'What are you hinting, damn you?' I said. 'Nothing at all. It is you who are imagining. Do you know, I believe you're jealous.'
'Jealous, by God! And what have I to be jealous about?'
'You should know best, surely.'
I stood looking thunder at her, torn between anger and fear of what she seemed to be implying.
'Now, look'ee here,' I said, 'I want to know what the blazes you're at. If you have anything to say about my wife, by God, you'd best be careful ...'
My father came stumping into the hall at that minute, curse him, and calling for Judy. She got up and walked past me, the kitten in her arms. She stopped at the door, gave me a crooked, spiteful smile, and says:
'What were you doing in India? Reading? Singing hymns? Or did you occasionally go riding in the Park?'
And with that she slammed the door, leaving me shot to bits, with horrible thoughts growing in my mind. Suspicion doesn't come gradually; it springs up suddenly, and grows with every breath it takes. If you have a foul mind, as I have, you think foul thoughts readier than clean ones, so that even as I told myself that Judy was a lying bitch trying to frighten me with implications, and that Elspeth was incapable of being false, at the same time I had a vision of her rolling naked in a bed with her arms round Watney's neck. God, it wasn't possible! Elspeth was an innocent, a completely honest fool, who hadn't even known what 'fornication' meant when I first met her . . .
That hadn't stopped her bounding into the bushes with me, though, at the first invitation. Oh, but it was still unthinkable! She was my wife, and as amiable and proper as a girl could be; she was utterly different from swine like me, she had to be. I couldn't be as wrong in my judgement as that, could I?
I was standing torturing myself with these happy notions, and then common sense came to the rescue. Good God, all she had done was go riding with Watney - why, she hadn't even known who he was when I warned her against him that morning. And she was the most scatter-brained thing in petticoats; besides, she wasn't of the mettle that trollops are made of. Too meek and gentle and submissive by half-she wouldn't have dared. The mere thought of what I'd do would have terrified . . . what would I do? Disown her? Divorce her? Throw her out? By God, I couldn't! I didn't have the means; my father was right!
For a moment I was appalled. If Elspeth was making a mistress for Watney, or anyone else, there was nothing I could do about it. I could cut her to ribbons, oh, aye, and what then? Take to the streets? I couldn't stay in the army, or in town, even, without means . . .
Oh, but to the devil with this. It was pure moonshine, aye, and deliberately put into my mind to make me jealous by that brown-headed slut of my father's. This was her making mischief to get her own back for the hammering I'd given her three years ago. That was it.
Why, I didn't have the least reason to think ill of Elspeth; everything about her denied Judy's imputations - and, by God, I'd pay that cow out for her lies and sneers. I'd find a way, all right, and God help her when I did.
With my thoughts back in more genial channels, I remembered the news I'd been coming home to tell Elspeth - well, she would have to wait for it until after I'd been to the Palace. Serve her right for going out with Watney, damn him. In the meantime, I spent the next hour looking out my best clothes, arranging my hair, which was grown pretty long and romantic, and cursing Oswald as he helped me with my cravat - I'd have been happier in uniform, but I didn't have a decent one to my name, having spent my time in mufti since I came home. I was so excited that I didn't bother to lunch, but dandied myself up to the nines, and then hurried off to meet His Nose- ship.
There was a brougham at his door when I arrived, and I didn't have to wait two minutes before he came down, all dressed and damning the secretary and valet who were stalking along behind him.
'There probably isn't a damned warming-pan in the place,' he was barking. 'And it is necessary that every- thing should be in the finest order. Find out if Her Majesty takes her own bed-linen when she travels. I imagine she does, but don't for God's sake go inquiring indiscreetly. Ask Arbuthnot; he'll know. You may be sure that something will be amiss, in the end, but it can't be helped. Ah, Flashman,'
and he ran his eye over me like a drill sergeant. 'Come along, then.'
There was a little knot of urchins and people to raise a cheer as he came out, and some shouted: 'There's the Flash cove! Hurrah!' by which they meant me. There was a little wait after we got in, because the coachman had some trouble with his reins, and a little crowd gathered while the Duke fretted and swore.
'Dammit, Johnson,' growls he, 'hurry up or we shall have all London here.'
The crowd cheered and we rolled off in the pleasant autumn sunshine, with the guttersnipes running behind whooping and people turning on the pavements to lift their hats as the Great Duke passed by.
'If I knew how news travelled I'd be a wiser man,' says he. 'Can you imagine it? I'll lay odds they know in Dover by this time that I am taking you to Her Majesty. You've never had any dealings with royalty, I take it?'
'Only in Afghanistan, my lord,' says I, and he barked a little short laugh.
'They probably have less ceremonial than we do,' he says. 'It is a most confounded bore. Let me tell you, sir, never become a field-marshal and commander-in-chief. It is very fine, but it means your sovereign will honour you by coming to stay, and not a bed in the place worth a damn. I have more anxiety over the furnishing of Walmer, Mr Flashman, than I did over the works at Torres Vedras.'(27)
'If you are as successful this time as you were then, my lord,'
says I, buttering him, 'you have no cause for alarm.'
'Huh!' says he, and gave me a sharp look. But he was silent for a minute or two and then asked me if I felt nervous.
'There is no need why you should be,' says he. 'Her Majesty is most gracious, although it is never as easy, of course, as it was with her predecessors. King William was very easy, very kind, and made people entirely at home. It is altogether more formal now, and pretty stiff, but if you stay by me and keep your mouth shut, you'll do.'
I ventured to say that I'd felt happier at the prospect of charging into a band of Ghazis than I did at going to the palace, which was rubbish, of course, but I thought was probably the thing to say.
'Damned nonsense,' says he, sharply. 'You wouldn't rather anything of the sort. But I know that the feeling is much the same, for I've experienced both myself. The important thing is never to show it, as I am never tired of telling young men. Now tell me about these Ghazis, who I understand are the best soldiers the Afghans can show.'
He was on my home ground there, and I told him about the Ghazis and Gilzais and Pathans and Douranis, to which he listened very carefully until I realised that we were rolling through the palace gates, and there were the Guards presenting arms, and a flunkey running to hold the door and set the steps, and officers clicking to attention,
