius, though. But there is plenty of time, is there not? Did we not also speak of taking a ship from there to Sicily en route for home when the time came?’

‘We did, and we shall. Goethe says it is not possible to understand Italy without seeing Sicily. And I think we must discover why.’

Elizabeth smiled. ‘Then I shall get me to a nunnery. The duchess is bound to know which one is suitable.’

‘Ah,’ sighed her brother. ‘The duchess has very decided opinions, does she not?’

She did indeed, thought Elizabeth. And her decidedness, though admirable, had made of her an exile, though it was of her own choosing and she was surrounded by attentive company if not actual friends. And she was a widow, not an old maid, taking obvious comfort in her former state. But Elizabeth still shivered at the eternal image of the ageing, friendless and, as she thought, childless singleton, for it was a spectre that began visiting females such as she, respectable women ‘out’ in society beyond the usual time and still without a lace cap.

When they returned to their lodgings that evening, around six, Elizabeth was tired and said she would take her supper in. Hervey said he would be glad to keep her company, for Peto had told him there were three days overdue in his ‘log’, and he did not allow himself four. ‘And I suppose I must reply very soon to this,’ he sighed, taking a letter from the writing table. ‘A second from Lord Sussex in as many months. He writes that the regiment is certain for India next year. He asks me once again to take a troop.’

Elizabeth, her bonnet already off and her hand on the door to her rooms, hesitated only for an instant. ‘I believe you should.’

Hervey looked at her intently.