Company Of Spears

At the door of the residence Hervey found familiar faces: Jaswant, the khansamah, and several other of the Somerviles’ Indian servants – and black faces too, got up very smartly in reds and blues.

‘Good evening, Colonel Sahib!’

Hervey smiled and returned the greeting more fully than he needed to: a familiar and a friendly face so far from home was a welcome thing. And ‘Colonel Sahib’ sounded so fine! No matter that in all probability it was temporary, he was indeed ‘Colonel’. And in a colony of a single general, a colonel was of consequence.

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…