Rumours Of War

corporal?’

Hervey had decided on the ride up to ask for a model vidette’s report, but now he thought the idea dull. Instead he smiled, and said, ‘Ask, “Who shall be next RSM?” ’

It would be easy enough to send the message in English – the signalmen could spell out the words as written in the tri-number code – but Dom Mateo wanted to test the code book fully. At the distant post there was an officer who could speak English too, so there would be no difficulty in that. He wrote down the question in Portuguese and handed it to the corporal.

The corporal consulted his code book – it took but a few minutes – scribbled the numbers above the words on the piece of paper, then began to read them off to the signalman, who worked the pulleys with impressive speed.

When the panel returned to rest for the last time, Hervey took up his telescope again.

‘They will need some time, I think,’ said Dom Mateo. ‘The reply they will have to spell out.’

They waited, not long, and then the distant semaphore sprang to life. Dois, dois, dois – two, two, two – the signal ‘ready’. And the home response: dois, dois, dois.

The reply took little more than a minute.

Dom Mateo seemed pleased. ‘Regular signalmen who know each other can do it so much the quicker, but today they do the drill exactly as General Folque prescribed.’

The corporal doubled across to them with his message pad, and handed it to Dom Mateo.

Dom Mateo looked at it, smiled, then handed it to Hervey. ‘It will, perhaps, be reason to you.’

Hervey read. ‘England expects Armstrong.’ He nodded slowly, smiling. ‘A most impressive demonstration, Dom Mateo. Altogether most convincing.’

‘Do you wish to see more?’

‘No,’ said Hervey, smiling still. ‘I am certain that any message may be passed faithfully. This way, without doubt, we can use the reserves to best advantage. Beresford’s men, if it is to be Beresford, need move only when they are needed, and not a minute before.’

‘I am glad you approve. Now, what more may I show you?’

‘Nothing, Dom Mateo. I am wholly convinced of what should constitute our contingent, and where, and I intend speaking plainly of it when we return to Lisbon. For the rest, I believe we ought to see if the land here might support a soldier. We were sore hungry at times in Spain!’

Dom Mateo raised his hand in a gesture of dismay. ‘Hervey, I have travelled much – London, Paris, Rome, St Petersburg. This is the finest of countries. Not, perhaps, the most beautiful, but without equal in the balance of nature and its people. I would not live anywhere else.’

Hervey smiled again. He loved a man who loved his country. The spirit of the age was of money-making, in England at least, yet here was a fidalgo enthusiastic about a bit of a mast and a few invalids who could read and write. Dom Mateo was a man who could stand by the proudest peer in His Majesty’s Guards. Hervey was certain of him, as the duke had been with old Blucher at Waterloo.

‘Dom Mateo, let us repair somewhere we might have a good dinner, and I will tell you my design again.’

*

Design for the Employment of British Troops in the Defence of the Portuguese Regency against InvasionObject to repel invasion by land by those Portuguese forces disloyal to the Regency, and their Spanish abettors.Information It is known from the assemblage of the Portuguese elements that there exists the threat of invasion in the north of the country, into Tras os Montes, and in the south from Huelva into Algarve. These however would not threaten the capital immediately. This latter is likeliest from south of the Serra da Estrela and along the valley of the Tagus, or through the passes of the Alentejo, having crossed the frontier at Portalegre, Elvas or Ardila, each of which places is fortified.Intention A general reserve be constituted from which troops may be sent to Tras os Montes or Algarve. The line Portalegre–Elvas–Ardila be re-inforced by infantry and cavalry of the Ordenanza. A mobile division be formed at Lisbon or Torres Vedras, three brigades, light, two Portuguese one British, and cavalry brigade mixed. This division ready to march to frontier once it is known where the enemy intends his main advance. Portuguese Telegraph Corps to establish line from Torres Vedras to Elvas, and thence to Portalegre and Ardila. Cavalry to establish despatch routes or in case of failure of telegraph.

M.P. Hervey

Bt-Major

Lisbon, 26 October 1826

‘No, Major Hervey, it will not stand. It is too risky a design in every particular.’ Colonel Norris sat at his desk in Reeves’s hotel with the submission in front of him, shaking his head repeatedly.

It had taken Hervey three days to travel from Elvas to Lisbon. At the end of the first, he had been of a mind to ride ahead, for they were slowed by the wheels rather than by the need to rest the horses, but there was a day in hand according to the instructions that Colonel Norris had given him, albeit reluctantly, and he had not wanted to abandon Isabella, for all that the road was considered safe. And now he stood before Norris wholly incredulous: how could his design be at fault in every particular?

Norris might be a proficient artilleryman, and an able staff officer who had the trust of the Duke of Wellington, but Hervey was of the decided opinion that the range of the colonel’s thinking was inextricably linked to that of the cannonball, and that his notion of daring probably amounted to no more than a willingness to fire one of his guns and trust that the ball would fly in the direction he intended. There was a mighty gulf between them, and Hervey was thinking desperately how to bridge it.

And bridge it he must if he was to advance his design. He could send a copy of his design to the charge d’affaires, but even if he read it – even if he approved it – Forbes had no immediate authority in the matter. Lord Beresford would not be here, if he were to come at all, for weeks, and then it might be too late if there were insufficient cavalry or light troops in the expedition. Norris’s despatch would leave for the Horse Guards tomorrow by steamer, and decisions would be taken. That would be that.

‘You may know, Major Hervey, that in your absence the Duke of . . . somewhere or other, descended on the southern coast and is exciting insurrection there.’

Hervey at once saw his chance; Norris could not have led better. ‘The Duke of Abrantes – yes indeed, Colonel. I learned of it at Elvas. But on return last night I also learned that the minister for war himself has marched with the best part of the garrison here to meet him.’

Norris looked puzzled. ‘That is true. Senhor Saldanha, with whom I personally have contracted much business these past weeks, may even now be exchanging fire with the rebels. And I think it the greatest folly to leave the capital unprotected so. There is a further intrusion, in the north, and if that is successful the rebels can sweep down into Lisbon unchecked, for there is not a man or a gun in the lines of Torres Vedras. It is as well that the affair at Elvas was not of the same order, by your accounts. Folly indeed!’

Hervey sighed, almost not caring to conceal it. A bridge he had built, but Pons Asinorum. ‘Colonel, do you not think that if Senhor Saldanha is successful he will do the same in the event of further attacks? Would he not therefore wish our support to be in that direction also?’

‘Not at all, Major Hervey. I see no logic in that. By securing the lines of Torres Vedras we guarantee his freedom of manoeuvre.’

There was perfect sense in the suggestion, Hervey knew, but Norris, as before, had failed to address the entire picture. He himself was not proposing that the lines should not be garrisoned, but it was not necessary to tie down troops from the outset. The Duke of Wellington had had militiamen there, not regulars, before falling back on Torres Vedras in the face of the French advance. It was a question of which were the better troops to manoeuvre with once the freedom to do so was made.

But Hervey saw that further reasoning was futile. ‘Very well, Colonel; with your leave.’ He took the papers, which Norris held out – thrust out, almost – and turned.