Rumours Of War

regimental court martial. Not the best of times for it, but then it never is. You had better hear Ellis’s account, Mr Scott.’

‘I will, sir.’ The serjeant-major gathered up his swordbelt and cap, and took his leave.

‘Well,’ said the adjutant when he was gone. ‘I shall consider it most carefully and then speak with the colonel. I think you may be satisfied, Hervey, that you acted properly.’ He sighed. ‘But it is the very devil of a business. He’ll be reduced, of course. Perhaps even to dragoon. Is there anything you would say for him?’

Hervey wished there were something he could say. He certainly had no desire to be the cause of a man’s breaking. Yet what was there by way of mitigation? He had given the adjutant an entirely factual account of the incident, and the serjeant-major himself had approved his conduct. ‘I think not, sir.’

The adjutant looked disappointed.

There was a long silence; or so it seemed to Hervey.

‘I’m scarcely surprised,’ said the adjutant at length, sighing heavily. ‘Ellis can be a vexing man. Very well, Mr Hervey, you may dismiss.’

The escort stood-to their horses at six o’clock. Though the sun had set two hours before, the torches, fires and settled snow made it light enough for Lieutenant Martyn to have a good look at them. They were a mixed bag, by no means the thirty best, for Lankester could ill afford them with what he imagined lay ahead. But he had made sure the NCOs were sound – Serjeant Emmet, long in the service and steady; Serjeant Crook, younger, dead keen and clever; and two corporals, one of them Armstrong.

They were not at all a bad sight, these thirty, even turned out in cloaks. Lieutenant Martyn thought he should say some words. ‘We are about to do duty of especial importance,’ he began, raising his voice just enough to carry to either end of the single rank, above the occasional snort and the chink of a curb chain; he did not want to make a spectacle of it (already there were dragoons from Number Two Squadron gathering to watch). ‘For we escort General Lord Paget himself, the commander of all General Moore’s cavalry. The regiment will thereby have an unrivalled opportunity to demonstrate to his lordship its character and capability. Upon our address, therefore, will his lordship’s approval rest, for although he will have regard for the reputation in which the regiment stands from its past feats, his lordship has not had occasion to become personally acquainted with us. I trust that every man will remember that – no matter what he is called upon to perform.’ He paused to lend emphasis. ‘Very well. Twos will advance left . . . Advance!’

His words would make no difference, Martyn supposed. The best would do their duty no matter what; the others would not be flattered into capability or exertion by appeal to the reputation of the regiment. But it would be a lame thing to parade in this bitter cold and then set off without a word. And by making such a song of it, too, there would be no expectation of clemency for defaulters. Was that too harsh a judgement? They all wanted to be at the French, he had no doubt of it, and they would all fight well when it came to it. The trouble was, too many of them believed they would go better at the French for a little liquor inside them. What was it the chaplain himself read from Scripture: Give strong drink unto him that is ready to perish?

There was no ease in drink for them that night, however. And beer and liquor they would have traded for hot tea at any price the sutler named. Lieutenant Martyn would not let them mount until they had been marching an hour and more, the road ankle-deep in snow, but they knew at least there would be no more of it that night, for there was not a wisp of cloud. That spelled worse in its way, though, for the air was already chill, so that soon the snow froze and their marching became harder as the crust began breaking unevenly with each step. Men started to curse, some of them foully, and some profanely. It pained Martyn; it pained Hervey. It pained the odd ‘Methodist’ in the ranks.

It even pained Corporal Armstrong. ‘If you buggers cannot curse decent then ha’d your gab!’

Hervey was surprised by the indignation, and he wondered if Armstrong was treading the boards for the officers’ benefit, playing up the corporal’s part, new-made. But Armstrong did not strike him as a man who would play to a gallery, or to the best box for that matter. ‘Jesus Lord’ was on his lips more often than on the chaplain’s, but Armstrong had a sense of occasion too, even with his fists. Hervey did indeed like him. He may have been a cornet for all of six months, but his instinct told him that Armstrong was a man he might trust, a man whose sabre would be there when the time came. The affair of Biddy Flyn’s donkey was hardly to be compared with what they might face at Sahagun, but Armstrong had come readily to the aid of his officer as surely as any coverman. And it had been Armstrong who had been last to break off the fight in that first skirmish with the French scouts. ‘Have a care not to close with the men.’ The words rang in Hervey’s ears. He supposed they meant the same for a man with rank on his arm too. But it did not stop him marking this corporal out.

‘How many miles do you estimate we have come, Hervey?’

Lieutenant Martyn’s enquiry recalled him to the present. He had to think hard. The escort was mounted again, now, and they had been riding side by side for half an hour without a word. He took out his watch. The moon was full and bright, and he saw that the hour hand had reached eight. Two hours, at a pace of no more than three miles in the hour. ‘I would suppose two leagues,’ he replied.

‘My reckoning too.’

They had the same to go again before they would reach the rendezvous at Melgar de Abaxo. But it was perishing cold, now, and some of the dragoons were beginning to wonder if they would see its end. Hervey was strangely thankful for his cold nights on Salisbury Plain with Daniel Coates, searching for errant sheep like the Good Shepherd; he knew there was a deal to run before the cold took a man, and he knew also how to stave off that peril. The poor city men whose feet had never touched grass before listing were suffering dreadfully, but as much from their fears as the frost itself. If they could bring themselves through this night they would be swords of ice- brook temper, Spanish swords. And they would see the morning, he had no doubt. It was his place to see they did.

‘Quite an affair, Hervey, the picket pig,’ said Martyn suddenly, and as if it were a perfect sequitur.

Hervey thought it sounded disapproving. ‘In what manner, sir?’

Martyn smiled a little, though Hervey could not see. ‘A right Tantony pig, too, so I gather.’

‘Do you say I should not have acted as I did?’

‘No, not at all.’ Martyn’s horse slipped again, throwing its rider forward, so that he had to recover himself before completion. ‘No, the picket-corporal was deuced idle. The whole camp standing to arms just so his picket might have a slice of pork – infamous.’

Now Hervey’s horse slipped and threw its rider forward.

Martyn waited for him to reseat himself. ‘But I wonder if it were absolutely necessary to report Serjeant Ellis?’

Hervey was keen to know what might have been the better alternative. Martyn was, after all, his senior by four years. ‘He would not carry out my order, and defied me in front of the dragoons. I cannot see that I had any choice. Indeed, I believed it to have been an obligation.’

He said it with just a suggestion of indignation, however, and Martyn was quick to it. ‘Hervey, do not misunderstand. Your resolve in this is wholly admirable. Some there are who would, without doubt, look the other way. They preserve a sort of easy-going regimen; nothing too evil occurs, but it is as injurious to the health of a troop as is the violent enforcement of each and every regulation. And, of course, I was not there.’

Neither of them spoke for several minutes. Hervey was not to know that Martyn forced himself to conversation out of the same respect as his for what the cold could do.

‘It hath been the wisdom of a good officer to keep the mean between the two extremes, of too much stiffness in refusing, and of too much easiness in admitting any variation from it.’ Martyn spoke his parody of the familiar words with a sort of mock gravity, but with just a note of satisfaction in finding the Prayer Book’s preface so apt and adaptable.

Hervey turned to him.

It was just possible to see his look of surprise. ‘We are both sons of the cloth, my dear fellow,’ said Martyn reassuringly. ‘You will not, as a rule, hear me quoting Scripture or rubric however.’

Hervey warmed with the recognition of friendly intent, though he was still unsure of what Lieutenant Martyn’s judgement was in respect of ‘the picket pig’ – or rather, Serjeant Ellis and the picket pig. Martyn had said that he himself had not been there, which, manifestly, was a bar to his perfect judgement, but at the same time Hervey thought he hinted at too much stiffness.

It troubled him, too. Cornet Hervey thought it very difficult to know what was right; more so than he had imagined. He told himself it would all be revealed as the months went by and he became a seasoned dragoon. For