A Close Run Thing (10 page)

‘I do not doubt that, Hervey, but insubordination is a military offence whereas Regan’s conduct was ungallant, and that is not. Do not misunderstand, mind – Regan behaved like an ass by all accounts.’

Edmonds now looked across to Barrow, whereupon the adjutant began speaking in an uncommonly warm
tone
. ‘There is but one chance, Hervey. You might petition for redress of grievance in respect of wrongful arrest. The prospect might cause the general to abandon the charges.’

Hervey did not hesitate. ‘Then I will do so, of
course
. Will it work, sir?’ he asked, looking at Edmonds.

‘I think it very probably will. We do not know whether it was Slade himself who ordered the arrest or whether it was Regan who was overzealous. Even if it were Regan’s doing, he has such connections that Slade would not want a squeeze. But the thing is this, Hervey: I am afraid that, whichever way it goes, you will be a marked man so far as Slade is concerned – as, indeed, will I, though that is a different matter.’

‘So be it, sir!’

‘And, if this stratagem is a success,’ asked Edmonds, turning to Mr Lincoln, ‘what should be done with Armstrong then, Sarn’t-Major?’

‘Well, sir,’ began the RSM, ‘you know it is my opinion that a senior rank should not be humiliated for a momentary lapse of good sense. There was to be no punishment before General Slade raised these charges. My mess would not be dismayed if we followed that same course now, and I tender my apologies that one of my mess should fail his officer as Armstrong has done. I have yet to speak to him in connection with this: he will not forget it when I do.’

No one could doubt it.

‘Very well, then, Mr Lincoln,’ said Edmonds, ‘a rebuke and nothing further. Mr Barrow, I suggest that
you
make the brigade major aware of Mr Hervey’s intention to petition without delay. With any luck it may never come to a formal submission. That is all, gentlemen; but, Mr Hervey, stay a moment.’

When the others had left, Edmonds motioned him to sit in the chair by his writing-table and he himself sat on the edge, his earlier formality easing. ‘Look, Hervey, this is really a deuced tricky business. Slade is a vindictive man, and his reach is long. I do not even know whether approaching Sir Stapleton Cotton would be to any avail. In truth I wish Lord George were here now. We must get you out of Slade’s reach. There is an appointment with the Staff Corps squadron for America, and after the affair of the French battery I feel sure that we could place it for you, for you are aware of General Cotton’s opinion of your action. The last thing I want to do is see you leave the regiment, even temporarily, but I really do urge you to take this opportunity.’

Hervey said nothing, stunned by Edmonds’s pessimism. At length he reached into his tunic. ‘Sir,’ he began, unfolding his sister’s letter, ‘I would have welcomed the prospect of America, but yesterday I received this from home. My brother has died. He was my elder, and I feel that I must at least return home to discover my father’s circumstances and wishes. I am not sure now that I may accept the lieutenancy even.’

Edmonds nodded. ‘Yes, I understand well enough,’ he sighed. ‘There comes a time in this whole wretched business of fighting when the spirit just yearns for
something
peaceful and decent – yes, and gentle even. And you are aware, as I indicated in the mess, that this news of our returning straight to England may well mean disbandment? Your investment might then be lost.’

‘Yes, sir, though I would hazard all in that respect.’

‘I am glad to hear it. Those loobies in Parliament will make unconscionable reductions in the Army. Mr Pitt’s income tax will be repealed, and there’ll be beggars in scarlet aplenty on the streets. That is what Cotton believes, too. I do not wish to talk about it with the regiment just yet. As long as you understand all the implications of not going to America – there might even be promotion with the Corps, whereas you might be thrown on to half-pay with a worthless cornetcy to sell if you stay. You are a courageous officer, brave, but …’

‘Thank you, sir,’ he replied a little uncomfortably.

‘Not just that,’ continued the major. ‘I mean that you have yet to acquire sufficient guile … but, then, so have I, for that matter. It might be a case of crabs for us both if Black Jack Slade has another turn. I will leave the question of the lieutenancy for a while, but I must have an answer on America tomorrow. That is all, Matthew.’

Captain Lankester’s advice was at least unambiguous – and exactly as Hervey would have predicted. Lankester the Corinthian always squared up to difficulties, as he had done to ill-breaking balls on Upper Club at Eton,
though
always with a sobering realism. He hardly looked up from his journal, which he kept with the same diligence that he would his game-book in Hertfordshire, as Hervey recounted the America option. ‘Petition and stay put!’ he drawled. ‘Slade has been the death of enough good men. Do you want to be shot like a black-cock by some half-breed in a racoon hat?’

Hervey laughed for the first time since the letter from home. He was pleased with the advice, for though he was perfectly happy to take his chance with an American militiaman, the option seemed too much like running. Edmonds’s was without doubt the more prudent of the advice – he knew that full well – and it was all very fine for Sir Edward Lankester, with wealth and rank in his favour, to urge the devil-may-care course. But prudence in a cornet was a questionable attribute – like coyness in whores, Edmonds had once said. What would it profit him to evade this challenge to his self-respect, now, when other challenges would surely follow? He knew right enough that for him there was but one option.

As in some medieval scriptorium, Hervey sat in his cell making a fair copy of the draft petition which Barrow had given him. There was a knock at the door. ‘Come in, Johnson,’ he called absently. But Johnson never knocked, and Hervey looked up to find instead the same sister of the day before. Her habit was no longer bloodstained and her face not nearly so drawn. He might not have recognized her but for the ice-blue eyes
which
, now less sunken, were more piercing than before. She had cast her overmantle, and he was able to gain a more faithful impression of her figure, as pleasingly slender as any he had seen. Her bosom, too, suggested an aptness for fashion, unlike the Spanish nuns whose amplitude would have challenged the corsetier’s art. Having had the broken sutures replaced by the surgeon only the afternoon before, he was perplexed at her being there – though much charmed. ‘Yes, Sister, can I help?’ he asked in French.

And she replied, to his evident astonishment, in English. ‘Mr Hervey, I have heard that Lord Wellington has said that if King Louis were to be restored we would be treated as if liberated rather than conquered.’ Not only did she convey her sense perfectly, with an admirable mastery of the subjunctive, but her aspirates, as alien to a Frenchwoman as they seemed to be to Johnson, were breathed consummately. And there was scarce a trace of accent, though she did not Anglicize the king’s name as Cotton’s dispatch had done – or, at least, the way in which Edmonds had read it. ‘Mr Hervey, forgive me,’ she continued. ‘Yesterday you paid me the compliment of speaking in French, and I have not returned that compliment until now. Yesterday was … well, a most tiring day: I had not slept in—’

‘Sister, there is no need,’ he interrupted. ‘I believe you thought me … indulgent, in so far as I appeared to demand the surgeon in person. That was furthest from my intention.’

‘I do not doubt it for a moment, Mr Hervey. You are an honourable man, I think, one who might be trusted,’ she replied softly.

‘I hold myself to be so, Sister,’ said Hervey thankfully. It was curious how he felt the need of this nun’s approval.

‘Sir, I wish to explain something to you and then I have a kindness to ask.’

‘By all means, Sister,’ he replied, intrigued by both the warmth of her tone and the notion that he might be of assistance to her.

‘Mr Hervey, my name is Maria de Chantonnay. My people are from the Vendée. There was much suffering there after the rising for the king. You may know of General Turreau’s
colonnes infernales
?’

‘Yes, it was some time ago, but we all know of it.’

‘My father lost his estates there, after the fighting. We have been under suspicion ever since. My family will learn of the fighting here in Toulouse and they may fear the worst for me …’ Her voice trailed off.

Hervey nodded in sympathy but was at a loss to see where this might lead.

‘Sir, your army will, I think, have couriers whom it can trust. I wish to commit a letter to my people to you.’

He was not even sure where the Vendée was. He said that he supposed it must be possible, although he could not immediately think how. When she rectified his ignorance of the French seaboard he was even more sceptical. ‘I will, of course, do all I can, Sister. I cannot
say
whether your letter might be carried by courier, however. And I fear that it is quite impossible for me to carry it in person since I do not suppose the regiment will march further than Bordeaux for our passage to England. And the Vendée will scarcely be on the marching route to Paris for those regiments which are to furnish the garrison there. Why cannot you entrust it to French hands, Sister?’

‘Mr Hervey, there would be a price on any letter addressed to the comte de Chantonnay. Where may I find one of my own countrymen to trust at this time?’

The appeal was irresistible. ‘Sister Maria, I will do all I can,’ he said at length, ‘though what that is I am not in the least sure.’

Sister Maria de Chantonnay could now at last rest; for an Englishman, an English officer, had given his word, and she owned that there was no more she could ask for – nor, indeed,
need
ask for. ‘Mr Hervey,’ she resumed, her aspect and tone becoming once again solemn, ‘when I came here yesterday you had in your hands St Ignatius Loyola’s
Spiritual Exercises
—Oh, but please sit down and rest your leg.’ (She seemed suddenly to notice the slight awkwardness with which he stood.) ‘Did you read sufficient of it?’

What constituted sufficiency in her mind he was not sure, but he reckoned it would be a demanding measure. ‘In a cursory fashion,’ he replied truthfully but guardedly.

‘St Ignatius was a remarkable man, Mr Hervey. You will know of him, I feel sure?’

‘Nothing but that he was founder of the Jesuits,’ said Hervey flatly.

‘Yes, indeed, he was,’ she replied with the suggestion of a frown.

‘And the Jesuits were expelled from Spain and Portugal half a century ago for political intriguing, and from your own country, too, Sister, were they not?’ he added.

‘Yes,’ she sighed, ‘and His Holiness dissolved their order, it is true – though some there remained in Russia, I believe. But St Ignatius
himself
, Mr Hervey: do you know anything of the man and his faith?’

Hervey admitted that he did not and shifted uncomfortably in the sedile. His leg was beginning to ache and, with apologies, he began loosening the bindings of his overalls, grateful for the opportunity of distraction.

Sister Maria kneeled on the bare stone floor, sitting back on her heels, oblivious to any sign of his discomfort other than his leg. ‘Like you, St Ignatius of Loyola was a soldier,’ she pressed, ‘the younger son of a Spanish nobleman. I think you, too, perhaps are such a son, Mr Hervey – of a nobleman I mean.’

‘No,’ smiled Hervey, ‘not a nobleman. My father is a clergyman, a minister of the Church of England.’

‘Then a gentleman certainly,’ she replied, reflecting his smile. ‘St Ignatius was from the Basque country: you must have passed close to Loyola when you crossed the Pyrenees, Mr Hervey?’ (But the name meant nothing to him.) ‘He was wounded during the
siege
of Pamplona in the war with France – about 1520, I think. He made a long convalescence and read much of the life of Christ and of the saints, and he determined to give his life wholly to God’s service. He gathered others about him, and they bound themselves by vow to become missionaries among the Mussulmen of the Holy Land. But when war barred their way to the east they offered their services instead to His Holiness.’

Hervey wondered where this could be leading, but thought better of trying to interrupt her homily.

‘It was then that they resolved upon founding a religious order, the Society of Jesus, with an additional vow of placing themselves entirely at His Holiness’s disposal. St Ignatius brought his soldier’s discipline to the order, you see, Mr Hervey.’

‘But I do
not
see, I am afraid, Sister. I do not understand your purpose. It is not unusual to find oneself, as a soldier, with wounds.’

She paused, and then startled him with her candour. ‘Do you pray, Mr Hervey?’

‘Yes, of course,’ he replied.

‘And do you meditate?’

He recoiled at the intrusion. But then, so disarming was her voice and manner, and so innocent her directness, that instead he found himself welcoming her solicitude. He knew full well that every officer maintained a pose – a mask – in which the worst effects of war were immured. But this pose, however habitual, was not maintained without effort, and with this nun
he
perceived the mask to be unnecessary: indeed, he felt in its slipping a glow, a warmth – a release even.

‘I
think
, Sister. About certain things I think much. But meditation would imply some system, would it not?’

‘Yes, and
The Spiritual Exercises
are just that.’

He could not but permit a smile at the adroitness with which she had brought the colloquy full circle. He was out-manoeuvred. It was now obvious to him how she had managed to survive both the reign of terror and the repression since! He freely confessed that the
Exercises
had engaged him, such as he had found the time to read – and, indeed, within the limits of his Latin, which was of late unpractised.

But she was no less ready for this self-deprecation. ‘St Ignatius, also, found he had insufficient Latin at first. He took to studying with the schoolboys of Barcelona, no less. If you wish, I will conduct you through the exercises.’