exclaimed Hervey.
‘I couldn’t. That is where he always sits.’
Hervey smiled. ‘Then I wish you had met the duke’s chief of intelligence. You would have had much to speak of in the question of humbug.’
‘You cannot be sure that I have not.’
Hervey narrowed his eyes mockingly, but he was largely hoist on his own device, for secrecy in such matters was the very essence of intelligence work. ‘No, you are right. I cannot be sure.’
‘Calculation and just the right degree of humbug. That would be the essence of intelligence work, would it not?’
‘I suppose so. And am I to calculate now?’
‘There is nothing to calculate, Matthew,’ insisted Emma, turning to her husband. ‘Really, Eyre! I think there must be more to the skills required than being an ornithologer.’
At dinner Hervey had noticed how much of a teasing dominance Emma had achieved. It appeared to be in direct proportion to Somervile’s own diminution in dispute, and left the impression of a thoroughly happy balance. Theirs was indeed an altogether admirable union.
Two days later, Hervey was standing at the rails of the sandy arena which served as the summer riding school in the cavalry lines. In a couple of hours’ time, mid-morning, the place would be a great cloud of dust if so much as a single horse trotted its four corners. But the bhistis had been at work from soon after dawn, and would bring their watering cans in continuous relays to damp down the manege until the sun drove all to seek the shade. Hervey knew it would get hotter, too. This May heat was nothing compared with the heavy air that would settle on them before the monsoon broke, although, being close to the sea, their discomfort would be minor compared with the garrisons on the plain further west. It was difficult to imagine that the Calcutta garrison would have need of the big, whitewashed stone school which served all three regiments during the winter. Not that the regiment was labouring greatly in the heat, Hervey had been pleased to observe; the weeks coming up through the Indian Ocean had served to acclimate both men and horses well. He had five men sick this day, probably no more than would have been the case in Hounslow, although the surgeon’s prognosis in the case of Private Carrow was not good. Poor Carrow had not seen India other than the inside of the isolation hospital. He had been laid low with a fever since the transports had entered the Hooghly, and had been taken off by stretcher in a delirium as soon as anchor had been dropped. It was the last thing that Hervey had wanted, for the smiting of Carrow as soon as they had come within breath of the land had put a terrible fear into the troop. Even ‘Chokey’ Finch, old Indiaman that he was, had been unable to shake off the dread that they would all be taken by the Hooghly’s notorious miasma before laying a foot ashore.
But Finch had rallied after a few days, and with Chokey Finch in decent spirits once more, the others had soon followed suit. Hervey congratulated himself on persuading B Troop’s captain to give him up to E, for an old sweat had good tricks to teach as well as questionable ones. Watching his troop at riding school, and with a heavy heart, Hervey wished he had a dozen more sweats. Before leaving Hounslow the new men had had a rude introduction to military equitation at the hands of the rough-riders, just enough to make them secure at the trot; but now they looked like raw recruits again.
‘Three months at least before a field day I reckon,’ opined Serjeant-Major Armstrong, taking off his watering cap and mopping his brow with his cuff. ‘But some of them have the makings, for sure. “Boiler” Smith can sit secure, as you’d expect. And Rudd has a good seat, and Wainwright too. And neither of them had been on a horse before. It was worth going to Wiltshire just for those two. And Shepherd Stent’s at home in the saddle, except that he won’t do as he’s told. Look at that leg!’
It was not where it should be, that much was certain. Yet Hervey observed that he had his mount in hand.
‘Get them ’eels down, number three, and the leg where the girth is!’ bellowed Rough-Rider Serjeant Smollet. ‘This is His Majesty’s Light Dragoons, not a flock of sheep drovers!’
‘Six months was what the colonel said we could have. It certainly won’t be a
‘You just missed French. I’d be the first to say I judged him too hasty. That lad puts everything he has into it.’
Hervey agreed. No one had worked harder than French on the voyage out. It could not have been easy for a youth of evident education to be below decks. ‘He seems very content in his lot. Yet I believe him to have ambition.’
‘Oh, I hope so, sir. Mind you, it’s your credit for things, getting him to teach the likes of Mole to write. Have you seen how they look at him? As if he’s a corporal already.’
Hervey smiled a little with satisfaction. ‘But I was wrong about Sisken.’
Armstrong sighed. ‘Ay, well … I could’ve insisted more.’
They watched a while longer in silence.
‘Half the trouble is those remounts,’ said Hervey, after the second of the ‘Warminster pals’ had dismounted involuntarily. ‘They’re as green as the recruits.’
‘Well, I doubt we’ll see better this side of Christmas, no matter what the RM says. Them ’Indoo ’orse next door reckon they’ve scoured the country from here to Lucknow and still haven’t enough.’
Without a doubt, thought Hervey, these were the poorestlooking troop-horses since the Peninsula — and very disobliging. ‘I don’t understand it. I saw more quality in the rajah’s stables in Chintal than I’ve seen in years.’
‘Word in the bazaars is that the agent’s got the option on every screw in Bengal.’
Hervey sighed. ‘It’ll be a sorry affair if we have to go and find our own remounts as well as recruits.’
They watched as the ride changed reins. A third ‘pal’ slid to the ground, bringing a welter of expletives from the rough-rider serjeant. The Sixth’s methods were thoroughly modern, but a dragoon who would not keep his horse between himself and the ground must be put in no doubt as to his delinquency.
‘You missed the best, sir.’
‘Indeed?’
‘McCarthy. The footiest man on a horse you ever saw. But by God he’s determined. As soon as he’s proficient we should make him corporal. Collins says he’s like lightning with firearms.’
‘And Caithlin likes him.’
‘She does.’
‘I think it settled then,’ he said with a smile, but hardly surprised — that affair in France, the only cool head in the company. ‘I’d dearly like to know how he lost his rank.’
‘Fighting, for sure. Like every other Paddy. What
As far as the barrack-room was concerned, Private Dodds might as well have been christened ‘BC’ as branded it.
‘Well, it will out sure enough, and probably soon. And you can tell me you warned as much.’
Before Armstrong could protest, Hervey saw the commanding officer approaching, and with him the RSM.
When the colonel had closed with them the officers exchanged salutes, and the serjeant-majors stood to attention as was the Sixth’s custom.
‘Some way to go, I think,’ said Colonel Lankester, with a bemused look.
‘I think so too, Colonel,’ replied Hervey, managing not to frown too much. ‘We shall need our six months.’
‘Mm.’
Hervey looked at Lankester uneasily.
‘I shall need to “borrow” your troop, shall we say, somewhat earlier than that.’
‘Indeed, Colonel?’
‘Nothing too serious, Hervey. I shouldn’t worry about it. The Governor-General wants to stage a demonstration, as he puts it. The last of the Pindaree forts was overcome last month and he wants to send a message to all the spies in the city.’
‘When, Colonel?’
