Major and Acting Lieutenant-Colonel Matthew Hervey had intended only the briefest of calls on the cavalry barracks at Hounslow. While his new wife drove on to London to see her aunt (or, more particularly, to see that her aunt's arrangements for the musical entertainment at which she, Kezia, would sing and play – a benefit concert, but a London debut nonetheless – were properly in hand) it was his purpose to speak with the commanding officer of the 6th Light Dragoons on the orders for the recall of the detached troop at the Cape Colony, to which he himself would be returning from his leave of absence in September.
The honeymoon had begun ten days before, in Brighton. Although for Hervey the place held unhappy memories, these were of a dozen years ago and more, and the time had come to lay them to rest. Besides, he knew Brighton and the country thereabout; and his bride had no objection. The town had the merit, too, of some fine houses, with whose occupants Kezia was acquainted, and so there was opportunity for her to practise the pianoforte daily, which, as she had explained to her husband-to-be, she must do, for the entertainment in the Queen's Concert Rooms in Hanover Square was of the utmost importance (the prime minister himself was to attend).
The ten days had not been as they had wished, however; certainly not as Hervey had wished. The glass stood high throughout, and this occasioned Kezia a protracted headache, which her dutiful practice at the pianoforte only served to exacerbate, so that on several evenings she had to take leave of her husband before dinner; and even on those evenings when the headache was not so dispiriting, she had been obliged to retire early. The abandonment of their seaside sojourn was therefore not entirely unwelcome: Kezia would be able to put her mind at rest concerning the arrangements for her music, and for Hervey there was the prospect of an end to headaches.
He kissed his new wife on the cheek, bid her well for the afternoon, said that he would be with her in Hanover Square (where she had lodgings with her aunt) by nine, and got down from the chaise. He watched it pull away, turned to the arched entrance to the barracks, acknowledged the sentry's salute (one of Third Squadron's dragoons, and therefore recognizing his longabsent squadron leader despite his plain clothes), and set off. He walked briskly towards the regimental headquarters beyond the parade-square. He returned several more salutes from NCOs with whom he had long acquaintance, though he was curious as to their rather solemn demeanour in contrast with the customary cheer of that rank. By the time he reached the orderly room he would not have been surprised to hear that the King were dead; except that there was no sign of court mourning.
The adjutant stood as he entered. 'Good morning, Hervey,' he said, with a double measure of surprise.
Hervey smiled at him. 'I know, Malet – appearing at orderly room with but a quarter of the honeymoon spent! The weather at Brighton was inclement. And, you may believe me, I have not the slightest intention of remaining here but an hour.'
The adjutant's brow furrowed. 'You are not come, then, on account of the . . . news?'
'What news?'
Malet swallowed hard. 'Mrs Armstrong.'
Hervey was at once alarmed. 'What—'
'I'm afraid she died yesterday. I sent an express at once.'
Hervey shook his head. 'I did not receive it,' he said, quietly. He sat down. 'How . . . Of what did she die?'
'Poisoning of the blood, I understand. Or rather, I do not understand.
That is what the surgeon reported, having it from the man in Hounslow who attended her. She had had a fall. I do not know any more. It was a very sudden business.'
'The children?' asked Hervey, still shaking his head in disbelief.
'Mrs Lincoln has care of them.'
That at least was no cause for concern: the quartermaster's wife was as capable as might be. But Armstrong himself, his serjeantmajor, dutifully at his post in the Cape Colony . . .
'Lord Hol'ness is visiting with them now.'
'That is uncommonly civil of him,' replied Hervey, and with complete sincerity, for whatever were Lord Holderness's weaknesses as commanding officer, they were certainly not of humanity.
'Shall I bring coffee?'
Hervey nodded.
He had known Caithlin Armstrong since before Waterloo. He had known her family, Cork tenants, rack-rented – had stood up for them, indeed, against the magistrate when they faced eviction, setting himself against the military authorities thereby, saved only through the intervention of the young Duke of Devonshire, himself a considerable Cork landowner, at the behest of his, Hervey's, soon-to-be betrothed, Lady Henrietta Lindsay. Caithlin was a scholar of the hedge school. She had good Latin, and he had taught her some Greek. Her marriage to a bruising serjeant, his own serjeant, had come as a surprise to many, but Armstrong had offered her protection, and the rough-hewn decency of his own home and calling, and they had become the best of couples, the parents of . . . four – was it five? – fine children. Hervey had seen the look in Armstrong's eye whenever Caithlin was there – the deepest pride, the most complete adoration, which he supposed he himself had once known, but never could again. He wondered how in God's name he would be able to tell Armstrong of this, how he would be able to see that look of pride and adoration fade, and in its place despair.
Malet came back with a clerk and the orderly-room coffee pot, which was kept permanently hot by a nightlight. Hervey bid the clerk dismiss. The merest nod of the head was all that was necessary in the atmosphere of collective bereavement (Caithlin Armstrong had long run a regimental school, and classes for dragoons who wanted to read and write). He poured a cup for himself, taking neither sugar nor milk. He forced himself to put a hundred and one questions from his mind; in such circumstances it would be easy to become lost in the pity of it all. Two, nevertheless, pressed upon him.
'A fall, Malet: how could such a thing bring about death? Was she unwell?'
The adjutant shook his head. 'Not in the least. She had by all accounts taken a reading class the evening before.'
'Then . . .'
