John says he is, it will be to no avail. He’s an old man, and a sick one too. His opinions are more decided by the day, and they are not favourable to junior officers who take things upon themselves, especially in the face of their seniors.’
‘All this is because of Colonel Norris.’
‘All this is because of me, Johnson. I cannot escape the responsibility.’
Johnson stood up and looked at the fire despairingly: no wood he could find in this place gave off any heat. ‘Very Christian that is, Major ’Ervey. Some consolation to thee, I suppose.’
Hervey scowled back.
‘An’ why ’asn’t tha been to see Mrs Delgado an’ ’er father?’
‘What has that to do with it? I told you anyway: I have been, and shall go again as soon as I am able. You forget, perhaps, I am in open arrest.’
‘Colonel Laming’s been to see ’er.’
‘I am glad to hear it. But I cannot call on her and her father before Colonel Norris gives me leave.’
‘Tha knows they might go to England? On account o’ t’trouble ’ere.’
Hervey looked surprised. ‘No, I did not. How did you come by this?’
‘Colonel Laming’s man.’
Hervey’s eyes widened. ‘I compliment you on your sources, I’m sure!’
‘Ay, ’e ’eard they’d be gooin’ by t’end o’t’month.’
‘Well, I have not seen Colonel Laming these last few days, I regret to say.’ Hervey sounded especially thoughtful. ‘He has important duties with General Clinton. He says he will come by tonight, all being well.’
But what came instead that night was a letter:
Head Quarters,
Valle de Pereira Barracks
8th January 1827My dear Hervey,I am prevented by only the most urgent duty from calling on you this evening, for there are matters with which I would acquaint you in person, and so I am obliged to depose these matters here instead, and would beg your indulgence, confident that you of all men will know the urgent delicacy of what we are about. You will be pleased to learn, for every good reason, that Sir William Clinton is inclined to base his dispositions in the very largest measure upon your design, for he has learned from M. Saldanha the Minister of War that the Miguelites will next renew their offensive in Minho and Tras os Montes, but that M. Saldanha is confident of the Portuguese army so long as there are English troops not too distant who would thereby demonstrate to the Miguelites that whatever success they might enjoy in the provinces it would never take them to Lisbon. Half our army is therefore to march forthwith to the Mondego, and shall have its Head Quarters at Coimbra. The remainder shall occupy the Tagus forts with a view to securing the peace of the capital and to be in a position to reinforce the garrison at Elvas if that front should become active. The Spanish announce that they are to form an army of observation of fifteen thousand men in Estremadura, this to guard against advance from Portugal, which notion is of course entirely without justification, and it is the opinion of M. Saldanha that the true purpose is to check the Miguelites, which they protest they are now certain to do. In any case, there is to be no occupying the lines of Torres Vedras, save for a very few forts. Instead if the division on the Mondego is obliged to withdraw, or withdraws to shorten its lines of communication in the event of the Regent’s forces driving the Miguelites from Minho and Tras os Montes, it will occupy a line from Leiria to Santarem, much as you proposed, with an advance guard at Thomar. In almost every detail, therefore, Sir William has adopted your design, and he asks me to assure you that he is most conscious of it. I do believe this will mean an end to your animadversion, for he is sure to write in these terms to the Horse Guards.The second matter on which I write is one of some delicacy too, although a different kind. I have resolved to end my state of bachelorhood, and if Isabella Delgado returns a favourable reply to my offer of marriage then it will be ended sooner instead of later. I confess to you – and here, perhaps, I am able to confess more than I might were we to speak together – I confess that I have formed a most ardent affection for her. She is, without doubt, the most admirable woman of my entire acquaintance, and I pray that she will judge my circumstances to be to her favour. I go tomorrow to Belem, and you will wish me every good wish, for you, I know, hold her in the highest regard also. My one regret is that I did not press my suit all those years ago when first we made the acquaintance of the baron, but then circumstances were hardly to my favour, whereas now a colonel instead of a cornet asks his daughter’s hand . . .
Hervey laid down the letter, his hand trembling. Favourable circumstances indeed! Lieutenant-colonel, with a colonel’s brevet – and more promotion to come, no doubt. What would Isabella’s reply be? What should it be, for her daughter had no father, and she no husband?
He sat down heavily in an armchair. What did he offer? Captain, a major’s brevet, and the prospect of a court martial that might end in cashiering. He did not even have the right to propose, let alone contest so favourable an offer as Laming’s – his friend of nigh on twenty years, the man who had risked everything to rescue him from Badajoz, and who even now was working for his deliverance from an injustice. It would be the basest thing, would it not?
Despite Johnson’s coaxing, Hervey lapsed into a long silence. In his resolution to put his affairs in order, and to ‘lead a new life’, he had allowed himself to imagine that Isabella Delgado might somehow play a part in it. Indeed, in the hours before his release he had begun to imagine her playing a very decided part. She would be mother to his daughter (she was loving and well practised in motherhood already); she would be an agreeable companion in every way (and, he imagined, a zealous lover); and she would be his strength through the public degradation that would follow from the Horse Guards’ discipline.
She would be none of these, now, and he could see no prospect of any other who would take her place.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
A GRAND OLD DUKE
Gravesend, 13 January 1827
Hervey came down the gangway of the steam packet into the bustle of the Peninsula quay and began making his way through the crowd of hawkers and porters to the Duke of York Inn, where he intended buying a ticket on the first mail to London. As he rounded the corner into the high street, he stopped sharp in his tracks. The inn sign was draped in black.
‘The Duke of York, is he dead?’ he asked one of the ostlers in the forecourt.
‘Ay, sir. A week ago and more. Dead, but not yet buried!’ The man might have been surprised by the enquiry had not Hervey been so evidently new-arrived in the country.
‘Not yet buried?’
The man smiled dryly. ‘They says as they can’t bury ’im since they can’t find enough sodjers!’
Not enough soldiers! Hervey shook his head in despair. But then, he was hardly surprised when the country had had to send a battalion of Guards to Lisbon, and call on the garrison at Gibraltar too. England was at peace, but she hadn’t enough soldiers to send to Portugal and to bury a field marshal! But what should he care? Was the commander-in-chief ’s demise not a merciful release for them all? He may have been ‘the soldier’s friend’, but the army was not prospering. And it might mean – might – that the convening order for his court martial would be rescinded. An ignoble thought, he chided himself: a field marshal was a field marshal.
But what, in truth, did he care now? He cared, certainly, about being cashiered! He would be defiant if it did come to defending his actions, but a court martial would find against him if that was what the convening officer wanted. It was the way. He could not count on a last-minute surrender to conscience and honour, as had happened at Badajoz (if that had indeed been the impulse for Cornet Daly’s action). At best he might hope for a commission elsewhere – black infantry in the tropics, perhaps, the white man’s grave. He could not afford to go on half pay; that was certain. Would that be the court’s offer – the fever colonies or the Inactive List?
