Hervey 08 - Company Of Spears

by Allan Mallinson

  He began wondering when he would actually meet General Bourke. Not that it mattered greatly in the ordinary course of things: he had carried out his reconnaissance of the frontier under the lieutenant-governor’s orders, and his commission with the Mounted Rifles came directly from the Horse Guards; but he would like nevertheless to make a proper beginning with the General Officer Commanding. ‘Am I the only guest this evening, Jaswant?’

  In deliberately well modulated Bengali, the khansamah replied, ‘Colonel Somerset-sahib will be dining, Colonel Sahib, but he will not arrive until later.’

  Hervey’s heart fell a good way.

  He followed Jaswant along a limed corridor, brilliantly lit, to where Somervile stood at the open French doors of a small reception room contemplating the last of the sun.

  ‘ “Now Phoebus sinketh in the west”!’

  Hervey raised his eyebrows. ‘Quite remarkable. I was observing only the same myself outside.’

  ‘ “And the slope sun his upward beam Shoots against the dusky pole.” I confess I’ve quite forgotten the rest.’

  ‘So have I.’

  Emma came into the room. Colonel Hervey!’

  Hervey greeted her with a smile and an embrace. ‘I had not thought your drawing rooms such formal affairs, Lady Somervile.’

  ‘We are ever at the lieutenant-governor’s command.’

  ‘Just so, madam.’

  Eyre Somervile remained at the window. ‘You know, I do think Phoebus shows a different face depending on where he is: quite a different appearance from India, quite different.’

  Emma looked at her guest.

  Hervey glanced at his host, who remained intent on the setting sun. ‘Indeed, I believe it so,’ he tried, determined that the sun should not regulate the conversation. ‘I have lately been in the eastern part of the colony. The country there is different in every degree from Madras and Bengal. It is savage, and yet at the same time not so … fierce. The sun, of course, has much to do with it. It warms the country rather than burns; though they say that in summer not greatly further inland it can be quite as desert-hot as Rajpootana.’

  Emma continued pointedly on the subject of the weather, or rather climate. ‘I confess I find it agreeable in the extreme, though I have been here but a short time.’ Then glancing at her husband, without response, she changed the subject very decidedly. ‘Now, Matthew, I bear a letter for you.’ She held out an envelope.

  He did not recognize the hand.

  ‘From your betrothed!’

  He looked embarrassed. ‘Oh, I…’

  ‘Eyre and I shall retire for a little while.’

  ‘That won’t be necessary,’ said Hervey hurriedly. ‘I mean, you should not have to retire in order to let me read.’

  Emma smiled. ‘I think a man ought to be allowed a little privacy in communicating with his sweetheart, even at such a remove.’

  Hervey coloured rather at ‘his sweetheart’. Of course Kezia Lankester was just that, but he had never quite thought those words.

  Before he could protest further, Emma removed herself and her husband from the room.

  Hervey took a few steps closer to a candelabrum and broke the seal (he noted it was not Lankester’s, and presumed it therefore to be her own). He had not expected a letter. He had written to her on arriving at Cape Town, and intended doing so again now he was returned, but she could not have received his letter before writing hers.

  Hertfordshire,

  17th June 1827

  My dear Colonel,

  I trust that this finds you in good health and happy circumstances, and I send you congratulations and warm good wishes on your promotion, as does my father, who asks me to thank you for your hospitality of the two days prior to your departure. He particularly wished me to express again his pleasure on meeting you, and at our betrothal. For my part I must say once more how delightful it was to meet both Miss Hervey and Georgiana…

  He read on. The polite expressions of pleasure and various causes for satisfaction continued, but in a cool and somewhat mechanical way, so that by the end he felt it might have been from Elizabeth herself on a matter of family business. But, he told himself, this was a first letter, their betrothal had been an unusual affair following so brief an acquaintance, and the time for expressions of endearment would follow. He did not mind the somewhat arch salutation (it was probably a relief to her, not having to initiate the intimacy of their correspondence) and after all, he had managed only ‘My dear Kezia’ and a few paragraphs hardly more amorous. It perhaps seemed strange in comparison with Kat’s last letter, received just as he was leaving for his ship, which was full of unselfconscious sentiments of affection. He shuddered at the import – what he thought was the import – and then put it from his mind as a mere demonic qualm.

  He folded the two sheets of vellum – he need not read them a second time for now – and replaced them in the envelope. Then he went to the window to distract himself with what remained of the sun’s glow ‘in the steep Atlantick stream’.

  Emma returned, alone. ‘Eyre has just received a despatch from General Bourke. He will join us shortly.’ She sat down.

  The khansamah entered.

  ‘Matthew, I’m so sorry: we evidently left you to your charming diversion without a drink in your hand.’

  Hervey looked at the khansamah. ‘Chota peg, Jaswant; mehrbani,’ he said without thinking. The Somerviles spoke a very proper form of Bengali, whereas his Urdu was merely serviceable. It was in truth the emergent vocabulary of the cantonments which, since Warren Hastings’s day, the British – and the wives who increasingly accompanied them – preferred to the real vernacular. It was a compromise, easy enough for the sahibs and memsahibs to acquire, and easy enough for the little armies of servants – native speakers of any number of the languages of the sub-continent – to understand. Much as Hervey despised the practice, it had not been long before he had succumbed, so common was it in the garrison of Calcutta. If only he had spoken to Vaneeta in Bengali, instead of in the English that she spoke so well…

  ‘Matthew?’

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘Jaswant asks if you prefer whiskey or brandy.’

  ‘Oh, I hadn’t … whiskey, thank you.’

  The khansamah bowed and left.

  ‘You were thinking…’

  Hervey sighed. ‘I was thinking – at that moment, at that precise moment – of Vaneeta.’

  ‘Is that a cause for sighing?’

  Hervey shook his head a little. ‘No, it should not be. I never asked you: did you see her before you left?’

  Before he himself had left, he had asked Emma to keep watch. He had settled a good income on Vaneeta: it was the very least he believed he could do (though a very good deal more than others did in like circumstances), but he had asked Emma to let him know at once if his former bibi fell into any sort of difficulty. Indeed, he had asked her to make whatever financial provision she felt necessary as soon as possible, and he would reimburse her at once. He had settled more than enough on Vaneeta for her to live in respectable comfort. Even though her standing in Calcutta would ever be that of bibi of a Feringhee, he had hated the idea that she might pass from one pair of military hands to another. The thought that she might even return to the haveli had reduced him almost to tears. He had at one stage – in a moment he now saw as beyond reason – thought to bring her back with him to England. And in a fit of distinct madness he had even contemplated marriage, remaining in Bengal, throwing in with the Company’s forces, perhaps even with Colonel Skinner’s regiment of irregular cavalry. Emma, who disdained the growing ‘respectability’ and aloofness of the new memsahibs, had received Vaneeta in her own drawing room, albeit discreetly for her visitor’s sake more than her own. She had liked Vaneeta, both for her wit, sensibility and charm, and for her evident restorative powers: Vaneeta had nursed Hervey back to health in every sense. Emma had never sought to persuade him of the unsuitability of marriage, or for that matter taking her to Eng
land as ayah to Georgiana. She had only wanted him to think in terms other than wholly of duty.

  ‘I did see her before I left, yes. She was very well.’

  ‘And…’

  ‘And what?’

  Jaswant came with his whiskey and soda water.

  Hervey took it, nodding his thanks. ‘She … she was happy?’

  Emma looked a trifle frustrated. ‘It was not so many months after you left that Eyre and I sailed.’

  Hervey looked anxious. ‘And so…’

  ‘Matthew, it is very hard for me if you will not finish your sentences!’

  ‘Was she appearing to … be recovered?’

  Their parting – Hervey and Vaneeta – had indeed been a painful one. He had loved her as much as he was able; she had loved him completely.

  Emma’s look of frustration only increased. ‘Matthew, I understand that you should be concerned for Vaneeta’s situation – but at this time? I made careful arrangements for her, with a very reliable party, as I explained in the letter I sent you, and for the rest … only time can do its work.’ Her brow furrowed. ‘Is there something in the letter that has prompted this – Kezia Lankester’s letter, I mean?’

  Hervey shook his head. ‘Nothing at all.’

  ‘Then in the circumstances I believe we should drop the matter.’

  Hervey nodded. ‘It’s just … there are times…’

  Emma leaned forward and placed a hand on his. ‘Of course there will be times, Matthew. You cannot help it. It does you credit, indeed. But to dwell on it is … imprudent. I dare say unseemly.’

  Somervile returned, with a glass in his hand. ‘Great Ganesh, but Bourke’s oldwomanly about that place!’

  Hervey and Emma looked at him, uncertain.

  ‘St Helena! He’s got a notion the French’ll seize it one day – make it a shrine or some such. Does it matter one iota if they do? How in the name of Shiva can it be worth the cost of placing one bombardier there? And why so urgent a dispatch, I can’t imagine.’

  Hervey shook his head and raised his eyebrows slightly.

  ‘In all else I’ve found him a most sensible fellow.’

  ‘I am very glad of it,’ said Hervey. ‘You think, therefore, he will approve of my own dispatch?’

  Somervile gestured with his glass. ‘Ah, your dispatch. Indeed – admirable, admirable. I have written this afternoon to Bathurst, in large measure your words, with a copy to the War Office – who, I trust, will send it to the Horse Guards. And I have written to the magistrates at Port Elizabeth and Graham’s-town commending their actions.’

  Hervey looked pleased. ‘And you will commend Fairbrother?’

  ‘I shall. But first I would meet him. I very much like the sound of him. Indeed, had it not been for Colonel Somerset I should have invited him this evening. But it would have been unfair on Somerset to interpose to all intents and purposes a stranger when there is colony business to be about.’

  Hervey would have preferred that Colonel Henry Somerset had not been invited at all. He had hoped for a reunion of friends; but then he reminded himself that Eyre Somervile, undoubted friend that he was, was now primarily his sovereign’s regent in the colony, to whom even General Bourke must answer in the first instance. There could probably be no occasion that was entirely – or even, he had to admit, and with regret, in any large measure – an affair of friends. He took comfort, however, in Fairbrother’s delightful assertion that where one gentleman was the subordinate of another, the superior would never mention it, and the inferior would never forget it.

  Emma tilted her head, resigned. Her drawing rooms, be they in Madras, Calcutta, London, and now here, had ever been conference halls, or else offices, and occasionally even headquarters. ‘May we not first have a little conversation, my dear? I would ask Colonel Hervey how was his visit to the frontier.’

  Somervile looked puzzled. ‘Did you not read the dispatch?’

  Emma lowered her head emphatically. ‘A very little. If you recall, I only had opportunity to take it up this afternoon, and your secretary at once had need of it.’

  ‘Mm.’

  ‘So, Matthew, after you left these wonderful-sounding clay pits, did you encounter the fearsome and magnificent Xhosa?’

  Hervey’s eyes widened. ‘I did, though I had no occasion to observe any magnificence. I must admit they very nearly worsted us in an ambuscade, and again the same day – in the middle of the night. They might have taken our camp had it not been for Mr Fairbrother.’

  Emma quickened. ‘Oh, I must have the particulars, Matthew!’

  Hervey knew full well that Emma would want the particulars. She had smelled more powder than many a man in England. He let the khansamah take his glass, accepted another, and began recounting the affair at the headwaters of the Gwalana.

  When he had come to the natural conclusion of the action, Emma, who had remained silent but very intent, shook her head. ‘I, too, am full of admiration for your Mr Fairbrother. Such resolution as well as skill!’ She turned to her husband. ‘Eyre, he must come to the castle as soon as may be.’

  Somervile, who had been listening almost as intently, though he knew the affair from the pages of the report, smiled and nodded, as if conceding to his wife a personal favour. Hervey was touched by the evident orientation of the lieutenant-governor’s heart. He said nothing, allowing Emma and her husband their intimacy.

  Emma turned back to him. ‘But Matthew, your corporal: again he dashed to your rescue – no, not rescue, defence. I—’

  Hervey inclined his head. ‘I should happily admit to “rescue”. Had there been more men in that bush Fairbrother might have been shot from his horse, as might I.’

  Emma shook her head. ‘I mean that yet again he was there with you. In Rangoon, and then again in Spain, and now here.’

  ‘That is his position: he is my covering corporal.’

  Her eyes widened with astonishment.

  Hervey smiled. ‘I sport with you, Emma. He is the most admirable of NCOs. I am, you may imagine, inordinately attached to him – not least because of the circumstances of his joining. I listed him from the Warminster sink, and I have to say that – God be praised – he is not the only man of his kind in the Sixth. Nevertheless he is singular in what he has been obliged to do these past five years. I have today made him serjeant.’

  Emma clapped her hands. ‘I am delighted for it! When shall I see him? For besides prodigious courage and a devotion to you, he has very agreeable manners. As does, too, your serjeant-major.’

  ‘The night affair, Hervey,’ Somervile interrupted. ‘The fleysome affair of the night!’

  Hervey looked suitably chastened. ‘Ah, yes, the night affair. I should say, Emma, that after the ambuscade we retired north towards one of the frontier posts, taking the wounded man with us, making camp a little before sunset. It was impossible to know if the Xhosa had followed, and just before midnight Mr Fairbrother, of his own, went out of the camp to discover what was the cause of some rustling noise, and found three of them poised to the attack. He killed two at once and came into the camp with a third.’

  Emma gripped her glass tight. ‘Was it very dark?’

  ‘The whole country’s very trappy, with a great deal of thorn, and it was as black as Hades. How Fairbrother found them, let alone did what he did, astonishes me still. But then, he called for one of the fires we had laid to be lit, so that he could show any Xhosa who were waiting to attack that we had a prisoner.’

  ‘But would that not encourage them to his rescue?’

  ‘I omitted to say he held a knife at the man’s neck, and called out to them in Xhosa that he would slit his throat’ (he paused and cleared his own slightly) ‘and cut off his manhood if they attacked. We managed to get away, first on foot and then at a gallop, all the time with the Xhosa captive bound and with a pistol at his head, until we came on a patrol from Fort Willshire.’

  Emma sat back in her chair. ‘Great heavens; I do not think I ever heard its like in all t
he time I was in India. This Mr Fairbrother: he sounds half savage!’

  ‘I told you of his lineage, my dear,’ explained her husband. ‘There’s the blood of the natives there somewhere.’

  Hervey took another sip of his whiskey. ‘I have a notion that a half-bred fellow with the education of an Englishman – which is what Fairbrother would answer to – might be the beau ideal of a cavalryman in this place.’

  ‘Well, I am all eager to make his acquaintance,’ said Emma, very decided. ‘And he is a poet too, you say?’

  Hervey raised his hands. ‘I confess he has read those I have never heard of.’

  ‘You never heard of Wordsworth?’ replied Emma, incredulous.

  ‘Of course he’s heard of Wordsworth,’ said Somervile helpfully. ‘Wordsworth the soldier of the Westmoreland Militia!’

  Hervey would not rise to the fly. ‘I said I had never read the poem he had composed about the warrior.’

  ‘Neither have I,’ said Emma, contented.

  ‘But you will like him very much. He is a little thin-skinned in respect of his origins, but that is easily overcome.’

  They passed a further quarter of an hour in pleasant conversation, though all of it with a purpose, until the khansamah announced Colonel Somerset.

  A man of middle height and patrician good looks, and several years Hervey’s junior, entered the drawing room and bowed.

  ‘Colonel, you are most welcome,’ exclaimed Somervile in exaggerated greeting, intending to roust the prickly scion of the Somersets from habitual ill humour.

  Hervey rose, as did Emma, who advanced on her guest with hand held out. ‘You are indeed, most welcome, Colonel.’

  Colonel Somerset, though evidently a little surprised, took her hand nevertheless. ‘Lady Somervile,’ he said, bowing, then again to his fellow guest: ‘Colonel Hervey.’

  ‘Have you travelled far today, Colonel?’ asked Emma, before Somerset could make any conversation of his own – or even her husband (she was determined to have just a few of the civilities of the presidencies observed in this, by comparison, unrefined outpost of the realm).