The Sabre's Edge

hand was the freest of the four, the sentiment likewise. What it was to have a female of the likes of Lady Katherine Greville bestowing her time on him. How diverting seemed the gossip that had formerly repulsed him so. How fondly, now, he remembered their brief company, and her uninhibited pleasure in it - and how lame his own response had been. But it had been different then

- too close to events, his mind encumbered by all sorts of notions and doubts. Things were not the same now. India, for all her heat, had moistened that dried-up interior of his. First she had given him back his very being as a soldier. It did not matter that in reality the affair of the headwaters of the Karnaphuli had been unhonoured by Calcutta, or that the campaign he had so recently left in a dhoolie was the re-creation of that muddle in the Low Countries a quarter of a century before. India was a stage on which the soldier could expound his art, learn stratagems and devices unheard of at home, and above all might have that most prized thing - the true exercise of command. Yes, Hervey was angry with Major-General Sir Archibald Campbell and the campaign in Ava; but it and the other diversions of this singular country made him feel as alive as ever he could remember.

He took a sheet of paper from the drawer and picked up his pen. Perhaps as little as a year ago he would have begun his replies in the strict order of filial duty, then sibling love, then respectfulness for the cloth, and then . . . But this morning he began, 'Dear Lady Katherine^’. An hour or so later, having written rather more than usual to this wife of an absentee husband, and likewise having returned her teasing and toying in fuller measure, he put on cantonment dress - the looser-fitting cotton jacket that the Sixth had adopted soon after arriving, with light cotton overalls and forage cap - and walked to the regimental headquarters to report himself back at duty.

Major Joynson heard him through the open door of his office and came at once into the adjutant's room to add his salutation. 'And a word with you as soon as you are done here’ he added, in a manner that Hervey could not quite determine as encouraging or otherwise.

He wanted to appear neither apprehensive nor indifferent, and so after ten minutes with the adjutant, in which he was apprised of the comings and goings of his troop, and its defaulters, Hervey signed the orders book and then repaired to the major's office.

Since the death of his wife, an invalid to laudanum, and the military demise of Lord Towcester, Eustace Joynson had grown steadily in stature and affection in the regiment. His reputation for painstaking administration had always been high, but the demands made on him by his late wife had sapped his vigour, and Towcester's martinet command had all but eviscerated him. Now, the sick headaches that had removed him from duty with monotonous regularity had all but gone, and he enjoyed many a mess night where before he had found them a sore trial. However, he did not feel himself entirely a match for the decision before him now. And there were none, perhaps, who would blame him, for the decision was one of the utmost importance to every man in the Sixth.

'Hervey, close the door and take a seat. Have you had coffee? Would you like a little Madeira? No? Perhaps a shade early. I never do, not before eleven. Have you heard that Mr Lincoln's to marry?'

Hervey sat in a tub-chair that creaked with the slightest move of a muscle. 'I have. Joyous news.'

'You think so? Possibly, I suppose . . . yes.'

'Is there some objection to the lady?'

^‘Oh no. No, indeed not. She is a very respectable woman; very highly regarded by the light infantry's colonel. Lincoln's calling on him this very morning.'

'Then why do you sound uncertain?'

'Because Marsh is to send in his papers. Says he wants to spend his declining days in Ipswich rather than be quartermaster here.'

'Singular!'

Joynson smiled. 'A man who prefers Ipswich to Calcutta might rightly be said to have begun his decline already. I could not say that even the worst of the stink here would drive me to such a decision.'

Hervey nodded, returning the smile, a sort of mock grimace. 'Ipswich. Indeed no.'

'But you will imagine that there must be a replacement quartermaster.'

'And a replacement for the replacement.'

'Exactly so. I am excessively pleased that Lincoln shall join us at last in the mess. Indeed, it is long overdue. But the pleasure is dulled by the thought of having to determine his own succession.'

The word was well chosen. Lincoln's had been a long reign by any standard. Hervey wondered what the RSM himself thought of relinquishing the crown. 'It should be Deedes, by rights. Is there any serious objection? It has always been seniority tempered by rejection.'

Joynson took off his glasses and polished them with a silk cloth. 'I've been disappointed with Deedes these past twelve months. There's a want of vigour. I dare say that he'll make no mistakes, but if we're to have him for any time then I fear he'll begin to drop the bit. Rose thinks so too.'

Hervey raised an eyebrow. 'Deuced tricky superseding Deedes. He'll fall right away and become a malcontent, no doubt. And the rest of his mess will be ill at ease if they perceive no very good reason for it. Who is next in seniority? Harrison?'

'Telfer.'

'Oh dear.'

'Precisely. Who would you want?'

'Hairsine.'

'Exactly.'

Hervey frowned. 'They've all been too long in the rank, even Hairsine. In that respect the war brought them on too quickly. I can remember Hairsine the night we had word of the surrender, at Toulouse. He was orderly serjeant-major. It was ten years ago.'

'Deedes's time will be up in a couple of years in the normal course of things. And Harrison's not much later. I suppose we could take a chance on him, and Hairsine could bide his time a while longer.'

'There'll be more talk of dead men's boots. But it wouldn't do any more harm, I suppose. What would Sir Ivo want to do?'

'Strange to say, we never spoke of it. Marsh looked the last man to give up so cosy a billet as quartermaster.'

Hervey supposed it an apt description of quartermaster in a station such as Calcutta. 'Can he not be persuaded to remain in post a little longer?'

Joynson shook his head. 'He's determined to leave by October - to have the spring in Ipswich, he says. And in any case, all we should have is six months of jockeying and wagering and heaven knows what else. All very unedifying. No, it's a decision I shall have to take myself, and be content with the notion that it will not be possible to make the right one.'

Hervey smiled again. Joynson knew his pack. The only decision that had the remotest possibility of being acknowledged the right one was that made by the commanding officer himself. The major might carry the horn this season, but he was not the master. 'Anything else?'

Joynson hesitated. 'Are you sure you won't have some Madeira?'

Thank you, no. In truth, I think my gut ought still to be listed sick at present.'

'I list mine sick one week in every month, and feel the better for it. Coffee then?'

'Yes, coffee.'

Joynson called for his bearer to bring two cups. 'What do you make of Barrow?'

It seemed a strange turn in the conversation. Hervey looked wary.

'If he has any he could call a friend it would be you, I think,' said Joynson, polishing his glasses again.

'I think it would be fairer to the three of us if you first said why you asked, sir,' replied Hervey. 'Especially since I have been absent for the best part of the year.' And he always tried that much harder with Barrow, for Barrow was an officer from the ranks - the ranks of another regiment, indeed - and Hervey had not cared for him to begin with. Not that Barrow had seemed to want to help himself in terms of popularity with his new-found fellow officers.

Joynson nodded. 'You're right. It may come to nothing. Let's hope so. But I've had word - it doesn't matter where from; it's not the regiment - that he's on the take with his remount fund.'

Hervey smiled. 'I saw some of his remounts this morning. How he's managed to find that quality and take a backhand glass I can't imagine!'

'I thought that too only yesterday when his troop paraded for escort. However, the accusation comes from